Funky Neverending Card with JoFY {by Martha Ponsanesi}

Hello everyone, Martha (@CrfatingMartha ) here with you today for a trip back in time! I am so excited to share an interactive 'never-ending' card, packed with warm colours, funky doodle layers, and a delightfully nostalgic palette.

The spectacular March release by Jo Firth-Young instantly stole my heart and inspired me to play with retro vibes using her new mini stamps and stencils. To bring this project to life, I also decided to dust off an older stamp set featuring those wonderfully bold, chunky flowers that scream 'flower power' to me.

To capture that authentic retro aesthetic, I curated a warm, earthy, and slightly dusty colour palette using PaperArtsy Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylics. I chose the Chocolate Pudding (FF42),  Cayenne (FF159),  Mustard Pickle (FF148), for a striking pop of contrast, I added Caribbean Sea (FF94) and Slimed (FF137). While the final color balance turned out slightly different from what I had originally envisioned, I absolutely love the result!
I used the three stencils from JOFY's latest release  PS512, PS513 and PS514 ( as usual, you can find the latest release products at the PaperArtsy stockist listed here ), to build my backgrounds, simply applying the paint with a dedicated sponge for each colour.

The beautiful vase stencil PS514 inspired me to create a layered pattern, overlapping the shapes in different shades to build depth.

By the end of this first stage, I had created a collection of vibrant, textured backgrounds ready to be cut down into panels.

As well as a background, I wanted to use the PS514 stencil to create a focal image too.

First, I stenciled a vase using a sponge and let it dry completely.
Next, I replaced the stencil exactly over the painted shape to act as a protective mask.
I then stamped some of the mini geometric patterns directly through the stencil opening. This ensured the stamped designs stayed perfectly inside the vase silhouette with crisp, clean borders.

I stamped some flowers from JOFY95 stamp set onto cardstock and heat-embossed the outlines with clear embossing powder.

Once embossed, I painted the petals using my Fresco Finish paints highly diluted with water, creating a beautiful, translucent water color effect.

Since I wanted to showcase some of the gorgeous new mini stamps, I knew a neverending card structure would be the perfect interactive choice.

You can find in the photo reminder of how to make the structure.

I cut out the squares and rectangles from my custom backgrounds to decorate each section of the card.

For these long side panels, I added some playful, abstract detail by randomly stamping the geometric curves from JM100.

I then fussy-cut the water coloured 'flower power' blossoms and layered them onto the central panels to create a striking focal point.

To prevent the busy backgrounds from becoming visually overwhelming, I made a conscious design choice for the other panels. While some images were stamped directly onto the stencilled papers, others were stamped on a separate sheet of cardstock, fussy-cut, and kept in crisp black and white. This created a perfect visual balance. For this part of the card I used JM97, JM102 and JM104.

Again, some images were stamped directly onto the background (with solid color this time, not through the stencil), with JM99 and JM102, while others were colored and cut out.

My absolute favourite spread is the one featuring the large Chocolate Pudding (FF42) vase. The pops of Caribbean Sea (FF94) dots on the vase, combined with the vibrant hand-painted flowers from JOFY123, feel so wonderfully retro.

And here is how the card unfolds, revealing its four different faces.

The defining feature of a neverending card is its continuous folding mechanism, which means you have to be incredibly mindful of the embellishments you apply. On two of the spreads, I made sure all my decorative elements stayed strictly within the square panels. 

However, on the other two spreads, I chose focal elements that crossed over the edges. To allow the card to fold seamlessly without catching, I had to carefully slice through these overhanging stamped elements exactly along the fold lines after gluing them down.

I still have a lovely pile of extra stencilled vases on my desk, just waiting to be filled with more funky flowers for some standard-sized cards. The possibilities really are endless!

Have fun!

Martha xxx

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2021 Topic 13: Tiny (News) Print with ZA {by Tracy Springer}

    2021 Topic 13: Tiny (News) Print

When we start with one idea, it often springboards to another one and Tracey began with the idea of a set of ATCs and ended up with.. well I won't spoil it! Check out her beautiful vintage typewriter and her clever idea for adding tiny text to painted stencilled panels.

Keren.

Hi everyone, Tracey Springer here with you today to share my version of Tiny ‘news’ Print. I knew right from the start that I wanted to do ATC’s with this topic so I rummaged (incredibly skilled at this, lol) through my stamps looking for what to use. I decided that there are a lot of little birds in these sets they may get overlooked for the bigger characters, so I challenged myself to use them. I picked out 2 sets of Elena’s stamps (Zinski Art) and 2 sets of Jo’s stamps (JOFY).

I already had quite a few off-cut gel-printed backgrounds that I could use up for these, but also had an idea to play with this little stencil and these really fresh Fresco colors. I have decided that I love to use my paints like I would inks, and they blend so beautifully!

I chose the cute little guy from JOFY15 to use on my first ATC. I coloured him with Copic markers and also a bit of the tree branch, leaves and little flowers. I die cut the clouds from an offcut background that had blues in it, and stamped a newsprint stamp on them. I used the ‘tweet tweet’ because I love really busy, collaged backgrounds. I stamped the newsprint stamp on the bird as well; I quite liked it, but was just too busy for the finished card – and that’s coming from me who loves crazy, over the top lol! I added a few flicks of pink ink and  I always finish with a double pen line around as a border and a thick surround of Gesso.

The next one I picked was one of the lovebirds from JOFY JM20, and I had an idea to stamp multiple of the same bird on the same colour background and then have one that stood out. I chose my fav Fresco colour Mustard Pickle (FF148) and sponged that on to a piece of book paper I had, and stamped multiple of the lovebird and cut them out. I coloured one quite boldly with my Copics and raised him up on foam tape (I once again tried stamping him with a newsprint stamp but changed my mind later on and covered him with a plain bird). I used my trusty typewriter (isn’t it gorgeous!) to type the wording, a pen border, some tied baker’s twine and gesso to finish.

 

 

The last 2 ATC’s were using the fabulous little birds from the Elena Zinski set’s ZA07 and ZA08. I had random strips of offcuts for the backgrounds, clouds, CUTE flowers, my go-to background script stamp of JOFY’s (JOFY89) and this very fitting quote stamp from Eclectica Emma Godfrey (EEG24) Everything got a heavy surround of Gesso to frame them.

And then….what are cute ATC’s if you don’t have anything to keep them in…I felt a little book coming on LOL!  A couple of pieces of craft board, another random little gelli print background, book page paper, this funky bird from Elena Zinski mini’s (ZN22) , an ATC stamp (MN21), typewriter quote and finally I had to use the ‘Handle with care’ stamp from the set by Eclectica Seth Apter (ESA19). I coated it all with Mod Podge which strengthens and protects the cover from wear and tear, and then added a whole pile of ribbons and tassels. I used the disc system to bind as it enables you to add and remove pages easily (I used cut down clear plastic sleeves to hold the cards).

 

This has been such a fun project to work on….I'm not sure if I met the topic entirely but the main thing is to have fun…zone out and de-stress! Thanks for coming on this journey with me! 

Tracey xx

Instagram: @tracey_springer