The theme for the second Instagram spring hop was a single layer spring card. I chose Tim Holtz Hipster Bunny stamp as the focal point.

Tim Holtz has a lot of wonderful stamps but most of them don’t have a matching die. That’s because his stamps are manufactured by Stampers Anonymous, a company that does only stamps and stencils. Tim Holtz does design dies as well, but those are manufactured by Sizzix. Apparently getting the two companies to work together was very hard, so Tim has stopped trying. Flutter and Ticket Booth are the only Tim Holtz stamp and die combos still in production today.

Sizzix dies are every bit as good quality as Spellbinders, but, apart from Tim Holtz dies, I don’t often find designs I like in their catalog. My first die cutting machine was from Sizzix, but my experience with it was not as positive as with the Spellbinders Platinum 6 that I use now. YMMV

To return to the card, I started out by blending Pinkfresh inks in various pastel colors onto the background, using blending brushes. Then I stamped and heat embossed the adorkable bunny and the sentiment with silver embossing powder. To differentiate between the bunny and its accessories - glasses and bow tie, I stamped them using Ranger’s Archival ink in the color Watering Can. It’s from Wendy Vecchi’s line of inks.

At this point I really wanted to add dimension to the card. But it was supposed to be a single layer card. So instead of adding dimension, I added texture. For that I used a die to emboss a frame. I chose the larger of Pinkfresh Studio’s Art Deco frames. You can use any die to emboss cardstock if you have an embossing mat. Embossing mats are thick silicone mats. Some die cutting machines come with the mat. Embossing mats all the same, so you don’t need a specific brand unless you care about the color.

I think the embossing makes the card look a lot more finished. What do you think?