I was a bit disappointed to find out that Ranger doesn’t have any round labels for the older Distress colors. So I made some.

• You can download them here.

This is the card I’m creating in today’s video. It has this fun, wobbling effect, created with an action wobbler. I’ll give you tips for helping your mug wobble better in this video. I’m also using Tim Holtz Distress Watercolor Pencils to achieve a loose watercolor effect when coloring.

When I got the new Distress Watercolor Pencils, I took them all out of their boxes and rearranged them according to the order on the Ranger web site. In this video I’m swatching the first box, from Spun Sugar to Fired Brick.

I was going for a cyanotype effect and used Ranger Archival Ink in the color Cobalt. Archival ink on a firm linen ink pad is pretty easy to work with.

This blog post is based on the weeklong class called Extraordinary Embossing Folders at OnlineCardClasses.com.

I want this card to be shabby chic, so I’m using a lot of gesso. Over-simplified, gesso is thick, matte white paint. People who are into shabby chic often use gesso to unify the color scheme. It’s similar to how in a vintage card, you’d use brown to unify the color scheme.

There are some great deals on Tim Holtz dies and embossing folders in the Sizzix Spring Sale. Here are some that stood out to me.

When the decorative elements “look” at the sentiment, it signals that the sentiment is important. That’s why the direction critters face is an important consideration when designing a card. Their gaze directs the viewers gaze, so use it to your advantage.

The theme for the Instagram hop this Sunday was Butterfly or Bee and Symmetry. I took the chance to use the recent Flowering tree pop-up die set from Spellbinders. It creates a fantastic four-tiered card that folds flat into a regular A2 format. It’s a real stunner and not too hard to pull off.

I started by laying out the dies on inexpensive watercolor paper and marking out how much space each of them would need. Then I colored the marked areas with Distress Crayons.

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.