I have been a huge fan of Stacey Yacula's artwork for a long time. The first set of rubber stamps I bought when I started card making were images of her adorable owls and bunnies. So the fact that she is now designing stamps for My Favorite Things makes me oh so happy! The images in the new Joyful Heart Bears stamp set are adorable, and I love how they can be used for both Valentine and non-Valentine cards.
One feature of Stacey's artwork that I've always admired is her use of soft colors. Since I usually veer towards the bright and colorful, I decided to try my hand at a softer, more neutral palette for these bears. I chose to color them with my Faber Castell Polychromos colored pencils to achieve a softer look. I am far from an expert in using colored pencils, so I simply colored them in layers until I had built up color to achieve the look I was going for, adding in some flicks here and there so make the bears look fuzzy. I had so much fun coloring my first bear that I colored another and decided to make two simple notecards. I cut the panels out with my A2 Stitched Rectangle dies and added some hand stitching around the edges.
One of my favorite aspects of card making is the ability to add in special details that let the recipient know that they are receiving a handmade card, so I decided to add some texture to the balloons. For my pink card, I cut a balloon out of pink wool felt and added some hand beading with little flower sequins. For the blue card, I cut a heart out of cardstock and glued some 3 mm sequins to make a subtly sparkly little balloon. I also decided to add some little butterflies from the same Joyful Hearts set, cut them out with the coordinating dies, and pop them up with foam tape for some extra dimension.
To finish the cards, I layered my panels on top of some fun foam and mounted them to my card bases. I just love the sweet simplicity of these little cards!
I hope you enjoyed these cards! Links to the products I used are below. I participate in the My Favorite Things affiliate program, which means that I receive a small commission when products are purchased through the links I share at no additional cost to you. Thank you so much for your support, and I'll be back soon with another project featuring more products from this awesome release!
These cards are stunning. Glad you stepped out of your bright comfi zone as these look fabulous in the softer colours. Great personalisation with those gorgeous balloons. Thank you so much for sharing these.
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