Interactive Birthday Frogs *Video*

Hi and welcome back. I'm really excited to share a new inexpensive, interactive die that I've just added to my collection.  It's the Lawn Fawn Swish 'N Pop Pull Tab die and I love how it adds such a fun interactive element to cards. Paired up with all the cute stamps from Gerda Steiner Designs, I see a lot of fun cards in my future 😁 !   I've made a frog themed card for today and here's a look at it.

You can see that when you pull the tab, the frog with the confetti leaps up from behind the frog on the lily pad.  How much fun is that!! Plus, it's really easy to make.  

I've made a video for you on how to create this card, so if you would like more details, PLEASE CLICK HERE.  There's also a second card that I share in the video, again made with Gerda Steiner Designs stamps, so check it out.  

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you're having a great day!

Masculine Valentines Day Card with Video

Hello, and welcome back. I’ve got a Valentines Day card today that I think is a masculine one.  Every year I get excited about making some pretty pink and red Valentines cards with hearts and flowers, but come Valentines Day, none of these seem appropriate for my husband! So I tried hard not to get out the pink and reds for this one, except for a wee pop of pink on the inside. 

If you would like to see a video of how I made this card, PLEASE CLICK HERE.

I used the cutest frogs I could find, which were the “Frogs” stamp set from Gerda Steiner Designs and used copic markers to colour them in (YG11, YG03, YG17 and G20. For the spots, G94, YG67).  I had a background already made on my gel press so I used that for the background. I just ran it through a geometric 3D embossing folder from We R Memory Keepers after I had stamped on the sentiment which is from the Frogs stamp set. There is actually much more dimension on this card than the above image shows. The white frame is the Wood Frame from Hero Arts and once I had that attached, I adhered the card front to the base. 

For the heart, I dabbed the wet edges in some Distress Oxide ink in Tumbled Glass, Old Paper and Evergreen Bough. On the back, I spritzed the center with water and then carefully tore a hole in the heart. From the front, I kept pulling back the edges until I had a big enough hole for the frog to come out of. I was hoping to make it look like the frog was bursting out of the heart. After attaching the frog and his hands, I mounted the heart on foam adhesive and attached it to the front. Finally, I added some alcohol ink acetate hearts to make it look like the hearts were falling out of the bigger heart. 

On the inside, I used some packaging acetate to cut a 1/2 - 3/4” wide strip for the frog to be mounted on, and used another small piece to attach some hearts above the fogs’ head. I attached all of the acetate with double sided tape and then glued a second diecut behind the frog to sandwich in the acetate. 

For the border, I used two pieces of cardstock, each with a scoreline I made at 1/4” from the bottom, and die cut a cattails border. The back piece needs to be a reverse image, so I diecut this with the wrong side of the cardstock facing up. This border can be anything you want - I think grass, hills or even a heart border would be fun. When I had the border cut, I turned the flaps to the back and creased them with a bone folder. I placed 1/8” double sided tape along the flap. Next, I adhered the leaping frog to the back border piece, glueing it where it touched the grass, and using double sided tape at the bottom. Then I glued the front border to the back border by only glueing together the top third to half of the borders. You need to leave the bottom unattached so it will form the pop up. I stamped my inside sentiment next. Finally, I opened the flaps of both borders so they were straight, removed the backing from the adhesive on the back border, and lined it up so the edge ran along the inside crease on the top half of the card. After pressing it down, I removed the backing on the adhesive on the front border, closed the card and pressed down to make sure it was adhered. 

These inside pop up cards are really easy to do and they add so much fun to the inside of a card. I love that extra little surprise the recipient gets when they open the card. Thanks for joining me for this card and I hope you’re having a great day!

Leaping Frog Masculine Birthday Card

Hello again and welcome!  I’ve got a card today that I actually made a while ago, but have since made a video for it, and wanted to share it with you.  I think of this card as being appropriate for a masculine card, so I’m going with that!  It features the adorable frogs from the “Frogs” stamp set from Gerda Steiner Designs  and I added a few images from the “Lucky Duck” stamp set as well.

If  you would like to see a video of how I made this card, I have it posted on my YouTube channel  and you can CLICK HERE to view it.


After copic colouring my images and cutting them out, I added glossy accents to all the frogs eyes and set them aside to dry. To create a shiny green cardstock for the happy birthday circles on the front, I combined some Nuvo glacier paste in Pineapple Delight and Sea Sprite to make a bright green, and spread that out on cardstock in a circle pattern. When it was dry, I used the Simon Says Stamp “Birthday Circle” die to cut it out. I also used this die to cut some circles from black cardstock. I stacked about 3 circles from white cardstock and added a final layer in the green for my center circle, then glued this in the center of my front panel. I glued down portions of circles around this in a mix of the black and green die cuts. I cut the hands from the front frog, trimmed his chest to fit in the circle, and then glued his hands down onto the center ring. Finally, I added dots with some of the copic markers I had used for the images, and added glossy accents to the dots.

For the inside of the card, I watercoloured a small piece of watercolour paper in a mix of blues and greens to make my pond. I used Distress Oxide Faded Jeans to stencil over the water with a stencil from The Crafters Workshop called Mini Sea Bubbles. I freestyle cut this piece to resemble a pond.

I die cut two grassy borders for the triangle pop up. You could use any straight grassy border in your supplies or even make your own border by cutting grass into 2 pieces of cardstock temporarily adhered together. I used a die from Paper Roses called Cattails and Grass border die. I then used brown copic markers to colour the cattails and Distress Oxide in Mowed Lawn for the grasses. I coloured both grassy borders, but for the one in back, remember that you actually colour the wrong side of the die cut. I creased both of these grassy die cuts at 1/4” from the straight edge, creased the folds and added double sided adhesive to the folds.

Next, I adhered the right leg of the leaping frog to a piece of scrap acetate with double sided tape and adhered him to the front grassy border. Then I attached all my other images with glue, being careful not to get excess glue on the grassy areas.

I glued down my “pond” by positioning it 1/4” from the inside crease of my card. Now I could see where to stamp my inside sentiment and this is best done before adding the triangle pop up. I used a sentiment from MFT’S Yay for You set.

I glued together just the top portions of the grassy borders, to just about a quarter to a third of the way down. You need to leave the bottom of these borders unglued so they can form the triangle pop up. Then I removed the backing paper from the back grassy border, and lined it up along the crease on the inside of my card and pressed it down. Finally, I removed the backing paper on the front grassy border and folded my card base up and over the grassy borders and pressed it down. And that was the card done!

This is such a fun card to receive because the inside is so unexpected, and those frogs definitely make it a masculine card - always a bonus!!  I really hope you’ll give this one a try. Hope you have a great day!

Frogs on a Birthday card

Hello again, I’m sorry I haven’t posted in such a loooong time!  I found that with this pandemic we’ve all been going through, I just lost my attention span and all my creative mojo. I’m not normally an anxious person, but I just found myself worrying about what was going to happen, and about family and friends scattered around the world. I know I’m not alone in that but I want to apologize for not posting before this.

Anyway, I have some new stamp sets to jump start my mojo and the first one I want to share is this fun set from Gerda Steiner Designs called “Frogs”. I especially love the leaping frog on the inside of this card. So many possibilities for him to leap out of cards!

I started by colouring in my images with copic markers.  I also coloured in the bullrushes, dragonfly and lotus flower from the “Lucky Ducks” stamp set to help round out my background scene.  I’ve listed below, the markers I used. I used glossy accents to fill in the frogs’ eyes and give them a shiny look. I also added some sparkle to the dragonfly with a Gelly Roll sparkle pen.

Next, I watercoloured a quick background for the inside of my frame on some watercolour cardstock. I wanted it to look like my frogs were in a pond so I added in a few grassy strokes on the green background.

I stamped the “Hi There” sentiment on the front in Distress Oxide Faded Jeans and heat embossed it with clear embossing powder. I die cut 4 or 5 frames using a set from Power Poppy called Double Stitched Square Frame. I also cut out my watercolour background using the frame so it would fit inside. I adhered my frame and images to the card front. I wanted to make the foreground frog look like he was trying to climb out of the frame so I fussy cut his “hands” off and then glued them to the frame bottom edge. I had to trim just a little off his body to make him fit against the frame inside edge.

On the inside, I used an older die from Stampendous to die cut a pop up frame for the leaping frog.  I also cut a small oval and coloured it in with copic markers to make it look like a lily pad. I created the sentiment from the “Moose Love” stamp set from Gerda Steiner Designs, and heat set it with clear embossing powder. I adhered the frog and lily pad to the pop up and finally added a lotus flower.
I think this is a unisex birthday card and love how the frogs add some fun, humour and dimension to the card.

Hope you’re having a great day!

Copic markers used
Frogs - YG11, YG03, YG17, spots G94, YG17
Lily pad - G99, G94, G82
Lotus flower - RV04, RV02, RV00
Bullrushes - E57, E59, YG17