Step It Down!

Have you ever turned to the Stampin’ Up! catalogue for inspiration only to see that you don’t have all the things you need to make the project you selected?
For example, maybe you love one of the projects, but you don’t have a Cut & Emboss Machine yet. First of all, put it on your wish list because they are awesome, but you can also “step down” your card to use what you have and still make a great card.

At a recent Connie’s Craft Along we did just that. Here are the pieces we started with.

Here is a lovely card that you will find on page 40 in the Annual Catalogue. To create the card as it is shown, you would need the Wildflower Designs Bundle, a Stampin’ Cut & Emboss machine and a Heat Tool to emboss the sentiment.

We used this card to inspire a stepped-down version using the Heartfelt Hexagon punch to create a similar look. Tone on tone stamping added texture to the background without an embossing folder. The sentiment is stamped on Basic White cardstock using Early Espresso ink, and that is mounted on a strip of Early Espresso cardstock, so no heat embossing was required.

The card has a similar look, but is stepped down from the original, and uses fewer tools.

Of course when you get your Cut & Emboss machine you will want to emboss all your cardstock to watch the magic transformation of plain cardstock to a beautiful textured piece.

For the second card I embossed the background with the Dashing Designs 3D Embossing Folder. Don’t you love the look of the extra texture?

I used the gorgeous Perennial Lavender Designer Series Paper for this card, and changed up the frame around the patterned paper. There are lots of creative ways you could put the pieces together to create lots of different cards. This is just the inspiration to get started.