Shaking It Up With Sequins and Tulle

As Natasha of The Artisan Life points out in The Joy of Snail Mail & Decorated Envelopes DIYS, there’s something special about receiving snail mail.

It was with this thought in mind, and the prospect of Mother’s Day around the corner, that I decided to make a card for my mother-in-law. She loves flowers, so I knew that whatever I created, it would incorporate one. I also wanted to experiment with a new technique, so I turned to my favorite card crafter, Jennifer McGuire. This past week she released a video tutorial, Tulle Shaker Cards, about how to create shaker cards using tulle.

Your usual shaker card sandwiches sequins and beads between two layers of acetate, but Jennifer suggested using tulle instead. Tulle can be purchased economically in the bridal section of a fabric store; I purchased a yard for $1.49 that will be good for dozens of cards. You can also go to Michael’s bridal section and purchase a six-inch-wide roll of tulle for $2.99; the roll holds 20 yards. Tulle allows a card to lie flat, making it easy and lightweight to send in the mail.

Here are the supplies I gathered to begin my project:

• Buttercup yellow card stock for the 4-1/4 x 5-1/2 inch note card
• White card stock for the 4 x 5-inch card front
• Memory Box Pinpoint Scalloped Circles die set to cut windows into the note card and card front
• An assortment of sequins from Michael’s in gold, bronze, lime green, kelly green and white
• Altenew Spring Daisy stamp set for a stamped flower embellishment
• Tim Holtz Distress Inks in Fossilized Amber, Scattered Straw, Ground Expresso, Forest Moss and Peeled Paint for coloring in the daisy-and-leaf stamped images
• Tsukineko Clear Embossing Ink Stamp Pad and Stampendous White Embossing Powder for stamping and embossing the daisy-and-leaf images
• Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist to blend the Distress Inks and add a sheen to the daisy-and-leaf images
• Bridal tulle
• Scor-tape
• Happy Happy Happy stamp set by Lawn Fawn

I began my project by cutting my card stock to size, cutting scalloped circle windows into the note card and card front.

Using Scor-tape, I applied double-sided adhesive around the circle openings, and overlaid that with a square of tulle. Then I dropped my sequins into the center of the tulle, and used Scor-tape once more to adhere the front of the note card to the note card itself.

Next, I stamped the daisy-and-leaf images with clear embossing ink, dusted the ink with white embossing powder, and then heat-set it. Using sponge daubers, I colored in the images with Tim Holtz Distress inks.

I sprayed the images generously with Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist to produce a pearlized sheen. As Jennifer McGuire points out, you can create your own glimmer mist with Perfect Pearls powder and water, but I used what I already had on hand. I was in a hurry, so I dried the wet, not-so-attractive concoction with a heat gun.

Once the paper was dry, the flowers and leaves looked a lot better. I did not have dies for cutting out the images, so I fussy cut them with scissors. The trick to fussy cutting is not to turn the scissors, but to turn the paper as you cut. I used Scor-tape to adhere the flower to the front of the card.

The last thing I did was stamp “Happy Mother’s Day” on the inside of the card. Initially I was going to emboss these words in black ink, but I changed my mind and used clear embossing ink instead. When you heat-set clear embossing ink, it gives you a tone-on-tone look.

Crafting a card like this takes only an afternoon, and you can probably make more than one if you organize your work assembly-style. Working with tulle was easy and fun; I suspect I’ll use this technique again. Thank you, Jennifer McGuire, for your crafting inspiration!

© 2017 Judy Nolan. All rights reserved.