Creative Greeting Cards

Rating:
Summary: A book with a lot of great ideas!
Review: After seeing Sandi Genovese on a tv show and seeing the card she made on the show, I was very interested in getting her book, Creative Greeting Cards. The book has many, many wonderful ideas for making greeting cards. If you're bored with the standard folded card, you might want to give this book a try. She shows you how to do photo, window, diorama, and tie-it cards just to name a few. Her use of incorporating die cuts, stickers and paper are really creative and can help get your imagination going again.

The book is nicely illustrated with color pages and photos. The only small downside (which is why I voted 4 instead of 5 stars) is that the templates that she uses for all the cards in the book are provided in the back of the book, and she tells you how much percentage you should enlarge the template or pattern to make the card. I would have liked to have known how large the card or pattern was suppose to be (ex. "use a 8 1/2 x 11 piece of paper), instead of being provided with the percent to increase the image. But I "winged" it and guessed at the size of the cards that she made and my cards turned out just fine. It took a couple of practice tries, but once you figure it out, you're amazed you created a really cool card.

Rating:
Summary: A book with a lot of great ideas!
Review: After seeing Sandi Genovese on a tv show and seeing the card she made on the show, I was very interested in getting her book, Creative Greeting Cards. The book has many, many wonderful ideas for making greeting cards. If you're bored with the standard folded card, you might want to give this book a try. She shows you how to do photo, window, diorama, and tie-it cards just to name a few. Her use of incorporating die cuts, stickers and paper are really creative and can help get your imagination going again.

The book is nicely illustrated with color pages and photos. The only small downside (which is why I voted 4 instead of 5 stars) is that the templates that she uses for all the cards in the book are provided in the back of the book, and she tells you how much percentage you should enlarge the template or pattern to make the card. I would have liked to have known how large the card or pattern was suppose to be (ex. "use a 8 1/2 x 11 piece of paper), instead of being provided with the percent to increase the image. But I "winged" it and guessed at the size of the cards that she made and my cards turned out just fine. It took a couple of practice tries, but once you figure it out, you're amazed you created a really cool card.

Rating:
Summary: Pretty Patterns
Review: Creative Greeting Cards is a very apt title for this wonderful collection of ideas and inspiration for making cards. The book includes ideas and patterns for making accordian cards, pocket cards, pop-up cards, photo cards, window cards, vellum cards, envelope cards, spiral mobile cards, diorama cards, faux-embossed cards and several other card types. While the card examples are based on using die-cuts, patterns are included in the book so you are able to cut the shapes (albeit with scissors) needed to create each card. But you needn't limit your thinking to die-cuts as it is quite easy to apply rubberstamped or punched images and other techniques to the ideas here. Also the card examples in the book present really nifty ideas and ways to use color and pattern combinations and patterns to make bright, eye-popping designs.

Rating:
Summary: Pretty Patterns
Review: I love to make cards and was excited to add this book to my collection of idea-inspiring tomes. The cards in this book are bright and pretty. The author has creative ideas for many specific holidays and events. The cards are very pattern oriented rather than technique oriented. The author has published a lot of work on scrapbooking, and there is a fair amount of emphasis on having particular colors of cardstock and on using the patterns in the back of the book. She does give many ideas for types of cards (pop-up, accordion, ribbon tied, etc.) I like the book, but to get a card that looks just like hers seems like it would often take a fairly long time investment unless you had some pretty specialized tools. It does offer some great inspirations and the photography is very nice.

Rating:
Summary: Unique ideas without a lot of fuss!
Review: The bright, clever designs in this book really make a statement without a lot of fuss. Although some of the designs look complicated, they can be scaled back and still make an impact. I especially liked the spiral mobile greeting card. I made a thank you note with this technique. It only took about half an hour and it really was appreciated. Although Ellison makes the die cuts shown in the book (especially the letters), similar products are available anywhere scrapbook or teacher's supplies are sold. They are a big time saver, but you can always grab the Exacto knife and cut your own! Two thumbs way up for this book!