Hi everyone,

Are you looking at your beautiful patterned paper and wondering what to do with all that gloriousness? It seems such a waste to have so much and not show it off, right? Well, today I’m sharing an easy way to make beautiful backgrounds with patterned paper for your cards!

I’m using the GORGEOUS Mixed Media paper pack designed by Alex Syberia. This paper is so stunning! I also grabbed a die sentiment from Simon Says Stamps called Paper Hugs as well as the Printed Paper pads Sentiment Strips from Maker Forte.

The paper pads come sized 6×6, so the first step was to trim the patterned paper to A2 size. But, you could certainly make a 6×6 sized card, those are stunning as well and plenty of stores sell 6×6 envelopes!

TIP: Before trimming the paper down, look for a focal point on the paper and trim around that focal point. Take a look at the card below and see if you can find my focal point.

After trimming the paper, I adhered it to an A2 sized card base. Now I could focus on the sentiment!

I chose a large sentiment because the patterned paper background was abstract and could pull off a larger sentiment. As you can see in the photo above, I placed the sentiment so that you could still see the focal point.

I heat embossed two of my sentiments using WOW! Embossing Powder in Primary Lagoon and Diana’s Love. I chose these colors because those colors stood out on the patterned paper. The 3rd sentiment was die cut on Mirrored Black cardstock.

Once my Paper Hugs sentiment was adhered, I added the sentiment strips over the top of it. I love how they turned out! The sentiment strips come in 8 1/2 x 11 size, so you could prep plenty of them to match your backgrounds!

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and find inspiration to use your lovely patterned paper! I challenge you to make several backgrounds and sentiment strips, setting them aside for when you need that last minute card! To shop the products featured in this post, click on the product description. To reach my Instagram page, click here.