Beginner Card Making Guide: Everything You Need to Get Started

Beginner Card Making Guide

Card making is a fun and creative hobby that allows you to create personalized cards for birthdays, holidays, thank-you notes, sympathy cards, and more. Whether you're making your very first card or looking to build your crafting supplies, this beginner's guide will help you understand the essential materials and tools needed to get started.

Why Card Making is a Great Hobby

Handmade cards offer a personal touch that store-bought cards simply can't match. Card making is:

  • Relaxing and creative
  • Easy to learn at any skill level
  • A wonderful way to celebrate special occasions
  • Perfect for creating custom gifts
  • A great way to use your artistic side

The best part? You can start with just a few basic supplies and expand your collection over time.

Essential Supplies for Card Making

Cardstock

Cardstock is the foundation of pretty much every handmade or homemade card project. For beginners, you will want the following to get started:

White Cardstock - great for stamping and coloring - be sure to order the type that best fits the coloring medium you will be working with. For example, Hammermill is a great brand for Copic coloring. If you enjoy watercoloring, you will want a specialty watercolor paper. 

Multi Pack of Colored Cardstock - great for card bases or to create layers, for bases be sure it is about 100lb or higher to give a sturdy structure.

Heavyweight Cardstock in black, white, or a multi pack of neutral tones - 110lb is ideal for card bases.

Popular Card Sizes Include:
A2 - finished dimensions 4.25" x 5.5"
Slimline - finished dimensions 3.5" x 8.5"
Mini Slimline - finished dimensions - 3" x 6"
Square - finished dimensions - 5" x 5"

Check out our downloadable card size guide. It's a great reference to have handy in your craft room. 

Patterned Paper

Patterned paper adds color, texture, and interest without requiring advanced techniques.

Look for:

Patterned paper is one of the easiest ways to create beautiful cards quickly. Just pair them with coordinating cardstock colors for the perfect start or even as a focal point.

Stamps

Stamps allow you to add images, sentiments, and background designs to your projects. You can purchase clear stamps or rubber stamps. Clear stamps are popular for a number of reasons, but the biggest would be because you are able to see exactly where you are stamping. Clear stamps are also easy to store and come in a variety of designs and styles. 

Rubber stamps often provide the most crisp and clear impressions. They allow for highly detailed designs and larger images. Many large background designs can be found as rubber stamps. Our rubber stamp collection come as cling mounted and can be used with an acrylic block just like clear stamps. This also makes them easier to store than wood mounted rubber stamps. 

Acrylic Blocks or Stamp Positioning Tools

To use most stamps you will need either a selection of various sizes of acrylic blocks or a stamp positioning tool such as a Misti. The stamp positioning tools are becoming more and more popular because they help achieve perfect placement, multiple impressions, and better results with smaller sentiment stamps.

Ink Pads

Ink pads are a must have and there are many different types and styles widely available. Definitely start by getting a high quality black ink that allows for different coloring mediums. Then you will want some dye inks which are great for general stamping and ink blending. Pigment Inks help achieve bold impressions and are great for embossing techniques. You don't need a full collection, just grab colors that fit your style and build your collection from there. 

Craft Dies

Metal craft dies are used with die cutting machines to cut shapes from paper and cardstock. Some great beginner dies would include basic shapes like circles or rectangles, frames and borders, scene building sets, words or alphabets, and dies that coordinate with stamp sets. 

Dies help to add dimension and beautiful details to handmade cards. If you plan to work with dies, you will need a die cutting machine. There are many on the market from basic hand crank style to the more advanced automatic cutting machines. Do some research and purchase a quality machine that fits your lifestyle best. A die cutting machine will be one of your most used tools when card making. 

Adhesives

Purchase good quality adhesives which will be essential for constructing your cards. You will want tape runners, liquid glue, and foam tapes and dots.

Coloring Mediums

Choose a color medium you feel will work well for your needs and style. You don't need to have them all to get started. There are alcohol markers that come in vibrant colors and are great for blending. Colored pencils can be budget friendly, easy to use, and great for beginners. Watercolors offer a softer artist effect and are great for creating backgrounds and coloring images. Pick one you will enjoy working with most. Then you can follow tutorials and take classes to improve your skills.

Paper Trimmer

Every card maker needs a good paper trimmer for cutting down cardstock to fit your card bases and layers. They come in different sizes and cutting styles. Many crafters use guillotine style or rotary trimmers. You can find a large selection on the market to fit different projects, but to get started you just need a basic trimmer.

Helpful Tools

These tools are required but do help make things easier when crafting. 

Scissors, bone folder, craft mat or sticky mat, tweezers, ruler, detail scissor for fussy cutting, poke and picker tool, and blending brushes for working with inks.