Fun Folds and Stamping along a Curve

I've spent a lot of time recently looking through my extensive hoard collection of books on bookbinding and artist books, and they're giving me so many ideas for accordion-fold cards. Today's card uses some free-hand craft knife skills to give a fun, slightly more organic shape to standard rectangles.

To make this, I started with a 9" x 6" piece of card stock and scored it at three and six inches.

Scoring Tip for Obsessive-Compulsive Stampers: When you score a line to fold card stock, the scored side (with the canal, not the bump) should be the outside of the fold...the mountain, not the valley. The scored canal keeps the paper fibers from cracking and looking unsightly as you bend and press the paper down. When making an accordion, you alternate mountains and valleys, so you need to flip the card stock as you score if you are a purist and want perfectly clean folds. Since I'm using a heavy white card stock, I scored one side of the accordion at 3" and then flipped the card stock over and scored at 6". The folds are lovely and clean!

I then cut the cascade using a craft knife, starting at the back fold about 1/4-1/3 the way down, and added curves as I cut down to roughly the bottom 1/3 line. Once the curve was cut, I put a quilt ruler on the back fold and cut a straight line to the top and removed the extra card stock.

The sentiment comes from a very old set from October Afternoon called Love Notes. The stamp is very bendy, so I was able to reposition it easily to match the curved edge for each impression. I cleaned the stamp between each impression so I did not get ink on my fingers and smudge the card).

Note that the two red sentiments and the hearts form a visual triangle, and the three hearts, of course, form their own triangle.

Side view of inside of card

Side view of "outside" of card

It will be fun to write on this card...nooks and crannies! I plan on giving it to my husband, sneaking it into his lunch box one day this week.

Supplies
stamps: October Afternoon (sentiment, Love Notes), Papertrey Ink (hearts, Love Birds)
ink: Memento
paper: Papertrey Ink
accessories: ScorPal, craft knife, quilt ruler, corner rounder