Showing posts with label edgelits. Show all posts
Showing posts with label edgelits. Show all posts

Thursday, August 24, 2017

Rescued Best Wishes

Carla's Ways to Use Challenge on SCS today was for us to "rescue" cards we had in our stash that we weren't quite happy with and wanted to improve. This challenge is right up my alley, because as a hoarder I rarely throw stuff away, even the things I'm really not very happy with. I don't do this often enough, but on occasion I do dip into this "runt" pile and do my best to "rescue" one or two. It was an absolute pleasure to do so today for this challenge.

There were many rescue contenders in my runt pile, but my time was limited so I tackled on of the easiest ones. A little more than nine years ago (Wow - I can't believe so much time has passed) I was making single layer cards for an SU convention swap that used the masking and faux tearing techniques. You can find the card and the tutorial in this post.

The card was a bit complicated, so it's not surprising that not every single one of my efforts was successful. However, none of them were so bad that they deserved to get tossed, so I kept them all in my runt pile, including the one pictured here which, in all fairness, was nearly perfect. The frame image was not perfectly centered in the white space, but I could have lived with that flaw. What made me toss this card into the runt pile was the slight smidge of elegant eggplant to the left of the stamped frame. It's a small flaw, but I thought my swap recipients deserved better. And with today's additions, this scrap card turned into quite a usable one.

First I stamped the three cake image from the Fun and Fast Notes set in elegant eggplant ink on a square of glossy white card stock. I then colored portions of the image with markers from the wisteria wonder, old olive, and smoky slate blendabilities assortments. I attached the image to a larger square of elegant eggplant card stock with dimensionals. I die cut a strip of certainly celery card stock with the large scallop edgelit and then embossed it with the lace embossing folder from the Elegant Designs textured impressions set. I arranged the elegant eggplant and certainly celery elements on top of my "runt" card base and attached them with snail so that the lace overlapped the edge of the elegant eggplant square and also covered up the elegant eggplant smudge to the left of the sentiment. As a final touch I added three of the smallest pearls from the basic pearl jewels assortment to the center flowers on each cake and attached the next largest size of pearls in the semicircles of the embossed lace.

I think this was a rather successful rescue. I may like it even better than the last "rescue" I performed on a similar card base this spring. That particular "runt" was in worse shape and required more work to cover up its sins, but the final result was also pretty and elegant. .

Huge thanks to Carla for the great challenge. I have a feeling I will be dipping into my "runt" card pile again soon to perform some more rescues.

Recipe:

Paper: Glossy White, certainly celery, elegant eggplant
Ink: Elegant Eggplant, wisteria wonder, old olive, and smoky slate blendabilities assortments, and also certainly celery and lovely lilac on original card
Stamps: Fun and Fast Notes and also Floral, Sincere Salutations, and Frames with a Flourish on original card
Accessories: large scallop edgelit, Elegant Designs textured impressions embossing folders, Basic Pearl Jewels and also post-it notes, brayer, and Stamp-a-ma-jig on original card

Friday, July 21, 2017

Country Birthday

Today I made another scored gingham card, but this matches more closely the original concept I had in my head. The QKR stampede crew didn't spell out exactly what the twist is for their "anything goes with a twist" challenge this week (or if they did the invisible ink doesn't show up on my computer screen), but based on the title (#253 Up, Up and Away) and the designer team's awesome samples I'm going to guess it has something to do with things that can fly? If so, I think my rooster may qualify, but even if not, the card will fit the "anything goes" part of the challenge. Click on the link to check out the challenge and submit your own card. It's fun!

On the black layer, I first scored the two parallel scallop lines using the border plate for my Stampin' Up! scorer. These scallops happen to match the large scallop edgelit from Stampin' Up!, so I used that next to give me the perfect edge. I then stamped the sunflowers from the Serene Sunflower set in versamark ink and colored them by tapping with sponge daubers coated with stampin' pastels, also known as the chalkboard pastels technique.

The gingham layer was created with the gingham wheel in ruby red ink on very vanilla card stock. Just as an aside, yesterday I rediscovered my wheels. These are the only stamps left in my stamp room that I haven't indexed and I apparently forgot how many and which wheels I had. I will index them this weekend and then I anticipate I will use them much more often.

The kraft card base came from the Neutral Smooth A2 cards and envelopes assortment from Darice. I stamped it in versamark ink with a stamp from the Itty Bitty Backgrounds set.

The image and sentiment were stamped on watercolor paper in black stayzon ink and then colored with watercolor wonder crayons and an aquapainter. I tore the edges of both and mounted both on pieces of Floral Garden Burlap Ribbon by Greenbrier International.

I really like the rustic country look and feel of this card and I think the recipient will appreciate it as well.

Recipe:

Paper: kraft card base from Neutral Smooth A2 cards and envelopes assortment by Darice, basic black, very vanilla, watercolor paper
Ink: black stayzon, versamark
Stamps: Itty Bitty Backgrounds, Serene Sunflower, Country Morning, Occasional Quotes, Gingham wheel
Accessories: Watercolor Wonder Crayons from Earth Elements, Rich Regals and Neutral Assortments, Stampin' Pastels, Aquapainter, sponge daubers, Floral Garden Burlap Ribbon by Greenbrier International, Border Scoring Plate and Stampin' Up! Scorer