Inspiration: Simon Says Stamp Monday (Embossing Folder)
I purchased the Christmastime dies from Tim Holtz when they came out last year and even though I pulled them out quite a few times, I never managed to put something together that made it on a project using the dies. Last weekend, after watching Tim's Valentine Live, I got inspired to pull out my craft supplies and simply play with supplies and testing some of the techniques he was showing, with no specific plan for a particular project in mind.
The first thing I tried was pulling out my metallic kraftstock, embossing a silver sheet with the Dotty Hearts embossing folder, sanding the surface and inking it with pink ink. I was really pleased with the result. I also tested out sanding a piece of Core'dinations cardstock and inking it to see if I would get a result similar to what he did with the kraftstock, but the result was not the same. Tim does mention that his technique worked well because the core of his cardstock is kraft, which is very porous and takes ink well. Seems the Core'dinations cardstock is not quite the same, but that being said, I still liked how the texture of the cardstock was showing up better with the sanding.
So both of those pieces became the starting point of today's card. I die-cut a scalloped rectangle out of the Cherry Cobbler sanded cardstock, and I layered my embossed and inked silver paper over it, adding white borders with scalloped borders dies. Then out of the blue, I remembered my Christmastime dies and thought that if I skipped the tree, I was left with a cute couple taking a walk together. And I also remembered I had some older sentiment dies from Stampin' Up! with the word "together" on it. The wheels were in motion, so I pulled the supplies I needed and started working on the card. I also found in my French sentiment dies the word "happiness", which helped me put together a full sentiment.
I picked my colours based on an old ColourQ combo of three shades of pink and Early Espresso. That being said, I was not liking how using solely pink would have looked with the paper piecing, so I incorporated a tad of navy in there. I'm really happy because I decided to test out the In the Navy cardstock from Gina K Designs and it is that rich and deep navy that I was hoping for. I have been using Night of Navy from Stampin' Up! for many years and I only recently noticed that it was not as deep as a true navy should be when I tried pairing it with patterned papers and the difference in shading became more obvious. I'm happy I found this alternative. Ordering online is so hard when you try to judge colours, but this was a pretty safe gamble as navy is a neutral shade. Not like the ever elusive shade of pink I'm trying to add to my collection and cannot seem to find anywhere.
To tie in the navy from the paper piecing, I added a stitched banner from the same Foundation dies set I was using, also filling in the empty space a bit. I added a Say It in Crystals gem on the pennant and two little epoxy hearts at the top, over my first word. I should add that I sponged some Cherry Cobbler ink on my Petite Pirouette cardstock before die-cutting the word "together", which gave a nice ombre look to it.
I used my silver paper scrap on the envelope, with another navy tab and a pink wax seal that was sitting on my desk. I added another epoxy heart to the seal because the heart size was a perfect match.
Supplies
Cardstock: Cherry Cobbler Core'dinations, Crumb Cake, Petite Pirouette, Primrose Petals,
Early Espresso (Stampin' Up!); Metallic Kraftstock (Tim Holtz for idea-ology); In the Navy (Gina K Designs)
Ink: Worn Lipstick Distress Oxide (Ranger)
Dies: Foundation Dies #4, Scalloped Borders (Queen & Co); Christmastime (Tim Holtz for Sizzix);
Tu es formidable (Stampin' Up!); Bonheur (DIY)
Accessories: Sanding Block, Stampin' Dimensionals, Dotted Hearts Embossing Folder,
Kraft Medium Envelopes (Stampin' Up!); Heart-fetti Shape Sprinkles (Doodlebug Design);
Pink Wax (Honey Bee); Wax Seal (Altenew); Sparkly Red Brad (Making Memories);
Blender Brushes (Taylored Expressions)
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