Big Floral Fantasy Flower for A Blog Named Hero's March Challenge

 Hello crafty friends!  

It's month two for me on A Blog Named Hero's design team, and what a talented group of people I'm finding in my co-designers! (It's pretty intimidating, really...but also seems to push me to try new things.)

This month's challenge (and the chance to win a $50 gift certificate from Hero Arts!) may be my one of my favorite themes for cardmaking:  Florals.

the first cards I made were all about florals--and flowers are still my very favorite things to color.  I love all the color you can use with flowers and those color can be soft or strong, true to life or simply fantastical.

What I did:  For today's card I tried a technique that was new to me--I heat embossed the outline of this biiiiig flower (I mean really big--like five inches (13cm) across on an alcohol ink panel.  I wondered if I could successfully heat emboss the paper--I had used Yupo, which is basically a plastic paper--without melting it or making the embossing powder bubble. Turns out it worked out just fine. I'll be doing this again, for sure!

I fussy cut the flower and leaves; popped them up on a gel press background using foam squares (look closely and you'll see I the mail jumble peekaboo stamp doing duty as a background)with some spattered gold and green and black inks and paints to give that background some interest; and added one of my favorite sentiment dies that I embossed about 4 times, to get a really rounded standout effect. I matted my panel with black card stock, popped it onto my card base--et voila (as my French design team friend might say), a finished card!  

By the way:  This is a 5X7 inch (A7) card.  I've been making those a lot lately. I think that this large format is a real wow from the time the envelope arrives in your recipient's mailbox.  Also, I really love big bold images--and this larger format really helps show off those images.  Honestly, it would have broken my heart to cut up that big peony.

Have you tried a 5X7 card?  What about heat embossing?  Gel press?  Alcohol ink?  It seems this card--which features each of these--is sort of a demo of all of these techniques (I love to color, too, but a little experimentation is good fun, too!)

Can't wait to see your floral cards--I hope you'll play along with us!

Thanks so much for stopping by, 

Essie

Rustic Reimagined: A Wood and Feathers Fantasy

 Hello Friends and Happy Friday! 

My crafty cohorts and I have a new card challenge for you over at Beyond the Blue.  It's easy and fun!

For this challenge, you make a woodgrain card front with a stamp or embossing folder (I used an embossing folder), cut it up, color/ink blend it in at least two different ways, and reassemble the pieces.  You get a cool barn plank effect that makes a great back drop for a quote or a diecut...or--in my case--both!

The feathers are from my overly large stash, colored during a gel press session with splash inks, and I've "gilded" them with iridescent foil applied with the help of a glue pen.  The quote "art grows brain cells" is from Picket Fence Studios--and it was their original video by card designer and Crafty Queen Susan Wymer that got our Beyond the Blue Team fired up for this latest challenge.  

Hope you'll join us in trying out this fun and easy effect!

Thanks for stopping by,

Essie