Falling into Celebration

Part 2 of the Falling into Celebration Dare is up on the Emerald Creek blog today and I have a Diwali card to share with you. To celebrate the Festival of Lights, I went for a stellar display on a Distress ink watercolour galaxy background.

I first stamped the Sunny D sun on a 4 1/4" x 6 1/4" piece of Ranger watercolour paper and heat embossed it using a combination of Tangerine Orange and Vegas Gold emboss powder. Next, I stamped a variety of stars from the Sweet Dreams stamp and heat embossed them in Vegas Gold. To add a bit more light to my future galaxy, I splattered water using a waterbrush and then heat embossed some more Vegas Gold emboss powder on the background.Then came the watercolouring part. I watercoloured the stars using Tim Holtz Scattered Straw mini Distress ink and the sun with combination of Scattered Straw, Dried Marigold, and Ripe Persimmon. Once they were all dry, I wet areas around them using a water brush and then began dropping in other colours (Tumbled Glass, Peacock Feathers, and Wilted Violet). Next, I added Black Soot and Chipped Sapphire, working them with water to allow them to blend. I added in more of the other colours as need until I was pleased with the look. After mounting my dried piece onto black cardstock covered card base, I added the CAC Shishoni Brush script Silhouette cut sentiment to complete the card.


Come celebrate the season with us over at Emerald Creek Dares by entering our Falling into Celebration Dare challenge for a chance to win a $50 store credit. Other projects by my fellow DT mates, can be found here along with the challenge details.

TTFN,

Emerald Creek Products used:

Sunny D stamp

Sweet Dreams stamp

Tangerine Orange Embossing Powder

Vegas Gold Embossing Powder

Other Products available in the Emerald Creek Shop:

Mini Distress Inks - Scattered Straw, Dried Marigold, Ripe Persimmon, Tumbled Glass, Peacock Feathers, Wilted Violet, Chipped Sapphire, Black Soot

Celebrating Fall

As the season turns, we are once again thankful for the fruits of the harvest. For this month's Emerald Creek Dare challenge, I shared an idea for personalized place cards to bring a Fall festive feel to a table setting when celebrating Thanksgiving with family and friends. Loaded with upcycled bits, this project is super easy to put together and uses corrugated cardboard, scraps of burlap, birch bark, and the most readily available and plentiful element of the season... fallen leaves.

I collected a variety of fallen leaves in sizes that would work with the scale of the place card. Try picking those that are newly fallen with greater moisture content. The colour of the leaves is added with emboss powder so you needn't be concerned about the colour of the leaves.

To emboss the leaves, I rubbed a bit of petroleum jelly on the leaves. I used Vegas Gold emboss powder on the oak leaf, Candy Red emboss powder on the maple leaf and a 3/4 to 1/4 mix of Thanksgiving to Tangerine Orange emboss powders on the poplar leaf. I experimented with a variety of ways to adhere the emboss powder to the leaves and while they all worked, I found I really liked the coverage and look of petroleum jelly. It takes a bit longer to activate the emboss powder when heating it and it will bubble due to the moisture content of the leaf. You will get different looks depending how long you heat the emboss powder. I found that I was able to retain a fair amount of detail and truer emboss colour by letting it just get to the heated bubble point but you can heat it for longer causing the leaf to dehydrate and slightly shrink in size. **NB - On a cautionary note, the embossed leaf stays hot longer than normal embossing on paper so be careful with handling until emboss cools.**

The base was made with corrugated cardboard that was scored, folded, and stripped of its' outer layer after being spritzed with water for easier removal. A scrap piece of burlap was glued on with Glue n' Seal and a piece of birch bark was adhered on top of that.

After arranging and adhering the embossed leaves, I used a VersaMark brush pen and hand scripted my guest's name onto the birch bark. I embossed the name with my leftover custom mix of Candy Brown, Mirror Gold, and Vegas Gold emboss powders (see this post here for ratios used).

Come celebrate the season with us over at Emerald Creek Dares by entering our month long Falling into Celebration Dare challenge for a chance to win a $50 store credit. Other awesome projects by my fellow DT members, Deb and Pam, can be found here along with the challenge details.


TTFN,

Emerald Creek Products Used:

Thanksgiving Embossing Powder

Tangerine Orange Embossing Powder

Candy Red Embossing Powder

Vegas Gold Embossing Powder

Candy Brown Embossing Powder

Mirror Gold Embossing Powder