Sending Joy

This card took longer than expected. The reason for that is that it was all going wrong, and I got annoyed and had to take a break. A few different challenges went into the making of this card. The layout is from Mojo Monday and the colour scheme is from Cupcake Inspirations. The current challenge over at Stamp Junkies is to use things from Simon Says Stamp. The Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge wants the inclusion of Christmas critters, Craftyhazelnut’s Christmas Challenge Extra wants anything Christmas, and Pixie’s Snippets Playground requires the use of snippets.

I started by picking out appropriate papers to use that match the colour scheme. I found the Christmas tree patterned paper which matches the colours really well and I knew I had to use it! I also found a dark blue plain paper to use for my sentiment strip.

Once I’d cut the papers down to size I decided I would do my sentiment. I picked out the sending joy sentiment from Lawn Fawn’s Merry Messages. I first stamped the “sending” and “for the holidays” parts with black ink and then used embossing ink for the “joy”. I then applied my enchanted gold embossing powder, which is a gold powder with holographic glitter through it. Unfortunately the powder seems to have gone bad as it just doesn’t stay on the ink at all, doesn’t melt, just does not work… (In hindsight it was bad when I got it, but as it was the first powder I’d tried I thought I was just doing it wrong.)

At that point I got annoyed and took a break to internet shop for some decent gold embossing powder. I found some, but haven’t pressed buy yet!

I cut a circle from a snippet of white card using the largest sizzix circle die, then trimmed a piece to make a little hill of sorts for the foreground of my focal panel. I coloured it gold by rubbing over it with my gold ink pad until I was happy with the coverage. I used the same gold ink to stamp my sentiment.

Next I used the rest of the white snippet for my cats. These come from SSS Christmas Cats set. I stamped the present and antlers first, masked them off and then stamped the cats themselves. I then coloured them in with my watercolour pencils, though I didn’t use any water. I went with the turquoise and midnight colours (or as close as I could get) for the present, and a goldy brown for the antlers. I tried to stay with relatively neutral colours for the cats. Once they were all coloured in I fussy cut them out. The taller cats ears hadn’t stamped very well with the antler mask in place. (The visible ears are part of the antler costume.) I decided to just cut them away completely, so we’ll just pretend his ears are squished down under the headband.

Finally I just had to assemble the card. I used Tombow Multi Mono glue to attach everything in place, and that was the card done.

Given how frustrated I got with this card, I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. It’s not exactly how I wanted it, but close enough. Finding the patterned paper was a stroke of luck, as it fits so well with the colour scheme. Then again, I can’t help but feel it might be a little bit too busy behind the cats…

Love,

Lady Joyful