Another Mother's Day Card

(Click on photo to view a larger image.)

Okay, now I really want to crow. I have managed to create two Mother's Day cards ahead of schedule. For me, that's nothing short of amazing. My inspiration for this card was a notification from one of my Yahoo groups that the weekly layout challenge was due. I haven't participated in a challenge in quite a while but I decided to give this one a whirl and, as is my custom, get more bang for my creative buck by making the card do double duty. Not only do I fulfill the challenge requirements, I have completed a card I needed to make anyway. An Asian theme and a rubber stamped image were among the requirements for this particular challenge so I pulled out all the stops. My last post featured a card I made for my mother. This card is for my sister. It just so happens that my sister loves Asian design also so this card was a no brainer.  

The layout challenge for this week was a criss-cross  pocket card. You can see a tutorial for this layout here. I used a different Asian themed origami paper on the two front pocket flaps and fabric paper on the back of the card. For the inner pull out card I chose translucent vellum so that the pattern of the paper could be seen through it. After stamping and embossing the central image of the woman, I used my Cuttlebug and an oval die to cut it out. Also cut out the larger black oval layer and edged it with gold paint. The belly band is a one inch length of cardstock wrapped around and adhered into place with sticky tape. Gold bamboo and Asian coin stickers are added to the belly band and the central oval is adhered into place using double stick dimensional foam to make it stand off the page. Stazon solvent ink is used to stamp the sentiment on the vellum. Once dry, solvent inks will not smear on non-porous paper such as vellum. A goldtone eyelet and tassel are added to the top to provide a pull for the card. Gold flower stickers add a final touch.


Ballo ergo sum
- Gitana, the Creative Diva

Ahead of Schedule

I'm one of those people who always underestimates the amount of time it will take me to complete a craft project so I tend to put it off until the last moment. This invariably leads to either a) a sleepless night trying to complete something that should have been started days earlier, or b) an unstarted/unfinished/ unsatisfactory project that won't be ready in time. That's happened more often than I want to admit.

This year I took the bulls by the horns and actually sat down to make a Mother's Day card a week ahead of need. In order to make the process go a little faster, almost all the elements I used, with the exception of the green leaves, were things I already had on hand.

Materials:

• Card base -- DCWV Mariposa Box of Cards collection
• Flowers -- Petaloo
• Black swirl rubber stamp -- Hero Arts Florentine Scroll Background 
• Sentiment Stamp -- Impress Rubber Stamps
• Ink -- Tsukineko Versafine Onyx Black (sentiment and scroll),  Versamark Watermark Ink (scroll), Ranger Distress Ink (shading around oval and leaves)
• Three-part butterfly (solid contour, black veining and body) -- Memory Box dies

Notes:

• The solid blue butterfly contour was colored using pigment inks and gel pens before the black veined wing details were attached. The body was encrusted with self-adhesive rhinestones. 
• I designed the leaves in a drawing program and cut them with the eCraft electronic cutter. 
• Florentine Scroll stamp was inked first with watermark ink then with onyx black ink. Image was then embossed with black ultrafine embossing powder. Because of the "dimples" in the card's texture, the impression looks somewhat distressed and antiqued.

It just so happens that one of the Yahoo groups I belong to is sponsoring a giveaway drawing to celebrate National Scrapbooking Day. The requirement for entries is that it must contain one or more elements created on an electronic cutter using MTC software. Well, the leaves on this card were created in precisely that manner so I entered my card into the drawing. Hey, who knows? 

Ballo ergo sum
- Gitana, the Creative Diva