Green Christmas and a study in movement

I've had a pretty unsuccessful week in my craft room so far - I've managed a few short trips in over 3 days and come out with nothing to show for it other than a full bin!

Last night though I had an idea to combine a few challenges into one project and I managed to come up with something that I actually think was decent enough to blog.

I've been enjoying the lessons Cath has been giving over in the Moxy Fab World from the new special issue of Paper Crafts which is all about the elements of design.  Yesterdays lesson was all about movement and there is a challenge to go with it http://www.moxiefabworld.com/2012/08/card-design-handbook-week-movement.html and I decided to try and create some movement in my card.  I opted for green shades only as that is this week's CASology cue word http://casology.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/week-7-green.html   and my theme of Oh Christmas Tree goes with both the colour and the challenge of "base your design on a Christmas song" over at 52CCT http://52cct.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/august-2012-theme-challenge.html

I stamped the Christmas Tree (Inkadinkadoo Holiday Sentiments) which has part of the song detailed in it onto pine linen card and embossed it with WOW glamour green powder.  To create my movement I offset the coloured card over the end of the base card as the swirls to the right of the image lead the eye up and out in that direction - I added a single lime green gem to the centre of the star burst to nod back down towards the 3 matching gems I placed around the sentiment (PI).  I blocked the sentiment off in a solid shape at the bottom of the tree to ground it and to draw the eye back down and across to the gems.  Hopefully I'm getting to grips with this whole movement concept - it's tricky but I think it's one of the things that once I know it will help me understand why some cards work, and others end up in the bin........

LIM Silhouttes

This is my second post for today, so if you're looking for my Guest DT spot on Sundays with Chrissie, then please scroll down for the details of my two projects.

Today is Saturday which means Less is More's new weekly challenge which this week is Silhouttes.  I got a new inkadinkadoo set at Stamp Magic in Doncaster a few weeks ago and haven't had time to play with it yet so this was the perfect opportunity.  I decided to make 3 cards, one with each stamp from the set, and as our challenge at St Luke's Charity Card Challenge this month is Christmas, they are my "mid month reminder" for our challenge and will be going into the stash of cards for the Christmas Fair in aid of St Lukes next Sunday.   Our challenge can be found here http://stlukescharitycardschallenge.blogspot.com/2011/11/christmas-is-coming.html and you have until the end of the month to play along and be in with the chance of winning some Lili of the Valley stamps.

 

For the first card the image is just simply stamped in the traditional silhouette black onto some snowflake DP and layered on a thin black mat before adding to a white base card.

 
The second image is the one that drew me to the stamp set - I embossed it with silver fine detail powder on black card and added a thin silver mat.  The base card is a lovely ice-blue and I finished it with a small Merry Christmas stamp from PTI embossed in black detail glitter powder over the top of Santa.

For the final card I embossed the image directly onto the small 3 inch green base card with vintage gold powder and finished with a simple thin gold ribbon.

Catch you all later

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