I’ve been invited to be on the September design team for the Splitcoaststampers color challenges.  I’m so excited to join a team of super talented ladies and share color inspiration.

This week’s challenge – A Basic Chocolate Gumball; create a card using Basic Gray, Chocolate Chip and Gumball Green.  The extra challenge – to make your own pattern paper background.

To create this card I started by stamping the leaves from the Stampin’ Up! Summer Silhouette stamp set with versamark and Gumball Green ink, then embossed it with clear embossing powder.

I used the Apothecary Accents Framelits to cut out the leaf panel, but instead of directly die-cutting the label, I die-cut a template.  Then I used a pencil to trace around the template label around the leaves and trimmed it out with Paper Snips, snipping around the leaves that extended beyond the edge.  View the  video tutorial on ‘stamping outside the lines’  here or http://youtu.be/8Rj4JLBT2SM.

I painted the label with a light wash of Basic Gray ink, splattered it with Chocolate Chip ink and, lastly, sponged the bottom right with Basic Gray ink.  I added flower circles punched out with a Itty Bitty Shapes Punch, and Silver Mini Brads to the ends of the lable.

In my sample, I made a pattern paper background for the square accents by first stamping the lattice grid with Chocolate Chip ink and then randomly stamping the small flower burst with stamped-off Basic Gray ink.

In addition, I added a Primrose Petals accent with the little butterflies and the Dahlias.  To make the butterflies, I created more pattern paper by closely stamping the small flower burst on Whisper White card stock with Primrose Petals before running it through the Beautiful Wings Embosslit and adding a rhinestone.  Each butterfly was also backed with a Primrose Petals butterfly.

The ‘thinking of you’ tag end was trimmed out by cutting just the end with the side of the a Apothecary Accents Framelit.  The card base is Basic Gray card stock with the corners rounded.

Want to take your crafting to the next level?  Purchase the Big Shot Die-Cutting Machine.  With the Big Shot, you can add texture and fabulous die-cut accents .  I use my Big Shot on almost every project and it’s super versatile and easy to use.

Enjoy, Julie