Blessed Beyond Measure

Today starts my term as a designer for Shannon Buck over at StampinBuds.com.  Shannon is both my friend and my CTMH consultant.  Over the years, she has gone above and beyond to supply my stamping addiction many times.  I'm thrilled to be able to return the favor in my small way.

Today's card uses the new Beyond Measure pumpkin and Pathfinding paper. 

There were a few steps to this card, so here come the pictures!  Let's start with the background.

I saw this technique a while back, and I can't remember where.  There is no intricate measuring here.  I took a piece of paper and trimmed it to 3.75 inches by...oh...maybe 4.9 or 5 inches.  Something like that.  I laid it on my paper cutter and angled it a little this way then a little that way.  I cut the Champagne paper to 4x5.25 and, when I was done cutting the patterned paper, started at the top, gave myself about 1/8 of an inch in between pieces, and then trimmed the bottom piece of Pathfinding so it ended up 1/8 of an inch from the bottom of the Champagne cardstock.  I'm sortof mathematically challenged when it comes to measuring, so this system works for me.

However, you will also notice that I offset the background panel.  It's not perfectly centered.  This is to give you another option in case you try my technique and it doesn't work for you.  You can always disguise an imperfect measurement by placing it off-center (or at an angle).  I added my Bronze Shimmer Trim, folding it over the top, and glued the whole thing onto a Chocolate card base.

The pumpkin was stamped in Autumn Terracotta, rolled in Sunset, and then rolled again in Barn Red just along the bottom.  Then I took some Barn Red from inside my ink pad lid and used a paint brush to color the stem.  When that was done, I cleaned off my pumpkin stamp and re-inked it in Versamark.  I stamped over top of the image I'd already done once.  Using Clear Embossing Powder, I covered the image then heat set it.  Before it cooled, I covered it with powder again and repeated this process until I had three coats of embossing powder over top of the pumpkin. 

Between the original overstamping being slightly off and the natural build up of the multiple layers of embossing powder, I had a bit of an overlap on parts of the image.  I used a sponge dauber to add Barn Red over top to get into wherever there were holes in the embossing.   I used the same process to stamp the leaf from Lifetime of Happiness using Olive ink for the leaf and Barn Red over top again.  I then trimmed out both images.  Before I added the leaf to the top of the pumpkin, I cracked the embossing powder by bending the pumpkin this way and that.  As you can see, the pumpkin looks rather warped. 

So...how did I get the pumpkin to lie flat on the card?

Foam mounted tape and lots of it!!  There is a time to be stingy and a time to be generous.  This is the time to be generous...really, really generous.

You will also need to use a strong adhesive to get the leaf to stick to the top of the embossed pumpkin.  I used Liquid Glass.  Love, love, LOVE that stuff!

For you regulars, today's card is the one I was making when I used the leftover Barn Red on my dauber to start the sponging process on this card.

That's all for today.  If you have questions, please leave a comment and be sure to check back for an answer.

Until next time,
Becca

Pathfinding Paper Packet	Lifetime of Happiness	Beyond Measure	Liquid Glass	Bronze Shimmer Trim
Autumn Terracotta Exclusive Inks� Stamp Pad	Sponge Daubers	Sunset Exclusive Inks Stamp Pad	Barn Red Exclusive Inks Stamp Pad	Olive Exclusive Inks� Stamp Pad
Ranger Clear Super Fine Embossing Powder	VersaMark� Ink Pad

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