Bloggers Challenge 37 – Shaped Card – Any Shape Except a Rectangle

I cannot believe how easy it is to get myself into a creative rut and not even realize it!  Did you know that you CAN make a card that is NOT a rectangle?  I know that some do, but never gave it a second glance until Lisa Sommerville announced this week’s challenge-a shaped card that is NOT a rectangle.  Since I usually procrastinate until Thursday night to do my Bloggers Challenges, I wasn’t worried about coming up with one; my theory is, if you procrastinate long enough, just the fact that it’s in the back of your mind means that your brain is working towards accomplishing that goal, so I assumed that when Thursday night rolled around I’d have an idea.  NOT! 

So, I waited until Friday, Saturday…nothing…so feeling rather abandoned by my gray matter I decided enough is enough and I’ll just do it.  Decision #1 – what shape?  Uumm, not a rectangle, so that leaves squares, circles, ovals, diamonds, triangles…ah, an oval!  That sounds easy enough!  On to decision #2 – what stamps to use?  Well, I’ve got tons that haven’t seen ink, so let’s use something new…and Artistic Outpost won.  I have been in love with Artisitic Outpost’s stamps ever since seeing Lisa S. designs on her blog, Splendiferous Creations-she’s on their design team.  And, when I saw Artistic Outpost’s logo, I HAD to check them out.  I am so thankful they decided to make their beautiful logo into a stamp set-Serenity!  So, that’s what I used today.

I stamped the image with embossing ink on watercolor paper, then embossed it with Soot Black Distress embossing powder.  The Distress embossing powder does not melt into a glossy finish, but rather feels like sandpaper.  IRL, this gives my stamped image almost a velvety look.  I then scribbled the whole piece with watercolor pencils, gave it a wash of water, and sprinkled some salt all over it.  I dried the image with a heat gun, rubbed off the excess salt, used my oval Nestibilities dies to cut out the stamped image and the black backgrounds, used some EK Success fibers to jazz up the card front, assemled my layers, and attached the front layers to the back with a little metal hinge.   All in all, it was very easy to do, and certainly not worth procrastinating three days over!  Hopefully, lesson learned…we’ll see if I’m on time this week…

Thanks for looking, and be sure to check out the other bloggers’ challenges by clicking on the links in the left-hand column.  And, be sure to check out Artistic Outpost this week-they have a great special going on, and you can see all the other fabulous stamp sets they offer.  Tell them I sent you!

Toodles,

Anita