Winter Birthday Greetings

Hello!  It's a new week at the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge and my 2nd of 4 weeks as the Designer in the Spotlight. This week we are featuring Lawn Fawn Products with a Winter Birthday Theme. You don't have to use them to join in, but if you have some, we would love to see them used.

Lawn Fawn does such fantastic plaids and I love this Grey, Teal and White Lawn Fawn Perfectly Plaid Winter Petite Paper. This is a 6 x 6 paper pad that has been scaled down from the 12 x 12 version but if I was still making scrapbooks, I love the larger sized plaids as well.  There are gorgeous Christmas, Fall and Springtime plaids as well and you can see them here. Lawn Fawn also makes my favorite acrylic blocks which have finger grooves on the sides and an etched grid to assist in lining up your stamps.  Since the grid is etched, it won't wipe off as you clean your blocks.

For my card, I started with one of the patterns in the Lawn Fawn Winter Plaid Collection and chose my other colors, Simon Says Stamp Audrey Blue and Simon Says Stamp Slate Grey Cardstock, based on that. One of my favorite things to use for masculine cards is plaid paper.  In fact, I use very little patterned paper otherwise.  Most of the time if it's a plaid, then it will work for a guy.  My card could be used for either masculine or feminine except for one little embellishment that I put on it at the last minute, but we'll come back to that later. *Ü*

My card base is made from Simon Says Stamp Slate Grey Cardstock in a top folding A2 size.  Next I die cut an Avery Elle Postage Stamp Die from Simon Says Stamp Audrey Blue Cardstock.  This leaves you with 2 pieces - an outer frame and an inner rectangle.  I cut another one of these from the Winter Plaid Paper so that I could put the plaid rectangle on the inside of the Postage Stamp Frame.  I cut a piece of Fun Foam slightly smaller than the inner rectangle and attached that to the plaid rectangle using ¼ inch Scor-Tape.  I find that tape runner is a little bit difficult to use on Fun Foam so double sided adhesive is less frustrating for me.  You can use tape runner or whatever adhesive you have available. Next, I adhered the frame to the card base using Ranger Multi Medium Matte and followed that by attaching the inner rectangle also using Multi Medium Matte since I had it handy.  I have two bottles of this at all times sitting upside down in my jumbo cup that I keep my main tools in.  For ease of use, I have Scrap-Perfect No Clog Writing Tips on them.

 I die cut three of the Impression Obsession "Wishes" from Audrey Blue Cardstock to make a thicker embellishment.  In order to increase the intensity of the top layer, I inked it up a Mini Ink Blending Tool using Audrey Blue Ink a couple of times to deepen the color.  Using the Impression Obsession Wishes Stamp Set I stamped the "Sending Birthday" in Versafine Onyx Black Ink and heat set it with Simon Says Stamp Clear Embossing Powder.  I much prefer this method over using black embossing powder or even regular black ink.  I'm a little funny because it bugs me when my stamps get stained but Versafine, which is a pigment ink, does not stain. I suppose it might eventually, but so far, it hasn't. Simon Inks are so pigmented and rich in color, that they can really stain your stamps. That's just the nature of high quality photo-polymer but for that reason, I typically use Distress Inks or some of the other inks I have that don't stain as much.  Yes, I know I'm a goofball!

Once I had the card assembled, I felt that a crisp white snowflake would be just the right touch for this Winter Birthday Card so I cut an Eliza Snowflake from a scrap of crisp white cardstock and attached it by adding Ranger Multi Medium Matte around the innermost ring of the snowflake. Eliza is my favorite of all the Simon Says Stamp Snowflake Dies. After that I misted the whole front of the card with Tsukineko Sheer Sparkle Shimmer Spritz.  Since this card is for one of my daughters whose birthday is January 21st, I couldn't help but adhere a tiny little genuine Sworovski Crystal right in the center of the snowflake.  *Ü* Actually, I would have liked it a lot more if I'd had a bigger one to put on there.  

Thank you for spending a little time with me today on my blog and be sure to enter your project at the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge Blog link-up for your chance to win a $50.00 Gift Voucher from the Simon Says Stamp Store.