Inspired By All The Little Things #74

Today's card is for the Inspired by All The Little Things Challenge. I wanted to create a card that was less fussy and more graphic feeling to fit in with the challenge. I like this sort of card for sending to some of the men in my life in particular, although I know some women who have a definite preference for clean graphics as well. I never feel like I do a very good impression of shabby chic but I do try once in a while.  Some people (Melissa Phillips comes to mind) can do that look so very well and I'm always inspired by the use of so many colors, layers and textures.

There are a lot of fun challenges going on right now for the holiday season and I am having a lot of fun playing in as many of them as I possibly can. But, as you know, I like to give you some general tips and guidelines for how I created my card.

I started by choosing a wood grain paper for my large star.  It's okay to change the shape of that element, but I didn't need to. I have several sheets of this and if you don't like the color it comes in, you can change it up easily by coloring over the top with a Copic Marker.  In this case I used a Black (100) Copic Marker to deepen the color.  It doesn't show up that well in the photos, but you can easily see the wood grain pattern when looking at the card in person.  I also created a card base from Soft Stone Cardstock.  I wanted a slight pattern for the main background panel and I chose this repeating text background paper.  It's hard to tell in the photo, but the text is done in green on a pale ivory paper.  To highlight that green, I also created a narrow mat behind it from Pinefeather Cardstock.

My wood grain paper is a text weight paper so in order to make it a somewhat more substantial weight, I cut three stars from True Black Cardstock and glued them one of top of the other.  I used my powder tool on the wood grain star and placed the negative into my MISTI to hold the positive in place in case I needed to stamp it again (which I did). I stamped the Merry & Bright sentiment from the Gina K Designs Merry & Bright Stamp TV Kit in Versamark and heat set it with my favorite Simon Says Stamp Antique Gold Embossing Powder, twice. I love this technique so much!  It makes such a difference in how bold your sentiment is. I did a light mist of Tsukineko Sheer Shimmer Spritz over just the star and when it was dry I adhered it with some Scotch 3D Foam Tape to my card front.  For the lower part of the greeting, I die cut the "holiday" word from Gold Foil Cardstock, and the "Greetings" banner from Concord & 9th's Season of Cheer Die.  All together, the sentiment says "Merry & Bright Holiday Greetings".  It's festive yet crisp and graphic.

Most of my Christmas Cards have already been sent out but I will still do a few more for things as they come up. There's always a few I don't think of when doing my initial list.

Thank you so much for stopping by today to see my project.  For your convenience, the supplies I've used are linked below.

Simon Says Stamp Antique Gold Embossing Powder Shop at: SSS	Kokuyo Long Dot Runner Adhesive Shop at: SSS	Gina K Designs Stamp TV Kit - Merry & Bright Shop at: GKD	Versamark Ink Shop at: PTI | SSS
Concord & 9th Season of Cheer Dies Shop at: SSS | C+9	Cuttlebug Die Cutting Machine Shop at: SSS	Papertrey Ink Pinefeather Cardstock Shop at: PTI	Papertrey Ink Soft Stone Cardstock Shop at: PTI
Papertrey Ink True Black Cardstock Shop at: PTI