Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Sparkling Friendship

This has been a fun week so far because my oldest daughter is home.  She is here until Sunday when we have to take her to the airport to fly to Italy.  She was accepted at a music camp there and is the only violist from America.  I might be stressing for a while until I know she is safely there - better yet, when she gets safely home.  I am excited for her but very nervous, too.

We are having an in-house glitter challenge among the SNS designers.  Though I have always enjoyed a little glitter on my cards, I have truly fallen in love with all the sparkly delights available at Sparkle N Sprinkle.  I experimented with several different techniques (see the technique page) until I found what I wanted to do.


This card is a 5” x 7” white card base with layers of dark pink, light pink sparkle, and beautiful green decorative cardstock.  The next layer is dark green cardstock cut with a doily die.  I sponged green ink on the edges of this die and the decorative cardstock.  I cut some sticker paper,  using Spellbinder Label 13 and added Bubble Gum and Burgundy Glitz glitter using a piece of lace to create the design.  You can see this technique here.

For the image I used the sentiment “Being My Friend” from Sparkle N Sprinkle’s Thanks A Bunch set.  I stamped it in dark pink pigment ink on a piece of the pink sparkly cardstock and heat embossed it with Sparkle embossing powder (dont forget to always use the Static Free).  I cut it out with a die, sponged a little ink around the edges, and used foam tape to pop it in the center of the card.

My next sparkly element is the flowers.  These are the same kind of flowers I talked about making with my friend, Bonnie.  I cut these out of white cardstock, using Spellbinder’s Rose Creations die.  I used the three largest dies and the second smallest die for the large flower and the three smallest dies for the smaller flowers and then cut a variety of sizes of leaves.  I colored each flower and leaf on both sides with shimmering water colors.  While they were still damp, I used a large tipped stylus and literally mashed down on them on top of a mouse pad.  I start at the ends and work around the flower or leaf, slowly moving to the middle.  When you press down in the middle it pulls the whole flower together to give you the shape.  After they dried I added Starfire glitter using SNS Brushable Glue.  Go here to see a video of this technique.  After this had dried, I brushed a little more glue just to the edges of each petal and added Burgundy Glitz glitter.  Once again I let it dry, then used SNS Dimensional Glue to combine the flowers.  The painting, glue, and glitter do stiffen them but you can still bend and mold them slightly.  You can also put them together using a brad but I usually use the glue if I plan to add some other embellishment, such as the pink pearls I used.  I added the flowers around the sentiment and added a few leaves.  I had planned to add glitter to the leaves, too, but they were already so shimmery and I did not want to take away from the areas that already had glitter. 

For final touches I added some ribbon to two of the corners.  I had some pink jeweled swirls I wanted to add but I needed to make two cards and I only had one set of the swirls.  I decided to add pearls to the second card and guess what.  I liked it even bettter.  I thought I would still show you the one with the jewels.


This card is entered in the following challenges:
Speedy the Cat’s Friends Challenge Week 61 – Make it Sparkle!
The Shabby Tea Room Challenge Week #68 – My Favorite Things (Flowers, Glitter, Colors)
Stampin For The Weekend Challenge #11 – My Favorite Things (Flowers, Glitter, Colors)
Art Impressions Stamps Challenge #21 – Handmade Flowers
Crafty Cardmakers Spotlight Challenge – Sentimental: Sentiment as Your Focus
Crafty Creations Challenges #124 – Let It Shine: Lots of Sparkly Things
Fussy and Fancy Friday Challenge – Case (I cased Lisette and was inspired by the flower and doily)
Ooh La La Challenge #83 – Summer Flowers
Top Tip Tuesday Challenge #40 - T is for… (Twinkle, Techniques, Three – three sets of three pearls/three in the three flowers, three in two different corners.  Two tips - Use the Static Guard and how to make flowers)

18 comments:

Grace said...

Wow Marie! This is beautiful!!!

Anonymous said...

Gorgeous!! Love all the sparkle this has! So glad you could join in the Crafty Creations challenge!
smiles,Deena

Lisa Minckler said...

I have learned so much from your post and your card is a beautiful creation! Thank you for that most educational link. I'll be sure to check that out. :)
So happy you could join us at Top Tip Tuesday for the "T" challenge.
Happy Stamping...
Lisa xx

Lisette Morris said...

Love Love Love this! I love handmade flowers and all the glitter. WOnderful card! Thanks for joining us at Fussy and Fancy.

Carol Hurlock said...

WOW can I say how much I am bowled over by the sparkle, the shine, and oh yeah those FLOWERS!!! Yikes - be still my heart this is amazing. What a enchanting creation. Thanks so much for playing along in Speedy's Friends Challenge. It is a delight to visit and see your creation. Hope you can play again with us next week!

Sandra H said...

This is pretty love the flowers looks so lifelike! nice for a friend to recieve this....:) Sandra H

Shirley said...

Let me just say, you card is stunning! I am really really in love with your flowers! Wow, Marie!

April said...

So beautiful, Marie! You did a fantastic job.

Hugs, April

Janeen said...

absolutely GORGEOUS flowers. what a beautiful creation. your daughter will enjoy her time so much. what an honor. Thanks for playing with the Friends of Speedy the Cat. Good Luck in the drawing this week.

Wendi said...

What a gorgeous card I love that colour combo and your flowers are beautiful
Thank you so much for sharing with us at ooh la la this week
Wendi

Melissa Bove said...

Another stunning and beautiful card!! Love it! Thank you so much for joining us this week at The Shabby Tea Room!

Hugs...
Melissa
Shabby Tea Room Designer

Donna Ells said...

Marie, how do you constantly exude such beautiful artwork in unique colors and textures? This is absolutely stunning! Thanks for a lovely card.

Flutterby Trina said...

Thanks for playing along with us this week at Tip Top Tuesday and our 'anything with T' challenge! Good luck x

Caroljenks said...

What a stunning card and awesome Top Tips - thanks for sharing them ;)

Thanks for joining in with our 'T is for...' challenge over at Top Tip Tuesday this week :)

Carol x

Chris said...

very pretty card, your flowers are great. thanks for playing with us at SFTW.

Judy Rozema said...

Oh my goodness - how did I miss this news about your daughter and Italy and music?? Congratulations to her! That is very exciting! I love your card - you did such a great job with the glitter!! And I am glad to see it at TTT. Thank you for joining us for "T is for..." at Top Tip Tuesday!

Unknown said...

Beautiful and glittery! This is a gorgeous card:) The lace background and the flowers make a perfect match!

Keri Brown said...

Thank you for sharing this gorgeous card with us... I am definitely going to play around making these flowers... Excellent job hun... :)