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Yes! I have been a bit MIA if you haven't been keeping track of me on my Facebook page or Instagram. Just lots of non-stamping stuff going on...But, I'm back today with, drum roll please, ... Let's Hear It for the Boys, a blog hop with the awesome Around the World on Wednesday group.
Our theme is projects that celebrate the guys in our lives. I took a little bit of a twist on this one. After we get done celebrating those guys, they may need some thank you notes. I made these for my husband to use after he retired last week.
I got started with this set of cards by using a color challenge calling for Coastal Cabana, Granny Apple Green and Mango Melody. This was also my first go round with the Rugged Icons Dies:
I can easily see myself using all of these, well maybe I'll need to use my imagination for the beard. Anyway, here is the first card:
- After experimenting with a few die cuts I realized that whatever color is used for the outline needs to work for trees and the shadow of the mountains. With the bright colors of the challenge I decided to go with the boldness of basic black. I also cut a Mango Melody and Coastal Cabana scene to use for the inlay.
- I cut the same image from the front of my Basic White card base and lined the inside of the front with a 4" x 5 1/4" piece of Granny Apple Green cardstock. This kept the inlay easy I only needed to add the sky, sun and river or trail.
- I centered the black frame so that the horizon line was level and secured it with sponged on Multipurpose Adhesive.
- Add the inlay. Hint: Fit the pointed end of the sky piece on the left into place first.
- Add your greeting. I loved the way the simple font from Sending Smiles works here.
With one card down and feeling a little more comfortable with the dies I tried a modification of my simple card sketch to avoid the extra layer on the inside of the card.
- This one used some smaller layers on the front to add the Granny Apple Green. I also changed the path to a river. Since I knew I'd be making a few more I positioned my greeting on the Stamparatus to get consistent placement.
I love the way the bright challenge colors looked with the black but wanted to try some more muted colors. There are lots of possibilities if you consider various darker shades of green paired with lighter shades. For these I settled on Evening Evergreen for my frame with Soft Succulent in the background:
- I used Balmy Blue for the sky/river and So Saffron for the sun. I subbed in Crumb Cake on the second card to depict a trail.
- The same greeting used previously was stamped in Evening Evergreen.
Now it's time to check out the rest of the blog hop.
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