Woodland Walking

Hello from Magpieheaven on this beautiful, sunny winter's morning here! Yesterday afternoon it was pouring hard; mum was having a visit from our dear Auntie Rene and my new kitchen is slowly taking shape, so I actually managed to create a card using some of the beautiful Bo Bunny paper I bought recently along with a Lynne Perrella stamp that I won from a Paper Artsy draw. I would like to enter this for the Artistic Stamper Challenge where this time the goal is to create something for Christmas. This is my first entry for this challenge. I don't have any AS stamps, although a quick look at what they have on offer proved very tempting! No time to buy, though - maybe next time! Here is what I created with what I have.

I made a triple fold card, using heavy white card and then applied a layer of Gesso, thicker in some places than others. I then went over in Fresco Finish Snowflake and added some Frantage Shabby Blue, edging the card with Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Aged Mahogany. I have a new stencil - well it hardly feels new because I'm using it so much - but I just love the effect you can get with it! It's by Clearsnap and they call it a Mascil, so I suppose that's something between a mask and a stencil! This particular design is called 'Winter Tree'. I used Tinned Peas Fresco through it to create the effect of birch trees in the winter woods. There are still a few fragile leaves falling from the trees in December, so I used what was left from punching out a little leaf from my Woodware punch and stencilled some leaves over my background. My colours were being dictated by the warm shades of my Bo Bunny paper. My great loves are cool and icy blues; but this time I came out of my comfort zone and experimented with golds, reds and greens together. The paper is double sided and cordinates well, so I punched out little Christmas trees from an X-cut punch to look like postage stamps. I then used a Lynne Perrella postmark stamp and a sentiment from her Christmas plate, stamped with Versafine Olympia Green onto card painted with Fresco Pumpkin Soup and a touch of London Bus. I clear embossed and accented with Classic Treasure Gold. Because my card is a bit of a Christmas parcel, full of bits and pieces, I tied it together with some seam- binding dyed with Aged Mahogany.

If you flip the card over you will see the image from the Bo Bunny paper that I fell for! I have to confess I was out of my comfort zone with these colours but that deer appearing out of the mist stole my heart! It reminded me of a walk my husband and I took one Boxing Day. We were strolling through the woods when suddenly the silence was broken by a family of deer that magically seemed to appear from the mist between the trees. After a few timid seconds looking at us warily, they were gone. If you dropped by on Wednesday, you will know I felt a little anxious about using these papers - would this be cheating? I have tried to add my own touches by stamping script from a Paper Artsy Mini, edging with DI, adding my own painted and inked leaves and snowflakes cut from a Tim Holtz die and - of course - cutting the paper into a tag. If you click on the image you can see that I carried through the stencil of the birch trees and there is Frantage, Mica flakes and little red pearls to resemble berries.

Here is a close up of the effect on the tag.

I gave my deer a tiny glittering eye with a careful touch of Stickles!

And then when we open the card...As always, if you want to see in more detail just click on the image.

I used a Tim Holtz die this time with Snowflakes cut out of it and contrasting paper stuck over the back. I 'fussy' cut out pieces of the Lynne Perrella image, which I then layered a little differently when I stuck it back onto the tag. She is clear embossed over red Versafine Ink and then the rays behind her image are frantaged with copper.

Although I was using a warmer palette with this card, I wanted to give an ethereal quality to my woodland walk and evoke the atmosphere of a winter afternoon, so I used Sage Fresco for my trees inside the card. When I had finished this card I felt as if I had been for a walk among the trees with the twilight just beginning to drift down through the branches and a final touch of winter sun glancing through. Thank you so much for taking a look today and 'Thank You' Artistic Stamper for all the inspiration from your DT and for running your challenges.