Blue and gold ice skater

I'm early this week for the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge. I actually had this finished on Monday morning, but am only just getting to blog it as I'm away at my mum's again.

It's a sketch challenge week:

I decided to go a bit shabby chic with this one.

I started with 8x10 Clarity stencil card, and added colour with distress inks - tumbled glass, iced spruce, salty ocean, chipped sapphire and peacock feathers. I used a mixture of the brayer and blending tool.

I cut into this sheet to get my base layer and the side banner for the sketch.

These I embossed with a Tattered Lace set of folders. I got these ages ago - there were 8 sets being sold as a pack, they include the triangle folders for envelope flaps which are very useful. As I haven't used these ones before, this meets my personal challenge of using something that's been sitting on the shelf for ages! I brayered versa mark over the top very gently, and added mica powder - moon gold and truffle were the names of the colours.

I do like this turquoise and gold combination.

I cut a scrap of the coloured card into a banner for the sentiment, and stamped "Merry Christmas" onto it - I think this stamp set came with a magazine. I used versa mark again and then truffle mica powder.

For the oval, which is my main image, I used some of the Clarity Christmas wee folk stamps. I was going to use the children throwing snowballs, which I haven't used before so they would double up my "stash" challenge, but they didn't fit well into the space, so I went for a personal favourite, the ice skater.

I used more of the card I'd coloured, adding chipped sapphire to define the landscape - a straight line for the frozen pond then a torn paper mask for the hills behind.

I stamped the wee folk Christmas tree behind the hills, and embossed with a platinum embossing powder. Then added the skater, then more tress around the sides and bottom of the oval.

The platinum matches really well with the mica powders I've used.

I used a versa mark pen to draw round the oval (I was using my fiskars cutting plate as a template) and heat embossed the line as well.

I then cut the oval out by hand.

I cut the side banner down to size, to fit a 5x7 card base. To edge the two banners, I did the same as I had on the oval with the versa mark pen and embossing powder.

For the background, I used the pen and then mica powder around the edge, to give a slightly softer look.

I wanted lots of height and dimension, so to construct the card I used foam between the layers, and applied with glue. Unfortunately I was a bit heavy handed, so there was a little buckling of the card where it got too wet.

I also lost the holly from my sentiment, as it fitted better with that part hidden under the side banner.

At this point I thought I was done, and took all my photos.

Look at my little skater girl, isn't she lovely?

The next morning, I remembered the stars from the original sketch, so thought I'd add some gems.

I had pearls and sparkly gems of different sizes that matched the soft gold colour beautifully. I really couldn't decide which to use, but in the end went with these lovely soft pearls. 

I'm glad I dug out these embossing folders, I think they look great. For me, this card has a real chocolate box feel. I think it's a combination of the traditional image and the colours. I can definitely see more versions of this making their way into my Christmas card collection.