The inspiration for these cards came from a recent card class I took at my local craft shop, where we played with distress oxide sprays and learned some different tips, tricks, and techniques to create fun backgrounds.  I was so inspired I came home and made so many backgrounds, which you will see in another post.

   While I was creating those backgrounds I had an idea for a card using Ella’s Garden Rose and Brick border die.  I decided to die cut it out and what came next was a happy accident. 

 I wanted to try using the die-cut as a stencil so instead of using it just as a border I die cut it twice from a piece heavyweight cardstock cut down to just over 4¼ x 5½. I placed it into my splat box with some watercolor paper and went to town with the sprays creating many many panels which I will be turning into cards for another blog soon.  

As I mentioned previously this all came about as a happy accident, as I had initially used the die-cuts as a stencil but then thought to myself,  “Hmm, what if I sprayed the oxides right onto the cardstock and added water?  What kind of print would I get?”  Well, what I got was BEAUTIFUL.  At least I thought so lol. 

 I loved how I ended up with a rainbow looking impression. ​​

I decided to keep the card itself very simple to allow the focus to be on the sentiment and the inked background. 

The card itself is 5 ½ x 4¼, I cut down the inked panels to 5¼ x 4 and then I took some mirror cardstock that really matched the colorus of each inked panel and cut that down to 5 3/8 x 4 1 /8 leaving just a little colour peeking through. 

The finishing touch was the sentiment, which I created using these wonderful Large Hugs die from the latest release.  I really love how Paper Rose creates their sentiment and words with the shadow die to match.  I cut out the sentiment 12 times.  3 layers for each card, from heavyweight black cardstock.  I used the same mirror cardstock to die cut the shadow portion which really brought it all together.  I adhered all the sentiments together and added some Nuvo shimmer pen to the top.  As you can see I may have gone a little heavy-handed, but, can you really have too much shimmer!

Thanks for joining me on this latest crafty journey.  Hope you enjoyed it and good luck with your own adventures!