Elements of Collage

Busy, busy day!  First "have to" this morning was to participate in today's SCS Challenge (below).  Then headed to Costco to pick up a belated birthday gift to me, an XBox 360 Kinect gaming system - hubby is setting it up right now so I know what I'll be doing this afternoon!:)  The bundle came with Kinect Adventures (the Kinect part of the XBox 360 system is a sensor that uses your body as the controller ... so you have hands free to play the games).  We also picked up Kinect Sports game which has bowling, basketball, soccer, table tennis and volleyball.  The plan is to have something fun that will get us up and moving (off of the couch!!).

It's also Thursday which means I'll be making "take out" dinner for my oldest son and his girlfriend.  I'm hoping that this gives them a break from working all day and then having to come home and make dinner.  It's the least I can do.  Tonight's menu, Spaghetti with Roasted Veggies and Meat Sauce, Garlic Bread, Caesar Salad and Dark Chocolate brownies for dessert - yum, yum!!

Today's "Ways to Use It" Challenge from SCS is "Crazy Collage" (WT331), using at least four different stamps.  This is a real challenge for me so I struggled a little before coming up with the card below.  I'm not completely happy with the card ... I wish I had some sheer ribbon that was more in the brown tones than gold ... but I felt it needed some embellishment so I used what I had.  Hope you like.

"Elements of Collage"

 

 

Stamps:  Elements of Style, En Francais (SU!)

Paper:  Basic Black, Soft Suede (SU!); Arches 140 lb. cold press watercolor paper "Natural White"

Ink:  Soft Suede, Cajun Craze, Early Espresso; Re-inkers:  More Mustard, Soft Suede

Accessories & Tools:  Artist's paintbrush & palette, sponges, matches, gold sheer ribbon, heat tool and sticky strips

 

* * * * *

 

I started by cutting the watercolor paper to just larger than the finished size I wanted.  I combined the re-inkers in my palette and added water to create a "tea" colored stain.  I sprayed my watercolor paper with water and then "washed" it with the stain using my paintbrush.  The paper was quite wet, so I used my heat tool to dry it before continuing with the next steps.

I used matches to burn the edge of the paper and give it an aged and distressed look.  Afterwards, I lightly wiped the sides with a damp paper towel to remove any soot that was left behind.  I stamped the stained watercolor paper with the En Francais background stamp in Soft Suede ink.  I stamped the flower stem and hummingbird in Cajun Craze ink ... because of the texture of the watercolor paper, the stampings have a faded look - LOVE IT!! :)  I stamped the swirly flower in the top right and bottom left corners in Early Espresso ink.

I cut a frame for the main panel out of Soft Suede cardstock and sponged the edges with the same color ink.  I mounted the main panel on top and then added a double bow made from sheer gold ribbon.  The main panel was then mounted onto a card base of Basic Black.