Sunday Stamper - week 300 - Dream Lover

This week is rather a special one over at the very talented Hels Sheridan's blog http://pinkleart.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/sunday-stamper-week-300-dream-lover.html  - it is the 300th week for the Sunday Stamper challenge! For each of the last 300 weeks Hels has come up with a theme, loosely based on a song title, and has created a gorgeous example of her stamped art to inspire us all to join in. As it's the 300th anniversary of the Sunday Stamper challenge, this week there are several companies sponsoring it and a very generous prize up for grabs for one lucky entrant.

All week I have been deliberating as to what to use to make my entry for the "Dream Lover" theme. I knew straight away that I wanted to use the Catslife Press quote stamp that I acquired recently (thanks Kaz)! But it wasn't until I was able to get into my craftroom yesterday afternoon that I was able to find the perfect image to go with it. This romantic couple from Paper Artsy's Urban Snapshots range - Young Love 4 - fitted the bill perfectly!

Apologies for the poor quality photograph - as per usual I was stamping and taking photos at night! The flash has made the copper areas look more orangey, but in real life they are a bright metallic copper. You can click onto any of the photos for a clearer view if desired.

I gathered together some more supplies - a white card blank, some shiny copper mirror card, thick white card which had been previously sprayed with various pink / purple / copper ink sprays (from Sticky Fingers), some pearlescent pink card, double sided tape, foam pads, some pink gems and everything shown in the photo below. Hels is a great fan of all of Wendy Vecchi's products so I thought it would be appropriate to use the "Art Colours Life" stamp set (which happens to be the only one of Wendy Vecchi's that I own), together with the Large Heart from her Stencils for Art collection.  



I started by trimming a layer of copper mirror card slightly smaller than the front of my card blank, then I cut a smaller panel from the colourful ink sprayed card. I used the central heart shape from the stencil as a mask and inked up the large flower panel stamp below with Victorian Velvet Distress ink before stamping it all over the background to give it a subtle texture. When I removed the mask there was a feint outline of where the heart was, but it needed more definition, so I laid the outer stencil over the flower stamped portion of the card and christened my new Ranger mini ink blending tool with the Victorian Velvet Distress ink to add more depth of colour to the heart. I really like the new little circular ink blending tool as it's ideal to use with stencils and it's easy to control the ink without getting any harsh lines.

I stamped the lovers' image onto white card with Jet Black Archival ink and cut around it leaving a narrow white border. I used the mini ink blending tool and the Victorian Velvet Distress ink again to gently add a little shading to the couple, but I made sure to leave the man's shirt white - if he was anything like my husband he wouldn't be seen dead wearing pink!

This photo and the one below were both taken without flash, but have come out a bit dark. In reality the pink is more of a bright rose pink and what looks like gold is actually a warm copper colour.

The brilliant Catslife Press quote was stamped onto white card using the jet black Archival ink and the corners were rounded with a corner chomper. I then layered this onto a slightly larger rectangle of pearlescent pink card, also with rounded corners, and stuck it to the card with foam pads.

I used a pretty Magnolia Doohickey heart lace border die to trim either side of a strip of pearlescent pink card and added a narrower strip of card, which had been sprayed with slightly darker shades of pink and purple with copper. I used JustRite alphabet stamps (Times New Roman font - 50 pt) to make up the words "Dream Lover" which I then stamped onto the strip of card using the jet black Archival ink again. I trimmed the right-hand side to a fishtail shape and mounted it on the card with foam pads, to help ground the image of the pair of lovers (which I had stuck inside the heart using double sided tape). The final touch was the addition of three sparkly pink gemstones .

I was really happy with the finished card and am now considering making something similar in a cream and duck - egg blue colourway that I can use as a hanging in our bedroom. Watch this space!