Merry Christmas Snowflake Card

Simon Says Stamp's Wednesday challenge this week is "Get Crafty and Use Kraft." I decided to create a Christmas card. Since most of the card was cool blues, I used kraft cardstock for the banner behind the focal panel, to add a bit of warmth.

My inspiration for my card came from this blog post by Lisa Flemming. I was drawn to the simple composition and the embossed background, & had pinned this card on Pinterest quite some time ago. I finally decided to CASE it for this challenge.

I began by embossing the background panel. I used the "A2 Intricate Swirl" embossing folder by The Paper Studio. I also cut a piece of the same light blue cardstock for the focal panel. Next I die cut the snowflake from silver glitter paper, with one of Spellbinders' "2013 Snowflake Pendant" dies. I stamped the greeting from this Hero Arts set onto the focal panel, using Hero Arts' Navy Mid-tone Shadow ink. After running the snowflake through my Xyron Sticker Maker, I adhered it to the focal panel above the greeting.

For the card base, I first created an A2-size top-folding card from white cardstock. I placed it in the scalloped die from the Mama Elephant "Femme Frames" set, making sure the fold of the card was below the cutting line. Then I ran it through my Spellbinders Grand Calibur machine, basically cutting the 3 sides with the scalloped edge, leaving the folded edge intact. I blended Chipped Sapphire Distress ink around the front to create a dark blue mat for my background panel.

The inspiration card had the focal panel matted. I decided to ink the edges with Chipped Sapphire instead. I felt this not only gave it the necessary definition, but that the soft blending looks almost frosty.

Finally, after cutting the banner from kraft cardstock, it was time to assemble the card. I glued the embossed background panel to the card base, and glued the banner in place on top of that. I adhered the focal panel with foam adhesive. And that finished this card.

I'm also entering this card in Hero Arts' Holiday Challenge: Anything Goes.