Deck the Halls

The current Lawnscaping challenge theme is "One Layer." I must admit, when I pulled out my Lawn Fawn stamps, I was not feeling inspired. I did start a one-layer card, but the ink for some reason never dried and I ended up smearing it. Since I wasn't enamored with the design to begin with, I just scrapped that idea, and tossed the card in my recycling bin. Finally, I decided to go with my other idea, to create a wreath with several of the elements in the "Deck the Halls" mini stamp set.

First, I created a white top-folding A2 card base from 110 lb. cardstock. I lightly traced with a pencil around the smallest "Grand Circles" die by Spellbinders in the upper right corner, creating a path to guide my stamping. I stamped the pine branches with Hero Arts Forever Green & Soft Leaf inks; the pine cones with Hero Arts Cup o' Joe & Colorbox Chestnut Roan chalk ink; the small leaf cluster with Hero Arts Green Hills; and the berries with Hero Arts Red Royal and Delicata Golden Glitz. When the wreath was as full as I wanted it, I moved on to the greeting.

This is where my process got a bit dicey. I totally forgot the challenge requirement to make this a one-layer card. I stamped the "Deck the Halls" greeting on a strip of white cardstock, heat embossed it with Ranger Gold embossing powder, and blended Gathered Twigs Distress ink over that, for a bit of contrast. I cut that into a banner shape, added some gold glitter cardstock & another banner from a plaid patterned paper, and layered them onto the card. As I was admiring my handiwork, it suddenly dawned on me what I'd done! Thankfully, I was able to peel my banners CAREFULLY off the card front, without ripping the cardstock base. Whew! :)

I then stamped the same greeting directly on the card front with Versamark ink, and heat embossed it with the gold embossing powder. The greeting still looked like it needed something to ground it, though. I considered masking off the areas above & below it, and inking over the greeting with Gathered Twigs. But that seemed like it would be too heavy. So I lightly penciled in a line on either side of the greeting, in the middle, to see if I liked that. I did, so I erased the pencil and redrew the line with a gold gel pen, using my T-square ruler to make sure it was straight. I rounded the upper right corner with the 1/2" side of my Corner Chomper, and this card is done!

I'm also entering this card in the following challenges:

Live Love Cards September "Sparkle & Shine"
Simon Says Stamp's Wednesday "Anything Goes"