Season's Greetings

I am very excited to be the guest designer at Christmas Card Throwdown for their July sketch challenge! Feel free to play along, and follow the sketch below. You can rotate it, flip it, or follow it exactly.

I decided to use the Poppystamps "Blooming Poinsettia" die set for the circle element in the sketch. I die cut the pieces from Strathmore Smooth Bristol paper. I ran them through my machine again with an embossing mat, to make sure the veins in the bracts (petals) & leaves were as pronounced as possible. Since I didn't want to color my flower just red & green, I did a search on Pinterest for pink & white poinsettias. I found this image, and decided to go with that color scheme. I chose a few of my Tombow water-based markers to color my pieces. I did some blending on the leaves, but left the colors pretty much unblended for the bracts, following the reference photo I'd chosen.

Because I wanted the bracts & leaves to have some lift, I decided to glue them only at the center parts of the flower & one end of the leaves. So that none of the white on the back of each piece would show, I did a rough coloring, emulating the front of each bract & leaf.

I chose a patterned paper from the "Rejoice" 6x6" pad from Creative Imaginations (long discontinued) for my background. I cut it to 3-3/4x5", added it to a narrow dark green mat, and adhered it to a beige cardstock panel that I'd mounted to my white A2-size card base. I added a banner of pale green cardstock to my panel to go behind the flower. Then I glued my flower & leaves to the lower right corner, letting one petal & leaf extend beyond the patterned paper layer for added interest.

I stamped my greeting, from Hero Arts "Color Layering Partridge" (discontinued), with Versamark ink onto a scrap of Essentials by Ellen 40 lb. vellum. After I heat embossed it with Ranger Princess Gold embossing powder, I cut it into a banner. I applied small dots of liquid glue to the back, behind the words, and adhered it over my poinsettia, lined up with the green banner I'd already glued down. I love how this card came out! I encourage you to join in the fun at Christmas Card Throwdown's blog. Just think of how satisfied you'll be when your holiday cards are finished BEFORE the holidays! :)