Club Scrap Blog Hop: December Kit: Navigation

This is an amazing kit.  If you love pirates, sailing ships or old word this is the kit.  It is full of wonderful images and sayings.  The colors lend themselves to a vintage feel or can be enhanced with color.  Very versatile.    You should have arrived here from:  Hetty.  If you get lost, you can start at the beginning by following this link:  Club Scrap Blog Hop.

My Cards:

I went with the ship and vintage theme.  I had made a treasure chest for the Team Challenge, and was going to use the shadowbox card as the card.  Then changed my mind.  Once I started down that road, it was hard to change focus.  But I like all three and they would be perfect for a man or boy.  

Card 1:  

Lets start with the simplest and work to the most complex.  As you know I like to learn something new and this month was no different.  I had used my Distress Markers for the Watercolor Blog Hop and decided to continue with that at least for one card.  I have all the markers and am sad to say I haven't even begun to learn what I can and can not do with them.  They have a place in my kit. 

I think the markers enhance this image better than anything I could have tried.  It gave the vintage feel due to the muted tones of distress.  

This is how it was colored.  I work on a glass mat.  Scribbled the markers onto the glass and added water, painted onto the image.  After finished, I enhanced the edges with distress ink and cut out.  

I used many markers:  to name a few: Ground Espresso, Evergreen Bough, Barn Door, Festive Berries, Vintage Photo, Frayed Burlap, Chipped Saphire and Peacock Feathers. The ink pads were Bundled Sage, Broken China and Charmed Clover.  

The tag was stamped in Brown Ink and heat embossed with clear.  Here are some tidbits:  I used the back of one of the pattern papers.  We often forget about the back.  But for tags it is perfect and will match the project well.  I needed in antiqued, so inked it with Distress Ink in Ground Espresso and sprayed with water.  Perfect match.  Rather than finding that die, fussy cut to match the area that the tag needs to go.  It is just paper, if you make a mistake, cut again.  I shaped it and used foam dots for dimension.

Final steps.  One of the pattern papers was used as a mat, then a dark brown and finally mounted on a tan A2 card base.  The ribbon is seam tape that was left over from making the trunk.  If you did not see that project here is the link:  The trunk and Treasure inside the box.  Card one done!!

Card 2:  

This card is similar but has a bit more detail.  

The image was stamped in brown ink and heat set with clear embossing powder.  It was then colored with colored pencil.  After coloring a Dove blender was used to smooth and enhance certain areas.

After coloring the paper was torn with the idea of creating parchment.  or a piece of old paper.

Using Distress Ink: Vintage Photo and Ground Espresso, the edges were inked and further distressed and shaped.  

A mat was torn in roughly the same shape as the image, distressed with Ground Espresso and a distressing tool.  

This is an A6 finished card.  A mat was cut slightly smaller than the finished size with the darkest brown paper.  A pattern paper was cut thinking about the image that would show.  A ribbon wrapped and held in place with by a metal eyelet.

This tag was created the same way as in Card 1: using the backside of the mat paper, stamped in Brown ink and heat set in clear, distressed lightly with Ground Espresso.  Of note here, the tag is cut and shaped to fit into that corner .  The edges are chopped to give distinction and interest.  That focal piece is going to steal the show, but we want to make sure that the birthday message is present.  It has to do with design and how the eye moves around the paper.  

The focal image was added with foam mounting tape, and the edges shaped to give the impression of a folded or rather unfolded parchment.  I think this worked very well.

Card 3:

This card was the most challenging from a process perspective.  I wanted to make a shadow box card like the Recessed Window Card whose direction can be found here.  There is also a link to a YouTube Video.  Anyway, I wanted to "changed it up a bit".  I am not overly happy with it, but the technique of possibilities for this type of card are endless.  

So lets walk through the steps.  

First I cut a card that would finish at 6" square.  Since I had 6 inch paper I just cut it in half.  At the center scored (6") and again 1/4 inch from first score.  That gives us the "spine".

I deterred from the video instructions by using a die.  I am visual and having a die to measure is easier for me.  

Once it was centered, I drew around it and scored it just like in the original instruction.  Then using a knife, made the cross cut as described in the general instructions, folded and added score tape to the flaps.

I cut out mats that would fit into the "window area".  The first a Dark Brown was cut exactly to the size of the opening and then a smaller was cut from patterned paper.  The next step I missed photographing.  My son makes model sailing boats and he had a lot of little pieces left over from a ship.  I glued these pieces down with glossy accents.  Then this was secured inside of the window.

Next I cut a piece of acetate and stamped the sailing ship and "you are here" stamp to the acetate.

Using the dies I cut a frame from the green pattern paper and then put score tape around the outside.

The center row of score tape was removed and the acetate with the ship stamped was centered over the from and adhered.
A second piece of acetate, slightly larger was cut out.  Foam tape was added to the inside of the frame covering the center and outside score tape.  The score tape is used to help secure this.  It will act as a backup glue should the glue on the foam tape fail to hold securely.  Probably over kill, but I live in Texas and it is hard to get adhesive to stick when humidity is high.

Flitter and beads are added to the acetate that was stamped, and the second piece of acetate adhered to the foam tape.  Are you following me.  This was hard to photo with all the glare from the glitter and the acetate.  In other words we are making a sandwich.  The frame is the Bread for example, acetate with stamping the "meat", glitter "the cheese", plain acetate the second "piece of Bread".  More score tape was added and this sandwich was affixed to the front of the card.  Creating a window pane over the box.  Whew!!!

A view of stamped acetate, mat with "things" and the beads.

Inside:  the center from the frame was used to cover the box and then message cards were matted and adhered to the mat:

Wooden arrows were distressed with ink and finished the layout.

On the bottom, a mat was cut from white paper in kit, a journaling tag added and a bow was made from left over ribbon.

Finished inside. You can see the "spine here.
All that was left was to add an embellishment to the front and call it done.

Thank you for stopping by.  Your next stop is:  Annette

Supplies:
With the exception of ink, glue, markers, colored pencils, and some of the ribbon, all of the supplies came from December's Kit: Navigation

If you would like to learn a technique or have an idea, post a comment.
Thank you for hopping and
Happy Crafting,
Josette