Hi there,
Can you believe it's April 1 already? Is it starting to look and feel a bit more like spring where you are, or are you still bundling up against the cold? (Or are you on the other side of the world where it's just starting to get cold as you're coming into winter?) :)
Well, with the first of the month, brings the Senior Design Team Challenge at Papertrey Ink and this month, Nichole has challenged us to dust off our Butterfly Kisses stamp sets and give them a bit of love.
With Papertrey now carrying three different butterfly dies, making your own custom butterfly embellishments is a cinch, especially when you pair the dies with Butterfly Kisses. The largest die in the photo above is the butterfly die I designed -- the Signature Series: Butterfly die. The medium sized die (top of photo) is called the Butterfly die and the smallest one (bottom right) is from the Love Lives Here die collection.
I started out by die cutting a whole pile of butterflies using those 3 dies. I ran all 3 dies thru the Big Shot at the same time, with a different piece of card stock each time. That way, I could cut out 3 butterflies at once. I used kraft, hawaiian shores and dark chocolate card stock as well as clearly creative card stock and vellum card stock.
I wanted to show you the clear card stock butterflies because I stamped them with a butterfly image from Butterfly Kisses, using versamark ink, and then heat embossed them with clear embossing powder. It may not look like much, but it helps the clear card stock to have a bit more depth when you stack the butterflies up. You'll see what I mean in a bit.
I stamped each of the butterflies with various images from Butterfly Kisses and after they were all stamped or embossed, I was ready to start stacking them up. I cut a piece of patterned paper from the Library Ledger collection and stamped the "Birthday wishes" sentiment along the top of the paper. Then, I used a 2-way glue pen to lightly adhere the butterflies in place, just in the center of each butterfly. I went ahead and stacked up each pile of butterflies -- 5 butterflies in each little pile -- so I could see how I wanted each butterfly to be layered. Once I knew which ones needed to go in each stack, I used the glue pen to hold them together just long enough for me to stitch down the center of each stack of butterflies. I lightly glued all of the butterflies in the top stack, stitched them, and then moved on to the next stack.
Once all the stitching was complete, I was able to adhere the patterned paper to the kraft card base, easily hiding all of the stitches on the back side of the paper. When trimming the threads off the front of the card, I left them a tiny bit longer than I normally would, just to give it a more rustic feel. Buttons were added (with foam adhesive) to each butterfly, as well as a few in the lower right corner (with scor-tape).
These photos give you a close up look at the 5 layers that make up each butterfly. See what I mean about the clear embossing adding a nice detail on the clear card stock?
Well, that's it for me today but don't forget that all of the other girls on the Sr. Team have projects to share with you too!
Mish Wooderson
Heather Nichols
Lisa Johnson
Betsy Veldman
I hope you'll pop back by tomorrow......I've got another card to share with you -- one I made for my Grandma's birthday.
Until then, take care and have a great weekend....
{Birthday Wishes supplies}
Paper: clearly creative card stock, vellum card stock, kraft, aqua mist, dark chocolate, Library Ledger
Stamps: Butterfly Kisses
Ink: dark chocolate, hawaiian shores, versamark
Other: signature series: butterfly die, butterfly die, love lives here (butterfly) die, clear embossing powder, aqua mist/dark chocolate/fine linen buttons, chocolate baker's twine, sewing machine/thread