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Hi everyone,

Welcome to a very different edition of Step-it-Up Sunday. I hope you have had a fabulous week. I returned to work after 2 weeks of school holidays. Getting up with an alarm is a struggle. I had enjoyed staying up all hours of the night and getting up at all hours of the morning! Now I’m back into my daily routine.

Generally, when I create the Step-it-Up Sunday cards I work from the Basic Card and progress up to each level. This time I had a Basic card but I also had a bit of an idea of how I wanted the Advanced card to look like.  So my challenge was to then make the 2 levels meet in the middle. I knew I wanted to use the Best Birds bundle as I love the birds and especially the burlap look stamp . That particular stamp made me want to make a textured look from, it such as embossing. 

On the first card I have stamped the branches in Soft Suede then sponged Pear Pizzazz on the leaves (very randomly) and Soft Sky on the rest of the Whisper White cardstock. 

The bird has been coloured in with Pumpkin Pie, Bermuda Bay and Chocolate Chip water colour pencils. The sentiment has been stamped in Bermuda Bay.

The Intermediate card has more branches stamped around the Whisper White layer. Then I coloured in the leaves with the Old Olive water colour pencil. The flowers were stamped in Pumpkin Pie ink on Pumpkin Pie cardstock. I have distressed the edges of the matte, bird and sentiment using a sponge dauber with Soft Suede ink.

For the advanced crafter I wanted to create a really special background for this bird. It’s quite vintage and distressed.

My first step was to take my clear stamp blocks direct to the ink pad. I started with Soft Sky and Clear Block C. Once I inked it up I then spritzed it with water and stamped just the block directly onto  Shimmer cardstock. I did this again on the diagonal side. I repeated this step in Pear Pizzazz on opposite ends of the cardstock. Then I came in with Soft Suede ink on Clear Block B. I inked this, spritzed and stamped on an angle in a couple of places. The colours will overlap and that adds to the interest. Using the aqua brush I moved the colour around and added any extra colour from the blocks to create a nice mix of colours. Don’t overmix as it can get muddy. Leave to dry.

I partially covered the Sheet Music stamp with a torn piece of paper and inked up in Versamark ink and then immediately in Soft Sky. Then stamped it onto cardstock and heat embossed in Clear embossing powder. Then I took the Versamark ink pad directly to the cardstock and stamped on the corner. I heat embossed in Copper embossing powder. This was done 3 times with the embossing powder narrowing along the page. The burlap stamp was also heat embossed in copper on the top right corner.

Next I tore the edges of the cardstock. To make it easier, run the aqua brush along the edge so it softens the cardstock. I then distressed right around the entire piece adding extra depth along the torn edges.

I die cut a set of branches from DSP and stamped and die cut another set from Pear Pizzazz cardstock. The leaves and flowers were inked around the edges in Soft Suede. Then I cut the leaves in individual sections and attached hem on the branches with a bit of glue on the bottom end. 

The bird this time was coloured in Stampin ‘ Blends, die cut and I inked the edges.

The sentiment was embossed in copper and the edges were torn and distressed. Some ribbon trim and copper sequins completed the vintage look for this card. 

Product List

Best Birds Photopolymer Bundle

Best Birds Photopolymer Bundle
[142315]
$73.75
Heat Tool

$50.00