In Love with Wink of Stella

Feeling all fiddly....

You know when you just feel like sitting down and doing something really fiddly?  Sort of like fussy cutting but without the cutting.  Well, that was how I felt last night.  I had no idea what I was going to do.  I had no plan in mind, but earlier in the day I was flipping through my patterned papers, and decided that I really wanted to use some grey.  I love greys...

Note:  At no point did I ever really "fall in love" with this card...  I fussed over it a lot.  I like it, but I'm still not satisfied with it.  This is probably a design I'll come back to again and change.

These look almost brown in this photo, but they really are grey!

The other thing I wanted to incorporate was Wink of Stella, and because these papers have such beautiful patterns on them, I thought what better way than to trace the patterns with the Wink of Stella to give them a little shine.

Yup, those are my bifocals in the picture...

I decided on another 5x5 card - one of my favourites.  I cut Neenah Solar White 110 lb card stock at 5 x 10 and scored at 5".  I also cut a lighter black card stock (65 lb) at 5x5.  I chose to use lighter weights because I knew the card was going to be a little on the hefty side as I would stacking and glueing card stock together, so I didn't want to go overboard.  I used my Silhouette with a dark grey card stock (65 lb) to cut the scalloped frame, and also to cut the word "Love" out of the paper.  

I have to tell you that I love my Silhouette.  I don't have a lot of dies, and I find with the Silhouette I can really personalize things, easily change shapes and sizes of elements, etc.  It's such a versatile tool!

I cut 5 extra Love words and one from the patterned paper for the top of the stack, and used the the base as a guide to start layering and stacking.  Each layer was glued into place, and I built it up until I had 5 layers including the final layer of patterned paper.

I did the same thing with hearts.  I cut one copy of each with patterned paper, and then 5 more copies of each size in the dark grey paper.  I glued each stack together layer by layer and topped each one with a patterned piece.

I cut a lot more than I needed, but I put those away to use in another project.

With all the heart stacks glued onto the base, I knew it was missing something.  So I chose two different heart stamps, the smaller from the Lawn Fawn Home Sweet Home set, and the bigger one from a heart set by Inkadinkado.  I used Memento Tuxedo Black ink and stamped off once before stamping onto the card.  I only wanted a very subtle look since this is a fairly plain and simple card.  I traced each heart with Wink of Stella to give the card some glitter and shine in an understated way, and then traced the patterns on the hearts and Love.  It's too bad you can't really see that in the photos, because the end result is really pretty.

Still missing something, I chose some light pink ribbon and attached it to the card.

One thing I've learned is to first secure the ribbon to the back of the card with adhesive, and then secure it again with whatever adhesive you're using to adhere the card to the base.  A little security is a good thing!

So there it is!  This card went from "Gee, I really like those grey papers", to a finished card.  I'm not going to lie...  This card took hours because I had no plan in mind, but sometimes just flying by the seat of your pants is a lot more fun than having a well laid-out plan.

Like I said, this is a design I'll probably come back to again and change a few things along the way.

Hope you enjoyed it!

What I used...

Simon Says Stamp - Inkadinkado Clear Hearts

Lawn Fawn Home Sweet Home

Simon Says Stamp - Wink of Stella Clear

Ellen Hutsen - Momento Tuxedo Black Ink
Ellen Hutsen - Neenah Solar White 80 lb Card Stock
Simon Says Stamp - Neenah Solar White 80 lb Card Stock
Ellen Hutsen - Neenah Solar White 110 lb Card Stock
Simon Says Stamp - Neenah Solar White 110 lb Card Stock
Tombo Mono Multi Glue
Scotch Tape Runner
Fiskars SureCut Paper Trimmer
Martha Stewart Score Board
Silhouette Cameo