Backgrounds 3 - Vintage Christmas

My romanticized ideal of what Christmas should be like was formed from two influences.  One is the Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens and one from the many years we spent with our daughters in ballet and dancing in The Nutcracker every year.

It involves beautifully rich decor, Victorian costumes, sugar plums and hearts changed from stone to flesh!

Families get together and party, gifts are exchanged, and a soft snow falls.  I know it never turns out that way, but that's the way my imagination rolls!





For my last background technique, I wanted to do the Faux Patina technique and I imagined it on a vintage Chrismas card.

• I'm a little sad, because the photos just don't do the card justice.  It looks so richly vintage in real life and somehow, the lighting and photo didn't pull that off.
• The faux patina background definitely adds to the vintage feel of the card.  I used a variety of inks sponged on to create that effect.  Here's a similar panel without the foreground:

• You start by adding some Crumb Cake in to underneath the top of the Beautifully Baroque embossing folder.  I used a brayer to accomplish that.  Then you add your Very Vanilla cardstock and run it through the Big Shot.
• You then sponge on your inks starting with the lightest colours and ending with the darkest.  I wanted to go for a red and gold design, so I started with Rose Red, then Old Olive, then Cherry Cobbler and finally Early Espresso.
• Dry your ink with the lower setting on the Heat Tool, and then rub over the paper with your Embossing Buddy to make sure that all the ink is dried up.
• I lightly applied (I could have been much lighter) VersaMark by rubbing (lightly) the pad (lightly) over the cardstock.  (The first time I did it, I was much too heavy handed and the whole paper was covered in gold embossing powder.)
• Apply the Gold Stampin' Emboss Powder and heat set it with the Stampin' Up Heat Tool.

• To keep the card vintage looking I stamped the tree from the Special Season stamp set in just one color, Old Olive.  The greeting from the same set is stamped in Cherry Cobbler.  I worked the end of the flag with the bone folder until the paper plies separated and curled each ply separately.
• Baked Brown Sugar Ruffle Stretch Trim added the perfect touch, as did two Vintage Trinkets brads.

My Technique Night classes will be very busy trying these three background techniques this week!  Thanks for dropping by!

Stamps:  Special (w131766); c131769)

Paper:  Old Olive (100702) and Very Vanilla (101650) card stock; Watercolour Paper (122959)

Ink:  Classic Stampin' Pads in Crumb Cake (126975), Rose Red (126954), Old Olive (126953), Cherry Cobbler (126966) and Early Espresso (126974); VersaMark (102283)

Accessories:  Gold Stampin' Emboss Powder (109129); Vintage Trinkets (118764); 3/8" Ruffle Stretch Trim in Baked Brown Sugar (130022)

Tools:  Beautifully Baroque Textured Impressions Embossing Folder (130917); Brayer (102395); Heat Tool (129053); Embossing Buddy (103083); Stamping Sponges (101610); Ovals Collection Framelits (129381)

Beautifully Baroque Embossing Folder

Heat Tool

Ovals Collection Framelits

Special Season Stamp Set

Stampin' Sponges

Versamark Ink

Vintage Trinkets

If It Ain't Baroque, Don't Fix It!

Wow!  Already it's time for a new challenge over at As You See It Challenges.  What fun we had the for the first week!  And if you didn't have time to enter that first challenge, see how you do with this next one!

The talented Amanda has come up with another winner!  It looks deceptively simple, but there is a lot of space that you have to design here.  I first tried a fall design, but decided it was much to similar to my first sample so I went to something completely different!

• My palette is Coastal Cabana, Smoky Slate and Whisper White, and I went to Eastern Elegance for some DSP to match!
• My stamp set is Lovely Romance, which has a definite Baroque style, similar to Eastern Elegance.  Baroque is an Arts period starting in the late 1600's defined by sumptuous ornate details.  Read more about it here.  I hand cut the little Smoky Slate design thingy (what do you call that??) and popped it up on Dimensionals.
• Do you notice the little slots I made in my Smoky Slate Cardstock to allow the Coastal Cabana strip to pass through?  I actually had to do some math in order to have it centered properly!  The Smoky Slate has been embossed with the Beautifully Baroque embossing folder.

• Now let me draw your attention to the doily, ribbon and Rhinestone Basic Jewels on this card. Stampin' Up doesn't sell any of them in this colour.  The ribbon and the doily are Very Vanilla and the rhinestones are - well, just rhinestones.
• I mixed up some 70% Alcohol with several drops of Coastal Cabana reinker in a Stampin' Spritzer.  I place the doily and the ribbon in an old pie plate and spritzed away.  In seconds, both the ribbon and the Tea Lace Paper Doily were duly rendered Coastal Cabana coloured!  And in a few more seconds (thanks to the alcohol), they were dry and ready to use!  I love how they look here.
• The rhinestones were coloured using a Sharpie permanent marker - easy peasy!

I hope you'll play along, too!  Here's the link again:  As You See It Challenge 2.

Stamps:  Lovely Romance (w130264; c130267)
Paper:  Eastern Elegance Design Series Paper (130131); Coastal Cabana (131297), Smoky Slate (131202) and Whisper White (100730) cardstock
Ink:  Classic Stampin' Pads in Coastal Cabana (131175) and Smoky Slate (131179); Coastal Cabana Ink Refill (131164); Sharpie marker
Accessories:  Tea Lace Paper Doily (129399); 1/8" Taffeta Ribbon in Very Vanilla (retired); Large Rhinestone Basic Jewels (129324); Rhinestone Basic Jewels (119246)
Tools:  Big Shot (113439); Beautifully Baroque Embossing Folder (130917); Stampin' Spritzer (126185); Stampin' Trimmer (126889); Stamping Sponges (101610)

Beautifully Baroque Embossing Folder

 Big Shot

Eastern Elegance DSP

Lovely Romance Stamp Set

Rhinestone Basic Jewels

Stamping Sponges

Stampin' Spritzers