Some days…

Hello! Today I wanted to share another card that nearly wasn’t. I came very close to throwing it out several times but I’m so glad I didn’t. I think it’s a great card idea to give a friend who has been battling illness and is now slowly recovering.

I started this card by stamping the images and sentiments from MFT’s You Make My Tail Wag Stamp set and their Lucky Dog Stamp set using black Ranger Archival dye ink. When I bought these sets, I couldn’t wait combine these two images to make a humerus card, as the MFT design team had. 

I thought, after adding the second part of the sentiment, that it was a little “wrong” for someone celebrating their birthday. I put the card aside for months, thinking it was another failed design attempt. But now, I now see it as the perfect message of support to someone who is on the road to recovery. 

I coloured the images with generic watercolour markers (similar to Tombow markers). I then used a stencil that I created, using MFT’s Oval Shadow die set, to draw shadows beneath each feature image. I traced around the stencil with my grey watercolour marker so that it would finish up without an outline, as shadows do.

Once the features had dried fully, I began to stencil the background, using distress inks and an Inkylicious ink duster. I started with MFT’s Stencil Sun Ray stencil  and applied Mustard Seed Distress Ink. After cleaning the stencil, I masked the sun circle, twisted the stencil so that all the yellow was covered and inked the rays again using Tumbled Glass Distress Ink.

As the sentiment implies that not all days are “sunny”, I stenciled a few cloud banks behind the sentiment, using MFT’s Stencil Cloud and Hickory Smoke Distress Ink. I finished the cloud bank off by inking a straight line beneath the last cloud layer, giving the clouds a lower edge. It’s amazing the effect you can get with a couple of stencils and an ink blending tool.

I didn’t want to leave the bottom half of the card empty of shading, so I inked just the edges, starting with Tumbled Glass below the clouds. I moved down the lower sides of the card with a little Bundled Sage Distress Ink and finished the bottom of the card off with Scattered Straw.

Once I had completed that, I noticed by inking generously around the edges, I had created a “spotlight” on the feature, which I really liked, so, to finish the card off, I left it alone. Sometimes less really is more!
 
I still wanted to emphasize the front sentiment was actually encouragement and to do that I added a few dots at the end of the cover sentiment and on the inside I added:
             “But, On your birthday,
              You’re always Top Dog!”

Finally, onto the challenges. I have entered into a number of challenges, this week, with an “anything goes” theme. They are:

• Color Crazy Challenge #27
• Craft Rocket Challenges #39
• Crafting With An Attitude #29
• Crafting With Friends Challenge #47
• Crafty Creations Challenge #345
• Creative Fingers Challenge #134
• Dragonfly Dreams July Challenge
• Jo’s Scrap Shack #196
• Lemon Shortbread Challenge #45
• Simply Papercrafts Challenge #48

Making Memories Crafting Challenge #7 have added “anything but square” to their “anything goes” theme, while The Crafty Addicts Challenge #38 has “something humerus” added. 4 Crafty Chicks Challenge #358 have a challenge theme of stamping and A Gem Of A Challenge #198 theme is animals. Last but not least, Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge has a theme of summer sunshine.

Thanks for reading today!