Nothing Sweeter!

Hello, Crafters. 

Yesterday I was playing with the Nothing Sweeter Stamp Set,

 and the Sweetly Stitched Framelits Die - both available as a 

bundle and therefore saving 10%! The tree, heart and gift 

are two step stamping, and all have a die to cut them out. 

Each of them also has a smaller die that fits inside the outline

 die, and puts in stitching around the edge. 

 The gift has horizontal lines as in stitches, the tree has

 vertical lines that look like dominoes, and the heart has

 little crosses on it. All these details offer several variations

 as to how this set can be used. The last photograph shows

 some of the ideas I came up with when I first started playing! 

My first colour choice was Blackberry Bliss, but I decided that

was too dark for the effect I was trying to achieve! I'd stamped

 the gift in Blackberry Bliss Ink onto a multi-coloured sheet 

from the Frosted Floral Designer Series Paper (DSP). I fussy cut 

it - although I could have die cut it, it was such an easy shape 

- and then I stamped it again on Blackberry Bliss Cardstock

 (CS) and fussy cut just the ribbon and the bow. 

Then I adhered the die cut to the patterned gift, but it was

 so dark the stamped details couldn't be seen. I tried the 

same idea again, except in reverse, and with Mint Macaroon.

 I thought it looked a lot nicer this way because the detail

 on the bow can be seen. The third image in the last 

photograph is what the ribbon and bow look like

 when fussy cut on their own. 

My first thought was, if the bow was cut off, a man's tie, and 

then I thought bow tie with the ribbon cut off! What do you

 see? In the end I decided to keep my gifts in three plain 

colours - Tranquil Tide, Mint Macaroon, and Soft Sea Foam 

- so I could put them on the same DSP I used yesterday. 

I thought about making one small tag with the sentiment

 JUST FOR YOU for each gift, but then I decided I wanted

 one larger tag, and chose the CHRISTMAS GREETINGS. I

 found a tag-shaped die in the All the Presents Thinlits Dies,

 and the size was spot on, but the Whisper White 

CS disapeared into the DSP!

I took a scrap of Tranquil Tide, and drew around the outside

 of the tag die. After I fussy cut it I threaded a piece of Soft

 Suede Baker's Twine - to match the stamping - through the 

hole and tied it into a bow. I adhered the there trees, and 

the tag using Dimensionals. I used some of the wooden 

elements from the Frames Elements (page 199) to decorate

 the knots on all three bows and the top and bottom

 of the sentiment tag.

 I finished the front of the card by painting all the wooden

 elements, plus the bows and the ribbons, using my Clear 

Wink of Stella Glitter Pen. To decorate the inside of the card,

 I adhered a layer of Tranquil Tide CS, and then a layer of

 Mint Macaroon CS. To this I added an half inch strip of the

 DSP and then adhered a Mint Macaroon Gift, decorated the

 same as the gift on the front of the card, but with the 

stitched lines added, and adhered it in the bottom 

right-hand corner.

 I'm very pleased with my card and used the same design

 for a Basic Black and Soft Sea Foam card I made 

yesterday for a challenge card. The challenge has been

 started by a lady in my Super Stars team and is being

 called Karen's Saturday Challenge! We'll be sharing our cards

 tomorrow, and I'll be sharing mine with you on Monday morning! 

I suppose these first two are paper-piecing, which is one 

of my favourite techniques!

I hope you have a great weekend whatever you are planning to do.

 Until tomorrow, happy crafting.

JanB.