Message in a Bottle

Hello, Crafters.

This is such a fun stamp set, I can't understand why I this is the first time I've  played with it! 

I really didn't have a clue what I was going to do for today's card until I saw something in the demonstrator's quarterly magazine from Stampin' Up'. 

The magazine is jam-packed with ideas, tips and projects, and today I saw a card which had three strips of the Wood Textures Designer Series Paper (DSP) Stack, as the top layer - it looked fabulous! 

It struck me as an outstanding base for a masculine card, so next I started looking for something masculine to make it into a card. 

By the way, I'm really pleased that this DSP Stack will be brought forward into the new Annual Catalogue, which is very unusual for DSP, but it has been so amazingly popular, and has been selling like hot cakes!

I chose the Message in a Bottle Stamp Set as there are five different images to choose from that fit inside the bottle.

Mental note to self: come back to this stamp set again sometime soon!! ☺

When I was choosing which three strips of wood DSP to use, I decided I wanted two where the grain was going horizontal, and one was vertical, or vice versa!

Today I have been working on my swaps - for the Stampin' Up! OnStage Convention on 7th April - and I had Very Vanilla Cardstock (CS) on my desk, so I decided to use it for today's card, too!

As my main colour is Crumb Cake, I think all the colours workk together brilliantly!
 
For the pennant, I stamped the bottle using Early Espresso Ink, and then filled it with Marina Mist water, and next added the ship in Early Espresso .

I stamped the little sentiment that was obviously designed to go with the  image, just underneath it. and then I used the little spotty stamp from the Amazing Congratulations Stamp Set to finish off the pennant!

For the main sentiment, I wanted something that was a reasonable size, but not so big that it covered the wood panelling. 

After going through my Stamp Reference File, I picked out the Happy Birthday Gorgeous Stamp Set. 

I first tried painting the Happy using my Marina Mist Marker Pen, and then the Birthday using my Early Espresso Marker Pen. 

I wasn't happy with how it stamped, and decided to stamp it in Marina Mist Ink, without cleaning the stamp first!

I knew there would be a hint of Early Espresso on the stamp, and I wondered what it would look like! 

The Birthday came out a darker blue than the Happy, and I liked the effect, although it's not quite so obvious now that it's totally dry, but I still like it. ☺

To decorate inside the card I added a Very Vanilla layer, and then a bottle I had cut out by hand. 

This was the first bottle I did, but the sentiment was too far away so I couldn't use the pennant! 

I think this is the best masculine card I've made for a long time - I'm really pleased with it!

That's about it from me today, until tomorrow, happy crafting,

JanB.