Hello Friends!

It’s raining outside which means – the smoke is clearing!  I’ve been praying hard for rain, as I know so many others have as well.  I’ve not heard official reports as yet, but I’m guessing the showers we’ve been getting since last night have really knocked the heat out of the fires we’ve been experiencing.  A very welcome change for all of our amazing firefighters!  Hopefully the thousands of displaced families will be able to go back home soon.

I met some lovely pups at the animal shelter this week, many of whom are there due to their owners having to evacuate and unable to have their pets with them.  The pups were all so eager to get out of their cages and soak up some affection, which I was happy to provide.  Hopefully they and their families will be reunited soon.  I can only imagine what’s going through the minds of those fur babies.  It was obvious that some of them are quite accustomed to being lap dogs and are missing their people badly, as I’m sure their people are missing them too.  I’m looking forward to returning to the shelter next week and hopefully finding that some, if not all, of the evacuees have gone home.  I enjoyed my time at the shelter and have committed to volunteering there at least one day a week.

At any rate, the rain has me back in my craft room and I chose to play with the Poinsettia Petals products once again.

I’m a country gal and my jeans are nearly always dirty by the end of the day.  I frequently have to scrub the dirt from under my fingernails as well.  I find myself frequently trying to “grunge up” my cards just a little bit for a more rustic look; today was no different.

I cut my mat layers and when I laid them out, everything just looked too “clean”.  I generally turn to my ink pads and sponges to ink up the edges, but this time I decided I wanted a little imperfect “gilded” edge to my DSP.  I tried my gold gilding marker, but it wouldn’t apply evenly and didn’t look as I had imagined.

So, I found some metallic paint (I think I got it on Amazon some time ago), and a flat brush and sort of smeared that around the edges of my DSP.  I intentionally applied it thin so I could see the DSP underneath, and rounded the inside corners a bit.

The paint has just enough metallic shimmer to it to highlight the gold foil paper without being “matchy-matchy”.  I think it adds that little bit of rustic-ness that I was looking for!

I chose to use So Saffron Stampin’ Blends (dark and light) to color the poinsettia petals which were stamped in Early Espresso.

Has anyone else noticed that poinsettias come in just about every color of the rainbow the last few years?  As such, one could make the poinsettia any color, as they’re certainly not limited to red, pink and white any longer!

LET’S GET INKY!

Materials:

Stamp Sets Used:

• Poinsettia Petals
• For Unto Us

Metal Dies:

• Poinsettia Dies
• Beautiful Boughs

Punch:

• Label Me Lovely

Embossing Folder:

• Scripty 3D

Paper:

• Whisper White CS (card base) – 5 1/2″ x 8 1/2″ – fold in half at 4 1/4″
• Poinsettia Place DSP – Mat 1 (Brown pinecones) 5 3/8″ x 4 1/8″    Mat 2 (poinsettias) 5 3/8″ x 3 3/4″
• Gold Foil Paper – 3″ x 2 1/2″
• Garden Green CS

Ink:

• Early Espresso

Accessories:

• Gold Glitter Enamel Dots
• Gold Cord
• DecoArt Metallic Venetian Gold Paint (available on Amazon)

PUTTING IT TOGETHER:

1. Apply metallic paint to edges of DSP and let dry.
2. Run gold foil paper piece through Stampin’ Cut & Emboss machine in Scripty 3D embossing folder.
3. Stamp one each of all three poinsettia petals stamps in Early Espresso.
4. Use So Saffron Stampin’ Blends Combo to color petals.
5. Crop petals out using Poinsettia Dies and adhere together using liquid glue or mini glue dots in the center of each.
6. Apply Gold Glitter Enamel Dots to center of poinsettia.  Using the Take-Your-Pick tool to apply these small dots is the easiest method (personal opinion!)
7. Crop fir boughs from Garden Green CS using Beautiful Boughs Dies.
8. Stamp the sentiment from For Unto Us on Whisper White scrap and use Label Me Lovely Punch to cut out.
9. Adhere paint-edged mat 2, to brown pinecone mat 1.
10. Adhere sentiment label to gold foil embossed piece, and adhere that to mat stack about 1/2″ from top and centered.
11. Adhere the end of a 6″ piece of gold cord to back of mat stack approximately 1/4″ from left edge, wrap over the front and adhere other end to back as well.
12. Tie a small bow with a piece of gold cord and use a mini glue dot to stick it to the cord on the front of the card approximately at the bottom edge of the gold foil piece.
13. Adhere fir boughs and place poinsettia in the center.

DONE!

A country-rustic, not-red poinsettia for Christmas!

I hope I’ve inspired you to get a little inky today.

It’s time for me to go feed my horses and get a little country-grungy cleaning their stalls!

Until next time,

Janet

Product List

Poinsettia Place Suite Collection (English) [155109] $94.00	Poinsettia Petals Bundle (English) [155148] $56.50	Poinsettia Petals Photopolymer Stamp Set (English) [153475] $27.00	Poinsettia Dies [153522] $36.00	For Unto Us Cling Stamp Set [153335] $21.00
Poinsettia Place Designer Series Paper [153487] $11.50	Whisper White 8-1/2″ X 11″ Cardstock [100730] $9.75	Garden Green 8-1/2″ X 11″ Cardstock [102584] $8.75	Beautiful Boughs Dies [150661] $35.00	Label Me Lovely Punch [151296] $18.00
Scripty 3D Embossing Folder [149634] $10.00	Early Espresso Classic Stampin’ Pad [147114] $7.50	So Saffron Stampin’ Blends Combo Pack [154905] $9.00	Gold Glitter Enamel Dots [152155] $8.00	Wonder Of The Season Ribbon Combo Pack [153537] $9.00
Take Your Pick [144107] $10.00	Mini Glue Dots [103683] $5.25	Multipurpose Liquid Glue [110755] $4.00	Stampin’ Cut & Emboss Machine [149653] $120.00	Magnetic Cutting Plate [149656] $24.00
Paper Trimmer [152392] $25.00