Paid Promotion for Spellbinders Paper Arts

I’m still charmed by Simon Hurley’s Woodland Wildlife Stamp and Die Set. So for an Instagram challenge with a snow globe theme, I watercolored the reindeer from it. I also submitted it to Simon Says Stamp’s Monday Challenge.

Reindeer & Friends

I heat embossed the reindeer and a few other critters with Ranger Super Fine Silver Embossing Powder. Then I colored them with my artist grade watercolors. I mixed Indian Red with Cinerous Blue to make a neutral grey. For the cheeks I used Carmine Red. I cut out the critters with the coordinating dies.

Shaker

The paper I’m using today is Graphic 45 Let’s Get Cozy 8” by 8” Paper Pad. I went with a low-contrast grey pattern, so the reindeer would stand out. I actually ink blended with some grey ink over it, to reinforce the contrast.

To ground my reindeer I cut a piece of Hammermill in a hill shape. I dragged a Ranger Embossing Pen along the top and heat embossed it in silver. Then I turned it over and traced the shape on some Recollections Pastel Foil Cardstock. I cut along the line I’d drawn.

I glued the hill shapes to the bottom of my shaker background. Then I adhered the reindeer on top with thin strips of foam tape. One of the many advantages of the Spellbinders Shaker Domes is that there’s room to pop up elements inside the shaker.

In my stash I found some iridescent snowflake sequins. I glued a couple of them to the background around the reindeer.

Shaker

In addition to the snowflakes, I added Kat Scrappiness Silver Bullet Shaker Dots and a retired Trinity Stamp Embellishment Mix.

For my shaker, I’m using an Arch Shaker Dome from Spellbinders. I adhered it to the background with ⅛” double-sided tape. Then I added more cardstock to the background, so that the card front would lie flat on it.

Card Front

For the front of the card I used the same Graphic 45 paper. But I wanted it to be more lively. So I embossed it with Spellbinders Holly Flourish Embossing Folder. With a brayer I applied Versamark Embossing Ink to the raised areas and heat embossed them with Ranger Super Fine Silver Embossing Powder. I repeated the process, to get more coverage.

I had forgotten to cut out the arch from the card front before dry embossing it, so I was worried that running it through my die cutting machine with one of the dies from Spellbinders Essential Arches would flatten the pattern. But it wasn’t bad at all, thankfully! I cut down the foreground by about ⅛” and adhered it to the background.

To frame the shaker element, I used the sixth and eighths arches and cut them from the same foiled card stock that I used for the background hills. I stacked it with another die cut from Accent Opaque to make it more substantial.

Sentiments

The main sentiment is Spellbinders Christmas Magic Sentiment Stamp with Coordinating Dies. I stamped it with Versamark and heat embossed it with Ranger Super Fine Silver Embossing Powder. Then I cut it out with the coordinating dies. I love that each word is separate, so I can choose different layouts. I stacked a couple more die cuts behind the words and glued them to the top of the dome.

I also stamped one of the subsentiments with grey ink and cut it out with the sentiment strip die that’s part of the Christmas Magic Sentiment Die Set. I had to stack some thin strips of cardstock behind the bottom part of the subsentiment, so it would lie flat when I glued it to the bottom of the frame.

Final Assembly

I covered the entire front of my A2 notecard with the Recollections Pastel Foil Cardstock. Then I glued the card front to it. I finished up by scattering some more iridescent snowflake sequins across the card.