It's All About Love

Good morning friends! I hope you all had a wonderful weekend...we enjoyed a three day weekend here! Monday was Family Day...we attempted to sleep in, which was cut short by our neighbour deciding to start up his snowblower at just after 7:00 am. Hmpf...what's up with that??!! Then our dog wanted out. (normally he waits until around 8:00 or later to go outside) Then Ainsleigh woke up earlier than she does on a typical school morning, and decided it was a great time to put on some noisy music and start choreographing dances. Lovely. Our dog Kalev, (who incidentally is a pretty sorry excuse for a Siberian Husky, lol...he much prefers to be in a warm house than out enjoying all the snow that is supposed to be his natural habitat) wanted back in after only five minutes outside. He then promptly sat in the kitchen and started to howl for more water in his dish...which he NEVER does!! I had really only hoped to stay in bed until around 8:00 or 8:30, but I ended up getting up around 7:30 as I figured falling asleep again was pretty much a lost cause. In reality, this was pretty typical of "family life" though...we did end up having a great Family Day despite the less than desirable start to our day. :)

Today, it's my turn to share a card over at Sundays With Crissy. Our challenge this month has been All About Love. For my card, I chose to use Crissy's beautiful carousel horse digi "Dance of Love" available at Whimsy Stamps. I decided to try a technique for a pleated background that I saw over on Amazing Paper Grace...Becca Feeken is an incredibly talented papercrafter, and her blog is a favourite of mine. (It is a constant source of inspiration...her work is absolutely stunning, and I am always so grateful when she shares her expertise through tutorials.) I used my circle Spellbinders to cut a "window" out of my patterned paper. The pleating was done with two strips of paper that were scored at 1/4 inch intervals. (Each strip was about 1 3/4", so that when they were formed into a circle, the diameter would be slightly larger than the cut-out circle on the patterned paper, which was about 3") The pleated circle was adhered to the centre of my cardbase, and the patterned paper later was then attached with a double layer of foam squares...the extra height was required to accommodate the pleated layer. To frame the circular window, I used the same size of circle Spellbinders with the Lacey Circles set to create a border. Finally I added some machine stitching and dollar store pearls

"Dance of Love" was printed on Neenah smooth cardstock and coloured with a combination of Copics and Conte Crayons blended in with a paper stump. I really love the soft blending you can achieve with the Conte crayons...I found them very effective for helping to create the musculature and bone structure in the horse. They also helped to soften the dappled effect that I first loosely laid down with my Copics. If you chose to use Conte Crayons, Prismacolour Pencils, or some other medium in combination with your Copics, you must lay down your marker ink first. If you attempt to layer the Copics over these other mediums, it will ruin your marker nibs. If this should happen though, don't fret...remember that the nibs are replaceable should something happen to them. :) I used some additional foam squares to adhere "Dance of Love" to the pleated background.

(OOPS...noticing just now that I accidentally typed 2010 instead of 2011 into my watermark on the close-up. lol)

Copics: W00, W1, W3, W5, W7, W9, 100, C9, (I only skipped C7 here because it is completely dry...need to get a refill!!) C5, C3, C1, C00, B60, BG10, BG11, BG72, BG75, BG78, R32, R35, R46, R59, Y00, Y21, Y26, YR31, E33, E35, E37, E59, Black and Brown Conte Crayon

We would love to have you join in our "All About Love" challenge at Sundays With Crissy! Crissy is offering a prize of FIVE DIGI'S this month. You can read all the details on Sarah's post from February 1st. You can also link up your project on her post....just look for the little blue Inlinkz froggie at the bottom of her post. (The list of rules for entering the challenges at Sundays With Crissy may be found in the sidebar.)

Thank you so much for stopping by today friends...it means so much that you take the time out of your day to stop by for a visit. :)

Blessings,

Melanie

Stamps: Whimsy Stamps "Dance of Love" by Crissy Armstrong

Ink: Copics, additional shading with Conte Crayons

Paper: Neenah, Bazzill, My Mind's Eye (Olivia)

Embellishments: Machine Stitching, pearls

Tools: Spellbinders, ScorPal