September SOTM Blog Hop - Random Acts of Cardness

Welcome to the September Stamp of the Month Blog Hop! 

This month, the stamp set is called Random Acts of Cardness and it is a set of 17 stamps. It's almost all sentiments with a few small images here and there (usually part of a sentiment). Although it is designated as a card stamp set, it most certainly could be used on scrapbook pages as well - and you may see that as you progress through this blog hop. 

You should have arrived here from Miss Carrie's Creations.

If you get lost along the way, a complete list of participants on this blog hop can be found here. 

I chose one sentiment to use on the card that I created but this card was not an easy project... 

Jennifer McGuire is one of my go to favourites for ideas and inspiration. She has some of the best creative ideas when it comes to cards and I decided to try one of her recent ideas for my card this month. That idea was dry embossing on vellum - sounds easy. It was considerably more difficult than I expected. 

I used an image from the new stamp Every Little Thing - Scrapbooking for my embossed image. It is an open image and it is quite large. I had to stamp it in sections because you have to use dye ink to stamp on vellum and then emboss over the image using a stylus. The vellum curls pretty quickly. The ink, surprisingly, started to dry before too long so working quickly is also important. I stamped small sections, did the embossing and then was able to wipe away the ink that was left. I used Mink ink so it wasn't too dark.  Figuring out how hard to press the stylus is another important factor - it needs to be just enough that the image shows in white on the reverse side but not too hard that the vellum tears. It's definitely a learning process and it took me three attempts before I was able to finish a complete piece. I had to set the completed vellum under some very heavy books overnight to allow it to flatten - and it sort of did, but not completely. 

Now - how to attach the vellum to the card front? Using my Cricut, I created a border that I placed around the vellum and I also added the centre piece (also created on the Cricut since CTMH doesn't sell the Basic Ovals any longer). That allowed enough adhesive to hold the still curled vellum in place. 

I stamped the sentiment using Bluebird DYE ink and very quickly put embossing powder on it and heat set it. That was cut with the Stitched Oval Thin Cuts. A few embellishments and the rest of the card came together quickly. 

Here is a close up of some of the embossing.

The SOTM can be purchased for $6.75 with a $67.50 purchase 
only during the month of September. 

I hope you enjoyed my project. The next blog on the hop is Brenda Lapp's blog.

Products used are all CTMH unless otherwise indicated: 

Paper: White Daisy Cardstock, Bluebird Cardstock, Lilac Cardstock, Vellum, White Cards and Envelopes

Stamps: Random Act of Cardness, Every Little Thing - Scrapbooking

Inks: Bluebird, Mink

Accessories: Cricut - Basic Shapes (not CTMH), Cricut - Art Philosophy Cartridge, Stitched Oval Thin Cuts, Silver Glitter Gems, Silver Embellishing Thread, Foam Tape, Stylus, Clear Detail Embossing Powder, Heat Tool

Enjoy,

Alyson