Journey

I used the retiring Define Your Life set and Sail Away from the summer mini to create this fun card. I know I live in landlocked ND but I really do love coastal living! I lived on one coast or the other until I moved here when I was 20. What was I thinking??? My grandparents always had a sailboat, and now some of my aunts and uncles do, too. My dad was in the Coast Guard so water was a way of life for us!

I made my own designer paper. I'm kind of weird and anal and crazy about my paper crafts, so here I actually cut all 3 colors into strips and then adhered them to the card base. Not Quite Navy, Cherry Cobbler, and white. The white strips are laid on top of the Cherry Cobbler, but the other colors are pieced together and oversprayed with a Cherry Cobbler marker in my Color Spritzer. I also used the spritzer to douse the top section with Not Quite Navy before I inked up the sailboat.

 I used the Designer Label Punch to frame the journey sentiment. I created the mat from 2 punches of Cherry Cobbler, trimmed and offset to properly frame the white panel. A button and a little bit of twine finish it off. I'm sure I could have threaded that twine through the button with a needle, but I just wrapped a little tape around the end to make a point and snipped it off when I was done. It looked like a shoelace. :) But it worked.

I stamped the sailboat image once on the card base and once on a scrap. I colored the flag on both with my Cherry Cobbler marker. I used Bashful Blue ink and a blender pen to shade the highlights on the sail, and Crumb Cake and Early Espresso markers with the blender pen to color the boat itself. A wisp of Night of Navy marker underscores the waves. I then trimmed out the sailboat from the scrap, and bumped it up with Dimensionals. I'm weird about my dimensionals. Once the actual pieces are used up, I cut up the border. For this card, it worked great for the small, angular areas like the top of the sail and the stern of the boat, so I had good coverage with the foam pieces for uniform lift and support. (gosh that sounds like a bra... tee hee)

Once I had everything else in place, I laid Sticky Strip across the top of the Navy/Cherry panel and then ruched some Whisper White Grosgrain ribbon (also spritzed with Night of Navy marker) along the front. I let the ends hang off and trimmed them at an angle.

We used this design at our Stamp-A-Stack events this month. I altered the design a little, eliminating the button and simplifying the striped section. I think this is a great card for graduations, retirements, or other big life events. Or, to send someone off on a year-long sail...

I think it's a winner. What do you think?

Becca