Hi, friends! It’s Walter on the blog with you today and the team is celebrating Christmas in July this month. It’s hard to believe that we’re halfway through the year already. Keep in mind though that it’s never too early to start making your Christmas cards! Today I’m featuring what may be my most favorite stamp from Blank Page Muse: Victorian Skaters Art Rubber Stamp. There is something so magical and nostalgic about this stamp. It reminds me of a scene from A Christmas Carol or the great musical film, By the Light of the Silvery Moon. Two people skate along on a pond on a cold winter’s night and enjoying the magic of the season. It’s a scene that anyone would love to receive on a card!
I used the following items to create it:
Here’s how I made it:
I began by stamping the snowflake border onto the card base with clear emhossing ink. I repeated it several times across the panel, applied the Alabaster Sparkle embossing powder, and heat set it. Alabster Sparkle is a white embossing powder that has fine glitter mixed in with it to add some shimmer to each snowflake. You may always substitute regular white embossing powder or a color of your choice. Light blue would also look nice set against the dark blue cardstock!
The next step was to stamp the image of the Vitorian skaters. I decided to heat emboss them with black embossing powder to really make them stand out and add some dimension. Once again, I stamped with clear embossing ink, applied the Raven embossing powder, and heat set it.
I colored the image with alcohol markers to ensure rich color and shading.
Once colored, I went over the ice with a light cool gray alcohol marker to further blend it and add additional shading.
I dried the panel with my heat tool on low to make sure all of the ink was dry and set, and then used a small paint brush to apply a coat of Brutus Monroe Fall Snow Glitter glaze to everything but the skaters. I did this to make the sky, snow, and ice sparkle. It helps add further dimension to your card by making the background stand out from the skaters.
Once dry, I used a Nuvo Shimmer pen to add some shimmer to the skaters. This makes them have a slight shimmer that is different than sparkle on the background. This again makes them stand out against the background and adds more dimension.
I used a larger oval in my stacking ovals die set, centered it on the scene, and cut it out with my die cut machine. I choose to do this to make it look more like a framed image set against the snowflake embossed background. I ran a silver metallic marker around the edge of the oval panel, applied double sided foam tape to the back, and adhered it to the card base. I stamped the sentiment, cut the strip to size, and applied it to the card.
I truly love this card! I love the image, the story it tells, and how much dimension was achieved with the coloring and glazes. It actually looks like the skaters are coming off of the card when the light hits it a certain way.
Thanks for spending some time with me today. I’ll see you again next week with another Christmas in July project. Until then . . . be well!
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