Winnie & Walter - Leading Lady Finale

I can't believe how quickly November has flown by and that it is already time for my last act! I want to thank Shay for her generosity and her invitation to join this wonderful Winnie & Walter blog for the month. I also want to thank everyone for their wonderful comments - both here and on my blog - they have brought me such joy and I am truly grateful that you took the time to leave them.

So now - onto my finale :)

Last week, I focused on building backgrounds using die cuts - so this week, I am focusing on stretching my stamps to create fun backgrounds.

For my first cards, I used the Scenery: Holiday Trimmings stamp set - this is one of my favourite sets for decorating holiday card envelopes - but the border images are perfect for building backgrounds as well. I stamped the tree image repeatedly across the card fronts in Versamark ink- I did shift the border to the left and the right to change the styles of trees on each row. On one card front, I embossed with detail clear embossing powder, and on the other, I embossed with clear sparkle embossing powder. I then sponged ink across the panels- on the clear embossed panel, I used Picked Raspberry, Mustard Seed, and Salty Ocean to create a rainbow effect. I used Cracked Pistachio, Peacock Feathers, and Blueprint Sketch on the sparkly one. I added a simple white embossed greeting from In A Word: Merry to each of the panels, and a few silver star sequins to a few of the trees before adhering the foam-mounted panels to some cards bases dressed up with silver glitter washi.

For my next cards, I wanted to create a "knit sweater" style background - there a quite a few background stamps that do this but I was pretty sure that I could make my own. I used two more borders from the Scenery: Holiday Trimmings set, a border from the Julie's Roses set (a 2016 Black Friday W&W Special set), and a row of hearts from Scenery: Seeing Hearts. I stamped two panels - both using light grey ink - one onto a white panel and one onto a light grey panel for a tone-on-tone look. This process is really straightforward using the MISTI - the hardest part is deciding what the pattern should look like but once the stamps are lined up, it is just a matter of shifting the panel up and down to create the pattern.

To complete the grey tone-on-tone card, I used some stamped images from Debra's Poinsettia with Lydia Evans and Victoria's Very Merry Flowers with Lydia Evans as well as an embossed greeting from Sentimental Winter and a scattering of crystal gems. To complete the white panel card, I added a pink ombre stamped mug from Warm Wishes To You, a greeting from Sentimental Birthday and a few pink gems.

For my last card, I used the swirl stamps from the Dotty About You with Lydia Evans set to create a Van Gogh inspired wintery background. I stamped the panel using a light blue ink - I did do some masking as well to avoid the overlaps but it was pretty easy to cut the masks. I added the panel to a light blue card base. To complete the wintery scene, I added the skiing bear from Winter Wishes with Evelin T (seriously - how cute is he?), Copic coloured in soft colours. To finish the card, I silver embossed sentiment from the same set (after doing some minor stamp surgery to position it linearly) and a few iridescent silver-blue snowflake sequins.

I love creating backgrounds like this, and I could have easily done many more with all the wonderful Winnie & Products but unfortunately, I ran out of time....  I do hope that this post has given you some ideas on how to stretch your stamps to create backgrounds, and that you enjoy it as much as I do.

Shay has kindly offered up a $30 Winnie & Walter gift card for me to give to one lucky commenter on my blog, My Life in Paper For your chance to win, leave a comment on this post and/or any of my leading lady posts and I will randomly pick a winner from all the comments left by November 30th.

Thanks again for all your lovely comments and your support for my Leading Lady act - it was so much fun! 

Jill