Whimsy Stamps ~ World Cardmaking Day Celebrations

Hey crafty friends, Happy World Cardmaking Day! It's OUR day, woohoo!! I'm so happy we have a day that celebrates all the joy that this hobby brings us! I get a little frustrated that holidays in general always seem to be translated into a commercial opportunity, so I'm beyond delighted that Whimsy is doing things a little differently this 'holiday'. We are celebrating World Cardmaking Day with a Cardmaking Challenge! It will run until the end of October. It will close Halloween night and the winner will be announced soon after. This event is happening in our Facebook Group, which if you're not a part of, I encourage you to join, purely to take in some of the amazing inspiration that flows freely from the talented Whimsy Design Teams. Whimsy has a large design team, several teams in fact and there are some phenomenally talented ladies on these teams! I'm constantly inspired by them and I feel sure you would be too. So join us if you're able. You can join the group here. All the details of our World Cardmaking Day Challenge are in the Facebook Group and Denise has graciously offered a free stamp in celebration of World Cardmaking Day and it can be used if you would like, to take part in the challenge. Today, I'm sharing my first Halloween card of October. Life has been super busy these past few days, lots going on, so I'm a little late to the October fun. But here it is!

I had a very different vision for this card when I started. I'd intended to stamp a spooky forest in multiple colours for a bit of fun, but when I stamped my image, it was so patchy due to the watercolour paper and I'd done it without my MISTI, so there was no second stamping opportunity! So I sprayed water over the stamped image, with some Perfect Pearls dissolved in it. I let the colours run and the background evolved from there. A happy accident, because I love the result! Weird spooky looking eerie shapes in the sky, perfect for my Halloween themed card! Would you guess from this pic above, that this is a Glow In The Dark card?

We have an amazing sponsor for our last month of Halloween fun. Studio Light, a Dutch company have sent a generous parcel for our team to work with which includes some really fun Glow In The Dark elements and also some gorgeous plywood frames. I wasn't able to work with the plywood frames, as it's prohibited to post wooden items to New Zealand (in standard mail). These items must go through quarantine as we have a very strict protection of our flora and fauna. So no lovely wooden frames for me, but I'll be sharing plenty of Glow In The Dark fun! As you can tell from the image above, the moon behind the haunted house has been treated with Glow In The Dark Paint from Studio Light and gives a fun eerie glow when the lights go out. I'll share more using this cool paint in later makes. 

You can vaguely see here the little wash of Glow In The Dark Paint that I added to the moon. I didn't try to tackle adding it to the windows of the house, that was too tricky and my paint brush didn't have a fine enough point. But I'm happy with the eerie glow it gives when the lights go out. 

I felt the scene needed a little more than the haunted house and then I remembered about the tiny images that were made last year as 'back of card' stamps and wondered how Elvira would look in this scene and hot diggity, I LOVE it! I think she looks fab. I managed to find a spot on the background that wasn't too heavily coloured, so her face looked okay without adding extra detailing and that worked out well. 

Final stamped detail was to add the sentiment. Having blooped with the background and not using my MISTI, I learnt my lesson for all the silhouette stamping and made sure I used it for these images, especially this sentiment, as there were some finer details. I wanted to use one of the sentiments from the same set as the little haunted house, because they're fabulous! So I chose an ornate one with bats and a mix of fonts. Kind of fun I think. For a relatively simple silhouette stamped scene, I'm very happy with the result. I diecut the finished stamped scene with my Wonky Rectangles to give a nice finished edge to the scene and mounted the image panel on a top folding black card base. I always line the insides of my coloured card bases with a white insert and often add a sentiment then, especially if I've not used a sentiment on the front. For this card however, I left it just a plain white page insert.

We would love it so much if you joined our World Cardmaking Day Celebration and this cutie sitting on her moon is the sweet image being given away by Whimsy for this event. So come snag your copy and we'd love to see what you're inspired to do with her! I will be back again soon with another crafty adventure, in the meantime I wish you a beautiful World Cardmaking Day and happy creative week. Hugs, Wends xoxo

My Halloween Poem

(I share thumbnails to the elements I design with in order to make your search for them easier, in case you like something I've used. I do use affiliate links where possible, which gives me a tiny commission but costs you no extra whatsoever. It helps the companies I design for to improve their marketing practice and track my contributions. I am deeply grateful if you use them for these reasons. I am proud to design for the companies I do and always feel happy to share where my inspiration and where my crafty stash comes from. I am occasionally gifted products to use, but I only design for companies whose products I absolutely love and buy for myself. My opinions are always my own.)

Challenge Entries:

Krafty Chicks Challenge: #736 ~ Stamps