You Light Up My Life Valentine

Here's another of the cards I created for my Valentine's and More Card Class this month.  I wanted this to be a more masculine Valentine, so used the Well Worn Designer Series Paper and the colors from that to create it.  This one is a gate-fold card, using the Gnome Sweet Gnome stamp set from the Occasions Mini.  Here's the front:

The base of the card is Cajun Craze.  The front flaps of the card are embossed with the Stripes Textured Impressions Embossing Folder.  Then, I decided to use the Heart Framelits to emboss a heart into the card base, too.  The first time I did that, I didn't have any paper in between the cutting side of the heart and my plate, and discovered that was a mistake.  For a few heart-pounding moments, I wasn't sure I would be able to extract the framelit from the plate!  A little patience, and some gentle prodding from my scissors, convinced them to separate.  And, ever since, to make this card, I instead line up the Not Quite Navy layer and cut that heart on top while the card base is embossed on the bottom.  That works!  No problems.

The gnome image and frog were stamped in Basic Black on Whisper White, and I colored them in using Blender Pens and Classic Ink.  The colors I used are Cajun Craze (hat and lantern), River Rock (gnome's shirt), Not Quite Navy (gnome's pants), Soft Suede (belt and ground) and Garden Green (frog).  I painted Gold Smooch on the gnome's belt buckle and then for the candle's flame.  

The greeting is partly from the Gnome Sweet Gnome set. I added the "life" from Fabulous Phrases in place of the "garden" in the original stamp.  I punched out the greeting with the Word Window Punch, and then layered it on a piece of Not Quite Navy that I'd punched out with the Modern Label Punch.  I added a couple of the silver Mini Brads on either side of the greeting.

Here's a look at how the card opens:

And, here's the inside of the card:

If you look carefully, you can see a bit of the heart-shape embossed around the white heart in the center and on each side of the front flaps.  I stamped the image on the white heart in River Rock.  The "be my valentine" greeting is from the P.S. I Love You Set.  It is stamped in Basic Black, and again punched out using the Word Window punch and layered onto a piece of Not Quite Navy, punched out with the Modern Label Punch.

Now back to finishing up my Valentine's for tomorrow!  Amazing how no matter how far in advance I start, there always seem to be things to do right up until the end!!!  Hope you had fun or are having fun preparing your Valentine's surprises as well.

Thanks for visiting my blog!

- Michelle