Tropical Chic Technique

Hello!   Yesterday, I showed you a card with the Tropical Chic stamp set and mentioned I'd have more for you soon about the technique I used on the flowers and leaves.  Well, that technique was inspired by Steffi Helmschrott -- I found this card by her on Pinterest and from a bit of research, was able to discover a post by Steffi with her card here on Instagram and more information and photos of it here on Facebook.  Here's my attempt to recreate that card for a sample on my display boards for the New Catalog Open House:

For my card base, I used Gray Granite -- not sure if that is the same color as in Steffi's -- hers looks more purple? -- topped with a layer of Basic Black and a layer of Whisper White, which I embossed using the Garden Scene Framelits and the new Embossing Mats.  Flowers were inked up in Flirty Flamingo, then I used a Sponge Dauber to add Melon Mambo ink to the center.  Following Steffi's instructions, I used an Aqua Painter to tap fine drops of water onto the ink before stamping.  I did the same for the leaves, inking the stamp up completely in Granny Apple Green, before applying some Shaded Spruce with a Sponge Dauber, then flicking on some water with the Aqua Painter and stamping.  Really loving this technique (in case you hadn't noticed ;) ).

In addition to the card from yesterday's post, I was inspired to create another card.  I thought it would be fun to have groups of even more vibrantly colored flowers framed with squares stamped with the new Swirly Frames Stamp Set.  Here's the palette I picked for it (tried to follow Patty Bennett's advice to photograph the ink pads to help remember, but discovered that good advice works even better if you have all new ink pads or all the ink pads turned so you can read the color name!  Live and learn!!!):

The top two colors are Mango Melody and Poppy Parade, followed by Gorgeous Grape and Melon Mambo, and again Shaded Spruce and Granny Apple Green for leaves. 

Here's a photo of the card in progress.  I decided to use the dies from the Tropical Chic Bundle to emboss some leaves on a Shaded Spruce layer, but first had embossed that layer with the Subtle Dynamic Textured Impressions Embossing Folder:

Here's the finished card:

The greeting is embossed with White Stampin' Emboss Powder on Basic Black card stock and fussy cut.  To coordinate with that, I tied some of the new sparkly Black 1/8" Cord around the layers.

Hope you'll give this technique a try! 

Thanks for visiting!

- Michelle