The Ton's December Challenge

Hi everyone. It's the first of the month and it's time for another awesome challenge over at
 The Ton's Challenge Blog
For the month of December we have a gorgeous winter/holiday mood board to draw inspiration from.  You have the whole month to enter as many times as you like, for a chance to WIN a $50 gift certificate  for  
The Ton online store (Merry Christmas to you, woohoo!).   You can click on the link to head on over and check out the details any time.  But first I'd like to show you a card I made for this month's Mood Board Challenge!

 

Isn't this a fabulous mood board?  While you can mix elements from each photo easily, the inspiration you can pull from each picture individually is endless.   Just by looking at The Ton's Challenge Blog you can see each designer was inspired by something different.  No two the same!  My inspiration came from the little photo on the right: the wooden board decorated with a white holiday greeting and embellished with white snowflakes. The pine sprigs as an embellishment really caught my eye too.

I decided this would be the perfect opportunity to put The Ton's new Vintage Christmas Block to the test.
I officially declare this my favorite Christmas stamp of 2017!!  Amazing details!

   Now with this stamp you are actually stamping the background, NOT the letters and images.  I started by placing the block stamp in the center of a white A2 size card front in my MISTI stamping tool.  For this technique it is best to use a stamping tool because you will be stamping many layers of ink onto your cardstock.  Your images must line up.  The cardstock I'm using for this card is 110 lb Neenah Solar White.

 I used three shades of The Ton's brown ink:  Found Topaz, Aspen Cocoa and Dark Roast.  I also used Noir for the darkest shadows.  First I swiped the lightest Found Topaz across the stamp from side to side and stamped it.  Since this will be your base color you may have to swipe and stamp two or three times to get your desired affect.  It's ok if there are some white streaks showing.  That will give the illusion of distressed wood.

Next I swiped the medium shade of brown, Aspen Cocoa.  But this time I tilted the pad to make thinner and more defined, multiple strips of color across the stamp.  This will give the illusion of shading between wooden boards.  You can add this to your stamp and keep stamping until you achieve the desired look.  I swiped a thinner layer of the darkest shade of brown: Dark Roast in the same way.  Then I added some very thin swipes of Noir to offer some deep, dark crevices in the wood.

For the folded card base, I did the same swiping technique only I took my ink pads directly to the paper.  This is very simple to do and it's fun to watch this plain white cardstock turn into what looks like wood, right before your eyes.  I would just like to point out the amazing details in this stamp. Even with all of the layers of stamping that I did, the images held their crisp shape and allowed the bright white cardstock to shine through.

I trimmed off the white edges of the stamped panel and adhered it to the finished card base using a piece of craft foam.  This gave it a nice pop off of the base.  Because this stamp is so large, there really isn't a lot of room for embellishments.  It could definitely stand alone on a card and still be gorgeous. But inspired by the pine sprigs in the mood board, I stamped some branches from The Ton's  Holiday Cones Coordinating Outlines, with some in Everglade Moss and some in Basil Mojito.   I used the coordinating dies to cut them out, then adhered them across the bottom of the card.  The pretty layered bow is stamped from The Ton's Christmas Wreath Builder stamp set using Lipstick Red, Grape Crush and Noir inks.  Finally some sparkly sequins were added from The Ton's Deck The Halls Couture Mix and a little shine on the branches using a clear Wink of Stella glitter pen.

That's all  for today my friends.  Thank you so much for stopping by.  I hope you'll make some time this month to join in this fun Mood Board Challenge with us over at The Ton Blog.  We love seeing all of your creations and it's so fun to see everyone's interpretation of each challenge.  

Have a great day and Happy Stamping!!