Happy Day to A Card-Making Buddy!

JOYFUL NEWS!

THIS CARD IS NAMED A 

SPLITCOASTSTAMPERS' FAVORITE 

OF THE WEEK ENDING - NOVEMBER 4, 2017

A lovely lady, who is a Stampin' Up demonstrator and cardmaking buddy, has an early November birthday, and I wanted to make and send her a birthday card.  I also wanted to use her card to catch up on the newest rounds of the Alphabet Challenge.  Letters A through L have already opened.  I've submitted a few cards for letters that are out of sequence, but have not designed and submitted for Letter A yet. There is a bonus challenge attached to each letter as well, using the alphabet letters backwards; therefore, A = double challenge Z for zebras and we are required to use black and white stripes on our card to meet the double challenge.

With these requirements in mind, I decided to use a cute little punch-art Asian geisha girl that I ran across on Pinterest for Dar's card and use a black, red, and white color scheme with a background of black and white stripes.  The original punch art character was designed by LeeAnn Greff, and I thank her for the idea!

To determine what my layout might be, I decided to check out other challenges on the Splitcoasterstamper website to see if any would give me ideas.  As it turned out two challenges wanted you to get inspiration from specific galleries...My Favorites and a Featured Stamper's gallery.  They both worked perfectly to get my mojo going.  Both had similar layouts, but with different embellishments and/or enhancements, i.e., like matting, ribbon, shaped mat for your focal point, etc.  My layout ended a using ideas from each inspiration card's layouts.

I think my little geisha girl turned out really cute.  After finishing the basic punch art tutorial, I added Wink of Stella-Clear to her hair and shoes for a light sheen, plus rosy cheeks using a Copic Marker, and a mouth with a fine-tip red pen.  To dress her up, I added scallop cuffs to her sleeves, and bitty black pearls on her belt and her hair.  I finished the inside with a bit of coordinating patterned paper borders and composed a verse.  I think Dar will get a kick out of her birthday card...take a peek below!

Ingredients:  Paper:  Stampin'Up Cardstock--Basic Black, Real Red; My Mind's Eye--Everyday Basics Pad (blacks); Doodlebug--Petite Prints/ Ladybug Daisy; Little Yellow Bicycle--Once Upon A Christmas/ OC-102; Photoplay--Holiday Cheer/ Holly Jolly.  My Favorite Things Dies:  Stitched Oval Scallop Frame (used inside cut-out/ red); ZigZag Stitched Oval STAX #2.  Punches:  Stampin' Up--1-1/4" Circle (head/ hair), 1/2" circle (shoes/ trimmed...Heart to Heart punch better), Extra Large Oval (2"x1-3/8"--body/ dress), Dotted Swiss Double Border (retired--trimmed: belt/ cuffs).  Queen & Co.--Black pearls.  Ribbon: 7/8" BoBunny Double Dot Sheer.  Computer sentiment/ verse.  Size: 4-3/4" x 6".