A Button and Sketch challenge --- Oh my!

*Yay!  This card was chosen for the "Featured Artisans" at the Paper Craft Crew!*

You've hear the term "cute as a button", right?  Well, that's how they begin the challenge over at The Paper Players.  The card must include one or more buttons.  Easy?  I don't use buttons in my creations very often.  But then I found a sketch challenge over at the Paper Craft Crew and everything came together.  I could actually "see" myself making a card that included a button and enjoying it.  And so we begin...

The sketch that changed my mind:

I decided to keep to a limited colour palette and kept the card to a neutral of Very Vanilla (that would be Naturals Ivory for the base), Cherry Cobbler and Basic Black.  For what I had in mind, this would bring attention where I wanted it most. 

On top of my base of Naturals Ivory, I layered a piece of Cherry Cobbler and then a layer of Very Vanilla.  The Very Vanilla was first run through my Big Shot using my Decorative Dots embossing folder and spritzed with a bit of Cherry Cobbler ink using my (unfortunately retired) Spritzer Tool.

The next detail was a bit more complicated.  I began with two squares, one Very Vanilla and one slightly larger one Basic Black.  On the Very Vanilla I stamped the largest flower from the Everything Eleanor stamp set using my Memento black ink.  Then I coloured the flower using my Cherry Cobbler Blendabilities.  Once that was dry, I coloured the filaments of the flower using my Gold Stampin' Dazzle marker and then covered each anther with a Basic Pearl jewel.  

At the top right I stamped a sentiment from my new Good Greetings hostess stamp set also using the Memento black ink.  Then I took a piece of Cherry Cobbler seam binding and pleated it into a piece of Sticky Strip.  I took another piece of Sticky Strip and sandwiched the seam binding between the two strips.  I attached the pleated ribbon along the right edge of the Very Vanilla square and then attached that to the slightly larger Basic Black square. Finally I adhered the square to the lower right corder of the card using Dimensionals.

After the square was attached, I took the largest of my Designer Very Vintage buttons and tied a piece of Cherry Cobbler Baker's twine through that.  After I attached it to the right bottom of the little square with glue dots, I added a large pearl to the centre.

I didn't want to add pennants to the top left of the card.  The mood of the card just didn't support pennants and therefore I chose to add butterflies.  First of all I braided three strands of the Cherry Cobbler Baker's twine together for a more solid "rope" effect.  Once that was attached, I added four small butterflies which I had created by heat embossing Vellum cardstock with Cherry Cobbler embossing powder using the Papillon Potpourri stamp set.  I bent the wings upward, glued the butterflies to the "rope" using Tombo and added pearls to the centres.

And that finished off my card.  I'm very pleased with the effect of just those three colours.  I love my butterflies and, of course, the flower coloured with those wonderful Blendabilities.  What I didn't expect to love was the button, because I'm not a button-type of cardmaker.  In this case, however, I'm very happy with it.  The button actually adds a final detail that enhances the card.  I may yet begin using those buttons a bit more frequently.

For more cards using buttons, check out The Paper Players.

For more cards using this sketch, check out the Paper Craft Crew Challenge.