FM226 - Thanks

This year has been so busy that I haven't had the time to enter as many challenges as I would have liked.  Today, however, I took a little "walk" through some of the challenges I've most enjoyed and discovered that the Friday Mashup is having a Design Team call.  I couldn't let the opportunity go by without at least putting in my card and seeing it went.  Fingers crossed.

Here’s the Mashup Challenge:

• Create a project with the Sketch.
• Create a project with Inlaid Die Cutting.
• or Mash it Up! and create a project with the Sketch and inlaid die cutting.

The challenge this week is one which I really enjoy:  inlaid die cutting.  This technique is so subtle but adds such elegance to a card.  Of course if you are sending cards overseas, the fact that the inlaid die cutting lies very flat is a distinct advantage as well.

I chose to keep it very clean and simple.  I kept the main portion of the card to a single layer, made possible because of the heavy weight Whisper White which Stampin' Up! added this year.  Since I wanted my base (and main layer) to be white, this really helped.  I folded the regular sized card into a portrait style and then ran it through the Big Shot with my "thanks" framelit, cutting across the bottom at a slight slant.  Then I cut the same "thanks" from a piece of watercolour style Designer Paper.  I very carefully glued that coloured "thanks" into the space left by the die-cut white "thanks" and then inserted the little white pieces into the cut-outs inside some of the letters.  The inlaid word looked great, especially that fancy border.

While that dried I took another piece of Whisper White and cut a square using one of my Square Collection Framelits.  Then I used the maple leaf die from the Leaflets Framelits and cut the shape out of the centre of the square.  I cut another maple leaf from the same Designer Paper from which I cut the "thanks" and then inlaid it into the white square.  A narrow Cajun Craze matte finished off the square.

Several loops of Gold Metallic Thread behind the square finished off the card.  Clean, simple and gorgeous.

There are some awesome cards over at the Friday Mashup and I hope you'll check them out.

I've also entered this card for the PP263 challenge at the Paper Players this week.