A Colour Challenge to myself

Hi everyone,

This challenge was born out of the need to make a birthday card for a male relative (who has forgotten all about my recent birthday...) I had a pack of the Outlaw papers on hand which are nice and mannish in their designs. I selected my least favourite sheet from the pack, which was tricky, but I was prompted by the colours mainly, as I am not a big fan of oranges, rusts and browns! The star elements on the sheet lent themselves beautifully to layering and punching, as well as using them as a block. A star stamp from the "Occasionally" set was perfect to use as an accent.

In the large card, I have used a base of Really Rust, and I have stamped the top third of the card in Chocolate Chip ink using the Canvas texture background stamp to add dimension. I then matted a strip of the Outlaw paper on a mat of Naturals Ivory, inking both edges again with Chocolate Chip for a distressed effect. I punched some 1 3/8" circles from Naturals Ivory, and some 1 1/4" circles from the Outlaw paper using the star circles as a guide. Again, I inked the edges. I was able to get a distressed blended look using the Earth Elements markers to colour the star stamp, and I punched the stamped images with the 3/4" punch. All the circles were layered, and the smallest circle was mounted using Stampin Dimensionals foam pieces to make them 'pop' from the page. A greeting from "Its Your Birthday" stamped in Chocolate Chip completed the card. For colours I really don't like, I am very pleased with the final result! It really is a credit to the Colour Family system used by Stampin' Up! - the Designer series papers match beautifully with the cardstocks - just choose a base and one or two accent colours and you're away creating. And it's great to know you can make something you like from even your least favourite colours, they all have their place
The smaller card uses Naturals Ivory as a base, has the speckled background from "Itty Bitty Backgrounds" stamped in Really Rust over the top section. A strip of Outlaw paper is mounted on Really Rust cardstock, and the edges inked with Chocolate Chip ink. This time I layered 1 3/8", 1 1/4" and 1" circles to create the accent, and stamped a different birthday greeting from "It's your birthday" in chocolate chip. A few more of my new stamps used as well! I hope you like them :)