A Simple Card that Shines

Heat Embossing & Big Florals

This extra large Altenew floral stamp has been a long time favorite of mine and was among my first Altenew stamps. I chose to heat emboss this stamp in white to achieve some subtle shine and contrast against the cardstock. I feel it worked out nicely, although the photo doesn't show it very well.

After selecting a beautiful coral-red cardstock, I cut it down to 5.5. by 4.25 and dusted it with anti-static powder. Using my MISTI stamp platform, I stamped the Altenew Bouquet of Love using Versamark ink onto the card panel. I stamped several times to get a good coating on the cardstock, which the MISTI makes it easy to do without mistakes.. Once, I was satisfied with the amount of ink on the cardstock, I sprinkled white embossing powder over the card panel, brushed off extra powder using a paintbrush and used a heat gun to seal the embossing powder to obtain a nice sheen. 

I set that aside, and used a scalloped edged Gina Marie Designs die, and cut out the center of a white card panel. Then I took the die cut and placed it over the red-coral card panel and adhered it to frame the stamp. I picked out a really nice sentiment by Graciellie Designs (she designs many wonderful sentiments along with her digital stamps and papers) and used foam double-sided tape to give it dimension. Finally, I randomly placed several The Diary of Belle Rose's white iridescent sequins on the card panel.

I am really pleased with the results and being that red is one of my favorite colors, I really like the way the white embossing powder shines against the red cardstock and how the white scalloped die cut frames the stamp. While I already knew all of the tips suggested in Lesson Two of the Altenew class, Let It Shine, it was good to be reminded. I sometimes forget to use the anti-static powder in my haste to get the embossing powder melted, so I am used to having to use a paintbrush to get rid of extra powder (both good tips)!