Rooted in Nature Sand Dollar

, , , , , , , 2 Comments

Have you ever looked at an image in a stamp set and thought, “That reminds me of a ______!”

Well, I keep looking at the cross cut wood image in the Rooted in Nature Stamp Set by Stampin’ Up! and am thinking exactly that! It reminds me so much of a sand dollar at the beach. I looked at a few images of sand dollars on Google and decided to try to create one using the stamp as a starting point.

My creative inspiration was from another As You See It Challenge – this one is a beach theme, which, of course, was the perfect opportunity to alter the wood image.

This card used some art skills beyond my usual application for my cards. I also used some supplies from the June Paper Pumpkin kit. If you don’t get Paper Pumpkin, I highly recommend it! If you don’t have a Demonstrator, feel free to use my name to sign up. You get wonderful stamping kits in the mail each month so you can create beautiful hand made cards or home decor with ease. It’s fun and a great escape from the stresses of the world!

Here’s my finished card:

I stamped the wood cut image on Whisper White Cardstock with Sahara Sand ink. Then I had to use some creative art skills to draw the centre image to make it look like the image in a sand dollar. I originally tried to find a stamp or a die that would fit the shape I was looking for, but with no success, I reached for a pencil.

I drew the image that looks like a five petal flower onto the centre of the wood cut stamped image. Then I used the pen end of my Gray Granite Stampin’ Write Marker to darken my pencil drawing. My Blender Pen also got involved to soften my marker lines and create a bit of shading and imperfections that you would find in nature. It took a couple of tries before I got it right, but it was a lot more successful than I thought it would be!

I used my pencil again to draw the long ovals that I wanted to cut with a craft knife. A punch would have been nice, but I didn’t have anything that would work. After carefully cutting these, I used my Gray Granite Stampin’ Write Marker again (this time, I used the brush tip) to darken the edge of the paper inside the holes to give the impression of depth. The colour bled more than I intended it to, but the effect ended up working for me. (Lucky!)

The rest of the card involves paper layering and some heat embossing with Gold Embossing powder on Vellum cardstock. I also sponged some Bermuda Bay ink over the upper portion of one of my Whisper White cardstock layers to create a sort of sky for my beach scene. This with the torn layers of Coastal Cabana, Sparkle Glimmer Paper, and a piece of patterned paper from the Woven Threads Designer Series Paper, along with some Linen Thread tied in a loopy bow, complete my beach-themed card.

Let me know what you think. Did I successfully turn a stamped image of a piece of wood into a sand dollar? Have you ever tried to alter a stamped image to make it look like something else?