Growing in Unity: Day Four

Happy Thanksgiving Day everyone!  Thanks for spending a few minutes of your holiday with me.  I appreciate you sharing your time with me.  Even though the snow has messed up lots of travel plans for many people, it is kind of pretty.

Today is Day Four of my Growing in Unity week.  I am sharing five day of posts featuring projects created with Unity Stamp Company red rubber stamps.  I'm so thankful for the great people at Unity Stamp Company for their amazing products and for giving me this opportunity to share my love of Unity Stamps this week.

Unity Stamp Company has also given me two prize packs of their deeply etched red rubber stamps to give away after the conclusion of my Growing in Unity week.  If you would like a chance to be the recipient of one of these prize packs, please leave a comment on one, or all of my Growing in Unity posts this week.  Winners will be posted on this blog, and on the Unity Stamp Company Growing in Unity Facebook page after December 7th.

In honor of the first measurable snowfall, I decided to finish an image that I had started at the past weekend's swim meet.  Painting sure helps fill the time between my son's events! I bring a small lapdesk with me, so I have a little workspace.

I had stamped this panel of Fabriano cold press watercolor paper with the image from Winter Girl, illustrated by Angie Blom.  I used Fade Out ink, and using my Original MISTI, carefully selectively inked only the girl, leaving off the snowflakes.  I gradually layered Daniel Smith watercolors with a waterbrush, letting each layer dry before adding another.

Eventually I ended up with the depth of color that I was looking for.  Yesterday, I finished my card by splattering a bit of white acrylic paint over my painted area, adhering my watercolored panel to a top-fold card base and adding a sentiment strip, using a white heat embossed sentiment from Owl Bundle Up.

My husband, son and I are having a small, quiet, non-turkey Thanksgiving celebration today as my adult children either working or spending this holiday day with their in-law family.  We will be celebrating together on Saturday instead.

Today, I'd like to also share a few snowy projects that use images from the Unity S.M.A.K. Kits.  S.M.A.K. stands for Scrapbooking, Mixed media, and Altered art Kit.  The S.M.A.K. kits are one of Unity's subscription programs.  As a subscriber, you will receive a large full sheet of rubber stamps, that are perfect for many uses.  The images contained in these kits are in general, a bit larger than those in other Unity stamp kits, and often include larger sentiments and images that are perfect for backgrounds.

This is the current Kit, Beauty of Life, and I have created two cards using the large script font sentiments.

My first card uses an emboss resist technique.  I used my Original MISTI to stamp the large snowflake onto the left side of my white cardstock panel with clear embossing ink.  I used clear embossing powder and heat embossed the image.

I added some pale blue and gray ink to the panel with a blending brush.

I placed the sheet music background stamp, (also from Beauty of Life), near the center of my Original MISTI lid and stamped it in gray ink onto a sheet of Dritz quilter's template plastic, which I have cut down to fit into my MISTI.  I tuck the sheet of plastic 

firmly into the corner of my MISTI,

This plastic template is flexible, so I am able to slide my embossed panel behind that plastic template to see my alignment.  Once I like the placement, I can secure my panel with a magnet, then completely remove the plastic template and stamp.  

I then replace the template in the corner of my MISTI once again, and rather than having to more my stamp, I can just move my cardstock panel!

I did this three times, so that my card panel was covered with the subtle music background.

I used a soft microfiber towel to dab/wipe away any excess ink that remained on top of my embossing.

Next, I added my greeting.  

The Simply Blessed greeting that is included in this kit is very large.  Too large for my horizontal A2 sized panel.  So I did a bit of stamp surgery.  I simply snipped it in two, separating the words.

Now I set about deciding how to align my words.

Starting with the word Blessed, I once again used that quilter's template to decide the alignment before stamping in gray oxide ink.  By stamping first on the template, and just moving my cardstock behind the template, I am able to decide exactly where I would like my word to fit within the points of the snowflake easily.  Once I like the placement, I secured my card panel with my bar magnet and stamp.  

Since red rubber stamps are obviously not clear, I use this plastic template often to double check my alignment before I commit ink to paper.  Especially when adding my sentiments to panels I've spent considerable time coloring images.  It sure has spared me a lot of "OH NO!" moments!  

Now I wiped the ink from my template, and repeated with the word "Simply", as well as with the line which reads "to have you in my life" which I stamped and heat embossed with silver rather than stamping in gray ink.

I added a dusting of "snow" on top of my Simply Blessed with a white gel pen.

I snowflake and a pretty script-y sentiment stamp from the November 2019 S.M.A.K. Kit for my card as well.  This time, I stamped the large snowflake, as well as the smaller snowflakes, in a light blue ink and added just a bit of pale gray ink with a blending brush to create more contrast to my white cardstock before adding the beautiful sentiment in silver embossing powder.

I used a frayed edge rectangle die to trim down the panel before adding it to my top-fold card base.

That's all for today.  Join me tomorrow for my final Growing in Unity post.

Now go eat some pie, and take a nap!

Happy Thanksgiving!