Tuesday, March 6, 2018

Die Cut Ampersand

I hope you are having a great start to your week!  So, as is apt to happen around here, I recently lost my crafty mojo.  I always seem to find it through die cutting.  I had some little foliage pieces lying around from my "Love" card (you can find it on my Instagram page), so I started coloring and die cutting little flowers.  I might have gone a little overboard, because before I knew it I had a TON of tiny colored pieces lying around.  I love illustrations that combine lots of small details into a larger image, so I decided to try to put these together into an ampersand shape.  I sketched out a rough ampersand and started glueing.

I'll be honest... I almost aborted the mission a  few times.  It looked like a HOT MESS.  But after my kids assured me that they could "kind of" see an ampersand, I pushed forward.  And after glueing a bajillion pieces, I almost cried happy tears when my husband saw it and said, "Oh... an ampersand!"  😂  So my advice to those taking on a project like this... don't give up!

Another tip... don't be afraid to alter the shape of your die cuts to make them fit.  I cut petals off flowers, leaves off stems... whatever I needed to do to make a shape fit into a space.  And the less white space there is within your shape, the better.  When you're combining little shapes into a larger form, white space actually makes it look busier and messy.  And the fuller the image, the clearer its borders become.



To cut the little flowers and leaves, I used Simon Says Stamp's mini flowers and leaves die, My Favorite Thing's fab foliage die, Altenew's spring showers cover die.  All were cut from Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock and colored with copics.  To finish it I stitched up some beautiful stitched butterflies from Poppy Stamps and added tiny Memory Box vellum butterflies.  A sprinkle of sparkling clear sequins from Pretty Pink Posh and some Nuvo crystal drops, and the card was done!



I should call this card "Wishful Thinking for Spring" because we are expecting 12 inches of snow tomorrow!  😳  To everyone in the line of this storm, stay safe and warm tomorrow!

3 comments on "Die Cut Ampersand "
  1. Holy moly this unbelievable !!! Jennyxx

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  2. Absolutely gorgeous! You should be so proud that you persisted and got this glorious result!

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