AECP - Let It Shine

The next class on the road to certification is "For the Guys".  I've been busy working on a bunch of cards for that class, but I had to pivot away as I found out a (female) colleague is retiring this week.  Since she strikes me as the perfect recipient of a "Let it Shine" card, I decided to take a break from the masculine cards and created my card for this class first.

Let it Shine is taught by Clarissa Wiley and I was happy to see that she was restrained in her application of shine.  I'm not much of a glitter person and I find too much of it overwhelming, so I wasn't sure what to expect.  But I found her projects to be very inspiring and I do love to add some shine and sparkle to my cards.  

The Leaf

We are currently at peak fall colors in the Northeast US and, in addition to the class, I was also inspired by the colorful leaves outside my window.  I started by blending a lot (and I mean a lot - more than I could fit in the picture) of yellow, orange, red, purple and brown ink colors together to create my fall leaf.  Occasionally I would hold the leaf die over the blended panel to see where I should add more color.

Once I was happy with my blend, I cut used the inner die cut of the largest leaf in the Grape Leaf stamp and die set.  Oops!  I realized too late that I should have used the outline die cut on the blended panel.    Fortunately, I managed to keep all the pieces together.  I then used the same inner die cut on gold cardstock and glued the gold veins on top of the blended veins.

Adding Some Extra Shine

Even if it hadn't been the theme of the class, I would have added some extra shine to this card.  I matted a white square with the same gold cardstock used for the leaf veins and glued the finished leaf on top along with some sequins.  Last but not least I added the sentiment using gold embossing powder. The sentiment is from the Gradient Sunset stamp and die set.

The Final Card

This was one of those cards that came together very quickly, and I love the result!  I think this could be a design that could work for pretty much any occasion.