Anyway, here's what I made. I really like the clean and simple cards which Joanne Wardle showed in her article in the October 2010 Craft Stamper, and which were so beautifully demonstrated by the Craft Stamping Quartet in their challenge showcasing Joanne's work. The link goes to Lesley Ebdon's post, but see also the three subsequent posts.
I also love the masked landscape technique which I first saw done by Barbara Gray a few years ago, and which I first tried back here. Recently there have been several people doing something similar, linking back to Heather Telford, who has some wonderful examples on her blog, including a tutorial. Do go and have a look at it.
I didn't want just to copy what other people had been doing, so I sort of combined the two techniques and came up with this:
I *think* it works - what do you think? To make the shape of the landscape I cut a mask out of acetate (so that I would be able to see where I was placing things) large enough to cover the card, and then sponged the design with VersaMagic inks and torn paper masks. The tree stamps are by Clarity Stamp, the small and medium versions. The landscape was made entirely with the small tree, using just the edge to stamp the little bushes. The larger tree and the sentiment (Personal Impressions) were then stamped with VersaFine ink.
I was quite pleased with the outcome, considering how long it is since I made anything, except for one thing. You can tell it's been a while. The finished card turned out like this!!
I'd totally forgotten to check which way the card opened before I started stamping on it! The perils of stamping straight on to the card! I was so annoyed! I thought the best way to redeem it would be to cut off the picture side and mount it on to another card, but that wouldn't be the perfect solution. Then it occured to me that it might just be appreciated as it is by someone who is left handed! I'll have to test the theory on a left handed friend......
