A Little Bit of Magic

Sometimes, I want to do something a little bit outside the box, and that involves going online and searching. My husband loves dragons, and Stampin' Up! didn't have quite what I was looking for. I went online and found some stamps that were perfect. It required a lot of thought beforehand - the stamp sets came from overseas and took a while to arrive!

I was able to find this Dragon set from Pink Ink Designs. It was beautiful, and I knew that he would love it. I ordered it and then had to sneak it down to my craft table and get it hidden. I popped it into a clear stamp case just like all of my Stampin' Up! sets and it has a spot on my shelf too. 

I used my Memento ink to stamp the dragon on the Whisper White card stock first. My Stamparatus made that super easy since the stamp was so big. I was also able to re-stamp it quickly and easily when one part didn't come out quite dark enough.  The wing was also made of two separate pieces, so using the clear stamps on the Stamparatus plates mad it easy to position things where I wanted them.

I coloured the dragon using my Stampin' Blends markers. I absolutely love how easy it is to blend colours with them, and how I get to look like an accomplished artist when I totally am not! I used the image that was on the stamp set to get ideas, but flipped the colours to some that my husband would like better.

After I coloured the dragon, I stamped another one on some sticky notes (I have larger ones and ones that have sticky material over the full surface too, just for things like this). I cut out the dragon and placed it on top of my coloured version to act as a mask. I then used several colours of ink to blend the background: Gorgeous Grape, Night of Navy, Balmy Blue and Seaside Spray.Using some sponges, I blended over the top to make the background pop against the dragon's colours. 

Last of all, I took some rhinestone embellishments and added them in various places, along with a simple sentiment on Basic Black card stock, embossed with black embossing powder over VersaMark clear embossing ink. 

I am so proud of this card, and he loved the thought, time and care I put into making it for him. I think that was pretty special to him. I know he is to me!