TRIM THE TREE

I have been so crazy busy with studying lately, 4-5 hours a day. Now, on Saturday, I found that I am going to be selling my artwork at a local gallery. So I've been crazy busy getting ready for that too. There had just been no time for healing Creative Therapy. So, I made myself do it. Yup. I actually did something for pure pleasure. 

When Stampin' Up! added so many new things to their Clearance Rack, I decided to do some shopping. One of the things I picked up is another retired box of the Project Life cards in three assorted sizes. I combined those with the ones that I'd had left from my first box, and now I have a nicely huge pile of cards to randomly choose from when I am in dire need of Creative Therapy.

So, that's what I did. I randomly chose a Project Life card, and the one I came up with was one from the most recent set I'd just bought.

This was sort of an odd one. You see, both sides of the card were cute. And, the best part was that the two cute portions were on completely different areas of the card. So, I was able to use BOTH sides!

What did I have in front of me after I trimmed off the interesting portions? A little sketchy untrimmed Christmas tree, with a star its only decoration -- so far. Then, the admonition that it was time to trim the tree. I dug out the set I'd purchased to host a special workshop in a few weeks: the Tin of Tags stamp set (page 33 of the Holiday Catalog). Using the tiny star and Christmas bulb, I "trimmed" the worded portion. 

Behind the tree, I tucked a piece of what I refer to as our "coffin trim". Retired a few years, I don't use it very often, but this seemed to be the perfect time. The color of the trim is Old Olive, and the greens on my card are Pear Pizzazz, and these two greens play so nicely together.

Do you like the squiggly swirls above the "coffin trim" and tucked within the words? That squiggle comes from the Cupcake Cutouts Framelits on page 192. I LOVE it! It is so fun and happy. And I thought it was perfect to set the mood for trimming the tree.

Speaking of, "trimming the tree" is the reason I did nothing to decorate the tree drawing. You know, it's time to . . .

After digging through my embossing folders, I decided to use the Lucky Stars (page 194) to echo the star on the top of the tree and the one that I stamped above "the tree".

When I finished the card, I was much more creatively healthy. But not completely cured. The card just needed a little something more. 

I've been fooling around with my drawing a bit these past months, so I decided that trimming the stamped images with a little drawn border would be cute. When I finished that, I actually said out loud, "Why not? It's MY card." And proceeded to add the split border around the edge of the top portion of the embossed piece. Then I sketched in the little metal bulb tops. There! Now I AM CURED! 

The bottom photo shows the happy dimension of the card. Can you see that the ends of the squiggles are not glued down? They are all ready to trim the tree, and they don't want to be held back! I love the whimsy this little touch adds to the whole card.

Trimming

Smiles.