Special Delivery - 3d embossing

A special delivery of bumpy eggs as a decorative item? Have a Flaming good day! My Game of Thrones inspired card features 3d embossing from Sizzix, Kraftin' Kimmie Stamps, and Nuvo mousses.

Side note: I've only seen GoT through season 5. Please refrain from spoiler comments :)

Putting It Together

I started off wanting a bubbly background for a mermaid I want to colour and ended up with a bowl of dragon eggs. Here's how that happened. 

I started with the Seaspray Green mousse from Nuvo, covering a 4 1/4" x 5 1/2" heavy cardstock panel. Seaspray should be good for underwater, right? The colour is this amazing goldish olivey green that reminds me a lot of the mystic colour in the Finetec Pearlescent Mica set. I used a blender sponge tool to smooth the mousse on the cardstock giving it a couple layers for depth of colour.

I ran it through the Big Shot with the Cobblestone 3D folder from Sizzix. When you cover cardstock with mousse and let it dry it becomes almost leathery. The resulting panel takes embossing amazingly well, similar to the depth of embossing you get with slightly damp cardstock (maybe better) because of the way the mousse bonds with the paper fibres. The 3D on this embossing folder is really cool with the cobbles not all at the same level. The metallic greens remind me of dragon scales. For bubbles, I will need to start with a much lighter or bluer colour.

I used a little bit of surface rubbing to bring in a little more colour variance with Aquamarine and Mother-of-Pearl to amp up the dragon scale effect. I didn't have a clue what I was going to do with the dragon scapes, but I ran out of time before I absolutely had to go to bed. I had a rather sleepless night (sometimes insomnia plagues me) but came up with an idea in my insomnia ruminations. Eggs.

The only egg shapes I have in my entire stash is from a Kitchen Sinks Stamps set. I stamped the two egg sizes on heavy cardstock.

I fussy cut those two eggs and used them as a template to cut 5 more of each size. I made three stacks with 2 of each size. I wanted to use the stacks to give the eggs dimension.

I used the egg stacks to trace on the embossed panel. I tried a couple different ideas with folding the paper under the stack but ended up cutting the embossed paper closer to the size of the stack.

I curved the edges of the eggs down over the egg stacks to give them slightly rounded sides. I didn't want to make them too tall or too heavy, just enough to amp up the egg shape.

Then, a bowl... I have none in my stash, so I came up with an idea of using 2 dies. While I was looking through my stash for shapes that would fit, the octagon felt like a good fit to a more distinctive bowl. An oval for the opening on top. Voila.

I die cut this really cool paper with the octagon and then partially cut the oval toward the top. I could fit all three of the eggs in the bowl, but it didn't feel right.

I tried it with one egg out of the bowl and Shazam!

I dry fit this on a card base with the sentiment stamp from a baby set. Fitting, I thought.

While I was at it, I dry fit the inside stamps for my idea.

I decided to go with a tall card because it fit the inside better. So, I wanted to have the bowl sitting on sand with blue sky. I wanted the sand to have texture. I don't have anything with a sand colour and texture in my stash so.. I started with a rough smearing of Red Leather expanding mousse on the bottom of a panel of heavy cardstock. I used a heat tool for the expanded effect which makes it very texture-y.

I then did a surface rub with Toasted Almond mousse and dabs of Indian Gold. I have more than a few mousses in my stash. Or is that meece?

For the sky, I did a very rough blending of Tumbled Glass Distress Oxide. I wanted a slightly cloudy but not an actual cloudy sky.

I did one last dry fit with the bowl of eggs and the sentiment stamp.

I stamped the sentiment with black, trimmed the background panel, and added everything to a white card base. I used double-sided tape to adhere the background to the cardbase because the mousse and heat treatment made it slightly warped and the eggs are a little heavy. I used foam mounting tape for the bottom of the bowl to give it more dimension.

Inside, I stamped the dragon and flame using more than one colour for each. I stamped the lightest colour as a base and then tapped on the other colour in spots on the stamp for a successive stamping. Quick and easy multi-colour stamping. I added the sentiment in black.

Supplies

Challenges

Kraftin' Kimmie Stamps: Anything Goes
Always Fun: Embossing Folder
Crafty Hazelnut's Patterned Paper: Anything Goes
Outlawz Festive Friday: Theme- Anything Goes
Polkadoodles: Anything Goes
Penny's Paper-Crafting: Anything Goes
Creative Moments: Anything Goes
Addicted to Stamps and More: Anything Goes