Gallery Idol, round 4.

Gallery Idol round 4.  I can't hardly believe that I'm still here!  

And when I read the challenge for this week: to use a household item on the card, I had my first moments of panic in this competition.  For each of the last rounds, I'd gotten an idea in my head within the first few minutes, and the end result was surprisingly close to that initial vision.  I wouldn't be so lucky this time.  

I tried melting plastic spoons.  That was a smelly, bulky-looking, hot mess.

I cut the bottom off of a water bottle and heat-gunned it to look like a plastic flower.  Very cool, actually, but still not the look I was going for...

I couldn't get over the fact that I'd just be plunking a hunk of plastic onto my card.   I was determined to create something that still looked like....me...and still looked like a pretty card, regardless of what the theme was.

Soooo, a stack of coffee filters, some blueberries, food-coloring, and a corrugated cardboard box later, I give you my entry:

(for those of you with an eye for the PTI products I used, yes, I cut my friendship jar die apart.  I used my husband's hardware scissors and snipped the jar away from it's lid.)

I started out by die-cutting stacks of flowers out of our coffee filters.  Next, I created a water-bath of mushed-up blueberries and a tiny bit of green food coloring (the flowers look quite aqua in the pictures, but in real life are more of a very light blue.)  After I dunked the stacks into the color-bath, I worked quickly to peel apart all the layers and lay them out separately.  By the time I peeled the last ones apart, I started stacking them back up, in the order I'd laid them out.  I punched a hole in the stack, put a tiny brad in the middle, and starting fluffing up each layer (which is why you need them to be slightly damp when doing this).  

When I was done, I left the flowers to dry while I worked on the rest of the card.  I found an old cardboard box in our recycling bin, and peeled back the outer-layer to reveal the more weathered corrugated cardboard underneath.  (tip:  once I'd snipped and peeled away more of the outer layer, I used an eraser to get rid of the rest.)

I die-cut the jar into the cardboard, and stamped the coordinating image inside.  The sentiment is computer-generated onto vellum.

I hope you like my entry - and if you do, would you vote for me?  I'd love a chance to make it to the top 5 round!  You have until Thursday to vote - just click on the picture of this card on the right sidebar... it will take you where you need to go :)





supplies
stamps: PTI: friendship jar, daydreamer, text style II
ink: antique linen distress ink, PTI: spring moss, memento black, SU: crumb cake and bashful blue
paper: PTI: white, vellum
misc: red buttons, cardboard, coffee filter, mft leaves die, pti jar die

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