Silver Bells in the City

Hello! Alison here. Each month, my family and I sit down for a few hours in the dining room and make cards using Sparkle Blends from Doodles Paper Playground and other fun supplies. We were off to a late start this month, so we only had our Family Crafty Time on Monday, since there was no school. Today's project was made by my husband, and I LOVE what he made. He was planning on making a card, but it morphed into more of a home decor piece. It's now about 7" x 7."

When he was figuring out what to do and he saw the Silver Bells Sparkle Blend, he quickly thought of creating a city skyline. I have a really old stamp set from Stampendous that was designed by Nat Kalbach that was perfect for what he was envisioning because not only are there multiple stamps, but a cool stencil too. He made the back layer of the city first, by tracing one of the stamps in the set and cutting it out. Then he used Chipped Sapphire Distress Ink and Mustard Seed Distress Oxide with the accompanying stencil to create windows. I love how it looks like some of the windows are lit.

His top layer was done with a lighter gray cardstock, and he stamped the sketchy city with VersaMark ink and embossed it with Detail Silver Embossing Powder. Then he applied Black Soot Distress Oxide just on the edges of the skyline to deepen the color a bit. He buffed off the excess where it was on the embossing powder. He decided he also wanted to add snow, so he used a VersaMarker and scribbled it across the bottom of the cityscape and across the "street." He applied Sparkle Puff embossing powder and voila! Snowy banks.

Gene really loved the big silver bells in this Sparkle Blend, and they are really what inspired his entire project. He cut some black cardstock for his background and flicked on some Sheer Shimmer Spritz in Frost. Then he adhered his city layers using different heights of foam. Last, he placed on all of the elements from the Silver Bells Sparkle Blend, including the snowflakes, the stars, and of course the bells. He used On Point Glue for this.

It took Gene a bit longer to create this than he anticipated, but I thought he got it done pretty quickly considering all of the steps that were involved. We all love how this turned out, and I am looking forward to hanging it up over the holiday season. Have you seen the entire new release of Sparkle Blends yet? Head over to the Sparkle Blends Shop on Etsy to check them out. You can use my code, “ALISON10” for 10% off of your purchase, not including bundles. Thanks so much for stopping by. Have an inspiring day!