Stamping with Julie Gearinger: Memorial Day Hero

Hi Friends!

As we approach the Memorial Day weekend, I wanted to create a card using the Artistic Outpost Hero and Grunge Elements stamp sets along with Our Daily Bread Designs Custom Dies and Paper in honor of those “Heroes” who have lost their lives in service to our country. May we always remember their sacrifice for your freedom and mine!

I decided to incorporate the My TimeTo Craft #346 Sketch Challenge along with the Word Art Wednesday #284-#285 "Anything Goes" Challenge into the design.

If you have not had a chance to check out the Artistic Outpost blog or the other challenge sites yet, I encourage you to do so! Inspiration is posted throughout the week on the AO Blog/ AO Facebook Page and the challenge galleries have fabulous samples as well!

To create this card:

1). Ink the military man image from Hero with hickory smoke distress ink and stamp onto a piece of white cardstock. Color the image with navy and cherry water-based markers along with vintage photo and tea dye distress inks. Add a bit of texture with the large splatter stamp as well as the smaller corner texture stamp from Grunge Elements using vintage photo distress ink. Die cut and emboss the image using the Double Stitched Circles Dies and mount onto a circle of navy cardstock (die cut and embossed with the Circles Dies).

2). Ink the Hero sentiment with navy ink and stamp onto white cardstock. Add a bit of splatter with the large splatter stamp from Grunge Elements and distress the paper with tea dye and vintage photo distress ink. Trim around the sentiment and mount onto navy cardstock.

3). Die cut and emboss stars using the Sparkling Stars Dies from navy cardstock and the Patriotic Collection 6x6 Paper Pad. Layer the stars and add a copper brad to the center of each star.

4). Trim a piece of the Patriotic Collection 6x6 Paper for the background to 4” x 5 ¼”. Distress the edges with a distressing tool and apply vintage photo and tea dye distress ink over the entire panel to “antique” the paper. Once dry, apply a thin layer of picket fence distress stain to tone down the images a bit and once that layer has dried, use a star stencil with crackled texture paste to add additional dimension.

5). Once the crackled texture paste has dried, apply a thin layer of mod podge over the entire background as well as the sentiment layer and the die cut focal image circle layer- allow all to air dry.

6). Mount a piece of navy cardstock onto the cherry card front, adhere the card front to the white card base. Add the background panel and mount the focal image along with the stars and sentiment using dimensional foam.

Thanks again for taking the time to visit- hugs! I hope you have a blessed Memorial Day week/weekend and never forget the real reason for Memorial Day...