Hello crafty friends! Today I’m sharing a card that I made after participating in Altenew Academy’s Let it Shine course.

I found this to be an interesting course, and really reminded me of all of the different ways to add shine and sparkle to a card. I may have overdone it on this one, because I used a bunch: hot foiling (hello), silver embossing powder (Sparkle on, Darling), a strip of “glimmer paper”, and finally some highlighting on the flower with a ZIG Wink of Stella brush in clear. I tried to balance all of the sparkle with a matte black card front, a mostly white flower, and the vellum leaves. I’m pretty pleased at how it came out.

Not often do I immediately know what color scheme I want to use with a card, but this one came together in my mind before I even sat down at my desk. For the shine, I wanted to use silver. That made me thing of black paper, with white flowers, to really make it stand out. I wanted to give the flowers a hint of greenish yellow, so I thought of Distress Ink in Shabby Shutters. I’m sure there’s an Altenew ink color that is similar, but it wasn’t in the front of my mind, like the Distress colors are.

I used the Altenew Craft-A-Flower: Sulfur Cosmos Layering Die Set for the flower and the leaves. The set comes with two flowers. I used the smaller one. I die cut all of the pieces with a piece of watercolor paper first. Then I placed the die cuts back into the negative space to hold them, so I could lightly blend some ink onto them with a mini blending brush, staying mainly in the areas that would become the center of the flower. I also used a foam blending tool to lighly apply color to the edges of the petals. Wanting to keep the card on the “clean and simple” side, I used vellum for the leaves. To finish the card off with just a touch more sparkle, I added clear Wink of Stella brush marker highlights along the die creases in the flower petals.

The course inspired me to use a bunch of shine-producing techniques on the same card, in a hopefully balanced way. I used the rounded corner and strip of glitz down the left side of the card that the course instructor demonstrated. I really love the Craft-A-Flower layering dies from Altenew. They go together very easily, as they have a keyhole cutout in the center that helps you line everything up in the right orientation. It couldn’t be easier! The flowers are gorgeous as well, so you just can’t go wrong. One flower is large enough to create a beautiful focal point for your A2 sized card, or use both for a really impressive look!

Thanks for stopping by my blog, I appreciate you!

Altenew products used:
Craft-A-Flower: Sulfur Cosmos Layering Die Set
Versatile Greetings Hot Foil Plate Set
Sentiment Strips 3 Stamp Set
Tim Holtz Distress Ink – Shabby Shutters, Scattered Straw
Tim Holtz Distress Heavystock – Black
ZIG Wink of Stella Brush II – Clear
Deco Foil – Silver
Ranger Detail Silver embossing powder