Simply Swap It – April 2024

Our new swap round starts this month. I think I picked a really good challenge for our group this round. We are playing Craft Roulette. So, what is Craft Roulette you ask?  It is a weekly crafting challenge based on a spin of the wheel. The wheel chooses four parameters – project, colors, element, and random.  There are 24 possibilities for each parameter, giving a combined total of 331,776 possibilities.  Watch this short video for the full description of Craft Roulette:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gtp_JemHb9U.

Before I explained what Craft Roulette was, I asked each of the Swap It Gals who chose to play this round to pick a number between 1 and 200 (I had to pick a stopping point). The number each person chose correlates to an episode of Craft Roulette.

Our April episode is Episode No. 12. Here are the parameters: Project: Matchbook Card; Colors: Summer Daisy Garden; Element: Heat Embossing, and Random: Use Eyelets. Here is a link to the episode if you’d like to check it out for yourself. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpVBT4dI5rw.

Now that the set-up is out of the way, let’s see how I interrupted the parameters of Episode No. 12.

I started by making some backgrounds using Distress Ink in Spiced Marmalade and Fossilized Amber on Canson XL Mixed Media paper. I made the backgrounds using Vicki Boutin’s kissing technique – smooshing my ink onto a piece of acetate, spraying some water on it, and then lightly touching it to my paper. I did each color separately and drying the paper in between layers.

While the paper dried, I chose a bright green card base out of Recollections Garden Greens pack in 110 lb. I cut the base at 4 1/2″ x 10 3/4″ vertically and scored it at 1″ and 6 1/4″.

Next I prepped a spot for my sentiment. I decided I wanted to put my sentiment on the “matchbook” spot and found a stitched sentiment panel from the Unity Stamp Company Scalloped & Stitched Sentiment Nesting Die Set.

I next worked on cutting my background pages down into layering panels of 4″ x 4 1/4″. I then stamped the beautiful daisies from Unity Stamp Company’s Keeping It Simple set. I used VersaFine Clair Nocturn Ink for the stamping.

I added the stamped background layer to the card base and then moved on to the “eyelet” element from the parameters. I used my W R Memory Keepers Crop-A-Dile Eyelet Setter to punch and set white eyelets on the “matchbook” fold of the card base.

I decided these cards should be birthday cards and used the “happy birthday” sentiment from Unity Stamp Company’s “Be Unstoppable” set. Here is where the heat embossing element came into play. I stamped the sentiment using VersaMark embossing ink and then poured on Black Ranger Super Fine Detail Embossing Powder.

I’ll admit that I’m not the best at using embossing powder. This powder has been in my stash for quite a while and was clumpy and didn’t seem to raise all that much. And, I got stray powder everywhere on some of the sentiment strips. But . . . it’s handmade – right?!?!

Anyway . . . after getting all the sentiment strips stamped and embossed, I glued each down on the matchbook, centered between the eyelets. I’m pretty pleased with how the final card turned out!

Leave me a comment below to let me know what you think!

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