Simon Says Stamp New Challenge - Emboss It - 'distress paradise found'

Hi there lovely friends - eeeeep!  soooooo exciting to be back in with another guest design challenge piece of art for Simon Says Stamp

And I've had a total 'colour' ball creating this 'distress paradise found' page, what an awesome challenge 'Emboss it!" to go see the details of the challenge PRESS HERE and ohhhhh ther's oodles of LUSH inspiration form the fabulous design team eeeeep!

So...

...after a little pondering on whether to go embossing folders or heat embossing hahaha!  I went with both!!

My starting point was this irresistable Tim Holtz Sizzix Layered Dragonfly Bigz Die With Texture Fades, look at all that amazing detail, he (the Dragonfly is a handsome dude for sure) Can you spy the teal colored Ranger Ink Shiny Transfer Foil twinkling away on the wings which I also stamped over, just on the edges with the 'Newsprint' from Tim Holtz Cling Stamp Newsprint and Type.  to colorise him I simply added layers of Tim Holtz Distress Paints, spritzed with a little water, let dry and the repeat till I was happy! Once the foil was adhered (I used a Ranger Ink Collage Gluestick to adhere the foil remembering to place the foil shiny side up!)  I then added tiny hi-lights and shadows to the Dragonfly with more of the same colors I'd originally colorised him with...I'm in love with this little fella for sure :-))) 

The other embossing folder I used was the very versatile Tim Holtz Sizzix Typewriter and Keyboard Texture Fades Embossing Folders as you can see I inked up my folder with black ink and once I'd run the folder through my Sizzix Bigshot I chose to cut out the little circle discs creating my very own custom buttons. Randomly stacking on top of eachother creates amazing depth to your art (some of the letters do come out back to front doing this inking up trick  but I don't care cos its adds a quirky edge to my art, gets the brain cogs thinking a little more when somethings upside down, back to front!)

Two of my fav must have go to items are the Tim Holtz Distress Cayons and Ranger Ink Frosted Crystals Embossing Powder. I loooooves this technique cos when you heat this embossing powder it leaves a 'rough' rather than the usual smooth finish to your image, thus you can lighlly scribble your Distress Crayons over the 'embossed frosted crystal image' and create a kool kaleidoscope of  'Distress' color as the crayon color gets trapped between the 'rough' finish embossed frosted crystals. Tis an easy , fun and uber kool technique adding more layers of bursting color and you can use whatever base color of ink to stamp your image with too, the variations are endless! The stamps I chose to use for this technique are Tim Holtz Stampersanonymous Rubber Stamp Countdown Stampers, Tim-Holtz Stampersanonymous Rubber Stamp Sequence Stampers and the tiny splatter dots from Tim Holtz stampersanonymous Rubber Stamp Halftone Stampers (these tiny splatter dots are soooo handy to use not only as a full and beautiful layer to a background but if you use just a small portion of the stamp you can fill in those akward unbalanced areas, also they look like tiny splatter residue (which totally floats my boat!)

My background was created on a loose page, why not my beloved Dylusions Journal, well more often than not I like to add a little machine sewing on the page, thats the top and bottom of it!  It gets adhered in there when I'm finished!  Also as with this piece i know i'm going to work, work, work that page with layer after layer of color and mediums so I find Ranger Watercolor Paper Inkssentials Surfaces is well up to that kind of color/medium hammer heeheehee!

My usual final layers, sewing round the edge with cotton on my 'old' Singer sewing machine, dibs, dabs 'n' dots of paint, adding more layers of color with my distress Crayons,  a few strands of cotton thread here and there, lush, lush Sequins and eeeeep! Splatters!!!

I do hope you have enjoyed my 'distress paradise found' page, I soooo want/need the summer to come so I went all out hot, hot, hot color, a kaleidoscope of  hot, fun and summery color!

I can't wait to see what you all create this week and remember that Simon says Stamp will give away  $50 voucher to shop at their store as always...