Penny Black for Rudolph Day

Hi and welcome to the first Rudolph Day Challenge of 2018. I missed a lot of Rudy Days last year, so I'm going to make a concerted effort to join in if at all possible in 2018 (that wasn't a New Year's Resolution or anything, but hey, it would make a pretty good one, yes?) You DO know about Rudolph Day? It's a challenge hosted by Scrappymoi, opens on the 25th each month, closes at the last day. The only rule is 'anything Christmas'.

Was inspired by this card by my so talented friend, Bonnie K. Of course then I had to buy the Penny Black stamp. Decided I'd use it for Rudy Day, as I needed to make something that didn't take a long time to color. First thought about using gold to emboss it, but had gotten some NBUS Altenew Platinum that needed a try, -- was pleased with the effect. Did some DOX sponging..(trying for a glow right around the tree, not sure I've achieved that. Still pleased with the outcome. My first try at coloring the swirls inside the tree wasn't great, neither was my second. Tried with an alcohol marker - got it messy outside the embossed edges. Then tried another effort with gel pens, still not great. Went to Polychromos pencils, not dark enough in the tiny spaces to show well, so went over the pencils with the Kaiser glitter pens. Liked that better).

Embossed Penny Black Starry Tree withWOW watermark pad, then heat embossed with Altenew Platinum Crisp EP. Colored elements within the tree with pencils and Kaiser glitter pens. Using a snippet of my other failed efforts, sort of masked the edge of the tree while sponging DOX Twisted Citron, Bundled Sage & Iced Spruce at the bottom. Spritzed a pearlized mica spray, while shielding the tree image. That same snippet mask was used to ink WOW versamark over the edges, then heat embossed with Platinum. Two slivers of that same snippet were trimmed, inked with copic blue greens, then used WOS for a little glitter. Started coloring the strips with the Kaiser glitter pens, but the ink didn't flow well. I'm not particularly thrilled with these pens, as they don't seem to hold much ink. A couple of times use, then they appear to dry up, even though you can still see ink in the barrel. Pulled out the trusty copics, inked, WOS, done. The blue doesn't match the swirls color but I liked the contrast between the platinum and this color, so....

Penny Black Rejoice die, cut 4 layers from the last of the failure snippet, then embossed with the same platinum used elsewhere on the card. After seeing the picture, the sentiment didn't get centered as well as might be.

Is anyone else having a problem with Blogger slowness when leaving comments? At some blogs, I hit publish and then it 'goes'. Other times I publish, wait, hit the publish button again, and finally it appears to take the comment. I'm not always sure.

Please do check out this fun challenge, as Maureen (Scrappymoi) always has some lovely prizes. So see you at Rudolph Day January 2018. Be there, or be square!

Thanks for joining me today, come again when you can, and hugs & Blessings. Stay well, as there is so much sickness about.