Just Keep Swimming....

Hello everyone and Happy Monday!

Hope you've all had a good weekend and you're ready for the brand new Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge which this week is called "We Can See Clearly Now'. So if you love acetate and vellum or maybe you have a different interpretation of this theme, then we would love for you to join us and play along!

For my project, I had a clear idea of what I wanted to make and inspired by the Disney Classic, Finding Nemo, I created my own little fish tank on the front of a card, using a Sizzix 3.5" Shaker Dome! I hope that the photos do this justice and you will have to excuse any reflections you can see on the photos ~ as you can imagine, photographing acetate isn't the easiest thing and I think I needed Annie Leibovitz on hand, lol!

So let's get the challenge started and here's how I made this card...

BACKGROUNDS

To begin with I'll start with the background and for this I used a panel of Distress Watercolour Card 12 x 14cm and a second panel 12 x 16cm. Using my splat box, I placed the card panels inside and spritzed them with a light mist of water before spritzing the card with Speckled Egg, Bundled Sage, Frayed Burlap Distress Spray Stains and Speckled Egg Oxide Spray.

I spritzed another light mist of water over the inks to blend the colours together to form the beautiful colour ~ as you will see I did make the smaller panel slightly darker in colour than the larger one.

After heat drying the backgrounds, I machine stitched a wiggly border on the top and the bottom of the larger panel which I then matted onto gold metallic kraft stash, distressed around the edges, then a layer of black kraft card from the Neutrals set and finally a panel of patterned paper that I have in my stash.

Set this to one side until you've finished the dome and the scene...

SHAKER DOME APERTURE

Moving on, I cut a circular aperture in the centre of the smaller panel ~ I used a 9cm circle die from a Sizzix Framelits set that I have in my stash and this die will fit the dome perfectly. Once you cut the circle, keep this piece of card as you will need it for later.

I then wanted to add some texture to this panel and for this I applied some Translucent Grit Paste through the Scales Layering Stencil from Tim Holtz and whilst the paste was still wet, I sprinkled Speckled Egg Distress Glaze over the top. Tap away the excess and then set the card panel to one side to allow the paste to dry. Once this has happened, then the magic begins and using a heat embossing tool, I very carefully heated the texture paste to melt the glaze to create the enamelled effect on the card panel. I finished the panel with some zig zag machine stitching around the edges.

Taking the die cut circle that I cut from the centre of the panel, I inked up the seaweed stamp from the Sea Life stamp set and stamped it around the edge of the circle.

I then watercolored it with Peeled Paint Distress Ink before attaching this circle onto the centre of the larger inked panel.

CREATING THE SCENE INSIDE THE SHAKER DOME

For the foliage that fits inside the circle, I used a couple of the dies from the Sizzix Funky Florals 2 die set by Tim Holtz and cut a selection from Distress Watercolour Card that I inked with Peeled Paint and Bundled Sage Distress Sprays.

I then attached the foliage, adding it so that it was placed along the bottom curve of the circle.

With the foliage in place, I moved onto creating those adorable little fish, and for these I used the Under The Sea 1 Thinlits Die Set. I inked each of the main bodies with a blend of Spiced Marmalade and Crackling Campfire.

After assembling the four separate fish, adding the white stripes and tiny little eyes that are cut from black card, I attached all four onto the circle using foam pads, adhering them so that it looks as if they're swimming and weaving their way, in and out of the fronds. I also added some small tufts of moss to complete the scene.

For the bubbles, I used four silver metallic droplets and placed these directly onto the background.

TOP TIP: When adding all the elements to the circle, I really recommend that you keep checking that the dome still fits over the top comfortably.

Adhere the dome over the top of the scene in the circle and then place the background panel over the top of the dome, leaving some of the lighter coloured panel showing at the top and bottom. I used red line tape to secure this panel into place.

After attaching some Index Clips, altered with a little Distress Paint to add a rusty colour to each of them and clipped these near the bottom of the panels.

I mounted the matted panels onto my kraft card blank which I'd inked with Walnut Stain Distress Ink. You might also notice that I also adhered some torn pieces of book paper around the edges of the card blank to add some more interest.

For the metal circle that sits around the outside of the dome, I cut a circle of metallic kraft stash card, approx 9.5cm in diameter and then placed the circle die in the centre before running this through my die cutting machine. I now have a perfect frame that once I'd inked with Pitch Black, Rust and Foundry Alloy Alcohol Inks for a rusty finish I attached with Matte Collage Medium, placing the frame around the outside of the dome.

FINISHING DETAILS

I adhered some Hardware Heads onto the metallic frame and then painted these with Rusty Hinge and Black Soot Distress Paints to match them with the rusted frame.

I also attached some more moss around the base of the dome, together with some more die cut foliage.

In the top right hand corner, I added a small offcuts of metallic kraft stash card that I had left over from a previous project. This is embossed with the 3D Foundry Folder and I adhered them onto the card before attaching a sprocket gear and a hardware head over the top. I used the same paints as I used before to add colour to the metal hardware.

We're nearly there and all that's left is to stamp the sentiment, 'you can never have too much happy' which I stamped with Black Soot Archival Ink onto a scrap of inked card. I then cut an inverted 'v' into each end of the banner and attached the sentiment underneath the dome.

To complete the card, I added a Remnant Rub number in the top left hand corner.

So that's my project finished for today and I hope you've enjoyed the step by step of how I made it.

As always, if you make anything, or been inspired by anything that you've seen here on my blog ~ then please, let me know by tagging me on social media or leaving a comment here and I will be right over to take a look!

Don't forget that every week, one lucky random participant has the chance to win a $25 gift voucher from Simon Says Stamp and you can join in up to 5 times, which means you could have 5 chances to win. You have until Monday 8am Ohio time. 1pm UK time, 2 pm CET to join in and good luck....

Thank you so much for taking the time to stop by today ~ stay safe and keep well.

Love Emma xxx

Recipe for project:

Sizzix/Tim Holtz Dies: Under The Sea 1 Colorize, Funky Florals 2, Sizzix Making Essentials Framelits Die Set from joy stash, 3.5" Shaker Dome

Stampers Anonymous: Scales Layering Stencil, Tiny Text, Sea Life

Distress Paint: Rusty Hinge, Black Soot

Distress Spray Stain: Frayed Burlap, Speckled Egg, Bundled Sage, Peeled Paint

Distress Oxide Spray: Speckled Egg

Distress Embossing Glaze: Speckled Egg

Distress Inks: Peeled Paint, Spiced Marmalade and Crackling Campfire

Tim Holtz Idea-ology: Hardware Heads, Index clips, Metallic Droplets, Specimen Remnant Rubs, Mini Sprocket Gears

Alcohol Inks: Pitch Black, Rust, Foundry Alloy

Mediums: Matte Collage Medium, Translucent Grit Paste, Black Soot Archival Ink

Surfaces: Watercolor Card, Metallic Kraft Stash, Neutral Kraft Stash

Glass Media Mat

Heat Gun

Sizzix Big Shot

Moss from my own stash