Friday, April 11, 2008

Inspiring Pillows

You know I love a challenge, and inspiration challenges are one of my favorites. I love that I can go anywhere with them and pick and choose which parts inspire me. So when Julee shared these pillows with us and told us to be inspired, I was!

I have to admit that I generally have a fairly literal take on inspiration challenges, and often find myself trying to re-create the entire piece. So it was no surprise that I found myself colour blocking based on the presentation alone! I definitely picked up the wonderful colours, the different textures, the stitching and the applique, and when I put it all together, it looked something like this.

I worked with the "Thankful Blossoms" set and began by stamping the stem and leaves on each of the four squares, matching ink colour and paper; Brocade Blue and So Saffron. The squares were layered on white, and then pierced along the outer edge...that just speaks to me of fabric and stitching! The white piece was adhered to the large blue square, scalloped and embossed with Nestabilites, with dimensionals.

The focal flower was stamped on Brocade Blue with Versamark and embossed with white embossing powder. A jumbo eyelet was set in the centre and a large blue circle rhinestone brad was inserted before attaching the flower with dimensionals.

The border along the bottom was created with the stem stamp and the sentiment was stamped just below it. To finish it off a blue gem was added to each intersection of the border, and four blue gems were added to the swirlies in the petals to really make the flower pop!

Now when I get inspired and 100 ideas go running through my head at once, I have to play immediately before they escape. Here is my second take on these inspiring pillows...a pillow box!

Here I chose the "Serenity" set, and worked with So Saffron. I stamped the larger open bloom in Versamark all over the box template, and embossed in clear. For the label, I cut an oval using Nestabilities, and then a second oval out of copy paper the next size smaller. I placed the copy paper the oval was cut out of, over the So Saffron oval to create a mask, and then stamped a cluster with the smaller open bloom stamp on the top and bottom with Versamark. These were embossed in copper then filled in with Liquid Pearls. The sentiment is from "Happy Thoughts" and it was stamped across the centre then embossed in copper as well.

The larger scalloped oval is Brushed Copper, cut and embossed using Nestabilities. Two slots were punched with the slot punch at either ends. Gold organdy ribbon was threaded through the slots and the So Saffron label was adhered over the ribbon. Then I tied the ribbon in a bow for a lovely presentation of a gift card, or other small but awesome gift!

Are you feeling a little bit inspired? Well we invite you to play along. You can check out all the details and the prize here. Be sure to link your dreamy creations here, so we can all admire them.
Have a great day, and keep your head in the clouds!