Chess Inspiration

Join us for a new challenge over at Perfectly Rustics!  This fortnight, the challenge is to include the word “remember” or “remembrance” on your project (http://perfectlyrustics.com/2015/04/06/prdc-no-45-remember/).

The sentiment I used on my card project is “remember every pawn is a potential queen” and is based on the promotion rule in chess:  if a pawn reaches the other side of the board, it can become any other chess piece (called promotion) and is usually promoted to a queen.  The pawn is the piece that is assigned the lowest point value of all the pieces on the board, but it has the potential to become one of the most valuable.  I think this reference is great to remind us that anything is possible if we work hard and put our minds to it!  I thought this inspirational card would be good for a graduate, someone starting a new job, or for anyone who needs to be reminded that we are all valuable and capable of great things.

This is one of those cards that just kept evolving; it is nothing like my original idea!  The stamps I used are from the Chocolate Baroque “The Art of Chess” set.  I started with a piece of ivory card stock and sponged some Gina K honey mustard and warm cocoa ink on it.  Then I stamped the sentiment repeatedly with Gina K dark chocolate ink to create a background.  Then I stamped the queen and some pawns with versamark ink and heat embossed them with clear embossing powder.  Finally, I sponged some dark chocolate ink over the whole thing.  I was going for an emboss-resist panel – and ended up hating it! There was just too much space between my chess pieces, and it was so dark and dull.  So, I ended up cutting this panel apart and using just the queen and one pawn.

Now I needed a panel for my chess pieces.  I used another piece of ivory card stock and stamped my sentiment again.  The sentiment didn’t have the word “remember” in it, so I used the stamp “Always Remember” by Woodware Craft Collection – Clear Magic Singles and masked everything except the word remember.  I originally had left this panel plain ivory, but I added a piece of a digital paper image called “Antique Game Board Papers” that I purchased on Etsy from a shop called MarysMontage (HERE) which was distressed so I decided to distress the ivory panel a bit by lightly sponging some warm cocoa and honey mustard ink on it.  To distress it a bit more, I sprinkled on a bit of clear embossing powder in random spots, heat set it, and inked a bit more over those areas.  And of course it started getting dark and dull again!!

I thought I’d try to brighten it up a bit by working with the cranberry that was in the checker/chess board.  I used a piece of patterned paper from the Heartfelt Creations Classic Sunflower Collection paper pad, and some Gina K honey mustard card stock.    (Note to self – cranberry and honey mustard are NOT bright!!)  And I couldn’t figure out what to do with these two panels!  I ended up playing around with a bunch of scraps that were piling up on my desk.  A few of the scraps were from card stock that was embossed with the Darice 5×7 damask embossing folder (which was originally the whole card base).  A few of the scraps have parts of the stamped images and sentiment I had been using.  One scrap was from my original emboss-resist panel.  And I tucked some of the cranberry patterned paper scraps in there as well.  Well, now my A2 card is 5×7!

All of the edges were inked with Gina K charcoal brown ink, and a piece of raffia ribbon and three metal sticker embellishments finished it off.

Another card in brown tones.  Hmmmm…..

I don’t usually add so many “scraps”  to my projects; usually I plan out what I need and cut panels. It was kind of fun to just keep throwing these scrap strips on my card!  And then I notice the email I received today from the “Use Your Stuff” blog where their challenge this week is to use paper strips on our project! Thin strips or thick strips, a lot of strips or just a few – it’s up to us.  Because we all have lots of paper scraps laying around just begging to be used, they are challenging us to put those scraps to use on our projects!  Well that worked out well!! (http://useyourstuff.blogspot.com/2015/04/challenge-179-paper-strips.html)

Over at the Mod Squad Challenge blog, the challenge for this week is Tick Tack Toe where we are to select a line of 3 techniques from the tick tack toe board to create a project.  Here is the board:

This card used techniques from the first vertical column on the left.   (Sadly, this site is no longer active.)

Thanks for checking out my card project!

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