Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

Every time I see a raven I always think of Edgar Allen Poe's poem. It has been a favorite of mine since reading it many, many years ago as a teen. I much prefer the grungy, creepy, scary aspects of Halloween versus the cutesy, so when SU introduced their newest Halloween sets last year I was thrilled!! Then this year they added more, with ravens to boot. Needless to say I was ecstatic!

I can't tell you how much fun it was to create this card for a recent swap I participated in. The black lace trim, aptly named Raven, is wonderful to work with and I love the way the card turned out.


For the main image on the card I used the 1 3/4" circle punch on a post-it note, getting as much of the sticky portion as possible. I placed this on the Whisper White cardstock and then brayered Basic Black over the top half of the piece. I sponged More Mustard on the bottom half and then Rich Razzleberry over the bottom portion of Mustard and around the bottom edges.

With the post-it note circle still in place, I then sponged Basic Black around all the edges and brought it down a little over the Mustard to soften the brayer lines. I then stamped the Raven with Basic Black.

To give the moon a little more "umph", I sprayed a little bit of Vanilla Shimmer Smooch Spritz on my finger. Starting in the middle, I rubbed the spritz in a circular motion toward the edges of the circle, avoiding the raven. This made the spritz coverage a bit uneven, and though it's hard to tell in the picture, it made it look a lot more like the actual moon high in the night sky. I then took a very small paint brush and Basic Black reinker to make the "clouds" passing in front of the moon.

The raven's eye is one of the new Jewel Basics Pearls colored with a red sharpie (see this post for a little more info on coloring them). I distressed the edges of the image with the distress tool from the Cutter Kit and inked the edges of both the image and Pumpkin Pie mat with Basic Black.

The Rich Razzleberry piece is embossed with the Vintage Wallpaper embossing folder for the Big Shot. I placed a piece of double sided tape along the back edge and placed the Raven lace trim on it. I bunched it together in some places and left it flat in others.

The large mat is from the Neutrals Patterns DSP Stack. I stamped it with French Filigree and the "31" is from the new Dark & Dreary set in the Holiday mini. Both the Rich Razzleberry and DSP pieces were also sponged on the edges with Basic Black.


But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling...

Simplified continued...

In keeping with my post on Monday, here is another set of simplified cards. For this set I used my favorite season as inspiration ~ Fall! These two were truly the quickest cards I have ever made. I really like how they turned out too. It also uses the least amount of accessories I think I have ever used, only 3!

I pulled out the Stampin' Pastels for these. (I haven't used them in ages.) I decided to use the DSP instead of plain card stock to stamp the image on as I thought it added a nice detail, yet it's tone on tone color is still in keeping with the simplicity of the card. After stamping the leaf using Versamark, I used sponge daubers to color the image with the pastels, using the edge of the dauber sponge for the stem.

My color palette is Chocolate Chip, More Mustard and Old Olive. The image piece is matted on Old Olive and popped up on dimensionals.

Stamps: French Foliage (Holiday Mini), Because I Care (Hostess Level 1), Sincere Salutations
Ink: Versamark, Chocolate Chip
Paper: Neutrals Pattern DSP Stack, Crumb Cake and Old Olive card stock
Accessories: Stampin' Pastels, Sponge Daubers, Dimensionals


Have a great Labor Day weekend!