Blue and Grey Paper Artsy Castle

So, as promised, here is the card I made using the Castle stamp from the Paper Artsy Crowns and Castles 4 stamp set.

The Castle image was stamped using Memento Tuxedo Black dye ink and coloured with Copic markers:

• Castle: W1, W3,W5,W7,W9

The image was then cut out.

Using Nestabilities dies, a petite cream oval and petite scalloped blue oval were die cut. Keeping the cream die cut within the die, the edges were distressed using Tim Holtz Weathered Wood and Antique Linen distress inks with shaving brushes. I much prefer the effect using the brushes to the Cut & Dry foam as I always get heavy smudges when I use the foam, whereas this gives a much softer look.

The Castle image was then mounted in the centre of the ovals.

A panel of the cream and blue medallion paper from the DCWV Once Upon A Time mat stack was then matted onto a strip of the blue card punched with the XCut Diamonds border punch and lengths of brown ladder ribbon and blue fibre from the HOTP Sapphire Sarabooks fibres were wrapped around it.

This was then matted across the blue distressed birds paper from the same mat stack. The edges of all of these pieces were distressed with the two distress inks and then matted onto blue card.

The corners of the blue distressed paper were then stamped using a small corner flourish stamp from the Fiskars Friends Forever Quotes stamp set and Versafine Smokey Gray archival pigment ink and then overstamped with Brilliance Graphite Black pigment ink.

The Birthday Wishes sentiment, from the Hero Arts Birthday Messages stamp set, was stamped in the bottom right corner also using the Graphite Black ink.

Here are the challenges I am entering this card into:

• Digi's With Attitude - #32 - Anything Goes
• Inspire Me Fridays - #12 - Anything Goes
• Stampin' For The Weekend - #11 - My Favourite Things (Shaving Brushes)
• Colour Create - #73 - Blue, Grey and White
• My Mum's Craft Shop - #11 - One Of The Boys
• Scrapbook Sisters - #41 - Anything Goes
• Sisterhood Of Crafters - Male Themed Birthday/Anniversary
• Everybody Art - #147 - Anything Goes
• Top Tip Tuesday - #39 - Cross It (Fibres)
• Tuesday Throwdown - #54 - Masculine Card
• Sweet Stampin' - Something Old, Something New (Old: Castle stamp New: Shaving Brushes)
• Word Play Weekend - #7 - Home/House
• Card Cupids - Cards For Boys
• Make It Monday - #43 - Anything Goes
• Freshly Brewed - #49 - For The Guys
• My Grafico - Anything Goes
• The Craft Garden - Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue (Old: Castle stamp New: Shaving Brushes Blue: Papers)