Soft Pastels & Embossing Folder Cards

This card was created for the Soft Pastels Blog Hop with Crafty Collaborations team. Today’s challenge was using Soft Pastels. My favorite way to use the soft pastels is to enhance the pattern made by embossing folders. It really adds a “Wow” factor to your cards.

The Crafty Collaborations Team is comprised of Stampin’ Up! Demonstrators from around the world. Each month we participate in several collaborative projects, including Blog Hops, like this one, to inspire all of us in our passion for crafting. Our goal is to create, share, and inspire every crafter to keep our creative energy flowing.

In the card above, I used the Soft Pastels to make the textured embossing from the Star Crossed Embossing Folder (retiring soon and on sale) stand out more. This is an easy peasy way to step up your cards. After embossing the mat by running it through my Cut & Emboss machine in the Star Crossed EF, I used the flat edge of the Poppy Parade Soft Pastel and lightly rubbed the flat edge over the criss-cross pattern. Then I used the Mango Melody Soft Pastel to enhance the stars in the same way. The die cut trees are from the Whimsical Trees dies (retiring soon) and the Merry Christmas sentiment, embossed in white, is from A Christmas to Remember. I added three Wonderful Gems to give it a bit of shine.

I also used this same technique with the Pretty Flowers Embossing Folder and the Night of Navy pastel. It looks much lighter when rubbed across this folder and I love the way it pops against the black card base. The flower and sentiment from the Shaded Summer stamp set are stamped in Night of Navy. A few Blue Adhesive Backed Gems gives it a bit of sparkle too. I love the bold look of this card and background but I also wanted to see if I could create a more subtle look.

This card uses Bermuda Bay card stock and the same Night of Navy soft pastel. I love the way the White Glittered Organdy ribbon picks up the color of the card base. It looks like I colored it, but it is untouched. The bling on this one is from the Elegant Faceted Gems pack.

I hope you will look at the embossing folders in your stash, grab your soft pastels and give this technique a try! It’s a great way to step up the background on your cards.

Want to see all the products used to create this project? Scroll to the bottom. Click on any thumbnail at the end of this post for more information or to purchase.

BLOG HOP

Remember, this is a blog hop and you are currently visiting ChatnCraft with Lorraine. Please hop on down the line and visit the rest of the talented collaborators.

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Here is the card that I made and for which instructions will be included in the tutorial.