"THE" Challenge

Every month just before My Favorite Things puts out its new release they have "the" challenge that all us MFT junkies would love to win.  The prize is always fabulous, stamps and dies from the following months release and the best part is the chance to play along with the MFT design team in the following months sneak peeks. 

This month the challenge is to "Stamp Your Heart Out" incorporate love/hearts in your card or project. 

I usually let the theme percolate in my head for a day before I start, of course I never end up where I think I'm going but that's OK with me.  This month was no exception.  I was stewing over a project, figuring I would use it as a Valentine's gift for hubby but as you can see that is not what turned up.  Would you be surprised to know that there was a brown, red and plaid paper and a pink harlequin paper on my desk when I started out? 

you can tweak the shape after you
cut the template out

In the end I made a shaped card.  To make a heart shaped card start out by folding a piece of plain paper (8-1/2 X 11 works fine) in half.  This card is meant to go into a 6-1/2" square envelope, it uses a 12" piece of card stock for the base.  On the paper I made marks at 6" on the long side and 3" on the other.  Draw half a heart on it, cut it out cutting through both layers of the paper.  Once you open it up, you can decide if it needs trimming. 

you just need the smallest bit to go
over the edge, it's barely noticeable

Place your template over a six" square card base.  Be sure to let a small section go past the fold of the card base so that it will open.  You can tack the heart down using extremely small amounts of tape or if you have repositionable tape use that.  Trace around the edge of the heart and cut it out.  You can sand the edges to make them smooth or you could distress the edges.   If you're uncomfortable making your own template you could run to the store and pick up a box of chocolates in a heart shaped box and use that for your template.  

I had been browsing around the MFT gallery looking for a something done with the "Mermaid WTG" stamp (I used that for another challenge).   I spotted one of my cards made with the "Who's that Harvesting Girl?" stamp set and thought one of the stamps was a bunch of hearts.  So as I was looking for this stamp set I was pulling other MFT stamps with hearts.  turns out the harvesting girl doesn't have hearts but that idea was just stuck in my head so I decided I'd just draw some hearts to put in the basket.  The rest of the image is paper pieced.  I pulled some die-namics to use for embellishments.  Of course I had to use heart charm and some pearls to finish it off. 

Here's the deets:
stamp - My Favorite Things "Who's That Harvesting Girl?"
ink - Memento "Tuxedo Black"; Ranger "Frayed Burlap"
paper - Bazzill "Ruby Slippers" cs; Stampin' Up "Kraft" cs and "Pink Pirouette" dp; My Mind's Eye Lost and Found Two "Blush" dp; Recollections Printed Scrapbook Papers dp
miscellaneous - copics; glaze pen; baker's twine heart charm; MFT die-namics "scallop ribbon", "faux crochet", "Fancy Flourish" and trio of hearts; open weave ribbon; pearls

Here's the challenges:
My Favorite Things MFTGUESTDT2012- February Guest Designer
One Stop Craft #168 - For the One I Love
Friday Mash Up #44 - Inspiration Photo and/or Cherry Cobbler, Regal Rose and White
Paper Play week 5 - Get In Shape
Moving Along with the Times 134 - Have a Heart
Pals Paper Arts PPA128 - Any Red, Any Red, Any Red
Really Reasonable Ribbon #41 Red and Pink with Ribbon
L'il Red Wagon #118 - Valentine's Day or Love
Ribbon Carousel RCC38 - Paper Piecing
Color Q CQC#122 - Black, Real Red, Regal Rose, Kraft; White
Tuesday Throwdown #83 - Use Hearts

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you'll come back again.