MFT Card Design Superstar - Clean & Simple Genius

It seems like it's been ages since I participated in a challenge.  I used to do so a lot, but my crafty free time is a lot less flexible these days, and sometimes challenges feel like work because you are really stretching yourself.  Still, sometimes a challenge really resonates with you and it makes the creative process fun and exciting.

That's what happened when I saw the MFT Card Design Superstar call.  I flipped through my MFT collection of stamps and dies, and was struck with an idea, and then it was just a matter of seeing that idea through.

For my card, I used and older MFT background that's been retired called Balloon Strings.  This is such a versatile background and can be used in many different ways.

For my card, I decided to piece the background with cardstock to create a dimensional landscape effect.

I started by choosing five shades of blue cardstock (including MFT Blueberry, After Midnight, and Nightshift Blue) as well as one shade of a very light cool gray (MFT Cement Gray).

The background was stamped on 2-3 pieces of each color using a very light ink.  Then I fussy cut along the lines to create the contoured piece.  I did this both at the top and bottom of the background to create the two pieces.

Originally I was just going to use two pieces of each color, but because there were so many layers, I used three for some of the middle colors.  I had also originally thought I might use some foam tape between some of the layers for dimension, but given the fact that each landscape piece already has 14 layers of cardstock, that didn't happen.

I did need a way to create some definition between layers of the same shade of cardstock though, and decided to use my Versamark ink pad to ink the edge of the cardstock to create that distinction.

There were a couple layers where lines from the background intersected and they needed to be 'erased'.  This was done with a combination of a fine sand/grit eraser as well as the Couture Creations eraser tool.  This was where stamping with that very light ink helped as well.

Once my landscape pieces were done, they were directly adhered to my card base.

I chose a clean and simple sentiment, from the Because You set, to finish things off.

This was such a fun card to conceive and put together, and definitely makes me think I need to get back into the challenge scene!