Monday 4 July 2016

Inlaid die cuts - my first attempt

If you've been wondering why it's been so quiet on here, I've been away in France for a few days, visiting family and having lots of fun with my two younger grandchildren. And my local friends may not wish to know this, but the weather was gloriously hot and sunny and I even turned a little bit brown.

One of our outings was to a lovely restaurant, and everyone saw my face light up when I was handed the menu. Not because of all the delicious goodies listed inside (well, not immediately anyway) but because the cover design was so simple and elegant - I had to CASE it as soon as I got home. The original was in shades of grey and white, but I thought it would be a perfect card for this week's Less is More colour challenge of "The colours in your kitchen". Our kitchen is in terracotta, dark grey and cream, so I raided my snippets box for suitable scraps of card to reflect those colours.

As soon as Mark saw the card, he recognised the inspiration - although as he pointed out, the menu we had said "Carte" where my card says "With love". But who wants to send a card that says "card" on the front?

I decided to inlay the dies where they crossed the grey band, to keep the flattish look of a menu cover. Never having tried this before, I found it very fiddly. Perhaps my choice of dies for a first attempt wasn't the most appropriate!

Because all the coloured card is from my snippets box, I am also popping over to the Snippets Playground with this card, where I know there are many more experienced die-cut-inlayers than I am. But we all have to start somewhere!



10 comments:

Sharon Traynor Designs said...

Bravo! Simply elegant and so, so classy!! That inlaid die cutting is superb and I can see why your face would have lit up with such a super-CAS design Jane. It was lovely to hear how you got your inspiration.
Thank you so much for sharing this with us.
Sharon xx
Less is More

Esther said...

Love this card! Your inlaid dies look great and what a stylish layout and colour combo. Glad you enjoyed your holiday though I'm a little bit jealous of the fab weather and tan!

Bonnie said...

Love these red, inlaid flowers, Jane! Glad you got to enjoy some sunshine!

Mac Mable said...

What fun inspiration with the menu. Gorgeous colours and I think you've done a fabulous job on in laying the die cuts. Thanks for sharing x

Sid said...

Very elegant card !

Kathyk said...

Well I reckon you've rocked inlaid dies! Fab make

Kathyk

Di said...

Hi Jane! I think this is fabulous and your inlaid die cuts are perfect! A wonderful card.

Hugs

Di xx

Cara said...

What a fab way to find inspiration! This is stunning. Cara x

Sarah G said...

I am glad to hear that you enjoyed your break in sunny France and that you found the inspiration for this lovely design along the way! The colour combo and inlaid dies just look gorgeous. Great to see you at Less is More :)

Chrissie said...

Just playing catch up on last week's challenge entries!
This is really striking... and I'm so pleased to hear you found some sun somewhere!
Thanks so much
Chrissie
"Less is More"