Dies R Us: Slimline Sea Life Scene

Happy Tuesday everyone! Lisa here with a oceanic slimline card! These are my favorite cards to make right now, I just can't get enough of the slimline layout. This card actually came together completely differently than I intended it to. Originally it was going to be a shaker card using aqua watercolor-printed acetate instead of clear. This is going to be a little photo heavy to show how I put everything together.

Here's some close ups to see all the layers and dies I used.

Foil can be hard to photograph, but I just love working with it. And when paired with glitter cardstock, it just pops.

I picked out the dies I intended to use, both from Paper Rose, one of my favorite companies as of late. Unfortunately, Coral Circle is out of stock, but the Under The Sea Border is available.

I know the round die is called Coral Circle, but I thought it worked well for seaweed or seagrass as well. That's the look I was going for when I started to put the card together. I hit my first snag when I tried to cut the first shaker hole with the Coral die. The acetate cardstock I was using is kind of brittle, and it cracked in half.

The top piece stuck to the plate of my Big Shot, I needed my paper piercer to dig some of it out. So I decided to put the acetate under the glitter cardstock instead of on top. I guess I could've layered another piece of clear or even the colored acetate under that and still go with a shaker, but I went with cardstock instead.

I now needed more dies to fill in the space on the card, so I picked these three out. Creative Expressions Mermaid, Memory Box Mermaid Wonder Frame, and Impression Obsession Mermaids. I wound up not using the Memory Box die for this particular card.

I started to think the acetate wasn't showing up enough on its own over either the card base of the glitter cardstock, so I added some rainbow holographic foil to back it, slightly offset. I wanted to show both foil pieces by themselves so you could really see not only the detail of the die but that I reverse cut one of them. I didn't want the coral going in the same direction on both frames. The acetate didn't show a wrong-or-right side of the die cut, and the foil hid it really well too. You can hardly tell that the one on the left was cut on the backside of the foil.

I forgot to take a picture of the dies, but I used Tutti Designs Nesting Stitched Circles to cut the glitter cardstock layer. There's a circle in that set, I think it's the third smallest one, that's just under three inches wide, so it was perfect to layer over the Coral Circle, since it's 3" wide.

This was one of those situations where the more I added to this card, the more I wanted to add. Fish, starfish, seahorses. I think with sea life projects, more is more.

Normally when I'm working with tiny die cuts, I put 1/2" Scor Tape on back of the cardstock before cutting it so they're easy to attach to my project. I wanted this card to have a little more dimension though, so I used Glue Dots instead. I used the Mini ones and cut some in half or quarters to put under the tiny pieces. I didn't use adhesive on any of the Coral Circle detailed pieces so that it would move and have dimension.

I hope you find inspiration from this card to create your own sea life themed project. Have a crafty day! --Lisa

Products Used:

Paper Rose Coral Circle Die
Paper Rose Under The Sea Border Die
Impression Obsession Mermaids Die Set
Creative Expressions Mermaid Die Set
Tutti Designs Nesting Stitched Circles Die Set
1/4" Scor Tape
1/2" Scor Tape
XFasten foam tape
Mini Glue Dots
Paper Studio Heavyweight Cardstock - Blues
Recollections Memory Explosion Box 12x12 Patterned Paper Pad
Recollections Primary Foil
Recollections Pastels Foil
Recollections Jewel Tone Foil
Assorted Glitter Cardstock Scraps
Shell Sequins
Mini Shell Sequins

Don't forget to come join in the fun at the Dies R Us Challenge Blog. There's a new challenge theme offered on the 1st and 15th of each month and one lucky randomly drawn winner will receive a gift voucher prize to the Dies R Us Store.