P is for a Partridge in a Pear Tree

Update on snow in Ayr - well a couple of flurries so far but nowhere near enough to stop the traffic yet. I'm poised ready with my camera and nothing is happening :(  All joking aside, for those of you still struggling with the problems the snow has caused you have my sympathy - I hope conditions get better soon.

I'm at P in the Alphabet series and because I already had this gorgeous paper in my stash the theme seemed obvious - the Partridge in a Pear Tree:

Here's a close up of the image on the paper - Papermania, double-sided, Pear Tree/Polka -  that inspired the card:

The cage started out as gold mirror board but I wasn't too happy with the gold - I wanted something that looked aged with maybe some verdigris on it - so I altered it, quite bit as it turned out.  I started by dabbing some Tim Holtz distress ink in Aged Mahogany from a bottle I had tucked away. This didn't give the effect I was looking for so I gave it a blast with the heat gun and while it was still a bit tacky applied some white embossing powder and this worked a treat because as it heated the ink underneath caused a sort of dimpled effect, a bit like hammered metal painted over. One of those happy little accidents that happen so often in crafting : ) I then spritzed some Cosmic Shimmer Mist in Meadow Lush to get the verdigris effect I was looking for and finally blinged it up with a few gems, a Christmas tree charm and some fibre from my stash.

Similarly, the bird got the embossing and distressing treatment. I started by stamping in Versamark a leaf flourish stamp from Anita's Magical Christmas set, then embossed in Crimson Red Heat It Up and finally distressed the birds body and wing with TH's Brushed Corduroy and the perch with Weathered Wood.

I finished the topper by cutting a trim from the polka dot reverse side of the paper using a mini Paisley Place template form Kiwi Lane Designs - love these templates - and embellishing with white twill, more of the fibre and three brads from the Papermania Silent Night collection.

Inside and back are decorated with a trim of the polka dot paper and the image of the partridges in the pear tree and another one of the sentiments from Sentiments 4 You that I use a lot.

I keep saying this but I think this is one of my favourite cards so far - I really enjoyed making it, all that messing around with distressing inks and embossing powders. Let's see what the letter Q brings - could that become a favourite too? : )

Thank you for taking the time to look and all comments are really appreciated.

Bye for now,

Elizabeth