It's time once again for the monthly Gentlemen Crafters Design Team Blog Hop. Be sure to visit all the presenters in the hop - links can be found at the bottom. The Gentlemen Crafters Design Team (#TGCDT) are a group of male crafters & Independent Stampin’ Up! Demonstrators from around the world, that love to share our creative side with you on the 2nd Friday of each month. 


Fall is my favourite season. Here in Nova Scotia the temperature starts to drop off suddenly in the evenings around the beginning of September, and the leaves start to change colour to a myriad of yellow - orange - copper - red - brown -  and gold. Everywhere you look is nature's beauty.

My projects this month are inspired by those fall colours and leaves, and by the new slim-line cards that are all the rage.  These are so simple to make, and the mix and match possibilities for this stamp and die set are limitless. I'm sorry I don't have a video for you this month - I am in the process of rearranging my studio to make crafting and videoing easier.  RIght now I have to pack away all my video setup in-between shoots. There is nothing difficult about these cards though, and you should be able to tell from the pictures and measurements what to do.


Measurements

• - Card Base: 8-1/2" x 7" / 21.6cm x 17.8cm  scored at 3.5" / 8.9cm along the 7" / 17.8cm side 
• - DSP Layer: 8-1/4" x 3-1/4" / 21cm x 8.3cm 

Tools

• - Love of Leaves stamp set
• - Peaceful Moments stamp set (additional sentiments)
• - Stitched Leaves Dies
• - Tasteful Labels Dies
• - Sponge daubers
• - Champagne Rhinestones
• - Designer Series Paper from Tasteful Textures
• - Ink: Pear Pizzazz - Old Olive - Mossy Meadow - Real Red - Rococo Rose - Blackberry Bliss - Crushed Curry - Bumblebee     - Pumpkin Pie - Cinnamon Cider - Cajun Craze
• Cardstock: Thick Whisper White - Crumb Cake - Regular Whisper White for die-cuts & tags

Tips & Tricks

• - Really juicy ink pads make the leaves look muddled.  Stamping Off or second generation stamping helps, but leaves them a little too light.  I used a dauber to go lightly over the stamp and remove any huge pockets of ink after kissing it to the inkpad, and it worked great. 
• - You can also use daubers to add a second darker colour around the edges before you stamp, so you get depth to your leaves.  Kiss the stamp to your lighter ink pad - then quickly daub with ink from the darker pad around the outside edges.  ALWAYS touch your dauber to the corner of your ink pads so you don't accidentally contaminate colours you may pick up from your stamp in the process.

We appreciate you taking time to visit all the truly talented crafters in this Blog-hop.  Click a name below:

Barry and Jay
Bruno Bertucci
Daniel Nickeson
Jason Loucks
Kevin Estey - you are here
Martin Stone - not participating this month 
Rene Guenther
Tony Embrey

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