Verve sneak Peeks: Harvest Blessings

Good Morning Everyone,

Can I tell you HOW excited I am today to show you SNEAK PEEKS from this month's Verve release!!?!!!!! Seriously SOOOO excited!!! Check out the Verve Stamps blogpost to check out the awesome samples from the Verve Divas :) And don't forget that the Verve Release Party is TONIGHT - you can check out this thread for more information!!!

Today, myself, Laurie Schmidlin, Teresa Kline and Susan Liles are previewing the sets: Harvest Blessings and Happiness Found over at the Verve Stamps blog! For my project today I used the Harvest Blessings stamp set to create a wreath from the beautiful leaves that Julee has designed - I LOVE the different patterns that are within these leaves and the sentiment is just beautiful! I had so much fun making this wreath and have a mini tutorial with step by step instructions for making one of these for your home :) Here is a picture of the wreath:

Here is a closer peek at the lovely leaves that Julee has designed for this awesome fall set. I LOVE how easy it is to create these beautiful leaves - all you need are different color inks!

Here is a mini step by step instruction with pictures on how to make one of these wreaths. All you really need are: a paper plate (heavy Chinnet plates are the best), ribbon, adhesive glue, leaves and a hot glue gun!

1. select your paper plate (one that is thicker is much easier to work with than a thinner plate) - trim around the rim (wait - that rhymes!!!) so that the center is cut out.
2. cover your plate rim with ribbon - this is so that if there is any part of the plate that is exposed - you won't see the white part of the plate and also the back of the plate will look nice too so that if you have a glass door - the back of the plate will be covered as well. I used some mono adhesive glue for my ribbon just a little dot here and there to keep it in place.
3. get your pieces ready for adhering! for this project, I stamped over 70 leaves from the Harvest Blessings stamp set from Verve. I LOVE that Julee has designed these leaves to have polka dots, swirls and argyle patterns. SO awesome!!! All you have to do is stamp them with different inks and you have an array of patterns and colors for your leaves. I spread them out on my work space to try to figure out how I wanted to arrange them by groupings of colors, etc.
4. this picture shows you what the BACK of the plate looks like after you adhere the leaves. I like that the back of the plate has a pretty pattern from the ribbon because we have a glass door and its nice not to see the white plate's backside :)
5. This is a close up shot of the different patterns of leaves in this awesome set that Julee has designed. Its so super easy to create different leaf patters by just stamping them on different ink pads. I also sponged some brown on the edges of some of the leaves for a more 3D effect. I wanted to keep it simple - but you could also add some glitter mist or some stickles here or there for more sparkle-age :)
6. Here is the finished product of adhering all the leaves to the plate (a hot glue gun does the trick very well!) I tried to arrange them in two lines going in one direction with some leaves here and there in the middle. Have fun experimenting as to what works best for your project!
7. To show you what this wreath looks like from the back here is a picture of the wreath from behind the glass door. Its nice to have the ribbon cover the plate so you can't see the regular plate backside:

And here is the finished product hanging from the door. I have a little over the door hook that I tied my ribbon onto (because our front door is already inside the main building, this plate wreath doesn't shake in the wind. For more outdoor front doors, you could use more of a foam board and then cover with a clear lacquer to protect from the elements).

and here is a closer look at those leaves!!! and isn't this sentiment simply awesome!!!?!!! I love being welcomed into our house with this Vervalicous wreath on the front door :)

Thanks so much for stopping by today and visiting my blog!!! Make sure to jump over to the Verve blog to see all the samples from this week's sneak peek and stop by the Release Party tonight! It is going to be a rockin' one!!!

Big hugs!

Sankari :)