Viva la Verve Challenge #1

This is for the first Viva la Verve challenge over on SCS - if you complete all 4 of the sketch challenges in the Verve Stamps member company forum, you'll be entered to win their entire March release! That's too good to pass up! Each of the sketches come with a twist - the twist for this one is to use embossing of some sort - heat embossing, dry embossing, anything goes!

Today I went to visit my friend Jenn, who was my college roommate for two years, at a hospital in New York City. She woke up a few weeks ago with the left side of her face drooping and she was unable to use her left arm. Unfortunately her symptoms have gotten worse over the past few weeks, and though the lesions the doctors found on her brain suggest multiple sclerosis, the rapid worsening of her symptoms are uncharacteristic of the disease. So for now, the doctors are stumped and she is stuck in the hospital receiving high doses of steroid treatments, unable to even get out of bed on her own because she can't feel her limbs on the left side of her body. So if you think of it, please say a prayer for her that the doctors find an answer and can heal her! The reason I share all this is because I made this card to take with me today. Though I don't always practice what I preach in my own life, I do believe in the power of positive thinking. I hope Jenn can keep her spirits up and hope she will display this card in her room to remind her that she has lots of people praying for her and that she can make it through this horrendous time in her life. Anyway, onto the card details, since that's what you're probably here for anyway!

My take on the twist was to do some dry embossing with my cuttlebug using the swiss dots folder. I embossed the front of the card base as well as the strip of SU Pumpkin Pie cardstock. The ink and blue cardstock are both SU Night of Navy and the patterned paper is from Chatterbox. I think that paper is just gorgeous! The sentiment is stamped onto PTI white cardstock and punched out with my Marvy giga scallop oval punch. I then adhered it to the card with foam dimensionals (which I also used to raise the entire cardstock/patterned paper panel up off the card base) and dotted each of the scallops with opal liquid pearls. The card was finished off with wedding bells dew drops. This card took me over an hour to make (I am VERY slow at coming up with card designs!) but I am really loving how it turned out and Jenn loved it too, which is really all that matters!

I'll be back tomorrow with Challenge #2!