Welcome to Paradise / Cut to You 3rd Anniversary Celebration

Hello again, friends!  I have another layout to share for Cut to You as a guest designer.  July marks the 3rd Anniversary of the Cut to You cut file store, and I'm excited to be a part of the celebration!  Thank you to Gwen for inviting me to play along :)  For this page I used her Fern Foliage cut file along with the Cocoa Vanilla Studios Sunkissed collection.

And don't forget, you still have a few more days to get 20% off all cut files in the store using the code MISSY.  July 31st is the last day!  Go shop now :D

I wanted to create a tropical layout, so I went with lots of green leaves and bright flowers.  I first cut the leaves on textured white cardstock.  I coated the leaves with white gesso using my finger and then painted them with several green Shimmerz Paints (Creameez Boogie Boardin' Blue, Shimmerz Rita on the Rocks, Inklings Honey Do List, Olive U Truly & Green Goddess, Vibez Palm Reader and Spritz 4 Leaf Clover & Olive Branch).  I used thick white cardstock for the background, and I coated it with clear gesso before adding color.

I used the packaging technique on the background with some pink, orange and yellow Shimmerz sprays.  I used Vibez Sweetheart, Coloringz Peachy Keen and Vibez Mustard Seed with a bit of Spritz Ruby.  I kept adding color until I liked how it looked.  Then I used a palette knife and scraped on some Pink Opal Nuvo Glimmer Paste...I love that stuff!  I also sprinkled some white acrylic paint and some Jen Hadfield Gold Glitter Spray.  LOTS of different products!  Once everything was dry, I glued down the cut file and then added adhesive foam behind all the leaves to pop them up off the page.

I went through all of the die cut flowers from the Sunkissed collection and added them around the leaves and the photos.  I chose this die cut to use for the title here below the photo.  I popped up a lot of the flowers to add to the dimension and then topped the centers with some of the Essential Jewels from Pinkfresh Studio.  I found a Heidi Swapp stamp in my stash that I added here below the title using gold ink.

I just love how this looks!  At one point during the background process, I did use some distress oxides over a leafy stencil, but I didn't love how it looked.  I washed it out a bit with some water...you can see a few hints of that here behind the cut file.  You can see how I did all that in my video down below :)

Leaves and flowers are wonderful embellishments to use for creating depth.  The edges curl up so easily off the page.  Add some foam under them and you really get some shadowing!  Here you can also see the fun glittery finish from the Glimmer Paste.

I added some matching colors of thread in a few places for even more color and texture.

I love this treatment of a cut file...gluing it down flat to the background and then popping up the little inside pieces.  It just makes it come to life, and it's so fun to look at :)

I used a few of the Sunkissed Puffy Sticker flowers as well as some of the Clear Stickers.

Here are a few more angles to see everything :)

I hope this inspires you in some way today!  Gwen's cut files are so amazing, and you should go right now and stock up while they're 20% off!  Again, use the code MISSY at check out.  Go HERE.

Here's my process video:

Thanks so much for stopping in, and have a great day!