Stamping Ground

Tha Friday challenge over at Daring Cardmakers is to make a card in an Oriental style, without resorting to black and red as the colour way. Now, Oriental is waaaaayyy out of my comfort zone. I know as a theme for cards and in rubber stamp sales it must be one of the biggest, but I don't do much of it. I always love what other people do, I'm drawn to images, particularly landscapes, and in my 15 years as a stamper, I've owned quite a lot of unused stamps on an oriental theme! So here I am trying desperately to work, never mind think, outside the box! This card pretty much shows off my entire collection of stamps that could be considered oriental, a fern by Stampendous, a rub-on that's meant to look like a strip from a fortune cookie, and thank goodness, a piece of 12 x 12 'Inspirables' by EK Success. I don't know how oriental it really is, but I loved having to think about it (it took me two days to come up with!) I'm generally over myself now; I know what I'm drawn to in terms of themes and can at last resist buying the stuff! Previously I've felt almost obliged to have a go because it's on trend or because I ought to be able to do it - loads of 'styles' that I just can't do with any enjoyment...then they end up just being derivative and bland. Now brace yourself interweb, I'm going to talk about some really wonderful styles that I can't do. It may well sound as if I don't like these styles/themes, but I assure you that the opposite is true; I love them. It's just taken me forever to know my limitations! There's oriental - too refined on too many levels. Then there's really cute - LOVE IT love all the potential that can be done with it, but always end up sticking a cute image on something really plain to sort of dilute it. How about the shabby chic stuff that Tim Holtz is the master of? I long to be able to do it, but I can't......my stuff ends up looking like I've worked in mutliple shades of weewee. And then there's the whole altered thing...I can't quite get my head around all sorts of aspects of that. But I think I'll tell you about that some other day, the hole I've dug this morning is deep enough for now! Oh and we did crop yesterday and I did do some stuff, but as Ginny is expecting award winning photography, I have to play with my light settings dahling! Yep, looks like I might have to RTFM!