Ice Fest

I wasn’t familiar with the story “The Snow Queen” by Hans Christian Andersen when given this Challenge, but I found a lovely illustrated book to read and inspire me. Andersen was a Danish author and poet who is best remembered for his fairy tales, my favorite being “The Emperor’s New Clothes.”

The element from The Snow Queen that I have brought into the layout as inspiration is the mirror and its many broken pieces, by punching 1” squares out of a lightweight shiny silver paper. I also gave a nod to Andersen and the Danish flag in the pattern and color of the Grid Paper, Brick, and additional Paper Tiles, in white and black.

The Red and White color palette made me think of “red work” embroidery but also reminded me of the Scandinavian sweaters with their rows of patterned stitches. I love decorating for the holidays using these themes, and with the recent Polar Vortex our area was hit with, warming up with a nice thick sweater really appealed to me!!

Because I totally missed out on time to shoot my granddaughter in the snow before it disappeared as quickly as it came…I reached back to the Annual Ice Festival for a few photos I had taken. As they were night shots and I wasn’t using a tripod there were a few that were a bit blurrier than others and I had never scrapped them. This was the prime time to use them in a smaller format where it would be less noticeable and still give me a page to remember a lovely night out!

A close up of the photos and journaling.

The title was where I wanted to pack some punch. Using a sheet of tear away stabilizer cut and taped to the 3”x 12” size I wanted to have, I then cut white felt and basted it to the stabilizer. Red thread was loaded into the sewing machine and rows of decorative stitches added.

On the reverse side of the felt, on the stabilizer, I drew the letters I needed in reverse. That’s very important to remember. Then cut the letters out. Adding another sheet of stabilizer to the back of the black felt and then attaching the letters with a blanket stitch to the black felt. Then, once again, I trimmed around each letter to leave a narrow black edge.

These over-sized fabric letters were then mounted on top of the “mirror” tiles with a heavy duty tape. A smaller strip of stitches was created to place below the journal block that was made with the red, white and black layered to imitate the lettering in the title.