Potholder Plaid

When I was in elementary school, a crafty gift my sister received was a potholder maker. Remember those? Loops of varying colors that you stretched on a frame and wove together? Well, that's what came to mind as I was making the focal point for this card tonight.

The idea came to me after I'd seen this photo on splitcoaststampers. Of course, I have trouble keeping it simple, so while this card started out as a possibility for my upcoming Stamp-A-Stack, I will probably rethink it to try to simplify the design.


I started with a 3"x3" square because the image--which is the stem from the Time Well Spent flower set (genius!)--is 3 1/8" long. Then I tacked it down on my grid paper and counted the squares down the side--12. That meant I could stamp 2 of each of the In Color colors and create a plaid pattern. I like how that turned out. The rest of the card didn't come together quite as easily. I wanted to include all the colors from the plaid in the card, and thus the layers under the sentiment. Then I had trouble getting it all to tie together. The flower border along the top and bottom again utilized the grid paper, and the DP is coordinating River Rock stripe from the recently retired Dashing set. If I'd had the River Rock double-stitched ribbon, I think I would've gone with that, but I don't, so...

what do you think?