Ombre Tea Cup

 Hello ladies!  Hope you're having a fabulous day today.  My psycho cardinal is back running into the dining room window again.  That poor girl must have an awful headache by now!  She usually sits on my car window and fusses at the side-view mirrors.  We've had to fold them back in against the window when we're not driving to make her stop.  So now she's back at the dining room and bedroom windows.  She actually woke me up way too early banging on my bedroom window this morning.  Whoever heard of a cardinal that flies into windows on a regular basis?  And not just once, but maybe 12 - 15 times before she quits.  Then she's back again to go at it another day. BTW, this has been going on for months. Crazy!  I wish I knew what to do to make her stop before she hurts herself.  Any suggestions?  Ok, that's enough about my crazy cardinal.  I don't suppose that's why you showed up here today, is it?  I had to make a card for a friend of mine going through some health issues.  We used to sit and have a cup of tea and visit on a regular basis. But both of us moved away.  I really miss our chats.  So, the Cup of Tea stamp set was my choice for her card.

My thinking here was to make something really bright and cheery, because I can't be there to cheer her up in person.   I started out by working with the Sale-a-Bration freebie - Silver & Gold 6" x 6" Designer Series Paper.  I cut a 1/2" strip from the bottom edge of the dotted print.  Then I cut it in half to get two 3" x 3" strips.  One I'll save for another project.  

I started with So Saffron ink and a Blending Brush to bring the yellow up from one end about halfway.  The end is darker with it blending out to very light as you go up.  Then I used Balmy Blue ink and came down from the top edge and blended dark to light in the middle where it overlapped the So Saffron and became a soft green color.  The blue wasn't dark enough for this, so Tahitian Tide was blended from the top edge to darken.  This only goes down about 1 1/2" or so.

The next thing was stamping the striped teacup with Tahitian Tide ink.  I liked the stripes as a contrast to the dots on the DSP.  The greenery in the set was stamped with Parakeet Party ink.  Then the band of 5 flowers was stamped twice - once with So Saffron and once with Daffodil Delight.  Out of the ten flowers stamped, only seven were used.  After the stamping of the teacup, greenery, and flowers, they were all die-cut using the matching Teacup Dies.

The sentiment is from the same set.  It's stamped with Daffodil Delight ink onto a 1" strip of Basic White cardstock.  The ends were trimmed square. 

After deciding to add a layer of Silver Foil paper behind the dotted layer, it was cut just a bit wider than the sides of the DSP.  They were attached together with Multi Purpose Liquid Glue, then attached to the card front also with the Glue.  The sentiment layer was also backed with the Silver Foil.  Then it was time to get all the pieces onto the card.  

The back of the teacup lip had a little adhesive across it to just barely hold the greenery in place.  Then Dimensionals were added behind both pieces to add to the card, and especially spanning the teacup and greenery to stabilize them.  The tiny flowers were added with Mini Dimensionals behind them to tuck in around the flowers. 

One tiny flower was added to the greenery flat with a Mini Glue Dot.  One of the larger flowers was added over the cup edge using a Dimenisonal.  This gave it a pleasing multi-dimenisonal look to the finished piece. 

The sentiment layer was also attached using Dimensionals.  I didn't attach it in the center of the card, but off to the side to give it more appeal.

Because of the silver foil layered behind the two areas and the silver dots on the DSP, I decided not to add any extra bling to this card.  I felt it would just get lost in the finished design.

Hope you like this bright and happy card.  And I hope it cheers up my good friend.  By changing the sentiment, I think it would make a great birthday card too.  What do you think?

Thanks for stopping by to see what's happening here.  My psycho cardinal finally gave up banging into the window.  Hope she's taking a breather somewhere and doesn't come back for a while.  I've been fretting about not seeing my hummingbirds this year, but this morning three of them were out at the feeder and doing all kinds of aerial acrobatics.  So much fun to watch them!

Thank you for the orders that have been coming in.  You know how much I appreciate you!  If you're thinking of placing an order soon, please use the Host Code shown at the top of my blog post.  When an order is placed through this, I can order extra goodies to share with you all without spending an arm and a leg for the items and then shipping them to you.  Thanks in advance of any orders placed!!!

Please stop by again soon.  I love seeing the comments you make.  It really makes my day when you take the time to leave a comment.  It keeps me connected to you!  And that's a good thing.

Happy stamping and creating!

Sharon