Sun Prints Card

Oh dear, here we go again.  It's so hard to say good-bye to so many of my favorite products.  Today's post revolves around the lovely Sun Prints Designer Series Paper.  The organic look and colors of all these prints remind me of blue batik patterns that I love.  And do you remember doing sun prints on specialty papers when you were a kid?  I always thought it was so cool how the sun could bleach out the paper and leave this awesome design behind.  That's what these papers remind me of on the blue side.  The other side has cute little prints in Gray Granite.  Together it's just awesome, and that's what I'm using for today's card.  I thought the blue and white would work both for ladies and men and I needed a slew of cards for the shut-ins this month.  This is just one of the card designs I'm working on.

It's all in blues with a little white and silver thrown in for an interesting accent.  Here's how it's made.  Start with a card base of Night of Navy.  It measures 8 1/2" x 5 1/2".  It's scored at 4 1/4" and folded in half.  Next is a layer of Basic White that measures 5 1/2" x 4".  This will fit right up to the top and bottom edges of the card, but with navy showing on both sides.

The Sun Prints DSP is the next layer.  I chose the print that has white fern-like sprigs and maybe dandelion stems on a mottled blue background. It measures 5 1/4" x 3 3/4".  It's attached to the Basic White layer with adhesive.  Then these layers are attached to the card base with adhesive also.

The leafy branches are from the Lighting the Way stamp set.  I stamped it in Night of Navy ink on Basic White.  The I used the coordinating die to cut it out.  The Lighting the Way Bundle is in the January-April Mini Catalog.  Unfortunately, the 10% off the Bundle price is gone at the end of April.   But I'm so happy it's carrying over into the new catalog and I can continue to share it with you.

Can you see the other two die-cut stem pieces?  They are much more prominent in real life.  First, I chose the skinny branch from the Harvest Dies.  This is such a wonderful basic branch to put behind other stems for a filler.  Alas, it is being retired.  This time I used some Silver Foil Paper to die-cut the branch.  

I also cut two butterflies from the same Silver Foil Paper.  Can you see the embossed detail the dies make when cutting?  I like having that extra detail on them instead of just being flat.  The butterfly dies come from the Meadow Dies.  These are also a carry over to the new catalog.

The second stem is cut from Vellum Cardstock.  This is one of the leaf dies from Poppy Moments Die set.  It has the look of a fern type of leaf to me, so it was the best choice for what I wanted to do.

First the silver branch was attached to the card front near the left side.  Then the vellum fern was attached over a little to the right of the branch with the stems coming together.  Lastly the stamped branch was attached on top of the others.  The two butterflies were attached with Dimenisonals.

The last thing I did was add a sentiment.  And wouldn't you know it, none of my other pictures actually show the sentiment on the card?!  At this point I wasn't even sure I was adding a sentiment.  That's why my pictures are bare.  But I did decide a sentiment was needed to fill the space.  I used a piece of Basic White that measures 3/4" x 2 1/2".  The sentiment comes from the Happy Labels stamp set.  It's stamped with Night of Navy ink.  The coordinating Happy Labels Pick a Punch was used to make those notches on each end.  The label was attached to the card front using Dimenisonals.  It's positioned just slightly over the stems to bring them all together.  Remember to go to the top of the post to see the totally finished card.  Guess I didn't have my mind fully in gear when I was taking the pictures.  So sorry!

The countdown is almost done.  May 2nd the new catalog goes live and we can order anything from it we want.  Woo Hoo!  As demonstrators we were only allowed to purchase certain stamp sets.  I wasn't a huge fan of the ones available, so I'm still playing with my old stamps.  It's time to bring on the new!  I can hardly wait to order.

Thanks for being here with me today.  I appreciate the time you take to visit.  You mean the world to me.  Remember if you're one of my customers, start looking in the mail for the envelopes I'm sending out.  And thank you for all your good wishes on my birthday yesterday.  You are a true blessing to me!

Happy stamping and creating,

Sharon