Butterflies and Flowers

Good day friends.  Hope you've all managed to stay warm during this cold weather.  Rick was just telling me about the temps in Saynor, WI where some friends live.  Hmmmm, a lot of below zero degrees temps going on up there.  I'm so glad we aren't that cold!  Needing to think about something other than cold weather, I worked on a card yesterday that screams warmer weather to me.  Hope you like the idea.  You could do something similar with different stamps.  And the great thing is how easy it was to make!

To get the summery vibe going, I started with a base of Granny Apple Green cut 8 1/2" x 5 1/2", scored and folded in half.  The next layer is Basic White that is cut 5 1/4" x 4".  This was stamped with Granny Apple Green ink and the large floral stamp from the Calming Camillia stamp set.  In case this set isn't familiar to you, it's on page 17 of the 4th January - 28 February 2022 Sale-a-bration catalog.  You can earn this set for free when you either host a $300 party with friends or place a $300 order yourself.  It's one of the DistINKtive stamps that Stampin' Up! sells and I think it's pretty gorgeous myself. 

The floral image was stamped about 5 times to cover the Basic White layer.  While stamping, the stamp was turned in different directions so the image looks like an overall design on the white background.  After this the layer was attached to the green card base with adhesive.

A layer of Basic White cardstock was cut 2" x 4".  This has the butterfly from the Amazing Silhouettes set stamped multiple times with Daffodil Delight ink.  I love the reverse look of the stamps in this set.  Just so different from the usual look. This is backed with a Daffodil Delight cardstock layer that was cut to 2 1/4" x 4 1/4".  The stamped white layer was attached flat to the yellow with adhesive.  Both pieces were attached more to the left side of card front using Dimensionals.   

To accent the butterfly themed layer, the Brilliant Wings Dies were used to cut out 3 different sizes of solid Daffodil Delight butterflies.  There was a matching sized detailed butterfly cut out of Basic White cardstock.  This was layered onto the matching yellow butterfly with Mini Glue Dots down the center of the body.

The sentiment comes from the Calming Camillia stamp set used earlier.  It has six different sentiments that are useful and pretty general.  And I just love the fonts used on them.  Most likely, I'll probably be using these sentiments quite often.  This one was stamped with Granny Apple Green ink on a scrap of Basic White cardstock.  The ends were finished by punching with the Banners Pick A Punch.  A layer of Granny Apple Green was attached behind it after trimming and punching the ends to match the sentiment.

The sentiment was attached near the bottom of the stamped yellow layers.  It was attached with adhesive so it would lay flat and jut out past the edges.

The butterflies were each attached with Mini Glue Dots to the yellow layer.  After attaching the butterflies, it was necessary to add some bling of course.  The larger butterfly has 4 small 2021-2023 In Color Jewels in the yellow tone.  The two smaller butterflies each have just one small jewel in the Soft Succulent tone.  I didn't think these would match with the Granny Apple Green I'd used throughout the card.  Surprise!  With the look of iridescence on the jewels, they blended nicely.  It's always a surprise how many different colors those iridescent jewels will blend with.  Love, love, love those!

The inside of the card was finished off very simply.  The sentiment again comes from the Calming Camillia stamp set.  It's been stamped in Granny Apple Green on the Basic White layer.  The same large floral that was used on the front was again stamped with Granny Apple Green only partially onto the bottom right corner.  After stamping, this was attached to the inside of the card. Then it's all finished and ready to send out.  I'm pretty sure it took me longer to get the pictures taken and type out this post than it took to actually make the card.  😁 

Keep reading further for another card that's very similar but was made with a different color palette.

Colors are Polished Pink and Fresh Freesia

Stamps are Calming Camillia and Happy & Heartfelt

Punch is Double Oval Punch

Dies are Brilliant Wings Dies

Hope you liked today's card idea.  It's so easy to make your own background paper like this when you don't have anything that quite fits your idea.  Just play with stamps and ink and you can make any color and type of background you'd like.

With all this cold weather everywhere, why not stay inside and do a little creating with your stash of stamps and goodies.  That's sure to lift any winter-time blues you might have too!

Happy creating and stamping my friends, 

Sharon

Amazing Silhouettes Sneak Peek

Wow, the time has been really flying by this past week.  I managed to design two cards and thought I'd have them posted already.  But alas, my planning isn't quite lining up with reality.  Today I'm sharing a card that I made to enclose with all the catalogs that I put in the mail today.  Yes, that's running slower than I had planned too.  But at least there are a whole pile of catalogs that were taken to the Post Office earlier today.  Now it's up to the Post Office to see how long it's going to take to get them to all my customers.  If you don't have one in the next ten days, please give me a call and I'll see what I can do.  Anyway, back to the card... 

As a demonstrator, I signed up for the Stampin' Up! Onstage event last November. One of the many fun things I received is this Amazing Silhouettes stamp set which will be available January 4th in the new January - June 2022 Mini Catalog.  It's so much fun getting stamps early!  There are three stamps in this set and they all look like this one with just a silhouette image.  I love the look of these stamps.   And I'm amazed at the amount of detail that shows from just having the image in silhouette like this.  They are really gorgeous.  This is the largest stamp, and after using it on these cards, I'm going to have to try out the other two stamps to see what I come up with.

Because I was making a whole pile of these cards, I was looking for a simple layout that wouldn't take too much time.  I set up the stamp on my Stampa-a-ratus and just stamped away on card after card.  What did I ever do before the Stamp-a-ratus?  It makes stamping multiples so quick and easy, and you always get the image exactly where you want it.  Some of the cards I stamped with Soft Succulent and some with Mint Macaron ink for a slightly softer look.

The color for the card base is the Soft Succulent cardstock cut at 8 1/2" x 5 1/2", scored and folded in half.  This seems to be my favorite color lately.  Out of the last three cards I've designed, all of them use Soft Succulent for the main color.  Hmmm, guess I really like it!  The next layer was Basic White cardstock cut 4"x 5 1/4".  The image was stamped over to the right side.  A 1" x 5 1/4" strip of Harvest Meadow Designer Series Paper was cut and attached to the left side on the Basic White cardstock piece using MultiPurpose Liquid Glue.  Then the Basic White layer was attached to the Soft Succulent base using the MultiPurpose Liquid Glue again.

I used the sentiment from the Inspired Thoughts stamp set that's found in the 2021-2022 Annual Catalog.  I like the way the font skips between all caps and all small letters.  Just something a little different.  I couldn't find a plain Thinking of You in the set, so I used a Soft Succulent marker and just inked the words I wanted.  This is actually a birthday sentiment, but you'd never know.  

TIP:  Make sure you really look at your sentiment stamps to see if you can use just a portion of the stamp to say what you want.  It's so easy to ink up only the words you need using a marker.

The sentiment was stamped on a Basic White strip and then backed with a slightly larger piece of Soft Succulent cardstock.  It was attached to the card front using several Dimensionals.  A tiny knot of Soft Succulent 3/8" Open Weave Ribbon was attached to the left side of the sentiment using a Mini Glue Dot.

As you can see on this last picture, I splatter-tapped some Wink of Stella on the front of this card.  Some cards I left simply plain.  After giving it a lot of thought, I decided to keep the card 'bling-less' this time around.  I really liked the nice, clean look of this card.  Hope you do too.

Well, that's it for today's installment.  Please continue to keep checking in with me.  I'll try my hardest to get more consistent with my posts.  You know, the best laid plans of mice and men oft times go astray.  And I seem to be having a lot of that 'astray' going on!  😁 

Happy creating and stamping!

Sharon