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We are back after an extended road trip after I attended Stampin' Up!'s Onstage earlier this month. My husband and I headed west to visit my parents in Arizona last week and then headed home to Minnesota just in time for a spring snowstorm.
On our trip we were fortunate to see spring blooms in many places so now that we are back I'm having fun putting together a few flower cards with a new set I brought home, Country Flowers.
This first card is my version of a Onstage After Hours, an optional stamping event I enjoyed with one of my downline. I had registered to use Country Flowers though there were 2 other choices. One of the new In Colors for 2024-2026 is Petunia Pop. It is my new FAVORITE! It's kind of right between Berry Burst and Fresh Freesia. Anyway, we all had cards to make using the same 3 sketches but with different colors. Well, I just had to switch mine up to use one of the other set's colors: Petunia Pop, Peach Pie, and Lemon Lime:
The sketch is basically what they suggested for Country Flowers but I borrowed the color scheme from the Citrus Blooms Stamp set:
- I stamped the rose image on two squares of Basic White and watercolored them with Lemon Lime Twist, Petunia Pop, and Peach Pie.
- The same image was stamped on the upper right and lower left corners of a piece of Petunia Pop cardstock with the same color ink.
- I added a layer of Lemon-Lime Twist and embellished it with Petunia Pop Shimmer Gems and Black Baker's Twine.
I watercolored another image using the plant in the teapot for another project at the event. But ... then brought it home and changed the layout completely. Using a little bit of everything. Not the way most Stampin' Up! demonstrators design teaching projects, but maybe the way most of us stamp in real life.
- The image was watercolored on 2 1/2" x 3" watercolor paper with Pecan Pie, Lemon-Lime Twist and Shy Shamrock.
- This image is layered onto a 2 9/16" x 3 1/16" piece of Basic Black. Yes, you read that right. The black was just 1/16" bigger. You have to use the tiniest of the markings on your trimmer. But, with a little practice you can get a nice, skinny border.
- The DSP strip is from the Zoo Crew designer series paper which will retire soon.
- I cut the teeny tiny banner out with the smallest die from Countryside Corners Dies and then stamped just the "sending" from the sending Love greeting that comes in the Country Flowers stamps. Instead of a stamped "love" I used the die cut "love" from the January - March add-on dies. These are no longer available though there is a new set, Thanks & Beyond, available for the April - June kits. These are only available to Paper Pumpkin Subscribers.
- These elements are mounted onto a Lemon-Lime Twist piece of cardstock that is embossed with one of the Basics 3D Embossing Folders.
Finally I have this week's color combination at Splitcoaststampers. Diane is hosting with Boho Blue, Fresh Freesia and Soft Sea Foam. Dessert is spring.
- I'm using some soon to retire products, the most important of which is the Scalloped Contours Dies. Though I knew it would likely retire this year, it is still disappointing. I use this scallop border so often and the scalloped rectangle dies are superb too. They will be on sale in April - if you want to take a chance that they are still in stock.
- Other retiring products are the Boho Blue Ribbon, Dots and In Color 2023-2025 DSP.
- There are two hints I would like to point out. The first is a trick I like to use instead of dimensionals. I make two extra die cuts if I want to show some dimension. On this card I cut two extra flower shapes in Boho Blue. It gives just a little shadow and makes a die cut that needs to stand out a little sturdier.
- The second hint is to use the dot or jewel embellishments to improve the balance of your design. As I was designing this I couldn't come up with a location for the greeting that I was totally comfortable with. So I went with my gut feeling to place it low on the card, close to my flower pot, knowing that I could add some dots to eliminate any awkwardness this left in the design. I think the dots help tie the greeting and image together and also start to float up into my white space, kind of increasing the white space's relevance in the design. Maybe it sounds kind of silly but that is my process...
That's a lot of chit chat for one evening. Have a good week!
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