Birch Press Design

 Happy Friday everyone!  I have a card up on the Birch Press Design blog today.  Here is a little peek at what I created.

I hope you will head over to the Birch Press Design blog to check it out.  Thanks for stopping by and have a lovely day!

two very different cards...

 Hello!  Today I have two very different cards to share.  One is light and bright and the other is rather dramatic.  Let's take a look at the first one.

First up is the rather dramatic looking card.  This one is for the current Sunday Stamps challenge as well as the April Pinkfresh Studio challenge.  The Sunday Stamps challenge is a color challenge and I just fell in love with the bold, dramatic color combo.   Pinkfresh is asking for floral themed cards and I did use at least one color from their color palette:  olive.  I started by foiling the Daisy Wreath with black foil.  Once that was done I stenciled image using the majority of the Sunday Stamps colors.  My greens aren't as dark, but I think that is okay.  All inks used are from Pinkfresh Studio.   The wreath was then die cut with the matching die.  I cut an additional wreath from scrap white cardstock and adhered it to the back of the stenciled one to give it more stability.  The sentiment is a collaboration between Pinkfresh Studio and Scrapbook.com.  I don't know if it is available now.  I have had it for a long time, but I think this is the first time I have used it.  I foiled it using blue foil and die cut it with the matching die.  Additional cuts were made and adhered to the foiled sentiment.  I decided to continue the dramatic look by die cutting dark blue cardstock with the Sparkling Diamond cover plate die.  I then die cut it down further so I would have the white border.  I adhered the wreath and the sentiment and then added some Pinkfresh Studio jewels in Stargazer and Pink to finish the card.  Here is a close up of the foiled sentiment.

Now for my light and bright card!

Even though it doesn't feel like spring in my part of the world the Color Throwdown combo helps remind we that it is in fact spring!  I pulled out my Reverse Confetti Poppies stamp and die set to do some simple stamping.  I'm still sad that Reverse Confetti is no more, but I'm determined to use my stash of RC products.  The hello is from the RC Hello Daisy stamp and die set.   After stamping and die cutting all the elements I arranged them on a simple white cardstock panel and then added some yellow Nuvo drops to the centers of the smaller flowers.   Clean, simple and very different from the first card!

Thanks for stopping by and have a lovely day!

another mother's day card...

Hello!  A quick post to share a card that I made for Color Throwdown and Freshly Made Sketches.    I started making the card and then almost didn't finish it!  But I did and now I have another Mother's day card. 

Yellow seems to be the color of the moment for me!  This is the second or third card I have made using yellow in as many weeks.  Funny how things happen that way.  I used lots of pretty Birch Press Design products on this card along with a sentiment from an older Simon Says Stamp Mother's day stamp set.  I have a post up on the Birch Press Design blog (see it here) where I did direct to paper inking in order to  have a cardstock color that matched the stenciling I did.  I decided to do that with this card and I must say that I love how much it looks like colored cardstock!  I used Hero Arts Butterbar and Pinkfresh Studio Lemon Whip for the rose and Pinkfresh Studio Mint and Evergreen for the leaves.  I added lots of texture to the card by using Memory Box white woodgrain cardstock and die cutting it with the Birch Press Design Pinpoint Contour plate die.  I added some additonal texture by die cutting heavy weight vellum using layer C from the BPD Calen layering die set.   The rose and leaves are from the BPD Dainty Rose and Leaves Contour layers set.  

Thanks for stopping by and have a lovely day!

Bold Butterfly - Birch Press Design

 Happy Friday friends!  I have a post up on the Birch Press Design blog today.  Here is a little peek:

I hope you will head over to the Birch Press Design blog to take a look at what I made.  Thanks for stopping by and have a lovely day!

you are my sunshine...

 Hello!  Is the sun shining where you live?  It is partly sunny here.  I could have said partly cloudy, but I want to be an optimist, lol!   About a week ago I was digging through my collection of products looking for something and came across my long neglected Blue Skies suite of products from PaperTrey Ink.  Instead of putting them back I kept them out because I really wanted to make something with them.  Thankfully the current JUGs challenge came along because I now have used the products sooner rather than later!   Take a look at what I made.

Recently my friend, Greta, asked if I wanted to share in an order from Simon Says Stamp.  She lives in Oregon and I live in Washington, but I said yes, because she would be placing the order and Oregon has no sales tax!   Plus, I think she had a free shipping code and so I would only have to pay for her to mail the products to me from Oregon.  A win-win in my book.  As part of the order we split a package of Simon Says Stamp Pawsitively Velvet Luxury cardstock in snow white.  I had used a tiny amount of one sheet, but when I saw the Blue Skies cover plate that creates a cloud filled background I knew I had to use the velvet cardstock.   The cover plate creates a lot of embossing so I was a little worried that the embossing wouldn't show up on the thinner velvet cardstock, but it turned out amazing!   I didn't want the entire piece to be white so I took a small scrap to see how it would take ink.  As you can see it work pretty darn well!   I used distress ink in Broken China for the inking.  I die cut the sun rays from white cardstock and then ink blended on Squeezed Lemonade and Scattered Straw distress inks.   Things were moving along smoothly until I decided to add foam squares to the back of my cloud/sun panel.  I hadn't stamped the sentiment that you see on one of the rays.  Thankfully everything stamped perfectly!  I finished with a scattering of sparkling clear sequins.  

Thanks for stopping by and have a lovely day!

Simon Says Stamp Beautiful Days Release

 Hello!  The new Simon Says Stamp Beautiful Days release is live on the website and I'm popping in to share three cards that I made with the new stamp set Garden Fresh.   This new stamp set is so pretty!  It is full of beautiful images and lovely sentiments!  Let's have a look at what I made.

This first card is probably my favorite.  I love going with simple color palettes and for this one I used teal, white and a little touch of gray.  I stamped the image with Memento Tuxedo Black ink and then did simple coloring with Copic markers.  I die cut the image and then matted it with some light teal cardstock.  I used the beautiful SSS Blossom Field embossing folderr for the background .   Isn't that sentiment beautiful?  As you can see I embossed it in white on vellum, tore the top of the strip and then wrapped it around the image.  I love the clean, simple and fresh look of this card.  I'm adding this to the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge to make a birthday card.

For my next card I decided to do a little simple watercoloring.  Take a look.

I just love the water can image in the stamp set and decided to just focus on that image.  I stamped it with VersaFine CLAIR Nocturne and then watercolored it with Jane Davenport watercolors.   Once the piece was dry I die cut it and stamped the sentiment in the lower corner.  I finished off the card with some twine wrapped around the bottom and tied in a bow.   

I wasn't planning on making a third card, but I just had to use another of the pretty images from the set.  

Spring has sprung and the color yellow just says spring to me because of all the lovely daffodils that spring up in March.  With this card I also did some simple coloring and then trimmed out my image.  There are matching dies, but I do not have them... yet!   Trimming the image out was very easy, though.  I used a very old Simon Says Stamp Mother's day stamp set that is no longer available.  But the dies that I used to die cut the word and shadow is still available.   I die cut some sunny yellow gingham patterned paper, determined the arrangement of my elements and then stamped the sentiment from the Garden Fresh stamp set.  I then adhered other elements and my card was done. 

Thanks for stopping by and don't forget to check out the new release!

a mother's day card...

Hello!  Popping in with a card for Freshly Made Sketches and Color Throwdown.  I love the folk art style florals in the Simon Says Stamp Happy Hello stamp set from their March 2023 card kit.  I finally got the matching dies and just had to use them to make a card. 

I had the light gray oval from another project and since the central element of the FMS layout is an oval it was perfect for my card.  I stamped all the stems using a sage green ink from Hero Arts, don't know the name, and the flowers using Lemon Whip from Pinkfresh Studio.  I glued all the stems flat on the oval and then popped up the flowers with different levels of foam squares.  For a little sparkle I added clear sequins to the centers of two flowers and some Nuvo drops.  Three additional clear sequins were added around the sentiment strip to tie things together.  The sentiment is from a now retired Simon Says Stamp mother's day stamp set and was heat embossed in white on vellum.  The strip was adhered using rolled up glue dots.  Going to add this to the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge of anything goes.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!