Butterfly crazy!

I had so much fun playing with these fluttering butterflies that I went a little crazy! I got to use some of my favorite floral printed papers. Click on the picture if you want to see them closer and look at the post below this one for supplies and technique used.

Inspired by Lucy Abrams and Nancy Taylor

I love all of Lucy's cards, have been a big fan of hers since she appeared on the Hero Blog, but this one of hers struck a chord with me. I love her use of the Nesties Label 1 die and the beautiful background behind it, not to mention the pretty flowers stamped on dotted paper.

I have been hoarding this Susan Branch pansy paper forever, and so I decided it was high time to cut into it. I used Nancy's directions to make this 3-dimensional heart-winged butterfly out of the same paper, and added pastel pearls to its body and elsewhere on the card. I kept my version of Lucy's card one layer except the butterfly for easier mailing. I think this will make a nice Mother's Day card for Hannah's card drive for our soldiers. Please think about sending a card or two to this worthwhile cause.

Supplies: HeroArts stamps F5158 Heart Winged Butterfly and AR130 Handwritten Sentiments, Bazzill lavendar dotted cardstock, Susan Branch printed paper, VersaFine onyx black ink, Recollections pastel pearls, Nestabilities Labels One die, black wire for antennae

Lucy's challenge

Lucy has challenged us to make a card inspired by someone else's creation. Mine is this gorgeous layout by Irma. I think it is SO creative and I loved her vertical elements, her colors, and her use of butterflies. I tried to use those elements for my card.
For details, see my Flickr photostream.

Pastel roses

Jacqueline pointed out this inspiration challenge at Stamping Around. I was drawn to the beautiful roses in her basket. They are just the colors I love: pinks and apricots.

Here is what I came up with. I used a computer-generated excerpt from The Secret Garden as my background, colored the roses with Distress inks, and couldn't resist adding the pearls, as this is so feminine.

Agata's flower

Agata posted on her blog a tutorial showing how to make flowers out of ribbon, and I gave it a try. It was fun! She adds pearls to the center of her flowers, and I did the same, and then used some teensy ones also under the sentiment, which was stamped directly on a strip of the ribbon.

See my flickr stream for details.

Deborah's CCC Challenge

Every month Deborah hosts a Card Chain Challenge. This was sent to Heather in Ireland, using Deborah's colors this month of purples and greens. For details, see my flickr photostream.

And I received this gorgeous card from Sue in Canada, based on the template that Deborah provided. Sue also makes her own beautiful envelopes out of calendar pages - mine was a close-up of some white Queen Anne's lace-type flowers with a soft-focus purple background - what a package!!
I encourage everyone to join in the fun for next month; Deborah will be posting about it at the beginning of March, and usually has a topic started at the Hero Flickr discussion area also.

Everything But the Kitchen Sink

I liked the EBKS sketch, and decided to use a new and an old Hero Arts stamp. The cling Flower Box is paper-pieced, pop-dotting the biggest flower, and also raising the panel above the card.

Supplies: CG127 Flower box, E4147 Sunshine and Flowers

More paper piecing

I'm enjoying paper-piecing lately; it feels like making a quilt, playing with all the pretty papers and finding a pleasing mix of designs. Here I kept my color scheme to blue, lime green, and white and used lots of gingham and dots, with a little stripe and a flowered paper thrown in.

Supplies: Hero Arts stamps CG 130 Butterflies, CG148 Blossoms, CL184 Thoughtful Messages

Robins and roses

Today while shoppng in a gift shop, I saw a tray that had these elements: birds on a branch and aqua and neutral colorblocks. I couldn't wait to get home and try and reproduce it.
I started with aqua cardstock stamped lightly with Antique Flowers background and some distressed music paper. Next I used a die-cut label that Carol at home just sent me; I love it because it has that faux stitching right on it - anyone know who makes this, 'cause I want it now! I lightly stamped Old Letter Writing on it first, then overstamped the rose spray. After adding the sentiment, the label was distressed and then popped above the card. Lastly I added the birds, which are also popped up.

Supplies: S5264 Antique Flower Background, S4878 Old Letter Writing, CG152 Two Birds, CL129 Anytime Messages , Prismacolor pencils

Pieced butterfly

Here is a card for someone very special. I haven't been much inspired by these butterflies, but I do like the way this one turned out. This card started out with blue glossy cardstock, and I embossed the Flower Wallpaper cling stamp on it with white.....I wanted the idea of a sky with clouds and a flower garden combined for the butterfly to hover over. I thought the pastel pinks, greens, and yellows looked pretty against that shade of blue, so I chose small-scale ginghams, dots and stripes.

Here's a close-up of the butterfly.
Supplies: CG123 Flower Wallpaper, CG130 Butterflies, CL278 Great Flourishes

Blossoms

Going through my paper stash, I was inpsired by this beautiful stripe by Frances Meyer called Maison de Campagne. For this first card, I pulled the 3 main colors from it and used other printed papers to paper-piece the small blossom from this cling set by Hero Arts.

Supplies: CG148 Blossoms, CL371 Essential Messages, white cardstock, various printed papers, Versafine onyx black

And for this one, I chose the widest stripe and used the larger of the blossoms. I also distressed the edges of the flowers and leaves to make them stand out a bit more, raised the orange centers with pop dots, and added a black gem to the centers.

Supplies: CG148 Blossoms, AR137 Script Messages, white cardstock, various printed papers, Versafine onyx black, Mustard Seed, Faded Jeans, and Peeled Paint distress inks, black gems

Daisies

Hannah is having a card drive for soldiers, making Mother's Day cards for them to send back home. I love blue and yellow together, and I think this would make a good Mother's Day card. The blue comes from blue embossing powder over white cardstock, then I just had to color in a few of the flowers in yellow and add some pearl centers to some of the flowers.

Supplies: CG105 Silhouette Flowers, CL307 Mini Messages, white and yellow cardstock, VersaMark and Mustard Seed distress inks,green marker for stems, a la mode sky blue embossing powder, Martha Stewart pansy border punch, gold and white pearls, embroidery floss

Silhouette Vase

My sweet friend Judy sent me this gorgeous new Hero Arts stamp called Silholuette Vase. You can see her work with it here and here. When I received it, my first thought was to try clear embossing it over music paper. I colored it in with Marvy markers.


And for my second try I used Judy's idea to add a ribbon. This one is heat embossed with white powder. I used the exact same markers to color it, but you can see that the shades look a tiny bit different.

Thank you, Judy, I LOVE this stamp!

For supplies see my Flickr stream.

Smiling flowers

If you look on Tif's blog, you'll see that she has been playing with beautiful printed papers lately. She inspired me to do the same. While mine isn't as elegant as her results, nevertheless I had so much fun putting this card together! I only wish my garden looked like this one.

For a supply list, see my Flickr photostream.

One more Valentine

I've been wanting to see what colored embossing powders look like (I've only used clear and white to this point) and since blue and brown are a favorite combination of mine, here is my first attempt.
Supplies: K5298 Blooming Heart, CL272 All Occasion Messages, CH151 Art Flowers Spring, blue pearls, twine, brown and blue cardstock, VersaMark ink, a la mode sky blue embossing powder, Prismacolor blue slate pencil

Blue Flowers

I have had this A Million Thanks clear set with this pretty flower for awhile, and have not used it enough, so I tried to think of a different way to use it. So I stamped, colored, cut out the flowers and leaves and added them to the corner of the Scroll Label stamped in green ink.

I thought it might look nice with a blue frame to help bring out the blue flowers, so this time I trimmed the Scroll Frame close to its edges and put that panel on periwinkle cardstock. I also lightly stamped Old Letter Writing in the center first, and added some tiny blue pearls.
For supply list, see my Flickr photostream.

for Oz

This morning in the mail I got a beautiful Valentine card from Linda (also known as Oz) all the way from Oregon! Here it is - aren't I lucky? So delicate with the heart wreath and little tiny pink pearls on it.

She also included a set of clear heart stamps, and I told her I was inspired immediately to try something with them. This card is the result. I stamped 2 of the hearts 6 times each, cut them out, and assembled them into these heart flowers. Their centers are felt heart buttons. I used one of my favorite sentiments to make one stem, and stamped and cut out the other, and added a green gingham butterfly.

Thank you, my friend, for thinking of me!

For supplies, see my Flickr photostream.

Pink Gerbera Daisy

I love pink gerbera daisies, and I tried to recreate one here using one of the large flowers from the Big and Small Flowers clear set. This one is made of 2 shades of pink BoBunny dotted paper and a green center, pulling the colors from the stripe. I snipped the petals apart on the top layer of the flower and ruffled them for dimension, also pop dotting between each layer. The smaller version of the flower was used to shadow stamp in Worn Lipstick on the kraft card. Suzanne just sent me an envelope of goodies, one of which is this fun stretchy green gingham ribbon, which I thought added even more dimension. Thanks, Sue, I love it!

Supplies: Cl374 Big and Small Flowers, AR137 Script Messages, kraft cardstock, BoBunny tutu dot and flamingo double dot papers, unknown green print paper, Kaisercraft Bloom stiped paper, Worn Lipstick Distress, Versafine onyx black, and Memories Artprint brown inks, bit of green gingham ribbon

More poppies

Are you tired of the poppies yet? They really make for an easy card, so I'm still experimenting with them. This one was stamped several times and sponged with Distress inks, then I cut out the flowers and paper-pieced them to the green-inked background, adding some punched lace when I framed it up.

Supplies: CG140 Poppy Background, CL278 Great Flourishes, coral, gold, white and lime cardstock, VersaFine Onyx Black, Worn Lipstick, Spiced Marmalade Distress inks, clear embossing powder, green marker

For these next cards, I decided to clear emboss the stamp over some printed papers. This one looks like a Fiesta to me, maybe a bit too busy? The poppies were sponged with a combination of Worn Lipstick, then Fired Brick, and finally Adirondack Cranberry to make them stand out from the background.

Supplies: AR137 Script Messages, parchment and orangey-red cardstock, printed paper from Dollar Tree

This one is my favorite using the printed papers. I used Fired Brick and some Spiced Marmalade to color the flowers, and added some twine and a tiny framed sentiment.

Supplies: CL307 SparkleClear Mini Messages, khaki, pale khaki and brick red cardstocks, unknown printed paper

I am most disappointed in this one, because the printed paper was so pretty, apricot and lilac butterflies against a pale green background, but I ended up just muddying the flowers as I tried to get them to stand out. Because the paper had pale orange in it, I started with Spiced Marmalade ink, but it didn't cover the background well enough, so I resorted to using Vintage Photo. This paper had a sheen to it, so maybe that's why my inks wouldn't take to it as well as other papers I've used?

Sympathy card

Just sharing a quick card I made using the layered emboss resist technique. Supply list on my Flickr photostream.

Deborah's Card Chain Challenge

Each month, Deborah hosts a Card Chain challenge. This month these colors are one of the options for our cards. I got the idea to make this flower from Jackie's blog - using punched hearts nested together. AND I got to use my new Martha Stewart pansy punch! Supply list is on my Flickr post.

For Anne

Anne is having a challenge over on her blog, to make something using butterfies and/or spring. Spring means pastel flowers to me, so that's where this started, and then I thought this sentiment would make a good butterfly trail. Most papers are dotted cardstocks. I added lots of little bling in the flower centers, on the butterfly body, and along its trail. The butterfly and the yellow flower are pop-dotted.

Supplies: CG148 Blossoms, CL383 Antique Engravings, CL278 Great Flourishes, BoBunny cardstock in pink, yellow, blue and green, VersaFine onyx black ink, clear embossing powder, colored pencils for highlighting, little gems

Pink posies

Are you tired of my pink cards? I made this one as a birthday card for a neighbor at home; she's shivering and I know this will warm her up! These flowers mean spring to me - at home they always bloom about Mother's Day. And there are pink lilies of the valley, though the ones I've seen are much paler.
The Silhouette Bells was stamped over glossy pale pink paper in VersaMark and embossed in white, then I colored in the leaves and flowers with markers. Framed that up with 2 strips of punched lace hearts, and then mounted that on some BoBunny dotted paper and added some tiny white pearls.

Supplies: CG175 Silhouette Bells, AR137 Script Messages, pale pink glossy and white cardstock, BoBunny Tutu Dot paper, Martha Steward lace heart border punch, VersaMark and VersaFine onyx black inks, white embossing powders, pearls

Cherish pink

This month's challenge at Hero Arts is flowers! I haven't used this new wood Silhouette Meadow Flowers stamp much, so I decided to start with it. It is stamped in VersaMark and embossed in white over a pink polished stone backbground, and then the leaves were colored in using Peeled Paint Distress ink, which turned them a brownish green. I also used a pink marker to give a little more shading to the roses, then framed the panel in brown. To finish I added 2 little butterflies, highlighting their brown dots in white gel pen ala Kathy, and popping them above the panel. This was placed on a printed paper and the sentiment was heat embossed in white.

supplies: K5340 Silhouette Meadow Flowers, CG108 Special Moments, CL151 Share Laughter, white and brown cardstock, Heidi Grace printed paper, VersaMark, Memories Artprint Brown, and Peeled Paint distress inks, white embossing powder, pink marker, pop dots