Garden in Bloom Thank You

I was awake at 6:30 this morning getting our granddaughter, Raine, up and ready to be taken to daycare by my husband. She slept over last night providing us with a wonderful evening enjoying her company. She is such a little character now and the time we spend with her is so precious!

Due to my early start, I was able to design, stamp, and assemble thank you cards for my stamping group by 1:00 PM! Wow! I think I'm on a roll!

I chose a four color scheme for my card design:

Using the solid flower stamp from the Garden In Bloom stamp set, I stamped flowers in both Peekaboo Peach and Flirty Flamingo, stamping some full strength and others stamped off, on a Thick Whisper White matte. I then stamped over each flower with the outline stamp in the opposite color.

Flirty Flamingo and Peekaboo Peach worked very well for this as they blended beautifully when overlapping flowers. To create a pleasing design, I stamped full strength stamps in both colors, in a sort of triangle formation, some flowers full on the matte, others offset, and then filled in with the stamped off flowers. I then used my MISTI to stamp the sentiment from the now retired, Another Thank You stamp set, with Chocolate Chip.

I inked the edges of the matte with Chocolate Chip and then adhered it to a Flirty Flamingo matte using Fast Fuse Adhesive. This was then adhered to a standard Whisper White card base using Dimensionals to complete the card.

Though the design of this card is relatively simple, it took time to stamp the two-step stamps on each matte. After that, it was relatively easy to complete the cards.

I think the color scheme and card design work well. What do you think?

Stippled Blossoms Background Technique

Do you ever wish there were like 48 hours in a day? Maybe even 72? These days, no matter how much I wanted to get in my craft room to stamp, there always seemed to be something else to do. And of course sleeping is an important activity, too!

Anyway, amidst a pile of laundry, and dishes, etc. today, I was finally able to finish the card I started last week!

I had viewed a video by Stampin' Up! Demonstrator Brandy where she created a background by using one of the stamps in the Stippled Blossoms stamp set.

I was in love! Who'd have thought that ONE stamp could create such a lovely design?

I chose to create my design using Blackberry Bliss and my MISTI. Now though I love my MISTI dearly, creating the design could have been done more easily using the stamp on a block but I wanted to see how I could use MISTI to advantage to create the design. I believe I moved the stamp itself about three times in total to create the background, but instead kept shifting my paper in different directions.

After creating my background paper and mounting it onto a Blackberry Bliss card base using Dimensionals, I adhered a strip of Coastal Cabana across the middle using Fuse Fast. Next, I mixed Rubbing Alcohol with a few drops of Blackberry Bliss ink refill in my Stampin' Spritzer and spritzed a piece of the White Jute Ribbon to match my card colors. After it was dry, I adhered it over the Coastal Cabana strip using Sticky Strip.

I next utilized my Pentagon template and circles template (cut with my Circles Collection Framelits) and MISTI to line up the Mother's Day stamp so that I could stamp it around a circle of Whisper White card stock. This is a really cool technique that I was able to do only because I was using photopolymer stamps and the MISTI! You can view three videos by Maureen Wong here that show how to make the templates and how to use them with the MISTI. These will be invaluable to you! Also, you might like to join the MISTIfied Facebook Group to keep abreast of all things MISTI!

After stamping my sentiment on the circle, I inked the edges using Blackberry Bliss and a sponge dauber. I then used the Starburst Framelits to cut a circle from the dotted design from the Irresistibly Yours designer paper. I sponged it with Blackberry Bliss and then wiped the ink off the polka dots. This piece gave me some color and texture to layer onto the circle with my sentiment.

Next, I used Misti to stamp the largest flower from the Stippled Blossoms stamp set using Coastal Cabana for the solid stamp and Blackberry Bliss for the detailed stamp. The flower was fussy cut and then both the sponged starburst and the flower were adhered to the sentiment circle using Dimensionals. The entire sentiment circle was then adhered to the card front using Dimensionals.

I used a piece of Naturals White card stock to create a matte for the inside of the card. I used the MISTI again to stamp around the create a border around the matte using Coastal Cabana ink. To complete the card, I used Blackberry Bliss to stamp the sentiment from the Sweet Laughter stamp set.

I really like the mix of textures and patterns in this card! If I could change one thing, it would be to have stamped the circular sentiment using Coastal Cabana ink instead of the Tuxedo Black Memento.

I hope you will try the technique of creating your own background paper by using a stamp! Perhaps you will find other stamps that work well for this technique. If you do, please share your findings in the comments below!

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