My First Easter Card

I have two favorite seasons: spring and autumn. Although today's temps are hovering in the 30s, the sun is shining, so I can deal with a bit more cold.

Yesterday, I saw tiny red buds on one of our trees! I'm guessing it's a red maple; I don't care. It's a sign of life and the greening of things, and that's what has me excited!

This card was loosely inspired by Kerin Sylvester's card, which I saw on Nancy Riley's week in review.

I went to my stamp stash and pulled out the much neglected Sweet Stems set, mostly because its images are similar to those used by Kerin. Once I got stamping, my card went in a different direction than Kerin's, but I like to give cred where cred is due. I used the largest flower spray and stamped it around a 3.5" x 3" piece of Whisper White.

I chose Wild Wasabi as my ink; why, I'm not sure. That's the way of the creative muse, I guess. I pulled out my Yo Yo Yellow Stampin' Write Marker, another interesting choice for me, since I don't tend to use my Bold Brights very often. Why question what works: that's my motto!

I mounted the white piece on a 3 5/8" x 3 1/8" piece of WW and then pulled out my YYY. Seriously, I can't believe I'm making a card with this bright yellow, but what says--SHOUTS--spring louder than YELLOW?

Then I realized that I now have a sentiment in my collection that I've never had before: Happy Easter. Normally, I don't make Easter cards because I don't believe the holiday to be about bunnies and spring, but I don't have any cross images either, so this is the closest I'm going to get to a card that speaks to the celebration. Imagine those flowers are lilies!

I stamped Happy Easter from Well Scripted and then set about to create a mat for it using the new Scallop Corner and Scallop Border Punches. FUN TIMES, I tell you! For this, I have Gretchen Barron to thank. This demonstrator figured out the math for creating these beautiful squares and rectangles. Her tutorial is here. I am SO thankful for the generosity of crafters on the internet!! I'm so math challenged that I never would've figured this out on my own. Kudos, Gretchen!

The one I used was 2 7/8" x 1 15/16". Note that this is the measurement of the rectangle BEFORE I used the punches on it, not what it measures afterward. You punch the corners first and then use the border punch to punch out what's left. Doesn't it look great?!

The ribbon is also WW, and it's mounted on .75" strips of Whisper White. I know some of these card elements aren't current, but use what you have before you spend more money: that's another motto of mine.

Happy Thursday! I hope you have a great weekend. I'm wondering: is anyone going without something for Lent? If so, why? I'd love to hear from you on this.

Sweet Stems for Spring...Two Ways

Hi there! At this very moment, the sun is shining, but we have had a lot of clouds and rain the past week. All necessary, I know, but the sunshine so lifts my spirit.

While I was away, I hosted March's Stamp-A-Stack. This is the early version of the card I made using Sweet Stems. I chose the emboss resist technique, stamping each of the delicate line art floral images in Versamark on Whisper White card stock and then heat embossing them with white detail powder. Then I inked up my brayer with Pretty in Pink, Barely Banana, and Bashful Blue and stroked it over each panel until I achieved the color saturation I wanted.

When I was done, I was really pleased with the look, but it was going to take too long for the SAS. So, I went back to the drawing board and recreated the card using the same three colors of card stock as the base, instead of the WW. It's not quite as eye popping, but it's still beautiful.

The Certainly Celery mat onto which the panels were mounted with dimensionals is also stamped in CC with the largest flower stamp in the set to create a subtle background. The base is Lovely Lavender. I really like the white satin ribbon that is running through the middle.

The sentiment at the bottom right is from Absolutely Fabulous, a sentiment only set in Kristina Werner's handwriting. (She is no longer at SU!, so a set of this type will not be produced again. Sad.) It too is stamped in Versamark and heat embossed with white detail powder. The embossing buddy, which eliminates static electricity, was critical here, so that no stray dots of powder were embossed accidentally.

Hope this card brightens your day. What favorite flower of yours is in bloom in your garden or around your neighborhood? I'm waiting for tulips, but I'm enjoying the budding trees.