I have been in seventh heaven since Monday as my lovely order arrived from SU and I have had fun playing and sorting and trying to find space for it all! Space is becoming an increasing problem as I don't seem to have enough! I think this is a common problem when you have an out of control habit like crafting !
I decided to go back to my roots , so to speak , for this project and using only SU materials and tools create some cards in the style I used to craft in before I joined Stampin' Up ! ( Have a look at some of my cards at the beginning of this blog back in the summer of 2011 ). My style has really changed as what you have to work with sort of determines the outcome and of course when you are a new demo you don't have everything in the catalogue ! So these cards were a challenge; I hope you like them !
I worked on very vanilla card stock and used watercolour paper for the topper. I always save tissue paper from packaging and it is nice to stamp on so I have added some to both my cards today. Through SU I have made some lovely friends ; some I see and some are bloggy friends. A couple of weeks ago my friend Paula came to play ( well, chat really ! ) and she is so very kind and brought with her a little gift for me containing some SU goodies that I had not previously used or owned. This project gave me the perfect opportunity to use them as I wanted to add in lots of different elements. Just using a tiny amount of the crotchet trim and one of the little mini vintage tags has given the card extra layers of interest , so thank you Paula !
The stamp sets I have used are Blessed Mother, French Foliage and Nature Walk. I put soft suede and wisteria wonder inks together here and really like the result. I treated myself to three new punches - scallop trim corner,scallop trim border and the scallop ribbon border and have used them with my old favourite the eyelet border ; I like to mix my edgings together ! To finish I tied a bow of the linen thread around the cut out stems of the flowers and popped some pearls on just to finish .
I follow Vicky at "craftingclare" and she made a beautiful card at the weekend inspired by some lovely tissue paper flowers and I had a play at an earlier date with little success ! So I went back and tried again, they are not perfect but they are supposed to be a bit shabby chic !!! So thank you to Vicky for the inspiration ! One of my new stamp sets is Oval All as I thought it would be one of those sets you would go to time and time again; so it has had it's first airing and I'm sure it won't be the last ! More lace here and some yummy crumb cake seam binding ribbon finished off with more pearls and some itty bitty flowers punched from scraps.
The flower was stamped using Delicate Doillies and I punched 4 layers with the fancy flower punch - back your tissue with a scrap of printer paper so the punch doesn't " eat " the tissue paper! I smudged some pretty in pink ink onto the petals which I also used for the stamping along with crumb cake and soft suede. An antique brad was used to attach the flower to the card.
It was very satisfying to make these more fiddly cards and I think I may have to explore more options along these lines !
I have been very remiss with my lack of quotes recently so have a great one for you today from Albert Einstein who was a great believer in the power of imagination !
"I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon imagination
Imagination is more important than knowledge
Knowledge is limited
Imagination encircles the world."
Until next time happy crafting !
Hugs Jane x
Your cards are beautiful Jane
ReplyDeleteMargaret x