Blossoms abound

I was digging through one of my cupboards of old stamps when I came across the Blossoms Abound stamp set.  This is a long since retired set. I am not sure if it was ever in the UK catalogue. I bought this set from a lady in the USA about eight or nine years ago. I used it a lot initially, but I wasn't really happy with the results. Probably because I didn't have two purple inks that worked well enough together to look like lilac.
 Until now that is... S.U have brought out two lilac /purples that go together brilliantly.  So I have been playing with this set again today, along with the Perfectly Penned sentiment set, The Birch background stamp and the very old  En Francais background stamp Inks,.. Highland heather, Gorgeous grape. Mossy meadow, Old olive, Smokey Slate, and Grey granite.

I started by stamping the background in Grey granite with the Birch background stamp and Smokey slate with the script.

 Blossoms abound is a two step stamp set. If you're unfamiliar with these sets.  I'll explain,   the lilac blossom is made up of two stamps. The base is a less detailed stamp,  which I stamped in the lighter purple.  The second stamp has the detail and I inked up the detail stamp in the darker purple and stamped on top of the lighter purple image. It's as easy as that.
The leaves on this set are done the same way as the blossoms, although you have to stamp the stem before stamping the leaves. The stem also has the veins of the leaves and  this shows you where to stamp the leaves.

The sentiment is from the Perfectly penned stamp set and I stamped this in black Versafine.  I finished the image with some sponging to vintage it up a bit.   If you want a closer look click on one of the photos.

By the Tide

This card  turned out a little darker than I wanted . I think I was expecting the inks to lighten up a little when it dried, but it didn't, So I am a little disappointed with the final result.

To create this card  I cut a 3 1/2 inch  square of whisper white car stock.
 I took two wide post it notes and stuck them  across the top and bottom of the card, leaving a gap of  about 2 inches between the post it notes.








I use the lines on my cutting mat when adhering the the post it notes to ensure they are straight, thus ensuring my art work will be straight.



See the photo below for the three colours I chose for this card.

 I started by applying Marina Mist ink with a sponge dauber.  I always start  sponging on the post it note to remove the excess ink before I start working on the card stock. It doesn't need to be even coverage, In fact patchy is better.           Repeat with the Coastal Cabana  leaving some patches of  the M.M showing through.




Finally I sponged some Night of Navy around the edges and overlapping the other colours slightly.

 I began stamping over the sponged background using Night of Navy ink.
The stamp set I used is called  "By the Tide," It's a retired set now.



Once I had filled the area with stamped images,  I removed  the Post it notes.

I stamped the sentiment and rounded off the corners with a corner punch. After adding some twine round the top layer, I mounted the piece on to  a piece of  Night of Navy card stock.










For the second layer I stamped around the edged of the card stock then sponged over the edges i the same colours.  Obviously  I didn't need to stamp and sponge the middle of the card stock  as it will be covered by the top layer.
Then mounted onto a white  5x5 base card.

I added a metal fish charm
before sticking all the layers together and mounting onto the base card.














To go with this card I made an envelope with the Envelope punch board. I  decorated the back flap of the envelope to co ordinate the two.

Another version of this card is the Father's day card below.  This time I have not used a second layer of background paper  and I only used Night of Navy ink.

Blossoms Abound in pink

I love this Blushing Bride ink and card stock from S.U.  so I thought I would combine it  with my new favourite stamp set  Blossoms Abound. Okay so the stamp set is an old one but it's new to me. 

I have  also use  this new cotton ribbon in Blusing Bride on this card. I love how S.U do ribbons to  match their card stock. 

 I really do love this ribbon,  being cotton there is little slippage, meaning my bows are less likely to come undone.   May have to invest in some other colours now.

Blossoms Abound

Just over a week ago I found this  lilac, two step stamp set on Ebay and fell in love with it on sight. 
But this set was for sale in the USA.
After some deliberation  over the cost of the stamp set, postage and possibly  import duty,   I decided  I would buy it.

It's called Blossoms Abound and it's a retired Stampin' Up set.  I believe it was retired in 2008 so it is quite an old stamp set.

 Anyway, it arrived at lunchtime today,  just as I was going back to work.  Which meant I'd have to wait to have a play with this set.

 I got my chance to play this evening after dinner and walking the dogs. This  what I came up with.




I found this stamp set a little different to work with. Normally i would stamp the blossoms before stamping the stalks and leaves.

With this set, it's easier to stamp the stalk and leaves first.  But you do need to plan where to position the stalks  carefully to allow enough space for the blossoms.

The colours I used for the stem and leaves  were ;
Always Artichoke and Old Olive,
Lovely Lilac and Concord Crush for the blossoms.
Unfortunately both of these colours have been retired. 

I think, I left a little too much space between the blossoms on this card. So I filled in the stark white areas with some splatter marks using the splatter stamp from the Gorgeous Grunge stamp set with Crumb  Cake  and Lovely  Lilac ink.

I also used the Honeycomb stamp from Butterfly Basics and Crumb Cake ink to fill in any  remaining blank spaces.

Once I had finished the card I still had the desire to keep on playing with this set so I made a couple of simple book marks.


The sentiment is from the Perfectly Penned stamp set.
Which I think has also been retired.







The Butterfly die is also from S U and is  still available from S.U.
I cut three Butterflies one in silver, one in purple and one in white.

I sponged the edges of the white butterfly with Lovely Lilac ink and applied glue to the bodies only and stacked the butterflies on top of each other.

To give the wings a little lift,  I cut a few sticky foam pads into small strips about 2mm wide and stuck them between the wings as  close to the body as possible so they cannot be seen.

A Little Experiment.

 Yesterday we had a visit  from my arty brother. We haven't seen him for a while so I asked him if wanted a tour of my craft room and see some of my tools and gadgets.

 During this quick tour I remembered my Gelli Plate and decided to give him a quick demo.

 I am ashamed to say, I bought this plate over a year ago.  I  used shortly after it arrived then packed it away and forgot about it.

 So this morning I decide to have a try out an idea I had and this is the result.  

It was just an experiment so I made a very simple card to show off this technique rather than something fussy with lots of embellishments.

Here's how I created the background paper. 

Using a brayer I applied Stampin' up's Cherry cobbler ink all over the Gelli Plate, making sure the coat of ink was even. 

 Then I took a large background stamp from Stampin up called  " Something Lacey "  and without inking it and making sure it was completely clean and dry .  I stamped in the centre of the Gelli plate.  The idea of this is, that the dry stamp will lift the ink from the Gelli Plate to give you a negative image of the stamp.

 After a moment or two I lifted the stamp off and placed a sheet of card over the Gelli Plate and smoothed it over the Gellie plate and left it for a few moments  to absorb the ink from the plate. 

 Meanwhile I inked up the same stamp again in cherry cobbler ink, lightly stamped off the image on scrap paper, then stamped it again onto my white card stock.

I then peeled the card stock from the Gelli Plate  to reveal the negative image.

I trimmed back the stamped image and saved the off cuts to stamp my sentiment on. 

I Love Lace Birthday Card.

I have been dying to get my hands on this lace background stamp. 

The moment I saw it in the new catalogue I said to myself  I'm having that. 

It is such a beautiful design and so delicate, how could I resist it.

I love it. I have so many  things I want to try doing with it, when I get a bit more time to play. 

It's a stamp that is going to be very versatile. I can see this being 

great for wedding cards , Valentine's , anniversaries, birthdays and vintage cards.

 It's a large background stamp called "I love lace"  and it's in the new stampin up catalogue.

Here I have stamped just half of the stamp on to Cherry cobbler cardstock using

 Memento black ink. 

I also added some crumb cake ribbon  and a bow.

 I punched out  some flowers  using the Boho three flower punch and shaped them with a large ball tool.

I added some rhinestones and pearls to the centre of the flowers . 

The birthday sentiment is from a stamp set called "Perfectly penned" again from SU.

Tri fold card.

I was recently impressed by a card I saw on face book made by a lady called Linda Parker who funnily enough doesn't live a million miles away from me. 

 After a nice long chat on Facebook with Linda I told her I wanted to CASE her card and she told me to go a head. So Studied her card for a few moments then went to my craft room and made the card as I had remembered it. 


When I had finished I went back to Linda's card to compare with mine.


Ummm  it's very  close, but not that close.
 I forgot Linda had put loads of butterflies on hers , I forgot the colours of the layers,  the brads and I think she may even of had ribbon and a different sentiment  on hers.




In fact I think the only things I remembered well were the stamps and inks she had used .
So I ended up with a card very similar but not exactly the same.

I think this card stood out for me because it is my favourite stamp set from Stampin up and it's called stippled blossoms and it's a two step stamp set and I adore the two step stamps.  I also  loved the colour combination Linda used. 
I think I still prefer Linda's card.


 And Linda if you are reading this THANKS for letting me CASE your card.

Stippled blossoms Blue.

Firstly I think I ought to apologise  for the very bright background on these. I decided I needed something to protect my table . As I have spoilt several table clothes with ink or by cutting through them with scissors. So Ang and I  dashed into town  to see what was available in plastic coated fabric.     

I love polka dots  and decided to go with this yellow as the other colours were too dark. My only regret is that isn't pale pink or willow green with would go in the room much better than this  yellow but unfortunately they didn't have those colours.  Anyway on to the card I  have used this gorgeous  stippled blossom two step stamping set New from SU.  As soon as I saw this I knew I just had to have it.  I haven't had a huge amount of time to play with it yet but here are two quickies I did this afternoon despite feeling quite a lot under the weather. For the background on the navy base I used the detail stamp with night of navy ink to stamp randomly over the navy card  then set about decorating the center panel. using bashful blue and night of navy ink with a hint of crumb cake. A few weeks ago I was going through the su catalogue and spotted the perfectly penned stamp set for the first time. I really don't know why this set didn't jump out me before, but it did that day  so I just had to order it. I am so glad I did.  I love it to bit. I think this set is going to get a lot of use and is my second favourite stamp set this year. I still can't believe  I didn't notice it sooner.