Stampin’ Up! Grateful Bunch on Wildflower Fields!

Good morning!  I hope that you’re having as nice a weekend as I am!  The weather is drop-dead gorgeous – we’re talking shirt sleeves and birds singing and ducks paddling in the pond.  And today (Saturday – as I type this!) isn’t even the warm day!  To be honest, I’m happy where it is – for me, it could stay at this temperature 24/7/365 and I’d be GTG!

Wayne and I spent some time outside building my new raised Square Foot Gardens!  Well, while I’m making a card, and posting it and getting dinner ready, he’s still out there.  I can hear the grinder and the welder sparking!

Yea, I know.  A man welding  – especially in those sexy green welding “sleeves”! – is hot!  Many many years ago, we were working together on a steel structure.  I thought it was so “cool” how the weld spark looked in the night – and I was…well, head over heels, so…I took lots of pictures.  I thought I was being so careful not to look right at the spark.  Well, at 2 am I discovered I hadn’t been so careful!  Safety tip – pictures of welding at night can get you in trouble.  Also, looking away from the spark, but at a metal building where the reflection is will also get you in trouble!  I’d burned my eyes enough to need to go to the doc in the morning.  Wayne told me to put raw potatoes on them.

Uhm.  No – that didn’t really help! 😉

Anywho – here’s what he’s working on today!

That’s the first bed all ready to fill and plant!  That means it’s for sure spring!! Can’t wait to see them full of tomatoes and peppers and turnips and kale…. 🙂

Well, on to the real reason you dropped in, yes?  Being that it’s feeling all spring-y today, I was feeling in the mood for flowers.  And butterflies.

I ended up with flowers – not the Rose Wonder flower I’d pulled out to use, but the pretty Grateful Bunch flowers (my faves!).  And I never did add a butterfly….take a look-see:

If you’re sharp-eyed and know your stamp sets, you’ll know that I did use the sentiment from Rose Wonder.  It’s so easy to focus on the beautiful flower (and coordinating framelit!), that we can lose sight of the fact that Rose Wonder is chock-a-block full of beautiful sentiments for various needs.  So, in this case, I’m sending this to a friend battling cancer and this is a most appropriate verse!  I sent her a card a while back, a much simpler one (with butterfly!).  You can see it here, if you like.  🙂

I got the layout idea from this week’s Mojo Monday, sketch # 437:

And the flower theme – although I’d been leaning that way already! – from the Just Us Girls Challenge #333 – which is a Word challenge this week!

The Mojo Monday sketch is a square card – I almost changed it up to an A2, but decided to go with the square.  I first matted a piece of the SAB Wildflower Fields DSP on a panel of Old Olive card stock.  Over that, I adhered a piece of 1 1/4″ Burlap Ribbon with Multi-Purpose Liquid Glue.

The smaller square is a piece of Farmer’s Market DSP (remember that one from the Annual Catalog!?!), matted on Old Olive.  I used some Stampin’ Dimensionals on the bottom part of the square and Liquid Glue on the top (to compensate for the Burlap Ribbon thickness).

The sentiment, from Rose Wonder, is stamped in Blackberry Bliss on a circle of Whisper White.  It’s a 2 3/8″ diameter circle, cut with my Circles Collection Framelits.  You’ll notice that I didn’t stamp the verse name on the circle itself – it wouldn’t fit!  I added the verse name to a strip of Vellum card stock, snipped the ends in a banner, and set it aside.  Then I punched a 2 1/2″ Old Olive circle – with the 2 1/2″ Circle Punch – and SNAILd the sentiment to it.  I used a combination of Liquid Glue and Dimensionals to adhere it to the card front.

I stamped several of the Grateful Bunch flower-trio images on Whisper White – some in Old Olive, Blackberry Bliss and Hello Honey – and punched them with the bundled coordinating Blossom Bunch punch.  Then I used my Clear Wink of Stella (the one with water in it now, designated for coloring!) and pulled some of the color into the flowers.  This Classic Ink will run a bit – so I used that to my advantage!

I did some dry-fitting and got to a layout of the flowers that I liked – photo above.  I had an epiphany today – why, in all the times I’ve spent energy dry-fitting, didn’t I just take a danged picture of the final layout?  So I could use it when I was trying to put everything back and get it all adhered!?  Nope – I don’t know either.  Goofy, I guess.  Today, I remedied that!  Wonder if I’ll remember next time… 😉

I used Multi-Purpose Liquid Glue to stick the little Vellum banner down – making sure the glue was under where the flowers would be.  I used more of the Liquid Glue to stick down the bottom layer of flowers.  Then, I stuck on some short pieces of Gold Metallic Thread with more Liquid Glue.  Over all of that, I added the top layer of flowers, these with Stampin’ Dimensionals.

All the flowers got some Pearl Basic Jewels and the front was done!

For the inside, I used a piece of Whisper White card stock for the inner liner.  I pulled out the SAB Flowering Fields stamp set and selected the image that pretty much mimics the design on my card front.  I stuck it on my acrylic block, and kind of curled the stem part of the stamp.  Curving the stamps doesn’t work quite as well with the Clear stamps as it does with the Photopolymer, but it’s doable.  I stamped the image 4 times around the edge of the panel with Tuxedo Black Memento Ink.

I colored the images with my Clear Wink – and used my acrylic blocks and my Old Olive and Rich Razzleberry Stampin’ Write Markers.  I just scribbled some of the ink on the acrylic block and then picked the ink up with my Wink!

Easy peasy!

The sentiment is also from Rose Wonder (see, I told you this is an awesome sentiment set!), stamped in Blackberry Bliss.  I SNAILd the panel to an Old Olive mat and into my Whisper White card base.

I also SNAILd the front on and the card was done!

This square card meant I needed to make a custom envelope and liner, with my Envelope Punch Board.  I used the steps you can find here in my Tutorials to make it from a piece of Whisper White Envelope Paper.  I used Fast Fuse to adhere the envelope together!

I decorated the front with a couple more of the flower images from Flowering Fields, also colored with the Clear Wink of Stella…

…and made a custom liner with some more of the Wildflower Fields DSP.

Et Voila!  This card touches a whole slew of my favorite SU! products….Grateful Bunch….Wildflower Fields DSP….Flowering Fields….the Blossom Bunch Punch….and the lovely sentiments from Rose Wonder.  Even without the butterflies I was planning….I love how this card turned out!  Hope you do, too. 🙂

Almost time to get your #imbringingbirthdaysback stamp!  It’s going to be available at midnight mountain time on Monday the 7th (that’s this coming Monday!) and will be just $12!  Want more info?  Check out my post from yesterday…near the end of the card portion, I tell you all about it! 🙂

I’ll see you tomorrow morning!

TTFN

Mary

HOST CODE FOR 1 Mar – 15 Mar 16: J9VBU4KX

Use this host code when you order and receive a free gift from me! But, if your order is over $150, please don’t use this code (you’ll miss out on your own Stampin’ Rewards if you use it) but you’ll still get the free gift. The free gift for March is your choice of any item valued up to $8.00 in the 2015-16 Annual Catalog or the 2015 Occasions Catalog.

STAMPIN’ UP! PRODUCTS USED IN TODAY’S CARD 

CARD CUTS USED IN TODAY’S PROJECT

Whisper White Card Stock: 5″ x 10″ (card base, scored and folded at 5″)

Old Olive Card Stock: 4 7/8″ x 4 7/8″ (mats for card front and inner liner); 2 5/8″ x 2 5/8″ (mat for small front square); 2 1/2″ circle (mat for sentiment)