Poppy Stamps monthly challenge - Framed

This month's challenge over at Poppy Stamps truly was a challenge - I really had to dig, and luckily I had some fun new dies that could be layered or die cut together to make frames. And, in my digging, I re-discovered another set of dies that I've always liked - the celebration balloons and collage dies. They work so well together, and I have a bunch of pre-cut balloons from a class that I keep in a tin, so it makes it super easy to put together a quick card with these two die sets.

I had a premade alcohol ink background on yupo paper, so I layered that under the collage and on top of the matted tag frames - love the double stitching!

Add a little wink of stella and nuvo crystal glaze, and top things off with a sentiment!

Pretty quick and easy birthday (or congratulations) card!
Thanks for stopping by!

Materials:
Paper: Misc. Bazzill cardstock, Neenah - solar white, misc. DP, vellum, silver foil paper, and Yupo paper
Stamps/Inks: Misc. Alcohol inks (ranger)
Cutting/Embossing: Poppy Stamps - Celebrations Balloons, Celebration Balloon Collage, Double Stitch Tags, Neat and Tangled - Hooray die
Misc: Zig - wink of stella glitter pen, nuvo crystal glaze

Memory Box Monthly Challenge - Florals

Hello!

The snow is finally almost melted, and it's time to start thinking spring... and maybe even summer! And Memory Box's monthly challenge for April (I know, down to the wire!), certainly fits the bill. I've been busy designing and kitting for an upcoming class here, locally, so the blog has been quiet... but the cardmaking has been ongoing.

I truly loved Memory Box's most recent release, and some of the dies I used today were new to me, and I was glad to put them to work! My main dies were Memory Box's Jumbo Peony and Fine Cut Leaves. I applied double sided tape (Sookwang) to the back of some gold paper foil and white paper, inked the white paper to make it pink, and then die cut a peony out of both. I then (with a fair amount of effort), removed the gold peony outline and applied it to a separate blue inked paper, and, like assembling a puzzle, put the pink peony petals back into the gold outline. I die cut Memory Box's fine cut leaves out of the same adhesive-backed gold foil paper, and placed them around the peony (I can't imagine chasing all those little leave inserts and replacing with green, so I just kept them uniformly gold).

I'm not sure if the photo really does the shine and sparkle of the peony justice. I added highlights to the peony petals with primsacolor pencil and then gave the entire flower a good coating of Wink of Stella (clear). The blue distress oxide background was lightly spritzed with water to add a little variation to the shade and interest to the background.

I stamped and fussy cut part of the sentiment, applied some gelly rol clear pen, and stamped the rest on the background. Applied to a Memory Box/Birch Press black licorice card base... good to go!

Materials:
Paper: Gold foil paper, Neenah - Solar white
Stamps/Inks: Distress inks - worn lipstick and picked raspberry, Distress Oxides - Mermaid Lagoon and Tumbled Glass; MFT - black licorice ink, Winnie & Walter - Sending You
Cutting/Embossing: MB - Fine Cut Leaves and Jumbo Peony
Misc: Water spritzer, clear wink of stella, double sided adhesive - Sookwang, clear gelly roll pen

Pick a Holiday (any Holiday)

I've really had bunnies on the brain (see previous posts), and Impression Obsession's new Bunny Border die really caught my eye... and then I decided to hop along for some more bunny inspiration, and I found a new challenge. It's called Pick a Holiday (any holiday), and the only requirement is to use all IO stamps and dies. Here's the link to the challenge, with all the details. So, after combing through my stash (and borrowing some stamps from my Mom), here's what I came up with. Obviously, my holiday is Christmas... making this the first official Christmas card of the year!

Materials:
Stamps/Inks: IO - Cover-a-Card Fluff and Holiday Cheer, TH Distress Oxides, Stampin Up white ink, Versafine - Onyx black
Cutting/Embossing: IO - Santa die, Town scene die, Ranger liquid platinum embossing powder
Paper: Misc. Bazzill cardstock, Neenah - solar white
Misc.: White shimmer spray, dimensional adhesive, gold metallic shimmer spray, Xmas red stickles