Nobody loves like a mum

Morning all, I am off out today to enjoy a lovely relaxing time at the spa. For Christmas I received a spa day voucher from my lovely friends Kate and Iain, and I thought what better day to take advantage than the day before I start my new job? Hopefully I'll be nice and relaxed for tomorrow morning. 

With only 10 days left of Sale-a-bration, yes only 10 days to grab those goodies before they are gone, I thought I would share another card using one of my favourite SAB items this year. I really hope Stampin' Up! bring out something similar to the Irresistibly Yours paper in their annual catalogue as I have had great fun playing with this. The photos just don't do this paper justice as you can't see how the white area shines and they are just so easy to colour. If you can only afford to do an order of £45 I would definitely recommend this paper as it's so versatile you can use it for any style of card.

I know that Mother's Day in the UK was last Sunday but I didn't get a chance to share this card that I made for my Mother in law before now and it could so easily be turned into a birthday card that I felt I could still share it. My Mother in law absolutely loves pink so just had to make the background pink. For this one I used Rich Razzleberry (not technically a pink but I had to get a bit of me in there as well!) and Rose Red, I simply used sponges to rub the colour over the top. So rather than dabbing like I usually do with a sponge I wiped them over so it gave a smoother finish in the coloured areas. I'm really pleased with the finished result.

The flowers have been created using the Painted Petals stamp set which I really enjoyed working with, it's another set that allows you to easily stamp different parts of the image in different colours and to create a different picture each time. Definitely another favourite from the Spring/Summer catalogue. Although not pink I felt the Blackberry Bliss ribbon finished the card off nicely.

Well that's it for me today as I need to go and get ready for my day at the spa, I'll be back next Sunday with another creation to share. Let me know what you're up to today by leaving me a little comment underneath. Thank you for stopping in to read my blog.

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Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog

Free Lotus Blossom

Hello everyone, well I got a little carried away making cards with all of my new sets that I forgot to share them, so I'm sorry it's been a bit of a gap since the first one. 

When I went to the Sale-a-bration event for demonstrators back in December we were given a sneak peak and were able to have a go with the lotus blossom set (which just happens to be one of the FREE stamps sets if you spend £45) and I fell in love with it. It's what's called a two step stamp set which means that you build up the layers to achieve the end result. It's a lot easier than it sounds as the layers are numbered and they have a little arrow so that you can line all of the layers up. You can do this either with one or two colours (or three...). I chose to do mine with just one colour this time but will have a go with two next time.

(Sorry about the quality of the photo, I haven't found the right spot yet to avoid the shadows but hopefully you'll be able to see the detail on the flowers.)

To achieve this with just one colour I really inked up the first stamp so it was really juicy and came out nice and dark. Then for the second layer I stamped it onto scrap paper first and for the third and final layer I stamped it a couple of times on scrap paper so there was barely any ink left on the stamp before stamping onto my image. The best thing with this set is to have a play with different colour combinations and ways of layering the stamps because you can change around the order to achieve different results.

Have you spotted the Artisan Embellishment Kit on page 27 of the Spring/Summer catalogue yet? I was so excited when I saw this as it's such a cute little set with some lovely bits to make adding embellishments easy. That's where the button and little bit of rose red lace at the top of the card come from. I'm looking forward to trying out the rose die-cut cards that come in the kit, I just haven't quite worked out what to do with them yet!

If you haven't got a catalogue yet drop me an email and I'll pop one in the post for you.

Supplies:

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog