Butterflies Squared

I loved Freshly Made Sketch's challenge #380:

It's pleasingly symmetrical, but with some room to play. I decided to try graduating the colour of some butterflies, by sponging three shades of blue in a continuum (golly, that's hard to spell!) on card to punch them out of. This led me (in an impressive feat of memory, if I do say so myself!) to recall the washed DSP 'Perfectly Artistic' from a couple of years ago, which I had lurking in the craft cupboard. A bit of judicious die cutting and the backgrounds for the butterflies were graduated as well. I embossed some delicate silverwork on that background with the help of a stamp from Needle and Thread. Finally, when I went to attach the butterflies, I decided to make them fly around a bit, rather than obey the symmetry of all the rest. 

Here's the result: 

Ingredients: 

Stampin' Up! card. (Marina Mist, Whisper White, silver), ink (Marina Mist, Balmy Blue, Soft Sky, Basic Black), stamps (Butterfly Gala, Needle and Thread), dies (Rectangle Stitched, Circle Collection, Layering Circles) Subtle embossing folder, silver embossing powder

Other: Versamark, francheville rhinestones, some random silver thread I have but don't know where I got. 

Funky!

What a cool key word from CASOLOGY for Week 334: Funky. By a happy chance, I'd just received the Four Seasons DSP from Stampin' Up, and the 'B-side' (that dates me, and anyone who remembers singles records!) is in undeniably 'funky' patterns - so I was off to a good start. For the flower, I used the flower bulb from Making Every Day Bright as petals. I completed the with a fun font and inside sentiment.

Ingredients:
Stampin' Up! card (Shimmery White, Basic Black) DSP (Four Seasons), stamps (Making Every Day Bright, Sassy Salutations, Party Pants), stampin' write marker (Tangelo Twist) ink (Basic Black)
Other products: francheville faceted jewel, American Crafts black glittered embossing powder.

Beautiful Butterflies

A lovely colour combination - Melon Mambo, Granny Apple Green and Coastal Cabana - from Global Design Project's #177 made me excited to use my new butterflies from Stampin' Up. As a base for the design, I used Fab Friday's latest sketch: #157 (which also enabled me to use the lovely new Stampin' Up doilies). To soften the stamped doily, I die cut another one in vellum as an overlay. I coloured the butterflies using Copic markers - thinking all the while that I really must invest in some Stampin' Up blends!

Here's the card:

Ingredients:

Stampin' Up card, (Whisper White, Melon Mambo, Coastal Cabana), ink (Basic Black, Granny Apple Green), stamps (Butterfly Gala, Dear Doily), dies (Doily Builder, Layering Circles), butterfly punch.

Other products: Stazon Black ink, copic markers (B02, YG17, RV29, YG03)

 

Wave!

I love the crisp cool blue of Pacific Point against white, so that's where my head went for CASOLOGY's 331 challenge 'Wave', which then gave me a starting point for Retro Rubber's #104 tic-tac-toe line 'blue, birthday, textured embossing' , which, of course, made me think of the 'Seaside' embossing folder, and so I was back to a wave! The stamp sets are Day At the Beach and Big on Birthdays (for the sentiment), from the 2016 and 2017 holiday catalogues respectively.

 Here's the result (I forgot to take a photo of the inside, which says Happy Birthday):

Ingredients: 

Stampin' Up card (Whisper White, Basic Black, Pacific Point), Basic Black ink, stamps (Day at the Beach, Big on Birthdays), Seaside embossing folder, Layered Circle dies, Pacific Point watercolour pencil.

Other: Derwent Inktense watercolour pencil: Sun Yellow

Valentine's Card

Thank goodness for the Card Concept's "Love is in the Air" #108 and Sunday Stamps SSC198 lovely sketch, both of which arrived in time for me to make a Valentine's Day card for my husband. I ended up making two colourways, and liked both. (With any luck, he won't remember the card and I can give him the other one next year!)
I'd call the card clean and layered: a stripped back version of the sketch, in which I responded to the colours and clean lines of Card Concept's photo inspiration.

Ingredients:

Stampin' Up! card (Whisper White, Merry Merlot, Crumb Cake, Basic Black), white embossing powder, stamp (Sure Do Love You), dies (Lots to Love Box Framelits), enamel shapes, Corrugated embossing folder.

Other: white kitchen string

Bouquets

Two pretty challenges inspired me this week: CASOLOGY's Week 330: Bouquet, and Fusion's 'Tea and Bouquet's'.  I don't feel I use my 'Time for Tea' suite enough, so I leapt at the chance.
the card:

Ingredients: Stampin' Up! card (Whisper White, thick Whisper White) ink (Basic Black, Pink Pirouette, Granny Apple Green) water colour pencil (Cherry Cobbler), stamp sets (Time for Tea, Itty Bitty Greetings, dies (Spot of Tea, Squares) and punch (Detailed Trio)

Rainbow cupcakes

I had my first play with Stampin' Up's Salebration set, Hello Cupcake, this week, as I responded to two 'cupcake' challenges. From The Card Concept's 107, I was inspired to make a Clean and Layered card with both rainbow colours and cupcakes. This was reinforced by the delicious looking pastel-y cupcakes in Just Add Ink's #441 challenge.
The result:

Ingredients:

Stampin' Up card (thick Whisper White), ink (Petal Pink, Pineapple Punch, Lemon Lime Twist, Pool Party, Highland Heather, Crumbcake, Elegant Eggplant), stamps (Hello Cupcake, Perennial Birthday).

Other - My Favourite Things Die-namics Stitched Basic Edges