Hello everyone! Erica on the blog today with a vibrant thank you card using the lovely big flower from the Thank You So Much  set which has just been released.

SUPPLIES:

Thank You So Much Clear Stamp Set

Dotted Balloons Creative Die

Darling Ribbon & Dotted Frames

Jet Black Fusion

I am an absolutely sucker for flower stamps! I love, love, love them! Flowers are by far my favorite image to colour.  One thing I’m not very good with though, is red. Anyone who read my blog post Pink Birthday with Erica will be aware of this already… and the fact I thought it was a bad idea to try things I’m bad at when I’m on a deadline. Well, this one I started on back in mid Feb, just to see what might come out of it when I had plenty of time to come up with something else if this turned into another big red blob rather than a flower.

After stamping up the flower on some copic friendly paper, I picked up some red copics, not without feeling a little bit adrift and unsure, red really isn’t my colour at all. I mean, I can’t even wear red without looking like a sickly ghost!

I always start with a light colour and for this one I went with R81 and flicked that all over all of the petals. This part isn’t about making it perfect so don’t worry if it doesn’t look too good whilst at this stage. Then I moved on to my darkest red, R46, and started at the outside of the petals, flicking the colour inwards. The contrast will be stark but don’t fret, by using several shades you can easily blend the colours in. If that’s the look you want. It can look very dramatic and spectacular by not blending too well but this is entirely up to you. I go both ways, sometimes I’m all about the blending and getting it super smooth looking and other days, it’s flick, flick, done ✅.

Back to the flower, my third colour was RV29 and with this one I mainly filled in any gaps I might have missed at the end of the petals and also pulling the colour down a little into the light pink areas. This is probably the colour I used the least. My fourth and final colour was R32 and with this one I went over almost the entire flower and filled in every single petal. You might wonder what’s the point in going over it with the R81 to begin with if it’s all going to get covered up anyway? Well, to be honest, I didn’t know that’s what I would end up doing. I thought the light pink would be nice but it was a tad too light and too pink, hence the R32. I went over the light pink bits very quickly and lightly to avoid it getting too dark.

As I had managed to go outside the lines a little bit in several places, I decided to colour in the outside of the flower with C-9 which is a very dark grey colour Copic marker. It’s not black but close.

Out of this card the colouring bit took the longest. The rest of it was a piece of cake!

As the flower is very vibrant and colourful, I decided on a monochromatic colour scheme for the rest of the card. When I use white as a card base I like using a lovely linen textured card stock I have. It gives the card a little something without adding anything or distraction from the focal point. For the actual base I used the A2 sized diecut from the Darling Ribbon and Dotted Frame and set aside. I then cut out another piece using a Lawn Fawn stitched rectangle die that would fit perfectly inside the dotted frame on the A2 panel. The idea was to cut out a circle and then place this panel on top of the flower piece so the flower peeks out of the hole.

I ended up using the middle die in the Dotted Balloons which isn’t a balloon, it’s a wavy circle and it was just about the perfect size! With foam tape, which I can’t craft without, I adhered the die cut panel to the flower piece. Then the double sided tape came out and was added to the back of the whole shebang. Carefully placing this on top of the A2 panel I stuck it down.

Originally I had planned on stamping the sentiment on top of the diecut panel but I forgot to do it so I decided to heatemboss the sentiment ‘Thank you’ from the stamp set on black linen textured card stock and add that with foam tape too. This would make four layers in total!

Before I stamped the sentiment with VersaMark ink, I dusted the cardstock generously with my anti-static tool. It will show and look a mess on black or dark card stock but don’t worry, this you can easily wipe off once your heat embossed sentiment has set and cooled down. I used scissors to cut out the sentiment and added it right under the flower on the card.

Then it was time for final touches and as per usual, I didn’t go simple… nope, that’s something you can almost always count on.. First the sequins came out, Jet Black Fusion and I used two different sizes. These I adhered with Glossy Accents. Aaaaaaaaaand, while I had the Glossy Accents on hand, I dotted it all over the flower. The idea was to make it look like dew drops on the petals. I may (read ‘definitely and every time!’) have gone slightly over the top…

Oh well, it looks lovely and it feels great when you run your finger tip over them! I love cards with texture on them. Whilst I adore what other people make in the CAS style, I’m really not a ‘clean and simple’ kind of girl myself. I can’t stop before it goes overboard! Maybe it’s something to challenge myself to this year?

Well, if you are still with me at this point, you deserve a cookie! Without much further ado, here is the whole card.

I hope you are enjoying this new release and have found some inspiration today!

Happy crafting from Erica

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