CTC 36 - Love and Sympathy

This week the CASE-ing The Catty team are focusing on the "Love and Sympathy" section of the Stampin' Up! Annual Catalogue on pages 19-30.  There are some really beautiful samples in this section, I chose the thank you card featured on page 20 as the inspiration for my card.

I kept the layout almost identical to the one in the catalogue, but changed up the colours to give it a more somber feel. I also wanted to have a bit more of a play with the new 2015-17 In-Colours and used Tip Top Taupe, Watermelon Wonder and Mint Macaron, adding in Early Espresso as a coordinating neutral.  Instead of a thank you, I decided to change the sentiment to fit with the theme and used a lovely sympathy sentiment from Petite Pairs, the second half of which I stamped on the inside of the card along with one of the other smaller images from Flowering Flourishes 

If you want to play along just take inspiration from the Love and Sympathy section of the catalogue, upload a link to your blog to the main CASE-ing the Catty page and we will add it in for you.

Now you are off to hop on over to see what the talented Alison has created.

Happy Stamping
Monique

Blue Flowers

I love it when I have time to get a couple of challenges done in a weekend, I also got to have a stamping get together with another demo friend of mine and have another card to show you from that session - we always do far more chatting than creating lol. This time I am combining Create with Connie and Mary colour challenge with Freshly Made Sketches challenge.

Now I don't always think flowers when I think "blue", in fact there is a fun family story about blue flowers that I'll share at the end of this post.  I was particularly inspired by Margaret's creation and decided to do my own blue flower using You've Got This. All the stamps on this card are from that set.  I thought the Smokey Slate background was a little dark after I stamped it so added a layer of vellum over the top, securing it with Glue Dots and Washi Tape.

Now for the family story.  The night my husband and I went out for dinner with my parents to celebrate our engagement, we were talking about what colour the bridesmaid dresses would be.  My husband said he would like them to be blue, to which I responded "there aren't any blue flowers" so they couldn't match the dresses.  At that point my husband laughs and says "then what are those" pointing to a wall of flowers through the resteraunt window behind me.  Now here the story splits into two versions, his is that the wall was indeed covered in blue flowers. My version is that the lighting outside was making them look blue when they were really a purple colour.

To this day, more than 25 years later, my mum still sends me magazine clippings of blue flowers, and my husband also still brings it up whenever he can!  

Happy Stamping
Monique

Bright and Bold Butterfly

Who doesn't love butterflies and bright flowers?  This photo and sketch from Fusion challenge was just what I need on a cold winter's day to remind me of the warmer months.

This was a fun card to make as I layered the flowers one over the next using masking technique before lightly colouring them with good old colour pencils.  The butterfly was an easy choice with the bottom layer in Bermuda Bay with the cut out layer in Basic Black.  I love how the Bold Butterfly Framlits and Butterfly Thinlits coordinate allowing some really stunning layered butterflies. You are going to be seeing way more of them in upcoming weeks.

The lovely big sentiment is from the hostess stamp set Happy Birthday Everyone, I just love the mixed font and size of this sentiment.  It is one of the Hostess sets available in the Stampin' Up! Annual Catalogue, which means you can earn it for free with a qualifying order or workshop total, contact me to find out more.

Happy Stamping
Monique