An outstanding actress

What comes to mind if the theme of the challenge is 'feminine'? Audrey, swirls and vintage ....

I started with stamping and masking the Audrey stamp. I had set my mind on using the birdcage somewhere in the background. My first idea was to stamp it with black or blue ink, but I changed my mind. Too overwhelming. So I used versamark instead. I added the swirls  and colourized all the white parts with my Inktense pencils. 

My eyes fell on this Katzelkraft sentiment and I didn't need to think twice, it was a perfect match!

Stamps:
- Audrey: Stampinback B206
- swirl: Home Impressions - Grungy plate HI28
- birdcage: PaperArtsy - Hot Picks HP1004
- sentiment: Katzelkraft KTZ204 - Be Batman

Materials:
- PaintOn Lisse
- Versafine black
- Versamagic Sahara Sand and Ocean Depth
- Inktense pencils (baked earth, Dark Aquamarine)
- cardstock

Challenges:
- We Love Stamping - March Challenge - Feminine

Thank you for watching!

Daffodils only

 I often combine my flower stamps with other stamps, like funny animals or cute critters. Last weekend, I was playing around a bit with my daffodil stamps. I wanted them to be the theme of a card. My eyes fell on the Brilliance inks, and I picked 'Rocket Red Gold'. It worked out quite well! The colour is close to copper but with more depth in it. 

By now, I had set my mind on using only the flower heads (Chocolate Baroque - Spring bird-Daffodil), well, this was not easy thing to do. I ended up masking the area around the flower heads to make sure the other parts of the stamp didn't stain the rest of the card. The rest of the card is pretty simple, I used an oval stencil (homemade) and a Dutch Doobadoo stencil and sponged Versamagic 'Tea Leaves'. I colourized the flowers with Inktense pencils and added a sentiment (Stampin'Up - Blooming with Kindness).

Challenges:

- Beautiful Blossoms Challenge - Anything Florals Goes With Optional Mood Board #15

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Daffodils

My favourite flower stamps had been waiting for me for a long, long time.  They match wonderfully with a stamp that I recently acquired. A new card was born!

I started with the new stamp, the bunnies. I stamped them on white PaintOn with black Versafine, and masked them. Then I stamped the flowers in the corners, masked them and stamped the border. Added the flowers on both sides of the bunnies. 

I thought long and hard about how to colourize this card. Not too bright, but still colourful, warm colours but not too yellowish .... 

I colourized with Derwent coloursoft and a little bit of Inktense with a lot of water for the background. And I quite like how it turned out.

Stamps:

- Messy Rabbit from Joanna Sheen - Rabbit Couple MR118

- border: Gorjuss - You Brought Me Love GOR907106

- flowers: Chocolate Baroque - Spring bird-Daffodil

Challenges:

- Stamping Sensations - March challenge - Spring

Thank you for watching!

The spell

Every once in a while, I promise myself to make a quick and easy card. You know, like the ones you see in tutorials and youtube vids. Ready in 5 minutes. For some reason, I will always end up making the most time-consuming cards ever. Sounds familiair? 

I spend half of my weekend on this card. Idea after idea popped up, so what was meant to be a CAS card with a very stylish daffodil, turned into the not-CAS-at-all-card pictured in this post. 

I stamped the daffodils (so far so good), masked them and stamped my other daffodil stamp and masked them as well. I stamped the bird and masked it. I used a white pencil to add a border around the parts I had previously masked. I used Derwent coloursoft but other wax-based pencils of even crayons can be used as well. 

I stamped the blossoms with versamark and allowed them to air dry before colourizing the entire background with Inktense pencils. Adding the water was like magic, blossoms kept popping out! And now you can see why I added the white border .... there is a subtle highlight around the flowers and the bird. 

Last step was to colourize the flowers and bird and add the sentiment. 

Stamps:

- daffodils: Chocolat Baroque, spring bird - daffodil

- bird: Katzelkraft KTZ151 les piafs

- blossom: Stampinback sheet 142

- sentiment: PaperArtsy - Eclectica EDY11

Materials:

PaintOn (white), purple cardboard, Archival (black), Derwent coloursoft and Inktense, Versamark.

Challenges:

- Stamping Sensations - March Challenge - Spring

Thank you for watching!

Spring is in the air

 Finally, the weather is improving over here, which hasn't gone by unnoticed. The snowdrops have disappeared, my small daffodils (narcissus tête-à-tête) have turned my backyard into a big yellow blanket, and hyacinths are adding  bright blues, pinks and whites. The hyacinths are extremely beautiful this year!

Time to capture this happy feeling in a card. 

The cardstock looks like kraft but it is actually more yellowish, I would describe it as 'sand'. I stamped lots and lots of flowers on it with versamagic in 5 different colours, this was so much fun to do! 

I added the lady and the grass, both stamped with black versafine. But how to proceed? I felt most of my sentiments were a little too much, and to be honest, I preferred the text to be on the inside of the card. And a lot of other stamps that would have fitted another card nicely, were not a great match with the 'spring' theme. 

Suddenly, I came up with and idea ..... why not use a small part of my stamp of a bird's nest? Exactly the branches with blossom I was looking for. Added some white dots with my sakura gelly roll for the finishing touch.

I glued the card on a piece of paper, and on pink cardstock. On the inside, I stamped 'It's the Art of living to make every day special'.

Stamps:
- lady, flowers and sentiment (inside): ArtSpecially Pink Ribbon (2009)
- branches with blossom: Chocolate Baroque, Spring bird - Tulip
- grass: Art Journey - Bird Boy

Materials:
- Cardstock (sand and pink)
- Versafine black
- Versamagic
- polychromos pencils
- sakura gelly roll 08 white

Challenges:

- Stamping Sensations - March challenge - Spring

- We Love Stamping - March challenge - feminine

Thank you for watching!