Perennial Birthday

Hello, Crafters.

I was overwhelmed by the amazing response I received for my new Facebook group yesterday. 

It was finally up and running by about 5.30 pm and within the first five hours there were thirty-eight members, and crafters had already started sharing their projects, and chatting. 

And to think I'd been worrying about whether it was a good idea to set up a group or not ! I'm well aware that there are already a great many crafting groups  available on Facebook, and I wasn't sure if there was room for another one!

If you would like to join the group as well, this is the link: Happy Crafting

It's not a very imaginative name, but it's my sign off from my blog, my videos, my emails and just about everything else, and I thought it'd be easy to remember Happy Crafting!
 
Yesterday was my first play with the Perennial Birthday Stamp Set, and it was the whirly-type flowers that had first caught my eye! 

The problem with the main flower image is that it has some solid small flowers/berries included with the flower and leaves. 

This means when the image is stamped in black - so that the flower and leaves can be coloured - the small flowers/berries would be solid black! 

There are two ways I thought of to get round this. I could paint the image on the rubber stamp using three four different Marker Pens, huffing on it and them stamping!

I rejected this idea because I thought it'd be too time consuming. 

I moved onto plan B, which was to use tape to cover everything except the flower, and stamp the flower three times using Sweet Sugarplum Ink. 

Then I cleaned my stamp and inked up the leaves and a bit of the surrounding stamps in Emerald Envy Ink. 

Finally I coloured the stem with my Soft Suede Marker Pen, and the flowers with the Berry Burst Marker Pad. 
 
Then I fussy cut all the flowers and leaves - which was quite easy -  and then the stem with small flowers/berries, definitely not so easy!

I used one of the Petal Pair Embossing Folders, and dry-embossed the centre of the top layer, which was Whisper White Cardstock (CS). 

My original plan was to make the card vertical, but when I decided to make three circles with the images, I realised I wouldn't have room for the sentiment. 

Before I adhered the fussy cut elements to the Stitched Shape Whisper White CS circles, I adhered the flowers, leaves and berries together - making sure the position with all three  of them were at very different angles.

I wrapped some retired Sweet Superplum Ruffled Ribbon around the top two layers of the card, and adhered the sentiment over it so the Dimensionals sat either side of the ribbon. 
 
I added a Berry Burst Glitter Enamel Dot in the centre of each of the larger flowers, and then a tiny Basic Pearls in the centre of the little flowers/berries. 

I forgot to say that I'd painted the sentment using Marker Pens, and decorated either end with the stem and small flowers/berries, painted the same way as earlier. 

I also repeated this twice more to stamp inside the card.  

This is a very clean looking card and I enjoyed making it, but it's not for someone whose in a hurry, or someone who doesn't like fussy cutting! LOL!

That's it from me today. Untiltomorrow, happy crafting.

JanB.