Lucky me!

How lucky am I? My fantastically romantic Husband snuck into my craft room while I was at work and made me this fabulous Birthday Voucher entitling the Bearer to Afternoon Tea at Fortnum and Mason! I'm thrilled by the afternoon tea but even more thrilled by the effort he put into making the voucher - Pool Party and Cherry Cobbler colour palette and look at all the daubing and the ribbon - he used a stamp I hadn't even got around to using yet! Impressed.com :)

Garden Box Card

Gold embossing glows beautifully in warm light :)

Over the past couple of weeks or so it seems that EVERYBODY  is making this box! It's making it's way around the Inspirin' Inkees (Amanda Fowler's Team), and the Dazzling Dreamers (Liz Shannon's Team) teams.  This is a real 'WOW' card which goes from conveniently folding flat into a regular size envelope, to being an all singing all dancing box card and it's just incredibly versatile.  You can find a video with instructions on Very Victoria's Crafts on Youtube here and there are plenty of examples of other designs if you have a peruse online.

This is the watercolour paper and gold embossed butterfly in natural light

For a quick reference once you've looked at Victoria's video for the technique, the dimensions are A5 size cardstock, scored at 7.3cm along the short edge (i.e ~half way), and at 2,4,6 and 8 inches along the long side.  Don't forget to NOT fold down the back panel!

I based mine on a garden theme and guess what made another appearance...brushed gold cardstock and embossed gold powder, along with my favourite retired stamp set at the moment, elements of style.  I have used the very vintage wheel in crumb cake on the brushed gold cardstock to add a bit of texture.  The other card colour bases I used were pink pirhouette (also then with very vintage rolled onto it in blushing bride) and always artichoke for the leaves and grass - made out of little leaves sizzlits and a lot of snipping!

I gold embossed the apothecary art and the elements of style stamps onto watercolour paper, and I then watercoloured using blushing bride, strawberry slush, crisp canteloupe, pistachio pudding and always artichoke.

I've put it all together and added the finishing touches of Papillon Potpourri butterflies gold embossed onto velum, and coloured using blender pens and the same colour palette. I used a little flower wire for the larger butterfly to get is standing prouder.

I've left my greeting blank for now so that I can use it for a number of occasions......

I hope you like!x

Clean vintage

It's a real shame that brushed gold card doesn't look as amazing in the pics as it does in person. It's a really subtle effect and if you haven't got any I highly recommend buying it! I embossed in gold onto velum and then coloured the flowers and leaves with blushing bride, a little strawberry slush, crisp canteloupe, pistachio pudding and always artichoke. I then backed it with very vanilla and put it on a background of brushed gold with the vintage wheel in crumb cake and a little gold ink with gorgeous grunge stamps.