Hello there! I’m back today to share with you a card using products from the new Be Creative release from Simon Says Stamp; you can find more details of that below. The Fantastic Flowers set, despite its name, there are a couple of cracking leaf images. You know me, I do love a nice leaf and to be able to use my favourite greens. 

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simon be creative release

Before I jump into this card, please check out the new Be Creative release from Simon Says Stamp. The Fantastic Flowers set I used for the leaf is from this release along with the Fantastic Flowers Stencil, Greetings Trio dies and Big Old Birthday set for the greeting add-on. . 

repetition makes for an interesting design

I started with that gorgeous frond from the Fantastic Flowers set and stamped it in a light, water-reactive ink. My favourites are Distress Inks which are super reactive with water and so blend out easily with the paint. Choose your ink colour from the Distress Inks range, depending on what you are painting. With a leaf, you could pick Bundled Sage, or for a flower, you could choose Tattered Rose.

The leaves in this set are solid images, so you have to be careful when stamping not to get too much ink down but just enough so you can see where to paint. It’s the perfect use of a stamping tool such as the Misti, where you can stamp very lightly for the first impression and then slowly build up until you have just enough. I had a lovely wee painting session with the frond using Daniel Smith watercolours – Undersea Green, Green-Gold, Cerullean Blue Chromium … Sepia for the stem etc.

Once dry, I used the matching Fantastic Flowers stencil to repeat the frond design twice. Once in the top left corner and once in the bottom right corner. Together with the watercoloured leaf, this gives a lovely trio of leaves, and, as we know, it’s always better to have things in odd numbers 1, 3, 5, 7, etc. I swiped Ranger Opaque Matte Texture Paste through the stencil, and once dry, I stitched a loose stem through the leaves.

The subtle repetition of the frond element supports the focal image without detracting from it. I finished off the mixed media aspect of the panel with a good splatter of left-over paint, white gouache and gold watercolour. This also helps to tie the images together as a whole.

Moving on to the sentiment. I die cut the Thanks from the Greetings Trio dies from a Matte Gold card and attached it with tiny pieces of foam tape. I do love a gold sentiment in real life, but the shame is they are so hard to photograph unless you can get the light to hit them just right.

Tipping the card here and angling it, you can see the shine on the gold and the watercolour splatter.

I added a wee add-on greeting from the Big Old Birthday set stamped in Versamark ink on Slate card and white heat embossed before trimming to a skinny strip and adding with more foam tape.

To finish off the card, I wrapped the panel with twine and then attached it to a Neenah Desert Storm card base. I embellished it with a triangle of Eggshell Pearls and Enamel Dots to draw the eye to the focal point and greeting.

Well, that’s me for today. I will be back tomorrow, though, with more to share. See you then!

supplies

You can find links to the supplies I’ve used below; click on the picture or shop icon to get taken directly to the product. Where available I use compensated affiliate links which means if you make a purchase I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you! Items marked with an asterisk (*) provided by a store or the manufacturer. You can read my affiliate and product disclosure here. I genuinely appreciate your support.