Beatrice

Hi crafter's

I finally got round to making my card for the Clarity challenge. The subject is vintage. I thought Beatrice would be the perfect stamp to use, and because there are flowers in the image there has to be some in the background! So I started with a piece of white card placed on my base plate and some flowers from my garden ( I only took a few so my husband will not notice) I used some pink cosmos. The first thing I did was to pull the petals off and arrange them on the card. You can use whole flowers but I find the centre can sometimes end up a brown mess. A bit of experimentation is needed for this technique. When I was satisfied with my arrangement I put another piece of card on top, then the cutting plate on top of that and run it through my Grand Calibur. Carefully pull the two pieces of card apart, they do stick together slightly. Using tweezers gently pull the petals off the card and see what colour  the flowers have left behind. Any little bits can be gently rubbed away. You end up with two pieces of card to use one will be darker than the other. Leave to dry. The colour I had was very similar to Milled Lavender so I used that along with Seedless Preserves. First I stamped Beatrice in place then coloured her in with Prismacolor pencils and blended with Sansador. Next I used a flower template (from Crafters Workshop) and Milled Lavender distress ink. I placed the template just around the edge and blended the ink. Turn the template around so each side is different. Then with the same ink stamp the key next to the hollyhocks. To frame the card I inked up the delicate corner in Seedless Preserves and stamped in each corner. Now ink up the rod from the Birdcage set and stamp in between the corners. Using black ink stamp the Count your Garden word stamp at the top of the card. Rub a little Inka Gold in Antique Gold around the edges with your finger. Mat the card on to some antique gold card then glue on to a white base card. For the embellishments I stamped the key and the miniature robin in Seedless Preserves. Using a water brush blend the ink to colour the robin, adding a little Vintage Photo. Blend a little Milled Lavender over the key to take away the whiteness, then rub some of the Inka Gold over the top. Cut out the key and robin and attach as shown. To make my bow I used two strips of lace then tied a piece of cream organza ribbon around the middle, the knot is underneath, glue this to the key and add a pearl in the centre to finish. That's all this time, let me know if you like it.

Happy Crafting

Sally