Inspired by Nature

I sat down at my craft desk today to make a card. My desk is right in front of a window looking out at Cinnamon Ridge. It’s a gorgeous view on any given day. Today the sky is so blue, and the sun is shining on the mountain, showing off all the shades of brown. As I was creating these cards, there were no trains on the tracks in front of me, but rather a herd of California big horn sheep. As I gazed at the natural beauty in front of me, I was inspired to use brown and blue to create with.

To start, I grabbed a blue ink from my stash and a stencil I picked up at Michaels long ago. I taped the stencil over a white cardstock panel measuring 4 ¼ x 5 ½ inches. Using a blending brush, I lightly inked the upper right and lower left corners of the panel with the blue ink.

Next, I grabbed one of the A2 card bases I’d previously made. I taped the same stencil to the card base and lightly inked from the upper left corner all the way down through the lower right corner.

Grabbing another A2 card base from my stash, I glued the inked panel onto the card base. Now I have the base for two cards.

For the first card, I took some scrap white cardstock and blended the blue ink all over it in varying layers. Some places ended up a little darker than others. This is the look I was going for. I then used the Paper Rose Eve Flower die set to cut out several flowers. I also used the Honey Bee Stamps Bitty Buzzwords die to cut out happy birthday.

To give the flowers a more realistic look, I turned them all over on top of some foam and used a stylus to somewhat curl the petals. Turning them all over, I used the stylus to press down the centers of each flower piece. Using Bearly Art glue, I glued all the flower pieces together to create three flowers of different sizes.

To assemble the card, I glued the happy birthday sentiment in the top right corner and the flowers in the bottom left corner. I added some blue diamond art gems to the centers of the flowers as well as adding a couple near the sentiment and a few near the flowers. I’m pleased with how this one turned out.

For the second card, I found a beige cardstock in my stash that I figured would go nice with the blue ink. I used the Lawn Fawn coffee cup gift card holder die set to cut out the coffee cup. I also cut out the heart from the same cardstock. I cut out the lid and sleeve from white cardstock. After gluing all the pieces together, I glued them to the card. I liked the look of that card without adding a sentiment to the front. Instead, I added the sentiment inside. I used the Cup of Love stamp set from My Favorite Things to stamp ‘Happiness is a cup of coffee with a good friend’ inside.

I love it when inspiration comes from random places. I love that I have this gorgeous view every day when I craft and I’m happy that it inspired these two cards today.