Happy Mother's Day

First of all, I want to thank those lovely people at the Simon Says Stamp and Show for picking my "His 'n' Hers" cards for the top three this week. I'm thrilled! Since you all seemed to like the design so much, I thought I'd share a similar one that I made for my Mum for Mother's Day tomorrow. For any confused American readers, here in the UK we have Mother's Day on a different day of the year to you :-)

"Happy Mother's Day"

I used a soft, pastel colour palette which seems apt for a Spring card, and followed the usual construction method in my tutorial. For these landscape cards, the cover is often made from two pieces of card glued together along the spine with PVA. This is simply because I tend to work with A4 card (approx 9" x 11") which isn't quite big enough to cut in one piece.

"Left inside panel"

The background scene for both the inside panels is stamped repeatedly using olive archival ink and coloured with distress inks and a water brush. The bottom part of the left hand panel is finished with sponged distress ink and overstamped with grasses using the same colour (Bundled Sage). The sentiment was from a pack that came free with a magazine, just cut out, the corners rounded and raised on some foam pads. I wanted to keep the sentiment simple since the background is so ornate; it draws the eye better.

"Dimensional panel"

The diecuts are cut from thick white card and sponged with distress inks. The flowers are lightly embossed with clear holographic powder before gluing in place with glossy accents (it's a great glue for this since it sticks virtually straight away and the thin nozzle makes it easy to get it in the right place). The embossing gives all the flowers the sparkle look of morning dew, but it doesn't really show up in the photo unfortunately. Both panels are edged with lace sponged with distress stain to match the project. The lace flowers are cut from a wider strip of lace, the leftover strips are used to make the closure, gluing inbetween the panels and the covers.

"Front cover"

For the front cover, I watercoloured a brick background using distress inks, edged with a diecut, and added a stamped and diecut window, also coloured with distress inks. A glimpse of a third version of the inside background stamping can be seen through the window to give a taste of what's inside.

Ingredients:

Heartfelt Creations Chateau Gate die and matching stamp sets HCPC 3447 Window Accents & HCPC 3445 Mystic Hideaway

IndigoBlu stamp set: Nature 1

Spellbinders Decorative Labels Eight

Spellbinders Die D-Lites: Fantastic Flourish One, Poppy Patch, Flower Burst, Cattails

cardstock: white 220gsm, red 300gsm

distress inks (pads, markers, stains, reinkers): Tumbled Glass, Bundled Sage, Tattered Rose, Spun Sugar, Milled Lavender, Antique Linen

archival ink pads: Olive, Coffee

lace

sentiment

adhesives: PVA, Glossy Accents, foam tape

Entered for the following challenge:
Country View Challenges - Pick 'n' Mix