The Flower Challenge # 16

Hi there everyone and welcome to our first challenge for 2018 at The Flower Challenge!! I hope you all had a wonderful holiday with your family and friends and received lots of crafty gifts!

Firstly I must apologise for this blog post being so late. My two week holiday is nearly over and I've been spending as much time as I can with my kids, so card-making has taken a back seat. Also Max ended up with a stomach-bug/headcold on Wednesday night which left him and I with no sleep for a while. He's getting better now but has an earache so fingers crossed it doesn't get worse. So hence this post being very late, I'm very sorry about that. I'm back to work next week unfortunately so will be back to my regular scheduling...

This month we are looking for 'Spotlight Stamping' which is basically where you stamp images on your project and only colour a particular area. Its really fun to do and the possibilities are endless with how you 'spotlight', so can't wait to see your ideas!!

For my card I really wanted to use a new stamp set I received before Christmas and to try a different layout:

I'm so in love with this stamp set from Altenew 'Frosted Garden' and love the 'frosted' effect on the flowers and leaves. Very cool!!

I cut a panel of watercolour CS and heat embossed the images using Ranger Embossing Powder in 'Queens Gold'. I then used a waffle-edged die from Winnie and Walter 'Essentials: Audreys Cutaways' and then my trimmer to cut it into non-even quarters. 

I chose to watercolour the larger pieces using my Gansai Tambi palette. Once they had dried I popped them up on the card front with foam tape, with the other pieces being stuck down flat. The 'hello' die (from Simon Says Stamp) was die-cut 3x from black CS, glued together and then to the card front. I then stamped the gorgeous (from the same Altenew set) using black ink on a strip of watercolour CS. To add a bit more sparkle I glued on some co-ordinating sequins from Neat and Tangled.

I'm going to link this to the Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge, the Simon Says Stamp - Monday Challenge and the Simon Says Stamps - Work It Wednesday Challenge where all of their themes are 'Something New', like my Altenew stamp set!!

You have until January 25th to link your projects to The Flower Challenge and we will be back with a reminder and more inspiration on January 15th. If your still not sure about 'spotlight stamping', pop over to the blog to see more ideas from the rest of the Design Team.

Right, I have to go and pack up the car now to go to Whites Bay. Max can't go swimming but he can still use his skim board on the beach and we always look for crabs, so should be fun. Gotta make the most of my time and the sunshine!!

Take care
Shona