Friday, May 21, 2010

More Hero Arts flowers

Hi there!
I haven't had much time to post lately, spring has finally arrived here in Colorado! We did get our traditional snow storm after the lilacs bloomed, but this year it didn't kill all the flowers. With all the lilacs around the house we have the most delicious scent in the breeze - love it! Most days we're getting upper 60s to mid 70s temperatures which is perfect for yard work. Even if we're getting rain storms in the afternoon. :)
I haven't had much time to blog with all the yard work, so I'm planning to put at least a couple of cards in each post for a while. Starting... now!
Today I'll show you two different takes on the same stamp. This is a Hero Arts stamp that just screamed *poppies* to me as soon as I saw it. For the last year or so I've been kicking myself for not getting some of my grandmother's poppy seeds while she was alive (so yes, I planted some this spring). She had a little section of poppies that had these flaming orange/red flowers that were amazing. Since it's doubtful that my poppies will be awesome this year, I made some with paper! The image was embossed with black ep on white paper and then colored with a variety of Distress Inks (Barn Door, Spiced Marmalade, Scattered Straw, Peeled Paint & possibly one or two others) and a water brush. The next panel was colored using the blending tool and Distress Inks also. Once the panels were attached to the black base card I added some faux stitching with a black spica pen. I also put just a touch of black stickles in the centers of the two open flowers. I believe the sentiment was from Serendipity Stamps - once it was dry I went over that with the spica pen also. Simple, yet bold!
I'm afraid that I just couldn't get a really good picture of this second one. Something about the light and the colors just wouldn't show up well for the camera. You can see that I used the blending tool with more Distress Inks on white cardstock. This time I used Spun Sugar, Scattered Straw & Dried Marigold. Basically I just added color to paper in well blended 'blobs' until it looked good. I allowed it to dry (although you could use a heat tool) then stamped the same Hero Arts image with embossing ink & dusted it with bronze Perfect Pearls. You can see the shimmer in the picture - but you can't see the bronze color! *sigh* I used a circle cutter to trim it out and edged it with Brushed Corduroy. That piece was matted with a piece of mulberry paper that is almost the exact same color as the Dried Marigold DI. I matted those on a piece of brown cardstock that I rubbed with Brushed Corduroy (the brown was just a shade too light) then popped up on the background piece. The background was a piece of scrapbook paper that I also blended some Distress Inks on - just so it would match! :) I'm not entirely certain if it's actually done, but nothing I've tried to add has looked very good so far. Guess it's done unless I have a Eureka! moment.
Thanks for stopping by!

3 comments:

Jill said...

Love how you created such different effects with the same stamp! Both are gorgeous!

Etha said...

super cool poppies!!
is this a negative stamp and the background is all embossed? I couldn't quite figure it out from the picture and did NOT think that you cut out all them skinny stems ;)
Hero arts makes some of the best flower images ever!
Do you have summer at the moment as well? Got 9 lilacs just finishing with their pathetic little blooms. I bought them from the forest service as mere tiny sticks and finally they are becoming bushy. My dream is to have that whole area be intoxicating with scent when they are all large and blooming! So far in the forest what is making you drunk with scent are the ever present choke cherries :)

lauren bergold said...

ok, i really think hero arts ought to grab these up for their catalog b/c it's hard to imagine finding 2 such totally ♥AMAZING♥ cards made from the same stamp! and really just the stamp, some inks and paper and THAT'S it!!! ok, yeah, there's the truckload of talent and inky experience of one m. adams...NEVER to be underestimated or over-appreciated!!!!!!!!!!!!! ♥♥♥♥♥