Goodbye old friend

Hello, crafting friends!

It's time for one of those hard-to-make sympathy cards today. 

I've gone for a one layer card, using masking and sponging techniques to create a sky and ground off the edge of a thick card base. Trees were stamped along the ground line using a little stamp from Stampin' Up's Holiday Home (retired.) The scene was spritzed with water and left to dry. 

A spritzed card will usually warp as it dries but I find a visit to the bottom of a large pile of heavy books sorts that out! I know, I know, it's hard to keep up with my cutting edge technology! The card was finished with stamped birds from Take Flight 2 by Inkylicious, some detailing on the scene with a marker, and a heat-embossed sentiment from Uniko's Simply Said Blocks.

CHALLENGES

I'm linking this card up with CAS Mix Up where they theme is Off the Edge and they want watercolour to be the main feature. Helen is hosting Watercooler Wednesday's Occasions challenge this week and I'm entering my sympathy card there. I'm also joining in with Stamplorations CAS challenge where I'm sticking with the Anything Goes option.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

The card is on its way to the owners of The Baroness who has come to the end of a long and happy life at the grand old age of 16. Regular readers will remember her as one of Eva's pals, a dignified boxer dog.  She stayed with us often and was such a character. She would pretend to be above Eva's fun and games but would often join in despite herself and every now and again she would turn herself over for a tummy rub which always made me laugh. I especially loved collecting her from her house for walks: I would usually find her asleep on the sofa and would sit next to her and gently stroke her head until she woke, took one look at me and leapt up wagging madly with her whole body. I enjoyed watching the dogs running shoulder to shoulder ahead of me on our long country walks, Eva with her fluffy trousers and The Baroness with her smooth black leggings. As she got older and began to lose her sight, The Baroness relied on Eva to show her the way, but they would still sniff the hedgerows together and The Baroness would still kick up her heels and frolic with Eva despite her arthritis. Last winter I started to see a change in our old friend. She started to have seizures and became increasingly frail. She struggled to climb the stairs where she'd always slept alongside Eva at the foot of the bed. I couldn't bear to leave her downstairs on her own, so I would carry her up, and down again in the morning. It was such a privilege to know her and I can say, with absolute certainty, that we were friends.

Sending hugs,