Experimenting with trees

Hello, crafting friends!

Well, I have had fun in The Craft Square Metre today! I took a small tree from a Christmas stamp set and had a good old play with it in a couple of non-festive ways! 

The set I found the tree in was Stampin' Up's From Our House To Yours. In the first card I stamped it on a smooshed background and in the second card I used it as part of a stamped autumnal border. 

CARD ONE

Here's the first.

I dripped inks in various purples onto some cling wrap, spritzed it with water and placed a card panel into the result. Once the panel was dry, I masked off a horizontal line and watercoloured in a ground. Once THAT was dry, I masked off the ground and repeat-stamped the tree in dark purple, varying the heights. A matching purple marker was used to fill in any gaps.

The most interesting part of the panel was trimmed using a tall, thin stitched rectangle die by Christina Griffiths. To represent the moon, I punched a small hole in the sky and filled it with the same-sized circle punched out of shiny card stock, taped at the back to secure. I added stars with a white gel pen and stamped the sentiment (from Stampin'Up's Today's Tiles) in dark purple ink. The panel was attached to a card base with dimensionals.

CARD TWO

For the second card, I tried using the tree as twiggy branches in a leafy border. I think it works!

The foliage and berries mostly come from WPlus9's Silver Bells but I also used a leaf that was out on my desk from Reverse Confetti's Fall Foliage. I tried the stamping out on scrap paper first and then copied the design carefully onto a card panel. 

For the sentiment, I cut a strip of card stock and trimmed it top and bottom with a stitched rectangle die. The bold sentiment is from WPlus9's Hello and Thanks, stamped in dark brown ink. I thought I had stamped my borders so carefully but when I put the card together, I noticed a red blob on my pristine white card... that's why there are lots of gems on this card!!!

EDITED TO ADD AN AWARD

So happy that the twiggy autumnal card was chosen as a Weekly Winner at CAS Colours and Sketches!

And that both cards were Honourably Mentioned at The Twofer Challenge!

CHALLENGES

I'm linking both cards up with The Twofer Challenge where the theme this month is Trees, and we are asked to use the same stamp/die/stencil, on two different designs, for two different occasions.

I'm also entering Card One into this month Stamping Sensations challenge where the theme is Great Outdoors; and also joining in at Less is More's Shades of Purple colour challenge.

Card Two was made with those amazing colours at CAS Colours and Sketches (my second entry!) and I'm also linking it up at Just Add Ink where the challenge is to Just Add 'A'. My 'A' is autumn of course!

AND IN OTHER NEWS

Forgive the rubbish photo but it really does sum up our weekend...

Yep! This weekend we have mostly been cavorting about the countryside in the sunshine :) How about you?

Hugs,