More Serendipity

As you remember, I had a lovely early surprise birthday present when Mary Lee Dew invited me to be a guest designer for the two blog hops on Serendipity Stamps this month (the first and third Wednesday). I love their stamps - you may remember the big " And the angel said..." sentiment which I used on my mass-production Christmas cards last year. So I was delighted to say yes please, and thank you.

Blog hop details: Mary offers a $20 gift certificate to spend at Serendipity stamps, awarded randomly to a comment left on any of the blogs. Start on the company blog and follow the hop, remembering to leave comments. I've often been inspired by the beautiful cards the DT have created when I see them on the website, I'm sure you will be too.

Serendipity Stamps blog

My Miscellany (yes, mine)

Beth Chiu

Julie Warner

Marybeth Lopez

Miriam Napier

Vickie Z

You have until April 22nd to leave comments; on the 23rd Mary will award the gift certificate so make sure to check the Serendipity blog again then in case you were the lucky winner.

Here's the card I made for this week - you can see I chose one of the large sentiment stamps this time round.

Details: This card too has a tangential French connection. A couple of years ago when we were camping down in the south we went to visit the ochre quarries near Roussillon, and I bought a beautiful set of pigment colours. I used two of these to create a cling-wrap background with spray starch, which helped hold the pigment but still gives a lovely chalky look, very reminiscent of the paint wash used on the houses in that region. You can see some of my photos from that visit HERE. I sadly admit I still haven't edited last years, when we went to visit a larger area in Rustrel, known as "the Colorado of Provence". One of only two grey, dull days in three weeks camping, but we still thoroughly enjoyed it.

Having created my background, I stamped To Everything and heat-embossed it for definition. Then I dry-embossed the frame with a Spellbinders die, and highlighted the frame and the edge of the panel with a gold pen. I knew I wanted to use these sweet Birds Looking Up, which I couldn't resist buying as they're so different to any bird dies I have. Mary also sent me the branch die, and when I saw the way it's designed for partial cutting (the end of the branch is open, it doesn't cut), I changed my original plan and decided to incorporate it for the birds to perch on. I cut an A2 size piece of textured brown card for my base layer, and then cut the die from it, so that the cling-wrap layer sits on top of the brown matting layer, and the branch just lies across the card. For the seasons, I added some leaves cut from assorted background scraps using the Reverse Leaf Die, and some punched flowers and snowflakes.

Thanks for stopping by! And thank you, Mary, for inviting me to be your guest this month.