Birdies of Happiness

Warning. . . this is a rambly, rambly bit of blahblah! This is my version of Beate’s sketch for this week. Make sure to check on Beate, Cami, Charmaine, Laurie, Lori, Mary Jo, and Sharon, too. I had fun with this one, and can’t wait to see what they’ve created!

I fell in love with these Crafty Secrets Bird Notes after seeing several gorgeous creations in the gallery, and every time I went to look for them, they were sold out (I think everyone loved them and were just faster than me!). When I met Sandy, the owner of Crafty Secrets, at CHA and was gushing about her stamps and everything else (Anna is such a good designer as well as supplier. . . she even delivered in person once!) and how I never could time my purchases right, she said she’d be happy to help me. And help she did! I got a little package in the mail the other day, and have been wanting to play with these since! Thank you, Sandy . . . for producing such beautiful products and for being such a delight!

As you can tell from my mess, this card took a little bit of mess to pull together. I must have stamped and watercolored this image 5 or 6 times yesterday! I really wanted to use the Jenni Bowlin patterned paper (the mini papers are perfectly sized for card layers at 4″ x 4″) with the birds, so my card for sure would have turquoise in it. Then the patterned paper was not quite white and not quite ivory and not quite any neutral I had, so I resorted to dirtying my shimmery white and the patterned paper with some Ranger Distress Old Paper ink (and then ended up loving how vintage-y pretty it is!). The patterned paper was still not right, so I crumbled it up and threw it across the room. Well, not really. I crumbled it up and added more ink, and then tried to stick it down. And then had to use a different adhesive ’cause the Distress ink wouldn’t stick with the adhesive I had. Whew!

I mounted the layered watercolored image with tons of foam tape, and then thought I’d use some vintage trim on the card, but after dumping out all of the white and ivory bits of ribbon, I went to the pink ribbon and dumped *that* out. And then found this piece of oldish looking, rosy silk ribbon. And it was perfect. I stuck a page pebble over the sentiment, adhered it to the back of a SU! styled hardware piece, and then ran ribbon through. As an afterthought, I added a Kaiser turquoise rhinestone to the brad I stuck into the hardware in an attempt to keep the piece from sliding. ‘Cause I liked it, I added some Colorbok fake brads (they just stick on) and some more Kaiser rhinestones. . . and then called it done!

personal blahblah and stuff follow

Stuff:

Crafty Secrets Bird Notes

Ink: Palette Noir, Ranger Distress Old Paper, tons of ink to watercolor with Aqua Painter

Paper: Tempting Turquoise, Regal Rose, Shimmery White, Jenni Bowlin Tangerine Dream

Accessories: Silk ribbon from my stash, SU! styled hardware, Colorbok stick-on stud things, Kaiser rhinestones, foam mounting tape

Personal blahblah. . .

I’ve picked up quite a few bird things lately. Went back home a few weeks ago and bought these at my favorite boutique for my newly-painted mantel

and this little iron birdie and the bird bath (behind the pretty flowers I picked up at the wholesale florist yesterday) on the other side came from Target

Happy Spring!