Take Flight

Hi everyone.  Whilst I had my stencils out I decided to make a card using a couple of stencils from sets I bought a few years ago at The Range and by Craft Sensations, both 6" square.  The first is a flight of butterflies, and the other a pattern of leaves.  I also very luckily won a set of stamps by Sheena Douglass called True Colours which has a couple of different butterflies and a few sentiments, and one of these is being used for the first time here, together with a sentiment from the set.  I also used a stitched square die set bought from The Works, again a few years ago, and one I use a lot.

Using a snippet of white card I started the background by stencilling the leaves using two green Distress Inks - Mowed Lawn and Peeled Paint.  I kept the coverage light using a brush and then I removed that stencil and laid the butterfly stencil down and started with Mermaid Lagoon DI and then darkened it with Peacock Feathers DI to make the butterflies stand out over the leaves.  I then went back to using the leaves and added some more of each of the greens in areas where there were no butterflies.  When I was happy I die cut the background with the largest stitched square die and I also added the 'Take Flight' words using Versafine Olympia Green Ink and then heat embossed with the WOW Clear Gloss Embossing Powder..I must admit that it is so dark it looks like black.  I finished the background by blending some of each of the greens around the edges to darken them.

I then stamped one of the butterflies onto a snippet of white card using the Peeled Paint DI and then heat embossed it with WOW Clear Gloss EP.  I decided to colour it with my recently acquired alcohol pens using shades of turquoise, but I did give it a green body, and at the end I went over the edges, including the antennae, using a black micron pen as I felt they would be better darker to stand out against the background.  I added the background and butterfly onto a white card,  just slightly smaller than 6" square.  I am trying to use up some scalloped edge cards which I have had for ages and I prefer a straight edge so I have been cutting the scalloped edge off which of course makes them smaller.

Before I go I would like to introduce a new follower called Barb whose blog you will find here and thank you for becoming my latest follower.

Thank you for visiting me here today and I'll see you again soon.

I am entering the following challenges:

Color Hues Challenge - No. 82 Turquoise and Green.
NBUS Challenge - No. 60 Where we use our Never Before Used Schtuff.
Snippets Playground Challenge - No. 475 Where we use our snippets of paper and card etc.
We Love Stamping Challenge - March Feminine.
Triple B Challenge - March - Birds-Blooms and Butterflies ( using at least one of the three).

I am also joining in with Darnell's I.D.E.A.S., a challenge which she has set for herself, but she has said that anyone is welcome to join in.  This is Week 1 - Ink/Colour Medium.