Welcome to InKing Royalty’s May Blog Hop! During this year’s blog hops, we are enjoying a year of celebrations. This month’s projects celebrate Sunshine, so prepare yourself for projects that are filled with sunny images of joy in the great outdoors. We are excited to share our creations with you today! After you read my post, I hope you’ll hop over to the next person on the list at the base of this post.

Sunflowers and Sunshine

I purchased the Celebrate Sunflowers bundle in my pre-order and have already created other cards with the set. You can see those cards here and here. I am sure you are thinking since the theme for this month is sunshine and I have have no sun in my card. Instead, I used Misty Moonlight, Smoky Slate, and Whisper White for my color combination. However, sunflowers won’t grow without sunshine, and ~~~ the name of the flower does contain “sun”.

Here’s my card:

I’ve seen fabulously colored sunflowers all over Pinterest. I haven’t had much luck coloring them and know I need much more practice. In the meantime, I wanted to really use this bundle. Therefore, I had to come up with a different idea to use all this gorgeousness.

A Little Tip for the Sunflower Stamp

I do have a tip for making it easier to replace the stamp in the rubber inside the stamp case, if you are like me and leave the red rubber surrounding the stamps intact. Before you remove the large sunflower, make sure you put tick marks to make it easier to replace the stamp. I had to spend time trying to fit it back into place after using it the first time. With the tick marks, I won’t have that problem again. Here’s a picture of my tick marks:

Misty Moonlight and Smoky Slate Color Combination

Misty Moonlight is now one of my favorite shades of blue. In order to create a calming effect, I chose Smoky Slate for the flowers. I did know I wanted to use the Misty Moonlight from the new In Colors 6 x 6 inch DSP. When I decided to use the same color cardstock for the base, I needed to figure out how to create a border for the DSP without adding bulk from another layer. The StazOn Opaque Cotton White ink pad allowed me to just tap the border in the ink to create a white border. The result almost looks distressed, just like the rest of the DSP.

Crop and Crop and Crop Again

I decided to use embossing powder on the sunflowers since I definitely need more practice coloring them. Embossing powder means that I also used my Stamp-a-ratus in order to be able to get perfect positioning and layering.

I stamped the corner sunflowers on opposite diagonal corners on a 5.5 x 4.25 inch piece of white cardstock. After getting the depth of color I wanted I cleaned the stamp and stamped again using VersaMark, Next, I covered the sunflower with clear embossing powder and heat set it with my heating tool. Finally, I cropped both out the corner sunflowers using the Sunflower Dies.

The embossing on the sunflowers is difficult to see on the first picture, so here’s a close-up:

The only thing I knew for sure regarding this card was that I would be using the corner sunflowers. Therefore, I decided to just start cropping away with the coordinating dies on white cardstock and vellum. I realized I’d need another sunflower for the center, so I went back to my Stamp-a-ratus using the same process as before.

That’s when I realized I had no idea what to do next. Therefore, I just left a pile of cropped items and sunflowers on my desk, albiet on the corner of my desk so I could distance teach the next day.

By the end of the day I had the card organized in my head and just needed to assemble it. I used dimensionals under the sunflowers in the diagonal corners and just the middle of the center flower. The popped up sunflowers allowed me to dry fit some of the cropped pieces. Once I had everything where I wanted it, I took a couple of pictures so I could adhere everything down with liquid adhesive

Finishing Up

I tied the ribbon in a square knot and then cropped the sentiment out using the rectangle stitched dies. The black mini-dimensionals allowed me to pop-up the sentiment over the ribbon.

Since the base of the card is Misty Moonlight, I used a piece of white cardstock cut to 5.25 x 4 inches. I used Smoky Slate ink on a sunflower, stamped it off twice and then stamped in the middle of the cardstock. The result is a very light sunflower over which someone can write.

Finally, I stamped sunflowers on the flap of the envelope and on the front lower left corner to complete this coordinating card and envelope set.

Back to the Blog Hop

Thank you for stopping by today.  I hope you’ll hop along to the next stop on the blog hop, Ann Murray with Murray Stamps Ink. There’s lots of inspiration to be found in this group, and you don’t want to miss it!

Thank you for hopping along with us.  If you get stuck during the Blog Hop, please use this line-up as a guide:

1. Brian King at Stamp with Brian
2. Linda Krueger at The Stamp Coach
3. Jackie Beers at Blue Line Stamping
4. Lynn Kolcun at Avery’s Owlery
5. Robin Myren at Songbird Designs by Robin
6. Julie DiMatteo at The Paper Pixie
7. Joanne Brown at Stamping with JoJo
8. Sheryl Sharp at Sharp Notes by Sheryl
9. Pam Morris at Tap Tap Stamp
10. Sue Jackson at Just Peachy Stamping
11. Ann Murray at Murray Stamps Ink
12. Candy Ford at Stamp Candy
13. Jennifer Spiller at Westside Paper Creations

As always, thank you so much for stopping by my blog today. I’d love to hear what you think, and greatly appreciate every comment.

Have a Peachy Day!

Sue

Color Combo:

Supplies Used:

Do You Want to Place an Order?

Of course you do! Even more so because of the products in the mini-catalog, the clearance rack, and the retiring products.

The HOST CODE for MAY is WW6HSM6A. If you are ordering less than $150.00, please use the host code shown. If you are ordering more than $150.00, please contact me first so you can get your stamping rewards!  Just look at this sneak peek into June’s Paper Pumpkin kit from Sara!

Here’s another video for you, this time it’s for the Ornate Garden Suite, which is available now from the 2020 – 2021 catalog.

Remember, any order over $50 qualifies for a FREE gift from me AND a free catalog for the 2020 – 2021 calendar year!   I’ve seen it, it is fabulous, and I have a rather extensive wishlist for the pre-order available to demos NOW!  Here’s a preview of the front cover, which is all I can show you right now!

Again, thank you for stopping by my blog today!  I appreciate your time.