Dogwoods

Today I have a card using more new Susan's Garden dies.  One of my favorite flowering trees is the dogwood.  The flowers on these trees can be either white or pink.  I used the grid die from the Garden Patch 1 3/8-inch dies for my background.  In this package you also receive dies for Mini Daffodils. I created two branches of flowers using the Susan's Garden - Dogwood dies.  I created the branches the same as I did on the Cherry Blossom post done yesterday.  I used a light tan card stock and sponged the branches with Crushed Olive Distress Ink, shaped them, then sponged on Gathered Twigs Distress Ink.  They look so realistic.  The flowers were die cut using white card stock.  On the indention on the end of each petal, I used the Copic marker R59 (Cardinal); place the tip of the point in the indention.  For the stamen, I die cut two stamen pieces for each flower and used scissors to cut each stamen stem in half.  Two stamen pieces were glued together to give fullness to it.  The ends were spread apart and tiny dots of Viva Light Moss Green Paper Pen was placed on the tips. 

This is a 6"x6" card.  I attached a piece of design paper from an old Jodie Lee Designs "Nature Garden Collection" 6x6 paper stack over a 6x6 piece of black card stock.  The Garden Patch grid was die cut using black card stock then the same die used to die cut the squares using a piece of design paper from an older BasicGray "Green at Heart" paper pad.  The grid frame was attached with dimensional tape.  Over the grid, I attached a pearl swirl from my stash.  

The sentiment is one of Susan's new sentiment stamps from Elizabeth Craft Designs "Take Time".  It was stamped on white card stock, cut out with scissors and backed with black card stock.  Black pearls were added to complete the card.

The new smaller flower dies by Susan are so perfect for creating beautiful cards.  

Below is a link to each of the Elizabeth Craft Designs products used:

1009 - Susan's Garden - Dogwood

1002 - Garden Patch - 1 3/8-inch and; Mini Daffodils

RS008 -  Take Time, sentiment stamp

  

Cherry Blossom Time

Today is my first post on The Elizabeth Craft Designs Blog as a member of the Susan Tierney-Cockburn Design Team.   I have Spring Fever and am looking forward to all the beautiful flowers that should start blooming soon.  I have decorated a 10 inch square mirrored frame with a beautiful branch of Susan's Cherry Blossoms at the top.  Along the bottom I have included three white flowers using Susan's Garden-Anemone dies.  

Before I started creating my flowers, I used a couple of stencils and texture paste to create a background on the frame. 

This is a picture of the Susan's Garden - Cherry Blossom die.  

I die cut the cherry blossoms using a very light pink card stock.  There are two sets of dies to create flowers and you can see that the flower has only two die cut pieces to form the flower (one piece has 3 petals and the other 2 petals).  These flowers are so easy to create.  I wanted to add cherry blossom buds so I die cut the 3 piece petal in a darker pink to create them.  I shaped (cupped) the petals, added glue over most of the topside, then pinched the petals to form a bud.

Below is a Tutorial on how to create a realistic branch:

To form the branches,  I die cut two branches using Kraft card stock.  The branches were sponged with several colors of Distress Ink then both branches sprayed with a light mist of water to spread the ink and loosen the fibers of the card stock.  They were shaped using a ball stylus (just press down in the center of all the branches to give them shape). In the picture above the top branch has been sponged but has not been shaped.

You will need to let the branches dry thoroughly (either air dry or use a heat gun) then glue the two branches together.  This creates a sturdy branch and helps make it look realistic.  Once they are glued together, you can sponge a darker brown ink over the creates to help it look like bark, if you want to.

After your branches are ready, you can start attaching the cherry blossoms and buds.  I only have two branches pictured here but actually used three for the frame. 

In the center of the frame is a mirror.  It was not possible for me to get a picture without my reflection so I die cut a piece of card stock to cover most of the mirror.  The sentiment I used is the Susan's Garden "Sunshine and Love" sentiment stamp.  ( I will be removing the pink card stock and have the sentiment attached directly to the mirror when I use it for a piece of home decor.

Along the bottom of the frame, I attached several pieces of lace.  The flowers on the white lace were created using Susan's Garden - Anemone dies.  The pretty lavender butterfly was die cut using the Elizabeth Craft "Small Butterfly" dies. 

Have you signed up for the Elizabeth Craft Designs Blog updates and the Newsletter?  You can do that at this LINK. You will find a lot of inspiration on the Blog including videos by Susan showing how to create her flowers. 

The products from Elizabeth Craft Design are linked below.

Susan's Garden Cherry Blossom (1006)

Susan's Garden - Anemone (1005)

Elizabeth Craft, Susan's Garden, Sunshine and Love stamp RS001

Elizabeth Craft Small Butterfly (713)

Step Card with Shimmer Sheetz Grid and Mini Roses

 Have you seen all the new products by Susan Tierney-Cockburn at Elizabeth Craft Designs (ECD)?  I have shown you projects I created with her Country Scapes, Garden Notes, and Susan Garden Flowers, and today want to show you a card created with her Garden Patch Dies.

  This is a picture of the Garden Patch -1 1/2-inch & Mini Roses dies.  In each of the Garden Patch series you receive the grid,(which you can use just the frame, the die cut squares, or both,) plus you receive flower/leaf dies.  All the flowers in this series are small and fit so well on the grid or of course, you can just use the flowers on other projects.  

For my card today i created a Step Card.  I die cut the grid die using black card stock.  I only wanted to use the black frame then used the grid die again to die cut the squares out of the Elizabeth  Craft Designs Amethyst Gemstone Shimmer Sheetz.  I used the ECD Spring Leaves embossing folder to give texture to the squares.  The frame and squares were glued to the front panel of the step card. 

The Shimmer Sheetz are so pretty I didn't want to waste any of the "scraps" so I cut narrow strips to decorate the side and bottom panels of the card.  Black pearls were added to coordinate with the black frame.  I love the look of the Shimmer Sheetz, don't you!

The cute little roses from this die set were die cut using white card stock.  The base of each petal was sponged with Milled Lavender Distress Ink then shaped with Susan's Garden Tools.  I had some metallic cord in my stash and used that behind the roses.  I wanted to help the roses stand out more, so added more greenery behind the pretty little roses. I used Susan's Garden Anemone die set to die cut the larger leaves placed behind the roses.  (I love these leaves and bet I use them a lot for fillers around other flowers.)  The little rose leaves were sponged a darker green and were glued in behind the roses.

I used the ECD Happy Birthday die for the sentiment.  I die cut it using white card stock to help make it stand out on the background.

 Now I have shown you some of each of the new products in the Susan's Garden line. Are you excited to have all the new smaller flowers to create along with the grids and sentiments?

Here are the products from Elizabeth Craft Designs used today:

1001 - Garden Patch - 1 1/2-inch & Mini Roses

1005 - Susan's Garden - Anemone

0101 Black Iridescent Shimmer Sheetz

738 - Happy Birthday dies

118 Spring Leaves Embossing Folder

Pretty Tag

Elizabeth Craft Designs has the most beautiful tag dies.  Today I designed a tag using the Tags & More 7 - Vine tag die set.  

 Here is a picture of the Tags and More 7 - Vine die set.  I die cut the main tag using the piece at the top of the picture of dies using a light green card stock.  Second, I die cut the pretty leaf border (2nd piece down in picture) using white card stock.  Both the green and white card stock are the same size.  You can create a tag as long as you want because you place the dies at the top of the card stock then trim along the sides to achieve the length you want.  Isn't that great!  The white die cut (with the leaves) was attached over the green tag with dimensional tape.  That gives some depth between the two pieces and adds dimension.

To decorate the front of the tag I used the Oval Flourish Frame Edges dies to create a frame.  With this frame you die cut two each of the die pieces.  It creates a lacy frame.  I wanted a light green background on the frame and it was super easy to do because the frame is die cut in four pieces to form the oval center.  I laid the white die cut frame pieces on green card stock and traced around each one, lightly with a pencil - doing this for all four pieces.  Cut inside the pencil mark so it is slightly smaller than the frame pieces.  The white frame was then glued to the green pieces.  I love this type of frame because I didn't have to find another oval die the same size to create an opening in the center of the frame.

Next I wanted an embossed background for the pretty rose, under the frame.  I used the Elizabeth Craft Spring Leaves embossing folder.  It was a perfect fit behind the frame.  To give it dimension, I attached the frame, over the embossed piece, with dimensional tape to the tag.

Next I created a beautiful rose using Susan's Garden - Rose 1 dies.  The rose was attached with a pop dot and the leaves attached under it with glue.  The butterfly was die cut using the Elizabeth Craft Designs Small Butterfly dies.  All three pieces of the butterfly were die cut using light yellow card stock.  I used Mustard Seed Distress Ink to sponge around the edges of the solid butterfly and Mustard Seed and Tea Dye Ink on the body.  The butterfly was glued together and attached to the tag with dimensional tape.  

Along the top edge of the die cut frame, I used the scallop die from the same Tag Set to create a border.  In the center of the scallop openings, I die cut the small circle from the same set and glued them on. These little circles created a background for the white pearls glued on top.  To finish the tag, I added a row of string pearls above the frame and a matching ribbon to the top of the tag.  I forgot to mention I used the reinforcement circle die from this tag set over the hole at the top of the tag.

A beautiful tag on a gift box or bag is usually cherished.  I am sure who ever I give this tag to will love it.

All these products can be purchased from Elizabeth Craft Designs:

960 Tags & More 7 - Vine

777 Oval Flourish Frame Edges

713 Small Butterfly

118 Spring Leaves Embossing Folder

997 Susan's Garden - Rose 1

Garden Notes Tulip

I know many of you have been waiting for Susan Tierney-Cockburn to come out with smaller flower dies and now she has a collection for us to work with.  Susan's Garden Notes flowers are so fun to create.  For this 4" x 5 1/2" note card, I used Susan's Garden Notes - Tulip.  I used a brick embossing folder for the background and layered it on a piece of coral card stock.  The Tulip was die cut using a light pink card stock then sponged with Rose Coral Chalk Ink and highlighted with Picked Raspberry Distress Ink.  A pink marker was used to color the base of the inside of the flower petals.  The leaves were sponged with Memento Bamboo Leaves green Ink and highlighted with Peeled Paint Distress Ink.  

The grass was die cut from Susan's Garden CountryScapes - Backyard 1 die set.  I die cut it twice and cut between each of the grass blades to make them thinner.  The grass was sponged with the Memento Bamboo Leaves Ink. The flower was attached to oval die cuts. I only wanted a one word sentiment on this card so I used the Susan's Garden "Lets Us Be Grateful" stamp set.  The sentiment was stamped on white card stock then I cut out the word "grateful" and attached it at the base of the flower.  To finish the card, I added a small piece of lace that had pink sequins and small clear beads.  

It is so easy to create smaller cards with Susan's Garden Notes dies.  The dimension is small enough that you can mail cards, with these flowers, in regular envelopes.  

Have you been over to the Elizabeth Craft Designs Blog?  You will find so much inspiration plus Susan's Videos that are now being posted on the blog.  Don't forget to subscribe to the Blog and Newsletters for all new updates.

Susan's Garden Products can be purchased from Elizabeth Craft Designs:

Susan's Garden, Garden Notes - Tulip 1000

Susan's Garden, CountryScapes - Backyard 1

Elizabeth Craft Designs, Garden, Let Us Be Grateful stamp set

Garden Notes Hydrangea

 I am so excited about the new Susan's Garden, Garden Notes dies.  They are very small flower dies that can easily be used on small note cards.  The eight flower dies in this collection are:  Hydrangea, Blue Bonnet, Lily, Peony, Rose 1, Rose 2, Sunflower and Tulip.  

I used the Hydrangea Garden Notes dies to create this 4" x 5 1/2" note card.  

The background was created with a brick embossing folder.  I created three of the hydrangeas using three shades of light purple card stock. All three shades were included on each flower to give them color variation which makes them more realistic. The leaves were die cut using white card stock and then sponged with two shades of green ink.  Susan's Garden Tool Kit was used to shape the flowers.  

Susan now has nine sentiment stamps in her Susan's Garden Collection.  I used the "Sunshine and Love" stamp. It was stamped on white card stock then cut out with scissors.  It was attached onto purple card stock and again cut with scissors.  

One of Susan's signature lady bugs was created with Viva Red and Black Paper Pens and glued to one of the leaves.  Three lavender pearls were added to complete this pretty note card.

The new Susan's Garden Garden Notes flowers are small and are very easy to create.  I know you will have fun creating your small flower garden with these dies!

All Susan's products can be purchased from Elizabeth Craft Designs:

Susan's Garden, Garden Notes - Hydrangea 994
Susan's Garden, Elizabeth Craft Designs, Sunshine and Love stamp RS001
Susan's Garden 4 piece all metal tool kit with case 

Exciting News and Susan's Garden CountryScapes

I am very excited to announce that I am now on Susan Tierney-Cockburn's 2015 Design Team for Elizabeth Crafts Designs.  Susan is now a licensed designer for ECD; she has 22 new die sets: "Country Scapes", "Garden Notes" and "Garden Patch". She also has 9 "Seeds of Thought" Rubber Stamps and soon will have a new flower tool kit available.   I will be giving you information about these new products soon.

Today I have designed a card using Susan's CountryScapes dies.  I have never thought I was very good at creating scenes, but it was so fun and very easy with these dies!  For this card, I have used dies from each of the CountryScapes die sets to give you an idea of the great variety of dies for creating beautiful cards for people who love the outdoors/gardening and also an easy way to create masculine cards.

 I started by sponging a cloudy sky onto white card stock.  The Country Fence 1 was die cut and sponged with Distress inks.  On the fence, I added the crow from the Country Critter 1 die set. There are 10  different critters in this set The Woods 1 tree was die cut using white card stock then shaded with light brown ink.  A black marker was used to add distress marks on the bark.  In this die set you also get extra tree branches, leaves, birdhouse and a mushroom ground cover(which I did not use). 

I had so much fun creating the little pots of flowers using the Backyard 1 die set.  I die cut the geraniums twice, to double layer the flowers to give them dimension.  I then die cut the geranium flowers again in green card stock and layered them on the leafy portion of that die cut.  The flower pots are also in this set.  

To create the purple flowers, I used one of the dies from the Country Flora 1 die set.  It has flower stems and grass.  The little flowers were die cut using purple card stock, were shaped then glued onto the flower stems.  For the grass, I cut down each blade of grass to make them very thin.  There are three layers of the grass along the bottom of the card.  

The bunny was die cut using the Country Critters 1 die set.  I added a tiny white pom pom to his tail.  The birdhouse is from The Woods 1 die set. For the sentiment, I used Susan's Winter Spring sentiment stamp.

I hope this post inspires you to check out all the CountryScape dies to see the possibilities for creating beautiful country inspired cards and projects.

All the following products can be purchased at Elizabeth Craft Design:

Susan's Garden CountryScapes Country Fence 1

Susan's Garden CountryScapes Backyard 1

Susan's Garden CountryScapes Country Flora 1

Susan's Garden CountryScapes Country Critters 1

Susan's Garden CountryScapes The Woods 1

Floral Heart

We still have a lot of snow and I want to think about beautiful flowers instead of the cold! I have been busy creating a lot of small flowers with my Susan's Garden dies, to create this pretty heart shaped wreath. They look so real, I can almost smell them.

This is a wood heart shape I found in the craft store and immediately thought it would be fun to cover it with realistic flowers.  The heart measures 9x9" from widest/tallest measurements.  To create the flowers I used Susan's Mini Petals (Roses), Mini Daisy, and Rhododendron (small purple flowers)  dies.  Once all the flowers were created, I used hot glue to attach them to the wood frame.  Small leaves were inserted around the flowers, then dried baby's breath tucked in.  

Hope you are having a great weekend.

LOVE

 Valentine's Day is not far off.  Today I used the Marianne Design LOVE (LR0301) die for the center attraction.  I used red glitter card stock for the die cut.  

This is a 6"x6" card.  On the background I embossed a piece of white cardstock with the Anna Griffin Smitten Embossing Folder.  On top I added the beautiful die cut doily by Marianne Design Anja's Squares (LR0242). The layers were attached using dimensional tape.

To create the flowers, I used the Susan's Garden Cistus dies (659658).  They were die cut using white card stock and the base of each petal colored with a very pale yellow Copic marker.  I used store bought stamens in the center.  Under the flowers, I added the Marianne Design Leaves CR1272, LR0192, LR0245, and LR0117.  For the corners, I added the Cheery Lynn B162 die cut corner. 

To give sparkle to the card, I used the Ivy Hollow ScrapFusion Needle Point glue to add small amounts of glue to the leaves, around the edge of the hearts and the top of the flowers, then sprinkled on Ranger Distress Stickles Clear Rock Candy dry glitter.  I know it is hard to see the glitter in the photo.

Have you started on your Valentine cards?

Marianne Design LOVE die 

Marianne Design Anja's Squares Dies

Susan's Garden Cistus (Rock Rose) dies

Spring Bouquet

 

It is snowing outside but I am ready for Spring.  Today I worked with Susan's Garden dies to create a Spring Garden.

I love to follow Dr. Sonia on the "Cards, Crafts, Kids Projects Blog". She creates some of the most beautiful projects.  One that I loved recently was a 3-D Pop Up Card that I used for a base for this project. My project does not fold flat;  I inserted a bottom (floor) section.  The box is 4" square so I cut a piece of card stock 5 inches square then scored at 1/2 inch along each side to create tabs i could fold down and attach to the sides.  The tabs were attached below  (folded down) in the 4 inch square so they don't show when looking inside the box. I used ScorTape to attach the side of the box together and to attach the "floor" piece.

Along the base of the die cut windows, I created a daffodil garden using Susan's Garden "Spring Bouquet" dies.

The flowers in Susan's Garden Spring Bouquet die set are very miniature compared to the original daffodils from Susan. You can see the difference in size in this picture.

 These little daffodils were so easy to create; they will work perfect on any project including cards.  I know you will have fun with them.  There are also dies to create mini tulips, in the Spring Bouquet die set.

Along the top of the die cut windows I added Ivy created with dies from the Susan's Garden "Leaves, Fern & Ivy" die set. The smallest ivy leaves in this die set were glued to thin wire to create a vine.  On the inside, I added more ivy and some purple vine flowers create with the Susan's Garden "Forsythia" dies.  Inside the die cut box, I placed a small gift box which has a bird sitting on the  lid. You could add a flameless candle and use it for a home decor piece.   Butterflies were added to complete the project.

If you would like instructions on building the pop-up card, go to  Dr. Sonia's blog at this LINK.

I hope you enjoyed this project.

Susan's Garden Spring Bouquet Dies

Masculine Birthday Card

 Designing masculine cards is always hard for me.  Today I have a birthday card to show you that I designed for my son.  When he has free time, he loves to get out in nature, so thought this card would appeal to him.  The overall card size is 6" x 6".  The two main items I wanted to use for this card are the Impression Obsession Tree Frame Die (IOB DIE 205YY) and the Penny Black Winter Sky Stamp (4204L).

 I started by using VersaMark Ink to stamp this Penny Black design onto a piece of white card stock.  It was embossed with Ranger's Ultra Fine Black Embossing Powder.  Next I used a 1" circle punch to create a stencil to sponge in the moon with Distress Inks.  I used a small sponge dauber and light yellow ink to create moon light down over the stamped image.  (I was trying to create a night scene but in the photo it looks more like a daytime scene!!)

Along the middle of the stamp image, I placed a piece of card stock, that was cut to resemble a snow bank, across the image and sponged on blue ink.  The round circle I punched out was placed over the sponged on "moon", for a mask, so I could sponge Stormy Sky Distress Ink and a Weathered Wood ink around it.  I used a stamp to create falling snow.  The "dots" were stamped using VersaMark Ink and embossed with Ultra Fine White Embossing Powder.  Be sure to use the anti-static pad over your picture so the embossing powder doesn't stick to some of the sponged on blue ink.  Some glitter was added along the top of the snow bank to help make it stand out.

Next I die cut the Impression Obsession Tree Frame.  Post It Notes were placed around the edge of the frame and the tree was sponged with brown Distress Inks.  I used a pencil to draw in some lines to resemble bark.  Next I used the Ivy Hollow ScrapFusion Needle Point bottle of glue to add some dots of glue on the tree branches and added Polar White Flower Soft to make the tree very dimensional.  The Flower Soft was also added along the very bottom of the frame.  Two of the Memory Box Resting Birds (98527) were added to the die cut tree branches.   

To make the card very dimensional, I added dimensional tape along the outside edge of the frame and some dimensional tape under the wider trunk and branches before attaching it over the stamped image.  The stamped image was trimmed to fit perfectly under the die cut frame.  

For the background on the 6x6 inch card, I embossed a piece of Navy Blue card stock with the Die'sire Embossalicious Happy Birthday Embossing Folder (EF6-Happy).  This piece was layered over light gray card stock.  The Dee's Distinctively "Deer 1" die was die cut using dark brown card stock and attached with a double layer of dimensional tape.

Some of these products can be purchased from Ellen Hutson, LLC at this LINK.

Susan's Garden Sweet Peas

I never thought I would be able to create the delicate little sweet pea flowers, but with Susan's Garden Sweet Pea dies, it was so easy.  You can see her directions at this LINK. 

Here is a close up of these pretty little flowers.   I assembled the sweet peas then used a hot glue gun to attach them to some thin floral wire.  These flowers make such a pretty addition to any card or box. 

 

The sweet peas look beautiful placed on white background.  You can purchase these dies from Ellen Hutson, LLC at this LINK.

Thank you for stopping by.  Have a great day.

Susan's Garden Southern Magnolia and Stamen Tutorial

 I love creating the Susan's Garden Southern Magnolia.  It is such a beautiful flower. 

  I used Susan's directions to create this flower but I did create the stamen a little different.  I promised you a tutorial on how I did it.  Here is the LINK to Susan's instructions for completing her magnolia.   Around the magnolia I added Susan's Garden White Pine Pine Cones and Pine Branches.  I created this card for a winter birthday card.

TUTORIAL FOR SOUTHERN MAGNOLIA STAMEN

 

This is a picture of a Southern Magnolia.

 When I started to create this stamen, I was not sure how many stamen pieces I would need,  so I die cut five pieces.  I cut each projection of the stamen twice to create 3 points.  This creates the frilly look needed for this stamen.  On one of the pieces, I colored the base brown to resemble the stamen in the picture.

 To get the stamen to have the curled points, I used the self-closing tweezers from Susan's Tool Kit and rolled down each point.  I caught the three narrow points and rolled them down.  You don't have to be real fussy about getting them exactly alike.  You can arrange them once the whole stamen is created.

 This is what the pieces looked like once the points were all curled down.

Add glue, on the back, to the bottom edge of one of the pieces that you have not colored the base, and roll it using the self-closing tweezers.  (You want the curls rolling out.) This will be the top of the stamen.

  Add glue to the next stamen piece and roll it around the base of the first rolled stamen.  The base is wide and this is very easy to do. This picture shows two stamens glued together.

 Depending on how high you want the stamen, you can use three or four pieces.  I only used a total of three.

 Next add glue to the back of the piece you have colored the base brown. Roll the piece around the bottom of the other stamens.  If the bottom is not perfectly straight, you can trim it with scissors so you can get it to sit straight in the center of the flower.  Add glue to the bottom of the stamen and place it in the center of the completed magnolia.

I know you will have fun creating these beautiful Magnolias. You can purchase Susan's Garden Southern Magnolia dies at this LINK.