Boycotting Winter

Ya. You read that right.
I am officially boycotting winter.
There is a Fowl Language Comic that depicts winter in 2 panels. The first one states that winter before Christmas is a magical time full of wonder. The 2nd panel states that after Christmas it's pretty much just a miserable cold and grey time.
And we are in our .... seventh? bout of it.
We had a hope in February of an early spring when thaw started and tempurtures crawled upwards.
Then we got a cold snap and a bunch of snow.
The same hope, a little more timid yet more yearning happened in March.
Then more snow and another cold snap.
It's now early April and we are in another cold snap with threats of even more snow.
I agree with Lucy from the Peanuts comics if you've seen them. This is BS. lol
So that aside, at least at my desk I can create the wonderful  bright colors of spring, with it's richness and blooms.
At least there is that.
I like to create in themes. So I will grab color schemes and a design element and do a few cards in various designs. Today that's what I have done, using the versatile Secret Garden stamp set from Stampin' Up! (Sadly, retired) and Forget Me Not by Papertrey Ink. I also had some Glimmer paper pack left over from last year's Sale A Bration that I used as accent pieces. The color pallet I chose to go with was Berry Burst from the new Stampin' Up! in Colors (absolutely gorgeous!) Old Olive, Blushing Bride and Sweet Sugarplum. They just work so well together! The first 3 cards also showcase Curly Cute sentiments from Stampin' Up! (unfortunately also retired) and the last one was for Mother's Day and features the Family Ties Stamp set from Papertrey Ink.
I've been inspired by bursts of flowers, like in a floral spray. My mom has one over a large portrait in her home and it's gorgeous. Then of course, now you can make your own or buy them at Michaels. Mom got hers before it was cool lol.

And the whole floral spray works so wonderfully. I see others inspired by the idea and using it all over Pinterest, so it was only a matter of time before I hoped on that bandwagon. And I must say that I love the results. You can either mask off where you are going to put your sentiment, or just cover it with a layered sentiment piece.

Another favorite thing of mine to do is create my own background paper. Put a piece of Whisper White in front of me and a versatile stamp set (usually flowers lol) and I can bust out a piece of custom patterened paper that works with my creation. I forget what the technique is called, but instead of inking your stamp in the traditional way, you smear it across the inkpad and stamp it that way. The result is a less clean, more artist, water color effect.

 I also really love the Gorgeous Grunge set from Stampin' Up! The splatters behind some 3D floral elements add even more dimension to the card to create the spray effect more vividly.

 Lastly this card is the outside of the Mother's Day card I created for a friend of mine. I really loved the color scheme of the previous cards so I recycled it a few weeks later to create the card. I used the Papertrey Ink sets: Family Ties and Forget Me Not for the background and sentiment, then created the lovely little blooms with my trusty Tim Holtz Tattered Florals Die.

Despite the snow and frost and cold and wind outside, I was able to bring lucious colors of spring across my desk once again.
Sad part is when Spring and Summer finally DO get here, I'll be digging out the snowflakes and wintery blue colors for the upcoming Christmas shows. Got to get started early doncha know!

Thanks for stopping by!
~Brandie~

Easter Blooms

Happy Easter Everyone!
What a beautiful and wonderful holiday :) Unfortunately for being in Northern Alberta, the weather isn't cooperating all that well. Winter hit back with a vengence and we've had another dump of snow (yes, snow) and temps dipping into -20 degrees celcius.

I am officially over it.

Thankfully the sun is peeking out and will melt all the snow with it. I am eager to see the spring blooms and colors and bright grass. I don't have much of a green thumb so I don't have a garden myself, I have tried my hand at it and it turns out I kill everything planted.
I think I'll create flowers that last out of paper. Less likely to over or under water them that way lol.
Despite the dismal snow covered ground outside, inside is full of bright spring colors and blooms. I wanted to do something special for my kiddos for Easter so I created flower pot favors with my famous homemade candies.
You can buy terra cotta planters from the dollar store for cheap. Mine were $2 CND for a pack of 2 that were about 3 inches in diameter. So not huge but perfect for creating what I wanted. They have smaller pots as well so you're not stuck with the size if you wanted to do something smaller and simpler. I painted them with acrylic paints and to do the sponging technique, I seriously used a bunched up piece of paper towel. Topped it off with ribbons and a paper flower(s).
The 'lids' are simpley paper. I got the Spellbinders layering circles sets and the largest of the scalloped circle was large enough to cover the top of the pot. My color scheme was Bermuda Bay and Soft Sky for the one and Powder Pink and Sweet Sugarplum for the other. The paint and ribbons I used correspond nicely. The flowers are from Tim Holtz Tattered Florals, where I used my stylus to form the paper and my copics to color blend them out. Finishing the center off with a simple pearl embellisment.
Back to the lids, the images are courtesy of Whimsy Stamps. "Bonnie" is the sweet bunny in the basket on the teal set. "Springtime" is the lovely bunny hanging from the tree branch. These are the artwork from Sylvia Zet with Wee Stamps (Whimsy Stamps). I adore her work and trust me when I say, you WILL be seeing more of her art featured on my page!

For those who were interested, the candies were molded into egg shaped thanks to a lovely silicone mold from Wilton and I wound up making: cream eggs, fudge, caramel and cookie dough truffle eggs for the kids.
For the record- they were a big hit :) As they get older it's really nice to do more than just the go-to candy basket. They appreciate the work that goes into the handmade and though they still get their Easter bunny and egg hunt- they were really stoked for something special from mom.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you all have a wonderful Easter holiday and were inspired by my little post.

~Brandie~