Love Grows Here with Kelly

February is the love month, and love is in bloom! It’s Kelly here today sharing a pair of wedding/shower cards using some older favorites. My daughter’s best friend is getting married this spring and so she’ll be attending many events to celebrate both the bride and the couple! I used inspiration from the bridal shower invitation for the colors and theme! This particular shower’s theme is “Love is in Bloom” so one of the cards uses the sentiment that fits that theme the best: Love grows here!

I photographed both cards on top of the invitation so you can see how well the Lovely Silhouettes stamp/die set works to coordinate with the theme! To begin, I die cut all of the pieces twice (you never know where a design will take you, so I always like to have options at my fingertips) and then stamped them using Distress Oxide inks and finger daubers for control. Because these are silhouette stamps, there aren’t different steps to separate the blooms from the foliage, so I chose to do it this way to add more color. Hopefully that makes sense!

Once that was done, I got to work on the backgrounds for each of the two cards. I used the beautiful Elegant Arches stamp that was released at the same time as the Lovely Silhouettes stamp set, so they are a perfect choice to use together! I took that particular release off, so I have tried to use each of the products because they are so beautiful. I chose to used white pigment ink on the darker background and then tone-on-tone ink for the lighter of the two. I love how you can get such starkly different results by changing up the ink color.

I used the A2 Arches dies in two different sizes to create a mat for the focal point. I simply used the lighter color on the darker card and vice versa. I added a touch of Antique Linen ink around the edges of the white arch for some added definition and detail. I layered them together using foam squares and then had fun creating the different bouquets. Because I wanted to use the “grows here” sentiment on the dark card, I chose to stamp it in black on the bottom of the arch and then on the lighter card I stamped the accent sentiment in black on the background.

The lighter card got some black ink splatter for added detail and I left the darker card as is. Both panels are attached to white A2 card bases using liquid glue. I didn’t add any glitter or sequins, so I’m not sure if I’m coming down with something or what! Ha ha! I might go back and give them a spritz of Shimmer Spray if I come to my senses! Ha ha!

Thanks for joining me today!
~Kelly