STB #1 : STAMPIN' UP!'S PLEASANT POPPIES BIRTHDAY

The irrepressible Queen of challenge blogs, Lesley Croghan, has created a fabulous new challenge site called Seize The Birthday.  This site is a great starting point for those of us keen to build up a stash of birthday cards.  Lesley has come up with a sketch, that will be current for two weeks, but there's a twist - in the first week, the sketch is to be used to create a feminine birthday card, and in the second week, we can use the same sketch to design a masculine birthday card.  What a great idea!

This sketch was exactly what I needed, to inspire me to get back into creating after having done very little over the Christmas/New Year period.  Here's the sketch:

I inked up, for the first time, my Pleasant Poppies stamp, and paired the stamped image with a couple of panels of Christmas paper!  I always over-purchase Christmas DSP, and don't use it all, so I was really pleased that it worked with the colours on my card.

 Stamps: Pleasant Poppies, Petite Pairs

Card: Natural Composition Specialty Designer Series Paper, Watercolour Paper, Cherry Cobbler, Very Vanilla

DSP:  Snow Festival and Be of Good Cheer Designer Series Papers

Ink: Crumb Cake, Early Espresso, Cherry Cobbler and Real Red stampin' pads, Basic Black craft stampin' pad, Old Olive marker

Other: Clear embossing powder, blender pens, Labels Collection framelits die, Large Oval punch, Beautiful Wings embosslits, sponge daubers, Victoria Crochet trim, Very Vanilla 1/8" Taffeta ribbon, Linen Thread, Naturals Designer Button, stampin' dimensionals, glue dots

I'm really looking forward to trying a masculine card with this sketch, too - thanks, Lesley, for the inspiration!