Simply Sketched - a Hostess Gift set

Well after the battle of bedtime on Saturday night, my youngest was up at 5 am Sunday morning! That obviously meant that so was I! By 8:30 am he was shattered so I put him back to bed - lucky him! He slept for 3 hours and my husband spent the time with our eldest son leaving me free to play.

Ever since I got the hostess set Simply Sketched I have wanted to make a notecard gift set to use as the Hostess gift at a party. This set can only be purchased with Hostess Rewards.  I have also wanted to try watercolouring with the poppy in the set. I love poppies and I especially love watercolour paintings of poppies.  I started off by stamping onto watercolour paper using black stazon ink and colouring the flower in with the aqua painters and some ink from the reinkers but I didn't like the results. 

Not giving up though I decided to try out the Stampin' Write Markers. I coloured the real red and old olive ones directly onto the stamp before spritzing the stamp with water. I then stamped the image onto whisper white card stock. 

The first couple of tries I used a bit too much water but I have used the images anyway as I really like them.

I also used the Gorgeous Grunge stamp set and honeycomb embossing folder for the background. The sentiment is also from a hostess set, Express Yourself.

I used Pear Pizazz as the background as a contrast to the Old Olive layer. I also only embossed a small section of the card by using a strip of cardboard placed over the outside of the embossing folder. I ran it through the bigshot on the multipurpose platform with all tabs closed, but only using one cutting plate instead of two.

I finished off the cards by cutting out the flowers and coloured card layers using the new squares framelits and adding some of the new candy dots.

Would you like to receive this set of cards as a Hostess gift? If so and you would like more information about hosting a Stampin' Up! party please feel free to contact me 07788746908 or tracyj.may71@gmail.com

To make these cards you will need the following:

Stamp sets: Simply Sketched and Express Yourself (hostess rewards only), Gorgeous Grunge (Wood) 29,95 € | £21.95 130514, (Clear) 23,95 € | £17.95 130517
Cardstock: Old Olive (Brights)106576 £6.25 | 8,50 €, Real Red (Brights)106578 £6.25 | 8,50 €, Basic Gray (Neutrals)121689 £6.25 | 8,50 €, Smoky Slate (Neutrals)131291 £6.25 | 8,50 € (all A4 x 24 sheets), Whisper White (Neutrals) 106549 £7.50 | 9,75 € (A4 x 40 sheets), Very Vanilla (Neutrals) 106550 £7.50 | 9,75 € (A4 x 40 sheets)
Ink pads:  Old Olive (Brights) 126953 £4.95 | 6,50 €, Real Red (Brights)126949 £4.95 | 6,50 €, Basic Gray (Neutrals)126981 £4.95 | 6,50 €, Smoky Slate (Neutrals)131179 £4.95 | 6,50 €
Stampin' Write Markers:  Old Olive (Brights) 100079 £2.95 | 3,95 €, Real Red (Brights) 100052 £2.95 | 3,95 €
Embellishment: Candy Dots £5.50 | 6,95 € Brights 130931 , Neutrals 130934 (100 pieces, 10 in each colour)
Accessories: Honeycomb embossing folder £7.50 | 9,50 €, Square Framelits 29,95 € | £22.95 130921 8 layering dies

If you would like to order any of the products used or alternative options to hosting a party, please don't hesitate to contact me on 07788746908 or tracyj.may71@gmail.com.