UP A TREE

Still not good quality photos. But I am going to keep working on it. 

Which is a shame because this card was ever so much fun to make, and it deserves to be shown off in a more flattering way. Once again, I apologize.

The Woodland Wonder stamp set on page 53 of the new Mini Catalog, begs -- absolutely BEGS -- to be played with. Good thing because it took me an entire afternoon to put this card together. All the cute woodland creatures are on hand to send celebratory wishes to the recipient.

If you look at the card sample on page 53 of the Mini Catalog, you will see an adorable card that the Stampin' Up! artists put together. At first, I was going to reproduce that card -- something I NEVER do. But, then I decided to listen to my very own drummer and go the route I ended up taking.

Tall and slender cards are all in vogue these days. So, I thought I'd extend (ha!) my capabilities and try my hand at one. This card measures 9 1/4" x 4 1/4". It is just a smidge too big to fit inside a standard business size envelope. So, if I were to make a card like this again, I would most likely shrink it down a quarter inch each way. Then it will slide inside a business envelope nicely.

The tree itself is composed of three separate stamps that fit nicely together when stamping. Also, the set is photopolymer, so you can see through them nicely for lining up.

Besides the animals/birds already on the tree, I added the bunny at the bottom, the balloon to the owl's hand, the sign and its pole, the music being sung by the birdie, the three butterflies and the fluffy clouds.

I actually colored the entire card, with the exception of the white background, of course, with my precious Stampin' Blends.

Once I finished the coloring, I added the sentiment at the bottom, popped up with Stampin' Dimensionals. With that little pop of dimension, I realized the piece needed a little more popping up. So, I restamped the birdie in the leafy part of the tree, the balloon and the sign once again. After coloring them (again), I fussy cut them and popped them up over their counterparts with small pieces of Stampin' Dimensionals.

In case any of you are interested in which Stampin Blends I used, here is the (long) list: Light and Dark Pumpkin Pie, Light and Dark Granny Apple Green, Light and Dark Balmy Blue, Light Poppy Parade, Light and Dark Smoky Slate, Light and Dark Cinnamon Cider, Light Cajun Craze, Light Flirty Flamingo, Light Soft Suede, Light and Dark Gray Granite, Light and Dark Crumb Cake, Light Petal Pink, and Light and Dark Mango Melody. Whew.

The cute sentiment, stamped in Balmy Blue (as were the clouds) comes from the Zany Zebras stamp set on page 104 of the Annual Catalog and cut out with one of the dies from the Tasteful Labels, found on page 179 of the Annual Catalog.

The card base is of Balmy Blue cardstock. 

I actually spent a lot of time editing the photos twice. After the second edit, I thought I had improved them drastically. Unfortunately, I guess I was wrong. So disappointing. The fronts of the card should be the same whiteness as the background of the blog. 

Do any of you have this cute Woodland Wonders set? If so, what have you done with it? Did you do a fold-out card as in the Stampin' Up! catalog sample? The animals are truly adorable, don't you agree?

Woodland

Smiles.