Time for Tea?

I do love my coffee when I first get up in the morning.  There's nothing like a jolt of caffeine to wash away the cobwebs left in my head and prepare me for the rest of the day.

But I do love tea!  Green Tea and Peppermint are my current teas of choice.  Naturally when "The Tea Shoppe" stamp set was released, it appealed to the tea-lover in me.  For a change, instead of using one of the delightful cup stamps in the set, I decided to use the "white peony" oval stamp.

First I cut a 6" x 12" piece of textured River Rock cardstock with my Fancy Favor Bigz XL die...love the way the score lines are automatically added when you use that die!  Then I used the oval Designer Frame embossing folder in the centre of one of the unscored panels.  Of course I used the pink Sticky Strip to glue the bottoms and sides of the Fancy Favor together...I didn't want the goodies inside to fall out due to failed adhesive.

Then I used the large Oval Punch for Calypso Coral which fit perfectly into the embossed oval frame.  I used the "white peony" stamp with Old Olive ink on Very Vanilla cardstock and cut that out with the "Scalloped Oval" punch and coloured the leaves in with my Lucky Limeade Stampin' Write marker.  Then I used the dimensionals to mount that onto the Calypso Coral.  I went a bit crazy with the flowers, using that wonderful Boho Blossoms punch on two DSPs (Neutrals collection River Rock and In-Color 2011-2013 Calypso Coral) as well as Whisper White cardstock.  For the centres of some flowers, I added a flower punched with the flower shape of the Itty Bitty Shapes punches.  The leaves were punched with my trusty and well-loved Bird Builder punch using Lucky Limeade cardstock and the butterflies were punched with that wonderful embosslit die: Beautiful Wings.

The finished product was filled with teabags and given to one of my dear friends...a total success.

The "How-To's" of Hemp

I've used the Baker's Twine to loop around the centre of a punched out butterfly to give it the illusion of a body and antennae but it's a bit droopy.  I've also been eyeing the Hemp Twine in the catalogue because I thought I could use a sponge and ink on it to make it any colour I wanted and it looked as if it would have more body.  Well, I was right.  It definitely has more body!  Compared to the Baker's Twine, it stands at attention and waits for a command. ;)

I decided to try it on a card just to see what it was like using it.  I wasn't using butterflies but it's not like that's the only way to use twine, after all.  In this case I thought it might make a unique border but it didn't have enough presence.  One strand was simply too thin to make it as a border.  So I cut three strands and proceeded to braid the strands loosely.  The result was exactly the right finishing touch for my card.  I'm going to use the Hemp Twine a lot in the future!

I love the way the braided hemp surrounds the Very Vanilla.  I stamped the VV first with my large Net Stamp using Crumb Cake ink, then I used my large Scallop Circle Punch to cut a medallion of that beautiful Everyday Enchantment DSP (I'll miss it when Sale-a-bration is over) and used my 2 1/2" Circle Punch for the Soft Suede backing.  All in all I'm very happy with the results.