WWC185 - "Anything Goes"

Yay!  It's the fifth Wednesday of the month and we get to do an "Anything Goes" challenge!  How sweet is that?  And this time I was inspired to make a special fold.

This fun fold stands up beautifully but easily folds flat to fit into a regular envelope.  As you can see, I used quite a few retired products in my creation.  For some inexplicable reason I had never used the Birthday Fiesta bundle before this.  Looking at the adorable Llama and the other images, I can't explain how that happened, but I certainly loved working with it for this card.  Despite the fact that the bundle has retired, I have future plans for it.  Those images just beg to be used again.  The designer paper behind the cacti and Llama is from the gorgeous Share What You Love suite.  I think it's perfect for this scene, don't you?

I had to take a photo of the card from this angle.  It shows the fold so well.  To fold flat, everything just pushes upwards.  I'd have to say that this is one of the easier folds I've done, but it certainly looks involved.

I hope you'll be joining us by linking up your awesome creations before Monday, September 3rd at 5 p.m. Mountain Daylight Time.  To see the wonderful creations by our Watercooler Artists, check out our Watercooler Wednesday Challenge blog.

WWC161 - Helen's "All About Occasions" Challenge

This week's challenge is being hosted by Helen Finlay and it's all about the special Occasions in our lives.  You can see a few listed in the challenge icon, but you can probably think of a bunch more.  Let's face it, special occasions are one of the reasons we create our cards.

Here in Canada it's still quite a while before Mother's Day occurs in May but it was my mother's birthday last week and I've been thinking of her a lot lately.  Making a Mother's Day card just felt totally natural under the circumstances.

I kept this card very simple.  In fact it's a one layer card except that I matted the one layer and then adhered it to a base.  But you know what I mean. After stamping it, I masked the pretty stone wall image from the Hostess set, "Cosy Cottage".  Then I stamped the trees from the retired "In the Meadow" set so that they would appear to be behind the wall.  The sizing of the two sets is perfect.  They appear to be made for each other.

The scene I've created and watercoloured reminds me so much of a pretty garden to which we'd frequently go for a little picnic when I was growing up in Victoria.  After a snack, I'd weave together the little wild daisies so I could wear them like a crown in my hair.  Most of the time both my sister and I wound up wearing the daisy "crowns" which our Mum had made.  For some reason mine seldom held together properly.

While the outside of my card is rather simple, without embellishments or surprises, I had to do something special for the inside.  So I took the Sale-a-bration "Blossoming Basket" set and stamped the basket in the centre of a piece of 8" x 5" Whisper White and then watercoloured it before carefully cutting around much of it using my craft knife.  I left enough attached so that it would "pop out" when the card was opened.

I hope you'll check out the cards created by the other Watercooler Artists at our Watercooler Wednesday Challenge.

I've also entered this card into the CAS March Watercolour Challenge which is all about Gardens.

I've entered this card into the Addicted to Stamps and More Challenge #283 - Holidays.

I've entered this card into the That's Crafty! Challenge - Spring Into Action

And, finally, I've entered this card into the The Crafty Addicts Challenge #46 - All About Mums