Of the Earth Cards

I haven't had a chance to blog this week until now -- I had some special projects to finish up for Mother's Day, and then two wonderful events to attend at Timothy's preschool during times when I usually do my stamping "work"  (seems funny to call it work, since I enjoy it so much it seems more like play!)  Anyway, I have a bunch of things I'd like to share . . . to start off, I wanted to share two cards I made for last week's inspiration challenge (Challenge #68) on Late Night Stampers (this is a wonderful group open to Stampin' Up! demonstrators and customers alike . . . lots of beautiful artwork and ideas being shared there!) 

Here's the first card:

The base for this square card is Chocolate Chip card stock.  To create the background image, I repeatedly stamped the flower image from the Of the Earth stamp set (a Hostess Level 1 set from the 2008-2009 Idea Book & Catalog) using Chocolate Chip Classic Ink, rocked into Soft Suede, onto Mellow Moss card stock.  I sponged Soft Suede around the edges of the Mellow Moss piece, then layered that first onto Whisper White and then onto Close to Cocoa cardstock.   I added some Chocolate Chip Taffeta Ribbon.  I stamped the greeting in Chocolate Chip Classic Ink on Whisper White cardstock and punched it out with the Modern Label Punch.  The shadow effect under that was created by layering the white piece on top of a piece of Chocolate Chip card stock that had also been punched out with the Modern Label Punch.

For the second card, I had created a similar background.  I had tried sponging around the flower images and at first had not liked how it looked, so I crumpled it up and set it aside.  I looked at again later, and decided to uncrumple it and try spritzing it with some Vanilla Smooch Spritz.  I also had stamped the bird image from the set in Pumpkin Pie Classic Ink onto Crushed Curry card stock, then spritzed with Gold Glow Smooch Spritz.  I decided to try putting those pieces together.  Here's how the final card came out:

And a close up of the stamped, Smooched bird image (you can see a little bit more of the texture from the crumpling of the background paper on this shot, too):

If it weren't for the challenge, I'm not sure I would have put these colors together, but I like how it turned out.  Would love to hear what you think about these cards, too!

Thanks for stopping by!

- Michelle