Whimsy Stamps ~ Lucky To Know You

Hey crafty friends, happy St Patrick's Day! I shared a wee creation on Instagram yesterday that I managed to whip up during the day. Too late for our St Paddy's Day celebrations here in New Zealand, but just in time I think for the US. Although I may have been too late there too! LOL. Though with the magic of 'date setting', this will appear on my blog, on St Patrick's Day! This week has been full on, so I've not had much crafty time, but today, I managed to create a few different designs, so I cannot wait to share those with you. A rare free day that I was able to freely craft, bliss! 

I loved creating this cute card. I sat down just to do a bit of 'me time' colouring and I had this sweet gnome printed from a previous project and had found it when unpacking a bit more stash. I still cannot find half my stuff, it's at the back of a pile of huge boxes yet to be tackled! But I'm happy to have found enough staple pieces that I've had some pretty happy crafty days since our move. Now just to get enthused about actually unpacking the remaining boxes! Hehe.

After I'd coloured this cutie from Dustin Pike's Lucky Gnomes stamp set, I decided he of course needed a rainbow and what better rainbow than the fabulous ones from Faye Wynn-Jones FaDoodles sets at Whimsy Stamps. But first, I added some sparkle details to the mushroom and the gold coins. This sadly does not show up in the photos, but it's lovely in reality. The rainbows in the FaDoodles set have several options and I took it one step further, by colouring 'between the lines' to fill in the missing colours. So I stamped the solid rainbow from the set in three bold rainbow colours, the red, yellow and blue. Then in between filled in the missing colours with Copic Markers. I love how it came together. Althought I'd love to have had a brighter yellow, but I'm limited to the stash I can find currently, so I used Scattered Straw rather than Squeezed Lemonade.

The FaDoodles Rainbow set also has some fabulous sentiment options and the 'Good Luck' was perfect for this cute creation. I needed something else to finish the design though, some clouds and grass! So I masked the rainbow and added the cloudy sky with a handcut stencil and some distress oxide ink in Tumbled Glass, which I like to use as it's a soft blue for skies. For the grass, I realised I needed a 'reverse stencil', which would give me the design of the blades of grass that I could ink from below. I added in some pussy willow, but stamped it in green for a bit of 'tall grass' and then masked off the section just under the last layer of clouds, with the stencil I'd cut from masking tape that I'd created using the blade of grass die from Whimsy Stamps No See All Seasons Tree Die Set. It has a really cute grassy tuft with blades at different heights, so I diecut this repeatedly, but at differing heights until I had a long enough strip to cover the card base. I then just pulled out my Garden Party green ink from Catherine Pooler and dragged it along the stencil, being sure to pull downwards, so I didn't lift the stencil edge. This ink seems to 'level out' colour wise, when it dries. I find it gives good coverage and a really nice finish. I've been very happy with the mini set I bought a while ago. 

This cute gnome was such fun to colour. If you'd like to see a previous creation I made with another gnome from this same Lucky Gnome's stamps set, you can see that here. You can check out the latest release at Whimsy via the banner above. It's been a fun few releases already this year and we're about to have another mini release tomorrow! I really love the way Whimsy have spread their new releases through the month since the Covid outbreak. This was dictated a bit by shipping difficulties, but it gives something to look forward to all month long! Be sure if you haven't already, to grab the gorgeous Sunflower that is free in the Facebook page this month, created by Jennifer Dove. Perfect for those #cardsforukraine creations! A lovely way to show support during this difficult time. For other ways to show support to the people of Ukraine, you can visit Yana's blog for her story and ways to help.

I'll be back with another crafty adventure soon. In the meantime, if you create with this beautiful Sunflower above, be sure to share it with us over on the Whimsy Stamps Facebook page and be sure to add it to our challenge too. We're looking forward to lots of gorgeous entries and there's a fabulous $25 Gift Certificate up for grabs for a lucky random winner. Hugs and happy crafting xoxo