This is a sweet thank you card for a very sweet person.

I love stencils and the fact that they are a simple, low-tech craft supply that you can use to great advantage. You can ink up a stencil, apply embossing paste, sprays and even use them as an embossing folder! Also, they are very reasonable priced.

How I made this project:

• I used a floral stencil by Altenew that has layering image options. I placed the main floral image on an A2-sized card front and then started to ink the flower and leaves using a round foam sponge on a round mini ink blending applicator.
• I used Distress Oxide inks because I wanted to create a soft watercolor look. The ink had to be applied carefully since the stencil has delicate details in some parts and I didn’t want to rip or bend the stencil. I used more of a pouncing motion on the stencil to ink up the images with the foam applicator.
• When the image was dry, I lined up the other shadow images over the main image to add shadows to the leaves and flower and inked the images with darker inks. This technique could be called a two-step stencil layering process, like two-step stamp layering.
• I then again let the ink dry because I was going to heat emboss my sentiment and didn’t want the embossing powder to stick onto any of the damp inked images.
• I noticed that after the shadow layer of ink on the flower had dried, the ink dried so that there was no shadow distinction. Therefore, to create more shadow, I reinked the shadow area with a much darker ink (not using a Distress Oxide). When the flower dried, the shadow was now more distinct from the layer underneath.
• I stamped the sentiment using Versamark ink and heat embossed it with gold embossing powder and then trimmed down the card front to 4” x 5.25”. I placed foam tape on the back of the card front and adhered the front to an A2 mat of gold sparkle paper. Then the entire front was adhered to an A2 card base.

Supplies used in creating this project:

• Stamps: Altenew: Folksy Florals stamp set (for the sentiment).
• Stencils: Altenew: Watercolor Bouquet stencil.
• Inks: Distress Oxide Inks: Worn Lipstick, Picked Raspberry (flower); Twisted Citron (stems & leaves), Cracked Pistachio (shadowing of leaves); Catherine Pooler Inks: Party Dress (deepen shadow of flower); Versamark Ink for heat embossing;
• Cardstock: Neenah Solar White 80# for card front; Neenah Solar White 110# for card base; Gold glitter paper for mat behind card front.
• Other: Brutus Monroe embossing powder in Gilded; Ranger round ink blending applicator and Ranger round blending foam.

Hope you like this project. Have a great day!