CTMH April Stamp of the Month Blog Hop

If the calendar says April then it really must be spring! Close To My Heart has a sweet spring stamp of the month set for April, called Flower Pot. It reminds me of the window boxes I saw in Europe (hence the inspiration for my card), and I will definitely be using it on some scrapbook pages.

It's also time for another CTMH Stamp of the Month Blog Hop. If you're coming from The Brae-er's amazing blog or just starting to hop, enjoy the creations with this stamp set along the way. If you'd like to read the details about my card, then stay a while; otherwise hop on over to to Alison's blog (after leaving a comment, of course!).

My card began with the Caboodle paper pack and a Colonial White standard side-fold card base. I used the faux wood grain technique on the Crystal Blue square, then drew in the "boards" with a Grey Wool marker. Does the Sweet Leaf bottom portion look like siding or wainscoting? I hope so! I used my scoring blade to score stripes on the card stock.

This card also involved a ton of paper piecing. I stamped the window stamp (which includes the shutters and the window box) in Chocolate ink three times: once on the card, once on Sweet Leaf card stock for the shutters, and once again on Chocolate textured card stock for the window box. I used my craft knife to cut out the window on the card front and scissor cut the rest. For the shutters, I cut out part of the inside of the window and then folded that piece back to give the shutters a bit of dimension. (They are colored just a bit with Sweet Leaf and Chocolate markers.) After cutting out the window box, I colored the top section to give it more dimension too. Assembly was easy: glue on the shutters and attach the window box (after gluing on the flowers) with a 3-D foam square for extra dimension.

To create the flowers, I stamped them in Chocolate on Buttercup card stock. Next I colored the centers of the flowers with a Sorbet marker and the leaves with my Sweet Leaf marker. Can you see how I drew a line down the center of the leaves for extra dimension? A Sorbet brad also added a bit of depth.

The hardest part was creating the curtains. Before assembling the card, I sort of fan-folded or pleated the Sorbet B&T, then glued them on at an agle behind the window opening. They are absolutely my favorite part of the card! Before I adhered the entire window box/Crystal Blue square to my card front, I glued on another square of B&T from the Caboodle collection to look like wallpaper in the room.

Hubby thinks this card needs a cat looking out the window, which would be precious except that I don't have a stamp that's the right size. He didn't agree that I needed a new stamp set either!

If you've read this far, thanks a bunch! Now hop on over to to Alison's blog for more Flower Pot fun.