Hello, Beautiful

Our Daily Bread Designs' current bi-weekly challenge is a sketch challenge. I ended up making 2 cards; this is my first.

As per the challenge rules, I based my card on their sketch:

I began by choosing which ODBD stamp I wanted to use. I decided on the largest and smallest of the "Sweet William Singles" flower stamps. I die cut a piece of cream cardstock with Lawn Fawn's "Stitched Journaling Card" die. I then stamped the larger flower a few times onto that, and filled in with the smallest stamp, using Cherry Red pigment ink from Stampabilities. I cut a piece of burgundy patterned paper from my scrap stash to have an 1/8" mat all around the focal panel, and rounded the corners with my 1/4" Corner Chomper.

For the background, I embossed a piece of green cardstock with one side of the "Garden Lattice" M-Bossabilites folder by Spellbinders. I chose a piece of teal paper with a subtle pattern from my scraps for the mat, and cut the banners and smaller mats from it as well. I found a paper with a small floral pattern on my scrap desk left from another project, and used that for the panel behind the stamped piece.

I used a stamp from Simon Says Stamp's "Summer Garden" set for my greeting. I stamped it in Versafine Onyx Black ink onto another piece of cream cardstock, then matted it with the teal paper. And that finished this card front.

Or so I thought. Apparently, I'd gotten a little glue on my finger, which had gotten tacky. Not realizing this, I touched the greeting panel, and the glue stuck to the cardstock and tore it a little. My heart sank at first, because there was no really good way to redo it, short of starting over on the whole card. But then I thought this would be a good opportunity for embellishing! So I found some sequins by Doodlebug Designs, some rhinestones, and a pink button. I adhered the button & sequins to the panel, adding the rhinestones on top of the sequins to give a more "finished" look. I added rhinestones to a couple of the flower centers as well. The upper corner of the greeting panel looked a little barren, so I colored a tiny clear button with Lettuce alcohol ink, and added that & a couple more sequins and rhinestones. I stitched through the button holes with black embroidery floss, and THAT finished the card front! Finally, I adhered the completed card front to a 4.5x7.25" card base.

I'm also entering this card in Simon Says Stamp's Wednesday "Anything Goes" challenge.