Autumn Blessings

The current challenge at Send a Smile 4 Kids' blog is "Cute Fall/Halloween Card 4 Kids." I got the apple tree image from Ladybug Crafts Ink on a CD included in a card making magazine, and couldn't wait to use it. I felt it paired perfectly with the greeting from this set from Doodle Pantry.

I have also wanted to do a card based on Operation Write Home's Sketch #223 since they first posted it this past May:

 I never had a focal image stamp large enough, so having this digital image that I could make the perfect size was a huge help!

I began by sizing & printing my image onto a piece of watercolor paper, and the greeting on white cardstock. I originally intended to color the tree with Inktense pencils & water, but thought better of it when I saw how small the leaves & apples were. So I colored them with colored pencils instead, using Gamsol on a paper stump to blend the colors on the apples & tree trunk. (Since the leaves were so tiny, I just used 2 colors of green pencil and a little bit of rough shading.) When I finished the coloring, I used watercolors to lay down a gradated blue wash for the sky, and green for the grass. Because the grass line didn't go all the way to the edges of the panel, I used a fine-tip black pen to add the "missing" sections.

While the focal panel dried, I cut the mats from orange-red cardstock, which I felt was a good color to play off the apples. I also die cut a piece of burlap patterned paper from The Paper Studio with the A2-size die from Avery Elle's "Custom Panels" set for the background. After rounding the corners of the mats & greeting panel with my 1/8" Corner Chomper, I adhered the greeting panel to its mat. I felt it needed something more, so I added a red eyelet at each corner. It still looked unfinished, so I got some "True Hemp" twine from Hemptique, threaded a length through the eyelets on each end, and taped the ends to the back of the panel.

When the focal panel was dry, I rounded the corners and adhered it to the mat. I adhered the burlap paper to an A2 card base, and rounded all 4 corners with my Corner Chomper. Finally, I added foam adhesive squares to the backs of both panels and adhered them to the card front.