Hummingbird & Columbine

I usually include a greeting on the front of my cards. I don't know exactly why, except that is typical in commercial greeting cards. I've seen cards through Operation Write Home, though, that have no greeting, so I thought I'd give it a try with this one. It will hopefully make a nice addition to their "Thinking of You" category!

I used OWH's Sketch #192 for my design:

I began by printing this digital image from Fred, She Said onto a piece of 140 lb. watercolor paper. I then colored it with Inktense pencils and a damp brush. To get the colors in the columbine flower correct, I looked up images on Google. I was surprised to find that it comes in several different colors, not just yellow like the one we have. I decided to color mine in the yellow/red combination. I also made my bird a ruby-throated hummingbird.

For the background, I chose 3 patterned papers from my scrap stash. I tacked down the red & yellow gingham paper strips to a piece of green cardstock, using temporary adhesive. I then ran the whole thing through my Grand Calibur machine with the largest of Lawn Fawn's "Large Stitched Rectangle" dies, to get the stitched edge. Then I carefully peeled up my patterned paper strips, applied permanent adhesive to the backs with my ATG gun, and stuck them back down. I also cut the small piece of my third pattern and adhered that in place.

Even though the focal panel is not shown with a mat in the sketch, I felt it was a bit unfinished-looking just to stick it down. But I also didn't want anything too stark. So I adhered my panel to a piece of pale yellow cardstock, and trimmed that to leave a 1/16" mat all around. Then I adhered that in place.

I initially glued a button to the lower left corner of the focal panel, replacing the oval shape in the sketch. But I finally decided, especially for OWH purposes, it was just too bulky. So I CAREFULLY pulled it off, and replaced it with a cardstock "button" I cut with a die from this set. I did thread the "button" with green embroidery floss, which I tied in a bow, before gluing it down. I mounted the completed card front to a white A2 card base, and I was done!

I'm entering my card in Simon Says Stamp's Monday "For the Love of Plants" challenge.