Daisy Congrats Card & Flower Pot Gift

A couple of weeks ago at our Slimming World meeting we celebrated our group's Greatest Loser of the year.  The winner, Emma, has lost over 8 stone and she is such a gorgeous, sweet woman and she has been a wonderful help and inspiration to me.  I just had to make Emma a card to congratulate her on the amazing success she's achieved!

My card is CASEd from this card that Jackie Bolhuis made.  I just loved the way Jackie added colour to the brick wall by stamping the Watercolor Wash stamp over the top of the embossed panel - quick, easy and very effective!  Jackie has a video on her blog post showing how she made her fab card.

After I'd made the card I wanted to try to make a faux flower in a pot.  I got lots of these tiny plant pots last year at the end of the summer when they were reduced in the end of season sale because I thought they'd be perfect to make cute faux flowers in pots.  Naturally, they have sat on a shelf in my craft room, untouched, ever since!  So here is the card, envelope and flower pot all together.

I used Crumb Cake CS for the A6 card base and for the embossed brickwork panel and the mat layer is Cajun Craze CS.  When I was ready to stamp on the brick wall panel I made sure I had the panel with the raised bricks facing up (you don't want to stamp on the raised mortar) and stamped the 'Watercolor Wash' stamp using Cajun Craze ink.  I stamped the daisy layers in Crushed Curry ink onto thick Whisper White CS, added Daffodil Delight ink to the petals and then Crushed Curry ink to the petal tips using sponge daubers.  The flower centres were stamped with Early Espresso ink onto Soft Suede CS and cut out with a 1/2" circle punch.  I hand cut stems and used a leaves stamp from the 'Painted Harvest' set which I cut out with the SU! 'Leaf' punch.  I stamped the leaves onto Pear Pizzazz CS with Old Olive ink and inked the edges with Old Olive ink using a sponge dauber.  I stamped the sentiment in Early Espresso CS, trimmed it to a rectangle shape, inked the edges and popped the panel up.  I completed the card front with a bow made from Linen Thread.

For the inside I used a die from the Concord & 9th 'Select a Size Edge' die set to cut a fancy white panel.  I adhered a piece of Cajun Craze CS at the bottom and added a line drawn with an Old Olive marker.  I stamped sentiments from the SU! 'Sunburst Sayings' set and added three gold star Metallic Enamel Shapes.

A stamped, punched and layered daisy adorns the envelope flap.

Here's the faux flower in a pot.

I used a 'Circle Layering' die to cut out 4 Early Espresso CS circles and I glued those together.  I pierced a hole in the centre and then inserted a bamboo skewer to act as a flower stem.  I cut the skewer to the height I wanted and attached two stacked daisy layers back to back to the skewer using large glue dots.  I used PVA glue to adhere the stamped and punched leaves. I stamped the top circle with a speckle stamp from the SU! 'Gorgeous Grunge' set for the soil.  I placed a few punched circles in the base of the pot, added a blob of Blu Tak, stuck the skewer in the Blu Tak and pushed the stack of Early Espresso CS down the skewer until they rested on top of the pot.  To echo the card front I tied Linen Thread around the pot in a bow and secured it with a mini glue dot.

Here's a side view of the pot.  I saw that the white backs of the daisies were visible from the front when I went to  attach the back to back stacked daisy layers.  I got my sponge daubers out and inked the backs with Daffodil Delight and Crushed Curry inks so that no white was visible - much better!  The flower pot was cobbled together as I went along but at least I'll be prepared for that issue next time!

As well as celebrating the group's biggest loser we also had a food taster session.  I made mini spiced orange cakes  topped with vanilla flavoured quark followed by a drizzle of Orange Spice Choc Shot.  Here's a photo of just three of the baby cakes on one of my pretty china tea plates.

I also made one of my favourite Slimming World friendly recipes, Carrot Cake Baked Oats, but I didn't have time to take a photo.  It comes out like a carrot cake flavoured bread pudding and it is yummy!  I'm happy to report the cakes and the crafty items were very well received!

Supplies:
Stamps: SU! 'Daisy Delight', 'Tin of Cards', 'Painted Harvest', 'Sunburst Sayings' & 'Gorgeous Grunge' sets, 'Watercolor Wash' background stamp
CS: SU! Crumb Cake, Cajun Craze, Pear Pizzazz & Whisper White (thick & regular)
Ink: SU! Cajun Craze, Crushed Curry, Daffodil Delight, Early Espresso & Old Olive
Tools: SU! 'Brick Wall' embossing folder, 'Daisy', 'Leaf' & circle punches, 'Layering Circle' die set, Concord & 9th 'Select a Size Edge' die set, paper piercer, sponge daubers
Embellishments & accessories: SU! Linen Thread, Metallic Enamel Shapes, Dimensionals, glue dots, mini plant pot, bamboo skewer
Ruth