Asian Spring

I covered two challenges in one today.  The Splitcoaststampers Free for All Friday theme was Asian, which gave me a chance to break out some of my oldest stamps.  When I first started playing with stamps, Asian themes were huge, I think at least partly because it allowed you to use things like oragami paper and mizuhiki cord as embellishments before there was such an abundance of choices in background papers and doodads.  But my Asian stamps have been languishing for quite a while, so I was happy for this theme.

I also wanted to make a card for this week's Sketch Challenge, which featured this sketch:

I turned the sketch on its side and came up with this:

The background paper is from Prima.  I cut out a piece of that and attached it to an ivory pre-made card.  I cut three strips of the dark green paper, which is the reverse side of the cherry blossom paper.  I stamped the sentiment ("Arigato", Japanese for "Thanks") on one strip and attached all three.  Then I stamped the geisha image (Stamp Happy) on a scrap of green paper and punched it out with a circle punch.  To add a little more contrast I backed it on a circle of pink paper, and then used foam tape to pop it up off the card.

I also made another quick springtime card, or one that could be a Mother's Day card.  Still trying to use up that lovely piece of Crate Paper background paper that I used on my Easter cards.

Both the background and the purple piece of paper are from Crate Paper (actually both sides from a 2-sided piece).  I used tape runner to attach the bottom layer to a white card.  Then I stamped the stem (Inque Boutique) on the purple scrap and added buttons (Making Memories) as flowers.  I layered the purple piece onto a yellow-green scrap and attached it to the card, and finished off with a strip of purple rickrack.

Thanks for looking, have a great weekend!