Quick and Easy Cherry Blossoms

Hey crafty friend, Amanda here from Pear Blossom Press again. I’ve been waiting months to share these cards with you. These are actually the first two cards I made with i-crafter products, and the beginning of a new obsession for me. When Lynda told me that she was going to launch i-crafter, I was thrilled and so excited for her. When she showed me some of the first products, I was blown away. She sent them home with me that day, and I immediately had to play with them. 

Now you’ve seen me use the Cherry Blossom Bursts and the Zip Gift Tag die sets in the past, but the sentiment on the blue card is from the new Positively Plants stamp set that was just released. At the time Lynda gave me the stamps and dies, the release dates weren’t lined up yet, so these cards had to wait until everything was available, before I could show you. Today is their day to shine (and man, do the flower centers really shine)!

For both cards, I die cut a Cherry Blossom Burst from heavyweight watercolor paper. The die set comes with a large cluster (used on the pink card), a small cluster (used on the blue card), and a few single blossoms. So on each card, there is only one die cut piece; all of the flowers are connected, making it really easy to handle. I placed the clusters on a foam pad and used a large ball tip stylus to curl up the petals and stamens (just rub in a circular motion and they pop right up). I daubed pink watercolor into the centers of the flowers on the large cluster, and yellow into the centers of the small cluster. Adding a little pale green to the stamens was easy since they were already popped up. Then, I came back in and added Liquid Pixie Dust to the centers of all the flowers; it really adds a lot of sparkle.

To create the backgrounds, I grabbed a pair of watercolor panels and added color in a very loose pattern. I wanted to cover enough of the panel so the flowers would have something to pop off of, but still have a lot of white space left around them. On the pink panel, I added a dark red branch. Now if you’re like me, and cannot draw a straight line, don’t let this scare you. There are no straight branches, and most of it gets covered up. So just wiggle your paint brush across the panel, and it’ll be fine. Next, I die cut the word THANKS from the Zip Gift Tag on the pink panel, and stamped a sentiment from Positively Plants on the blue one. 

Assembly was quick and easy. I trimmed and mounted each panel to a card base, using a colorful piece of fun foam for more dimension. I was careful not to add foam under the die cut word on the pink panel. Applying glue only to the the thin outlines of the flower bursts, I adhered the cherry blossoms to the backgrounds. Again, it’s all one piece, so this is super fast and easy. To add a little more texture and finish off the cards, I splattered on some concentrated color, trying to avoid the flower petals as much as possible.

So what do you think? Can you see why I was hooked from day one? I absolutely love the way these cards came out, and I especially love the burst technology Lynda incorporated into the cherry blossoms. It gives you a ton of dimension, with very little effort. Have you had a chance to play with any of the burst dies yet? If you’d like to see a few more cards featuring them, check out this article, and this one. 

Thanks for stopping by today! You can find the sister article to this post on the my blog. Head on over for more inspiration and to the specific products I used! I’ll be back soon with another fun card to share.