Hi friends. I know that the events happening in Ukraine are weighing on people’s minds. New horrors emerge in the news daily. As a momma of four, the atrocities affecting the children are weighing on my heart so heavily, as I’m sure they are weighing on many people’s hearts. Seeing daily reports of children’s hospitals and maternity hospitals being bombed, evacuation corridors being shelled, and the other countless horrific reports make me yearn to offer those poor babies solace and safety. I have been trying to figure out how I can help them, and I have donated money and formula and diapers, but helping these innocent people seems like such an impossible feat. To that end, I am very happy to announce that I have designed and painted my very first washi tape set for Pinkfresh Studio, the Sunflowers Suite, and Pinkfresh Studio is donating 100% of the profits from the sale of these pieces to the Save the Children organization.
The powers-that-be at Pinkfresh had already planned to release these products during our March release, but decided that in light of the fact that Ukraine’s national flower is the sunflower, they would release the set early and donate the profits from the entire month of March. (Wow, right?) The product suite was released Monday, but I was quite ill over the weekend, and just had the opportunity to do some work with them yesterday. I have four projects to share with you today, so let’s get started with the details!
These first projects use the Sunflowers Washi Tape. These washi tapes are especially exciting for me to see in the final product, as it’s the first time that any of my paintings or coloring have been printed in any form. The tape comes on a large roll 4 inches wide by 10 meters long, and coordinates with a matching die to make a seemingly endless supply of floral embellishments. Both of my cards today have been created with Sunflowers washi tape that has been adhered to vellum, the translucence of which I think lends an airiness to the overall feel of the projects. I simply adhered a section of the washi tape to some heavyweight vellum, then used the coordinating die to cut the pieces for some incredibly quick embellishments.
My first project uses a soft watercolored background to allow the sunflowers to be the focal point. I taped down a panel of watercolor paper to my watercolor board, then added a very subtle pastel rainbow wash at a diagonal across the front of the card. Once it had dried, I trimmed the Sunflowers Washi Tape die cuts and adhered them to the corner of the rainbow background, adding them with both clear foam tape and liquid adhesive.
I matted one corner of the watercolor sunflower panel with some matte gold foil cardstock to help enhance the gold foil accents on the washi tape, then butted both pieces into the corner of an A2 card base. I added a greeting from Incredibly Grateful, gold embossed on a square of white cardstock. I popped it up with some foam tape, then added a few gold pearls for one more accent of shiny gold.
The second project again features the Sunflowers Washi Tape and matching die. To conjure the image of a sunburst or sunshine, I die cut the Radiating Background 2 die from some white cardstock and layered it on a full A2 card base using foam adhesive.
I arranged the larger sunflower wreath image and some of the individual pieces of foliage around the opening in the center, popping some up with foam adhesive and adhering some with liquid adhesive. I added a greeting from Always Uplifting, heat embossed in gold on a strip of heavyweight vellum. A few more metallic gold pearls completed the card and added a touch of shine.
My next set features some watercoloring using the Sunflowers Stamps. The stamps include a variety of smaller bouquets, individual foliage, some sprigs of berries, and a larger wreath-just like the washi tape, except that with the stamps, you can use your choice of coloring medium to color them or “color” with the layering stencils! I chose to stamp them on some watercolor paper using no-line coloring ink, then used my Holbein watercolors to add lots of vibrant yellow, jade green, and sky blue. I die cut them with the coordinating dies, which are the same dies that are used for the washi tape. The entire suite coordinates, which I think is just splendid and makes the products incredibly versatile!
For my first project, I layered the watercolored images on top of a circular frame die cut from white cardstock, arranged to create a swag. I adhered them to a panel that I’d created using some silver holographic foil and the Arch Backdrop Hot Foil Plate.
I trimmed the hot foiled panel down slightly to mat it on a coordinating blue cardstock base. I white embossed a sentiment from the Sunflowers Stamps on a smaller strip of that same cornflower blue cardstock, which I matted with some holographic silver foil cardstock. I added it to the card front with some more foam tape, then added a few shiny silver pearls for even more shine.
My last card allows the large sunflower wreath to be the focal point of the card. I die cut an Ornate Oval Frame die from some iridescent white glitter cardstock, then die cut another from some navy blue cardstock. I ran the center oval through my die cut machine using the Tulip Love cover plate die to add a little texture and interest to that piece, which I then layered back inside the white glitter die cut. I adhered it to a coordinating navy blue A2 card base with foam tape. The pattern in the center is super subtle with that very dark blue cardstock, but it adds just enough texture to the background to add a touch of visual interest!
For the greeting, I used the Phrase Builder: Hello dies and Simply Sentiments: Hello stamps to die cut and heat emboss an uplifting greeting. I layered all of the die cut pieces on top of the sparkling die cut frame using another layer of foam tape, creating tons of heigh and dimension on this project. The final touch was to add some sparkling jewels for a bit of sparkle.
Well, that’s all for these projects. I hope that you will consider purchasing one (or all!) of the elements from the Sunflowers Suite from Pinkfresh Studio. It’s a great way to make your crafty dollars go farther and help those children whose lives have been upended by this horrifying war. I am honored to be a very small part of these donations to help the Ukrainian children. When Kinnari and I were brainstorming product ideas, we could not ever have planned that something like this would happen, but I am so honored and so grateful to work with such a wonderful company. As of yesterday afternoon, the crafty community has purchased enough of these sets to donate $18,000 to the Save the Children organization, and I am just astonished and speechless at the generosity of our community.
Thank you so much for reading, and have a wonderful day.
Such beautiful cards! I really love your first design!