Ducky Hugs with New Simon Says Stamp!

This post was sponsored by Simon Says Stamp. Thanks, Simon!

Hi friends! I have been super busy the last couple of weeks getting my mom to various medical appointments and celebrating my little boys’ fifth birthday (my goodness, how time has flown!), but I’ve taken some time to slow down and do some creating with the new Simon Says Stamp Rain or Shine release! The utterly precious little ducky in the new Darling Duckling die set immediately spoke to me; my theme for the baby shower for my older set of twins was based on the book “Make Way for Ducklings,” a favorite of mine as a child and a good representation of my own journey through motherhood with a gaggle of duckling-kiddos trailing behind me! I pulled out some white cardstock, botanical dies, and my OLO markers and got to work creating this sweet card. Let’s get started with the details!

*I have gathered links to all of the products used at the bottom of the post for your convenience, using affiliate links. Thank you for shopping with my links! I truly appreciate your support for my work!*

To begin, I die cut the pieces of the new Darling Duckling, Pretty Poppies, and Windswept Leaves dies from plain white cardstock. I then used vibrant OLO Markers to add lots of vibrant yellow and green to the ducky and foliage, as well as creating some almost-white poppies with a super pale yellow marker and using the Zero marker to soften the edges of the yellow so that they faded into white along the edges of the petals. Customizing solid white die cuts with alcohol markers is one of my favorite ways to make simple die cut shapes super special and bold!

To ground my die cut images, I decided to do some simple stenciling. After placing a white A2 card front on a Simon Says Stamp Craft Tacky Mat, I centered one of the Nested Domed Arches Stencils on the card front, then used blending brushes to lightly blend Pawsitively Saturated Ink in shades of Cadette and Butter at the top and bottom of the arch to insinuate a sunrise towards the bottom and blue sky above. The background doesn’t need to be super involved; the suggestion of colors is enough for your brain to fill in the blanks!

After I had finished creating the background, I used liquid and foam adhesive to adhere the flowers, foliage, and sweet little ducky on the blended area. I tucked the foliage around the flowers and added a bloom and leaves around ducky to complete the visual cascade, finally adding a greeting from Bold Smiles that I’d stamped with Cadette ink over which I added a layer of Iridescent Blue embossing powder, creating a subtle and beautiful shimmer. Finally, I added a few Butter Pawsitively Dazzling Gems for added sparkle!

Well, that’s all for my project today! I love the fresh springtime colors. We’ve had a cold snap after some endlessly rainy weather, but I’m hopeful that we will have warm temps by Easter so that the flowers can bloom and have a nice day outside. Thanks so much for stopping by today, and have a marvelous day!