I wanted to do quite a bright and cheerful card today, and didn’t want to get messy – for a change! The inspiration from this card came from The Colour Throwdown with the challenge to use the colours light yellow, blue, and green. I started thinking about water-colouring and a scenic card, but then also thought that I could use blue for the sky, and take the opportunity to use my Stampin Up ‘ Up and away’ thinlits dies. I have had them for a while, but not used them yet.

I took a 7 inch square white base card, and used my Sue Wilson ‘Ornate Pierced Squares’ to cut a layer slightly smaller. I then hunted through my embossing folders, as I thought I had one which had clouds on it. If I have – it is safely filed away somewhere – I couldn’t find it. So, I then took my Crafters Companion Textures Elements ‘Rain’ embossing folder, and ran the blue card through my Big Shot Pro.

I love the Big Shot Pro, as I can use all my A4 folders, my 12 inch square card/paper, and basically haven’t found any size of die out there on the market I can’t cut with it. I do, however, feel it is not so good when cutting smaller intricate dies – that’s what I have my Big Shot express for!

After embossing the blue card, I then took my ‘Up and Away’ thinlits and cut the intricate hot air balloon twice, then cut the different layers in green and yellow, and then used all those layers and stuck them behind with some detail glue. I then took the cloud shapes in the same die set, and cut several out of white card, and cut a smaller hot air balloon out of white card for my sentiment. The sentiment is from a set from Card-io called ‘Up, Up and Away’.

Card-io do a huge – and I mean huge – variety of smaller stamps ideal for creating your own background, for creating scenes by using each small stamp and building-up the project. They have tiny bugs, larger bugs, clouds, sentiments, trees, bushes, birds, alphabets…..the list is almost endless. Their web site has a lot of inspiration, ideas, and hints and tips. A great range of stamps…….mmmm….now I have found mine again I may have to have a go for another challenge!

Anyway, back to the card itself. The clouds were glued directly onto the blue card, but my balloons were attached with Stampin Up dimensionals.

This card actually didn’t take me very long. The longest time was spent deciding where I wanted everything to go, and which tone of blue and green worked well together. Compared to my last few cards I think this is quite a simple and clean card. I may have to do some more to take for the charity to sell.

I will also be entering this card into the Aud Sentiments Challenge, and 4 Crafty Chicks Challenge.