Hydrangea Birthday

Today's card is for the current Simon Says Stamp Challenge, to celebrate Stamptember and use a product from the SSS catalogue.  I used SSS's Delicate Dahlia die and Impression Obsession's Hydrangea die, which I got at their store.

I started by die cutting the hydrangea out of light green and light blue cardstock.  I then used the dahlia die to emboss the upper and bottom corner of my cardstock base.  I glued on the hydrangea stem and the thin bits of the leaves, using pop dots to raise the leaves themselves up.  I glued down the flower backing so there's a nice matching blue behind the flowers.  I removed the fuzz from a Q-tip and used the end to fold the individual flowers around and so I could dab bits of glue on the bases.  I then applied them to the flower base (I die cut 4 batches of flowers, though a 5th wouldn't have been amiss).

I applied a bit of chalk ink to the base of the card to give some colour to the embossed image there and the impression of grass.  I guess pigment ink it's a bit more forgiving than the dye inks I normally sponge with, so I didn't get any smear marks the way I usually do.  I'll have to remember that.  

To finish off the card, I stamped Happy Birthday in a light blue pigment ink.