Altenew Build-A-Flower: Snapdragon Release Blog Hop + Giveaway

I am so excited to be joining Altenew as a Guest Designer today for the Build-A-Flower Snapdragon Release Hop!  You should have arrived here from Seeka's Blog.  Here is a list of all the stops along the hop for your convenience.  If you didn't start at the beginning, you can go back to the Altenew Card Blog for the start of the hop.

Altenew Card Blog

Svitlana Shayevich

Lilith Eeckels

Anna Komenda

Lydia Evans

Agnieszka Malyszek

Virginia Lu

Altenew Scrapbook Blog

Maryam Perez

Ashlea Cornell

Nathalie DeSousa

Laura Volpes

Soraya Maes

Joni Andaya

Zsoka Marko

Seeka

» Vicki Finger « 

TaeEun Yoo

Jess Francisco

Patricia Roebuck

Ilina Crouse

Teri Wilson

Build-A-Flower Snapdragon Layering Guide

I had so much fun playing with this set!  I have a lot for you to see today and lots to talk about so let's get started.  This is a fabulous layering stamp set and as always, a layering guide and sample cards with color suggestions are provided for you.  

I must confess, as soon as I saw the graphic for the set, I knew I wanted to try a few variations of it, to include one that is not a Snapdragon at all, but a Texas Bluebonnet, which is the Texas State Flower.  I have a group of friends that I used to gather with a few times a year for a scrapbooking retreat.  One particular retreat happened when the Bluebonnets were just beginning to come into full bloom.  

Most of you probably don't realize that I worked as a professional photographer back in 2005.  The physical demands of that became too much for me after I was diagnosed with a few Autoimmune Diseases.  I captured this bluebonnet image while we were all taking pictures with our friends in the bluebonnet field near our hotel.  Most of the ladies who were present at that retreat purchased this image in a large size from me and I had them printed on Metallic Paper which is a specialty photographic paper.  Even back then, I was all about the shimmer and shine.  I actually had a large print of this image in my home for a while but I think I gave it away during our last move.  

This was the first card I made with the new Snapdragon BAF, and it was made with love in honor of those friends and memories of great times together.  The leaves are a little bit different than on a Bluebonnet, but it's close enough that those ladies will know what it is.  

For this image, I use two of the leaf frame die cuts in White and rotated one of them 180° to really get a full looking frame.  I stamped the blooms in Arctic, Ultramarine, and Azurite.  The leaves were stamped in Just Green and Hunter Green.  The sentiment is also from the BAF Snapdragon.  This made a pretty great bluebonnet card. 

© Getty Images

Next, I went with some more fun colors for traditional Snapdragons.  My next card used Frosty Pink, Coral Berry, and Ruby Red while the stems and leaves were stamped in Forest Glades and Evergreen.  I used some soft green background paper and a strip of more dramatic green foiled cardstock for a strip along the left-hand side.  I used a sentiment from the Beautiful Heart Stamp Set for this card.

For my next color combination, I stamped in Rose Quartz, Baby Pink, and Fuschia with the stems and leaves done in Forest Glades and Evergreen.  I wanted something a little more fun than my usual style, so I used Black Cardstock for the background panel with some Pink Plaid and Black and White Gingham for the background layers.

The "thanks" stamp was an Altenew freebie that I stamped in Versafine Black Onyx and heat embossed with Clear Embossing Powder on a little tag that was on my desk.  I used a black brad to secure it to the panel before adhering to a white card base.

Last, but not least, I wanted to use some specialty cardstock that I had in a color called Misty Rose Shimmer which is a mauve color.  Now, Altenew does not have inks in that color family so with a bit of experimentation, I was able to come up with a way to make my own.  For the first layer, I stamped Soft Lilac first and then went over that with Rose Quartz.  The two colors combined to give me the Mauve that I was looking for.  For the 2nd layer, I stamped first in Lavender Fields and then in Baby Pink while the 3rd layer was done in Lavender Fields with a gentle inking of Grapevine.

I die cut the frame from Sweet Friend Stamp and Die Bundle using gold foiled cardstock and then heat embossed the frame stamp onto the die cut.  It gives it a tone on tone gold look.  I also die cut the center of the frame from the same Misty Rose Cardstock and heat embossed the XOXO from the Sweet Friend Stamp Set.  Arranging the blooms to kind of circle the frame, I tied a little pink bow at the left center side and added the die cut butterfly.

I got pretty experimental with the color layering of two different color families to produce a color that isn't out there yet and I will be having a follow-up post here on my blog for that very soon.  It was pretty interesting how many other colors could be achieved using this method.

• Build-A-Flower: Snapdragon & Ink Bundle https://altenew.com/products/build-a-flower-snapdragon-ink-bundle (5% discount).

• Build-A-Flower Monthly Subscription Plan (optional) https://altenew.com/products/build-a-flower-monthly-subscription  

This is a monthly subscription plan for our Build-A-Flower set. When signed up, you are guaranteed a spot in our monthly BAF releases and will receive a set each month - at a specially discounted price! ($35.00 →$29.99)

Prizes:
To celebrate this release, Altenew is giving away a $30 gift certificate to 6 lucky winners! Please leave a comment on the Altenew Card Blog and/or Altenew Scrapbook Blog for a chance to win.

Altenew will also draw a winner to receive a $15 gift certificate from the comments left on each designer’s blog on the blog hop list below. All winners will be announced on the Altenew blogs on 5/10/2019.

The next stop along the hop is the fabulously talented TaeEun Yoo.  If you aren't familiar with her work, you should be.  She is incredibly talented!  Thanks for stopping by today.  I really appreciate your visit and when you take the time to leave me a comment.