Flutterby - Butterfly

My sister Jean is probably the only one who will immediately recognise the title of this post as it relates to some 'fairy' cereals bowls we had as children.

I promised myself that I would make a few more cards that were not for specific birthdays etc this year, to build up a small stock for last minute needs, but sometimes it is hard to get started. So when I found myself with a little time to spare last night, I looked for a challenge to give me inspiration, and sure enough, the new Butterfly Challenge was up. This week they want us to use at least one of each of the three 'B's - butterflies, buttons and bows. So here is what I made.

I have been having a tidy up over the past few weeks and lurking in the back of my embossing folders holder, I found two Cuttlebug cut and emboss folders. Although I really like these, they have been very under-used, so I chose the one with a circular aperture and found a snippet of lime green paper to cut/emboss it. 
I wanted a good contrast and searching through my card I found this piece of bright pink pearl with a matt black reverse, that was just large enough to make an A6 base card with a small strip left over. It is not a card I would choose and I think it came in  a cheap bulk pack. I once had a lady visit me for some basic guidance on using her silhouette machine, and she loved it, so I gave most of it to her, but this used sheet must have been overlooked. I glued the embossed frame onto the card and then used some ribbon to go around it. I often attach ribbon using double sided tape, and it wasn't until I picked the card up later that I realised the tape was wider than the ribbon - doh! -  so I had a sticky edge along each side of it. My eye-sight is not good right now and I hadn't seen this. So I rummaged through my glitter drawer and found a fine pink glitter which I poured over the ribbon and shook it off again, leaving quite a pretty glittery edge along each side. More by luck than judgement, I had actually stuck the ribbon fairly centrally on the tape! I tied a bow and added it to the ribbon with a glue dot. 

I then made one of my 'wet-method' flowers. I hadn't done this for ages. They are a little bit bulky for cards to post Internationally, but fine for local ones, and I do like them. I stamped several flowers from the Everything Eleanor SU set, and cut them with the matching punch. I then did the same with some of the Heartfelt Creations delicate Asters set of stamps and dies, all using the Memento rose bud ink pad. Starting with the smallest, I fed them onto a tiny central brad, spritzing each layer with water, and scrunching it up. When they were all on, I opened the brad to hold them together and gently unfurled the petals. I dried it a bit with my heat-gun, because I am impatient!, and then left it on a pad of kitchen roll to dry completely over night. This morning I glued the now dry flower to the centre of the frame, and added a black button over the tiny brad, for the centre.

With my little strip of left-over pink card, I cut two butterflies with a Martha Stewart punch, reversed them to show the black side, glued them over the rest of the pink card, and cut them out. I glued these to the top of the frame.

I have left a space at the lower edge to add a sentiment when I know what the card is going to be used for.

So now I shall link this up to the Butterfly Challenge 2, and also to Pixie's Snippets Playground.