2 Sketches 4 you - Top 30 - Round 2

Good Afternoon Everyone,

As most of you know I have loved playing along with Laura and Kazan at 2 Sketches 4 You and their awesome DT's past and present with their beautiful sketches and their awesome inspiring creations of art and I can't even tell you HOW blown away and completely honored I was to be picked to be in the Top 30 with such amazing paper crafters for the first annual Ultimate Card Showdown in Celebration of their first Blogaversary. Wow - I am still reeling! Thank you so much Kazan, Laura and all the fabulous judges for this honor!

So for round 2 - we have this beautiful sketch to work with - and I had so much fun working on this sketch :)

 I used the sentiment: from Rabindranath Tagore who wrote the national anthem for India and whose visionary works earned him the Nobel Prize in 1913. This sentiment reads: "Faith is the bird that sings when the dawn is still dark." My father used to repeat this quote to me growing up - and I have remembered it during some dark moments in my life - its always taught me to trust, hope and believe.

Here is a close up peek at the stamped sentiment and the cut out bird (the bird is cut out from the designer paper) and I put the little birdie in a nest on paper clip from Spare Parts. 

Here is a closer look at the dimensions of the card. The tree house was stamped and paper pieced, sponged and then "hung" onto the tree with some embroidery thread. The birds are actually on the designer paper (Urban Prairie from Basic Grey) and I cut them out and popped them on dimensionals. The little flowers in the grass are also cut out from one of the papers in the pack, sponged and then popped up on dimensionals.

Here is another close up - facing the front of the card with some of the bling in the tree. I loved popping these flower bling (from my bling stash box) and after putting everything together - I put some liquid pearl (red) on the flowers on the bottom and some Diamond stickles on the little birdies. 

Card Details:

Paper: Basic Grey (Urban Prairie) and the blue/black and white cardstock are from stash

Ink: Stazon Black and Martha Stewart Brown

Stamps: Branching Out stamp set, Branching Out Accessories set and Faith and Hope set from Taylored Expressions

Accessories: Circle cutter from Creative memories, dimensionals, corner rounder, sponger, paper clips from Spare Parts, silver marker, embroidery string, prisma color pencils, ribbon from stash

Technique: Paper piecing (everything from the birds (the birds were images on the paper - that I also cut out and adhered ontop of the same image with dimensionals), the leaves, tree leaves all paper pieced, scalloped grass with corner rounder

This sentiment always brings me hope and deep contentment - and making this card with this sentiment in the back of mind was a really beautiful process :)  I simply loved making this card and feel just completely in awe to be part of this wonderful group of stampers. You can check out the rest of the Top 30 gallery here  - these ladies are simply amazing! I am totally inspired by their creations!

Sending everyone lots of good luck and cheer! Total honor to be with you all!!

Thank you so much for coming over to my little blog :)

Sunny smiles and hugs :)

Sankari