Buds & Branches Tutorial

Wendy's PCP sketch and her sample with those beautiful punched leaves up the sides like a vine really inspired me to try it with my "A Year of Flowers", but I didn't have a punch like hers, so I had to work with what I have. You all know I HEART my Leafy Branch Cuttlebug Folder, so I decided I should try a little trimming. Is that gorgeous, or what?? (I am NOT taking credit for how pretty that branch is BTW! LOL!!)
It may look like some very tedious cutting, but it wasn't! Imagine if this was a line art image: you would really see every little place that I didn't cut exactly up to the line. But here with embossing on this colored cardstock, I could cut near it, on the edge, or even inside and it looks just fine, so this is a very forgiving process, I cut the whole branch in about 2 minutes. Next I snipped it into three different pieces so I could layer them onto my card in the places I needed. (It actually looked really nice as just one piece but a lot of it was covered by my quote that way, so I decided to separate a few leaves to spread it out a bit more.)

My rose is colored with Peerless watercolors and popped up on dimensionals. As I made this card I was also thinking of another quote in my "Say it with Flowers": "There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom". I don't have any rosebuds in my "Year of Flowers" set, but I realized I could make some for this vine to go with my full blown image.

I embossed my Leafy Branch again on white CS and then went over a few of the larger leaves with the Peerless Watercolors to match my orange yellow rose, then trimmed. TIP: Instead of drawing an outline, I held the chisel tip of my black Copic against the edge of trimmed bud and pulled to make a perfect outline (This is what I did on my yellow layers and greeting too, faster and easier than adding a skinny layer of black CS and doesn't add bulk to my card. Again, just pull the marker around the edge of each side. Really makes your layers pop!)

Last I adhered them on top of each of the green embossed leaves. Oooh, I just LOVE how this turned out. Tip: Extend leaves and flowers beyond the edges of your card, they will look truly alive! (a ramblin' rose...) :)

PS That vertical layer in the sketch had me kind of perplexed as to what to do, so I decided to keep it tone on tone and emboss the branches a third time, this time on a piece of Summer Sun. I like the texture it adds and repetition of the pattern it reinforces (and that is doesn't detract attention from the leaves) So...Have you played the sketch challenge yet?? ;) Don't forget, Monday is the last day to upload a project for the Mixology challenge, you could win a free set of stamps, so go stamp something!!