STAMPlorations 5th birthday June event and giveaway

Hello and a very warm welcome to this special post today. It is not my usual Design team post for STAMPlorations (all the challenges are on holiday until the autumn) but it's a super exciting one as 

we are celebrating STAMPlorations 

5th BIRTHDAY 

Many happy returns to the uber talented and most lovely lady Shery, who owns and designs for this fab stamp company.

There are so many amazing giveaways, sales and freebies that you really must check the links. For the whole of June Shery is hosting a 5th birthday event featuring a designer a day. We will share 3 of our favourite projects plus a newbie for visitors to CASE (copy and share everything). If you would like to join in and have a chance of winning a prize just link up your creations using the celebration linky over on the main blog here.  There are also lots of store specials too here . Some really awesome prizes can be won....over $500 dollars worth (this is open internationally). 

So today it is my turn to be featured as the designer of the day. You can see my post over on the blog here. I am sharing my favourite 3 cards I have made since I joined the Stamp and Sketch design team, initially as a guest designer and then a full design team member. I love working with these fab stamps and I struggled to choose my favourite 3 but choose I must. I am very much a "seasonal" card maker ie I tend to make bird cards in spring, seaside cards in summer etc etc as my inspiration is always from Mother Nature.  I have linked them to my original posts so that you can check out how I made them if you are interested.

They are in no particular order...so here we go.

Number 1

 from my original post here The trendy bird set is one of my all time favourites and I use it lots in my card making. 

 Number 2

I had great fun using an old map to showcase Shery's fab wanderlust stamps. This is the link here

Number 3

Those of you who know me well know that I adore everything about Christmas so I had to feature one of my Christmas makes and this one is my favourite. The original post is here

So what about my new card today? In my recent stash from Shery I received a fabulous summer stamp set which I have coveted for some time called

True North

The images are perfect for summer card making as are the fab sentiments which come with it. I have recently returned from a wonderful holiday in Majorca, a week by the sea. It was bliss.

This is what I got up to for my new card. 

There is no sketch or theme for the challenge but I decided to look through the STAMPlorations archives and find myself an old sketch to work with. I found this one from June 2017 

which I really liked working with. I actually find sketches are a brilliant starting point for inspiration. 

I got out my yupo paper and alcohol inks as they make the most unique of backgrounds.

I pounced on the inks, using blues and green to create the sea with seaweed.

I stamped the lighthouse onto a scrap of inky mop up watercolour paper

which I fussy cut out and added some more colour to

using watercolour pens.

I then stamped out a mask of the compass and added black and grey compasses across the page, using the mask to give some depth to my stamping. 

and added one of the sentiments.

To finish off I popped my lighthouse up on a foam fixer to give some depth to my card. I matted with navy blue card and used a Kraft card base.

So here is a photo of my finished card.

With a close up of the lighthouse and compass stamping

(I am giving this as an anniversary card to my darling Hb on 25th July when we celebrate our 37th wedding anniversary...he really is my true North!)

So if you would like to CASE my card just link up to the birthday linky here.  If (like me) you are not 100% sure what CASEing a card is there is a fab link  here  which Shery gave me and has kindly allowed me to share. It explains it perfectly, in my humble opinion. The best part of the explanation is to have a look at my card, look away and then ask yourself....what do you remember most......the colours, the lighthouse, the compass, the seaside feel, the arrangement of my elements etc. Just share what has inspired you, I would really love to see what you make!

Thanks so much for stopping by today, Happy 5th Birthday again to STAMPLorations, such awesome stamps which I have the absolute pleasure to design with as part of the Stamp and Sketch design team. Remember to check out all the prizes and giveaways over on the main blog. There are even prizes for just commenting on mine or any of the other designers blogs who are taking part, so do leave one here and good luck!

Also, outside of any other offers you can use my special code STAMPGIRLJANE at the checkout to get a 20% discount.

Congratulations to Shery and thank you for having me as a part of your talented design team.

Back soon, 

Bye for now,

Jane x