floral birthdays

several ladies from our luv2stamp group are having lunch today to celebrate 4 birthdays. unfortunately, I have to work, but I wanted to recognize everyone's great achievement (I mean really, consider the option) in making it through another year, and wanted to do something special. I wandered upon this amazing blog, www.valitasfreshfolds.blogspot.com, and had to try several of the flowers that she has video's on. she does amazing work, and explains things really well, so even I can make them! the fuchsia was a little time consuming, but was pretty straight forward. I made several at one time. the large heart punch was used for the leaves, and the 5 petal flower punch was used for most of the fuchsia, along with the large scallop circle (for the center). valita has some amazing tips for doing the stamen, you should definitely check out her video's. the rose was made with the owl punch - the hardest part was cutting off his legs! once again, the video was very helpful in putting the whole thing together. I added some ribbon roses that I colored with reinkers and an aqua painter. I hope they'll like their cards. thankfully, they'll be hand delivered today, since they'd never make it through the mail. tomorrow I'll show you the other 2. I used the hostess pack of 6x6 in color dsp prints to make the top notes, and you can get one whole and more than half of another out of each piece, so I cut several of the pear pizazz and mixed the prints for a fun background. hope you enjoy! now go visit that other blog, you'll see what I mean!