Welsh Birthday Card

This is the last of my samples from September's shows.

It's also my favourite!

When we lived in Brecon I don't really remember hearing a lot of Welsh being spoken but we were on holiday in North Wales last year and it was lovely to hear it. I thought it would be really nice to incorporate it into one of my Welsh cards. The Letter Box kit is great for this - you can write whatever you want.  For my fellow non-Welsh speakers Penblwydd Hapus means Happy Birthday and is pronounced PEN-BLUE-ITH HAP-IS. I did lots of Googling so that should be correct! 

The base is Theuva card. I started off by masking the central panel so that I could work on the frame. I stamped out the text and then triple embossed the tiles so that I could brayer over them. Doing it three times makes sure that the embossing is really smooth. The first layer I did using Versamark on the solid tile in the kit but I used a Versamark pen for the other two.

I then brayered over with Distress Ink and stamped the various Welsh images.

For the central panel I stamped Welsh Castle in the Six Cities of Wales frame and coloured it in with ProMarkers.

The outline of Wales was purchased from the Silhouette Store and cut on my Cameo. I coloured it in like the Welsh flag and added some more of the Welsh stamps.

Stamps Used

Six Cities of Wales

Welsh Castle

Welsh Flag

Remountable Welsh Set

Letter Box Set

Lynne

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Welsh Daffodils Card

This is such a simple card but I was really pleased with how it turned out.

Cymru is stamped in black Archival but as I wanted to colour the daffs with ProMarkers I stamped them in black Adirondack. I drew a wiggly line between them to give the effect of grass.

A thin green mat, cut with my Perfect Layers ruler, and some yellow eyelets finish it off.

Stamps Used

Cymru Framer

Daffodils from the Remountable Welsh Set

As that was such a short post I thought I'd share some photos of Maya. The daffodils have reminded me of the day we first brought her home, back in March 2009. 

The first thing we did was go out in the garden and the daffs were out in bloom.

When we did this with our previous lab she stayed close by us...........

............Maya had no such worries and was soon off exploring on her own. I guess that was the first sign that things were going to be a whole lot different with Maya. Bless her!

Before I go - Always be really careful with dogs and daffodils; the bulbs are poisonous to them if they eat them and it can be fatal. 

Lynne & Maya

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Beautiful Cymru

I'm so pleased that my Welsh samples got such a good reception at the weekend. Wales holds a lot of fond memories for me and I really enjoyed making them.

About 15 years ago we had a two year posting in Brecon. It was there that we got our first dog, a yellow labrador, and Hubby bought me my first pair of walking boots and dragged me out into the Beacons.

It was those memories that inspired this card.

This photo of mine is the background to the card. It's of the Upper Neuadd Reservoir looking over to Pen y Fan (the mountain on the right). It was one of our favourite places to walk from.

I started off by stamping all of the images onto the squares that I'd cut out with a Nestabilities die and giving them a thin black mat with my Perfect Layers ruler. I arranged them around the word Cymru (Wales) and this established how large I needed to print my photo. Cymru is stamped in Versamark and heat embossed with black detail powder so that it stands out well.

Finding the right photo was probably the longest part of making this. I wanted something that shows off the beauty of the area, that wasn't too busy and with most of the interest in the centre. In the end I found this one. It's not one of my better photos of it but it was perfect for this project.

Then it was just a case of assembling it. I used Pinflair glue gel to stick the squares on with as I wanted it to have a bit of dimension. It also gave them some manoeuvrability so that I could get them all nicely lined up.

Stamps Used

Cymru Framer

Remountable Welsh Set

Rugby Player from Remountable Sports Set

Rugby posts drawn by hand.

Whilst I was looking through my photos I also found these that I thought I'd share with you.

Happy Times

At the summit of Pen y Fan

This is me the first time I reached the top of Pen y Fan. I wasn't really in to walking back then and I was so chuffed with myself that I'd got there. It was a bit of a miracle really as Hubby's a foot taller than me and forgets that I'm not one of his soldiers. Breaks and walking slowly are not an option!

Lynne

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