Special Guest - Anika Mercier

 

Hello, Whimsy friends!  Today we welcome the talented Anika Mercier to the Whimsy blog!

Hi Everyone, I'm super excited to be guest designing for Whimsy Stamps during the month of March. I am thrilled and honored to have been asked! I adore Whimsy Stamps - they have awesome stencils and stamps plus some of my very favorite Mermaid stamps come from them. Today's card features one of the most adorable cacti stamp sets out there, Whimsy Stamps' Cute Cacti!

Images

To create this card, I started by stamping all of the images from the Cute Cacti stamp set onto Neenah Solar White, 80 lb, cardstock with Gina K Designs’ Jet Black Amalgam ink and then colored them with Copic markers. After the coloring was complete I fussy cut out the images and then stamped some of the cute faces onto a few of the cacti. My absolute favorite face is the one with the mustache - perfection!

Background

For the focal panel, I wanted to create a sunset, so I ink blended Distress Oxide Festive Berries, Picked Raspberry, Ripe Persimmon, Spiced Marmalade, and Fossilized Amber inks onto a slimline card front. Next, I die cut the focal panel with Whimsy Stamps' Slimline Marquee die - this is one of my favorite slimline dies. After my panel was die cut, I adhered the cutouts directly to the card front. Next, I added acetate to the windows and two layers of double sided tape to the focal panel edges so I could make a shaker card. For the shaker bits I decided to use colors similar to the background so pinks, oranges, and yellows.

Sentiment

I wanted this to be a birthday card, so I stamped that sentiment from Whimsy Stamps' Cute Cacti stamp set directly into the long planter using VersaFine Clair's Nocturne ink. There are several other really cute sentiments in this set too.

Finishing Touches

For finishing touches, I added a layer of black Sakura Gelly Roll pen to the eyes, mustache, and bowtie of the cacti. Lastly, I got a bit overzealous and added several different jewels, drops, and heart shapes onto the card front in coordinating colors with the background. I guess I couldn't help myself with the bling on this card. Thanks for stopping by and spending a little time with me today! Stay safe and warm!

Thank you, Anika, for this adorable inspiration!  To see more of Anika's work, visit her on her blog and Instagram.