Meaningful cards with a super cute twist - Giraffilious Collection from JMC Designs

I'm a wee bit of a sentiment geek & think I own more sentiment stamps than anything else! In fact sentiments/phrases in stamp sets can alone be the reason why I buy the stamps & not the images ... ! However the Giraffalicious Collection for JMC Designs actually was a marriage of the two: fab sentiments & gorgeous images too.

Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims

The giraffe images are so whimsical & cute, that they are very hard to resist.

Reach for your dreams

Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims
The sentiment here was my inspiration for the card as it is really meaningful without being to preachy - does that make sense?


Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims
Using the Giraffe Spots & Build A Branch stencils, (both from JMC Designs) with a few distress inks, I created my background. Love how the Giraffe Spots create a funky, stylised sky.

Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims
I then stamped out Gabriella Giraffe, plus lots of accesories from the same stamp set,  & coloured them with Copic markers. I've layered all the stamped images on to a die cut frame.

Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims

As a finishing touch, I added white gel pen highlights & also stamped the "Reach for your dreams" sentiment in to one of the clouds. Gotta say quite impressed with myself that I actually held back on the "faffing" part and let all the images speak for themselves.

Don't be afraid to stick your neck out

Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims
Recently this sentiment has come to mean so much to me but that's a story for another day ...! I just think the expression on Gwendoline works beautifully with the sentiment as her expression is one of encouragement.

Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims
Again I've stamped out all the images from the stamp set, coloured with alcohol pens and then layered them up on my stencilled background - same stencils as for my 1st card.

Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims

This time I've used the stencils with brighter distress inks to give the illusion of Gwendoline surrounded by tropical flowers.
Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims

I've also made the sentiment a feature because to me, it's a phrase I think needs to have pride of place. It also resonates with me at the moment too.

I'm too fabulous to fit in

Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims

Now this card is a little bit different to the other too as I decided to make it an aperture card using a selection of papers from Blooming Bright. I've chosen a heart shape as I thought it worked brilliantly with the sentiment. Did say the sentiments were "my crafty crushes" 😂

Giraffalicious Collection form JMC Designs - cards by Lou Sims

Using the heart shape I cut away to create my aperture, I added the ubber cute Gloria Giraffe & have surrounded her with stamped flowers. Again, everything has been coloured with alcohol markers.

  

In the photos above, I'm trying to show (!) how the aperture works. I've matted the cut out papers & card to the inside to be the decoration. A few more stamped & coloured flowers were added as finishing touches plus a white pen dot or two.


I had a blast dusting off my alcohol markers and colouring up these fun images but also realise I am very slow colouring with alcohol pens compared to water colours. Definitely need to practice more! Water colours/watercolour pens are just so much quicker or is it because I colour with them more?

I've linked all products at the bottom of this post for ease.

Until next time, take care & be kind to yourselves,

Lou
xxx

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Comments

KarinsArtScrap said…
o wow these are gorgeous and so cheerful Lou
Gr Karin