Inspire Me Monday - The Blossom Challenge - May

Hello and welcome to the Blog! The Power Poppy Bloom Brigade is bringing you a monthly challenge the third Monday of every month, starting TODAY! The lovely and super talented Christine Okken is your hostess each month! The challenge is called The Blossom Challenge and will be a different theme or type of challenge each month! 

This month the theme is: April Showers Bring May Flowers. So grab a Power Poppy image and create a project celebrating the flowers of spring! To top it off, the BEST Power Poppy spring images are on discount at 25% OFF too! 

Note: You do NOT have to make a card! If you like to color at 8 1/2 x 11, you may print your image at that size and share your finished coloring page! 

Our challenge WINNER will receive a $20 gift card to use at the Power Poppy Store!! The challenge is open until noon on June 17th! Link up your project to the Power Poppy Blog for a chance to win!

Now here is a look at my inspiration project for the challenge, April Showers Bring May Flowers! I love spring flowers, but living where I do spring flowers are not the same as where i grew up in Pennsylvania. Here in the southern part of the California Inland Empire, spring can be colorful, but you won't see many tulips or daffodils, or other spring flowers. Spring comes quickly and becomes summer in the blink of an eye! I love the spring flowers of my childhood, but really only see them in forced pots or bouquets these days. 

I used the BRAND NEW digital stamp, Sketches of Spring Vol. 1 for my card front. I love coloring bouquets of various flowers and this beauty is perfect. The bouquet contains several types of daffodils, fritillaria acmopetala (pointed-petal fritillary), and a tulip viridiflora. (Yeah, so I have no idea what those flowers are...I color them, but I don't grow them! I know daffodil and tulip...the rest I copied from Marcella's description!)

I printed the gray outline image onto tan cardstock at 5" x 7" to make a nice sized image to color. My finished card is slightly larger than 5" x 7" but it still fits into an envelope made for 5" x 7" cards. 

I kept this card very simple. I stamped a greeting onto the front with gray ink (the sentiment is from the retired clear set So Grateful). I used a white pen to create a stitched border around the card, then I added a few enamel dots. So fast and simple to make! 

I colored the image with Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils. I did not keep a list because it took me a few days to color, and I was also in the middle of rearranging my craft space, so the pencils kept getting moved around! 

I added a little gray gel pen to the flower stamens for highlight, but that is all the gel pen I used on the main image. 

I have been wanting to try coloring a white flower on tan cardstock, using colored pencils for long time, and I finally decided to get on with it! White is very hard to make look white, and I confess I was a little worried when I got to this stage, but when I added the orange and green bits, the flower began to look more white and less gray.

I kept going and decided to color all three daffodils the same way. I really was unsure what color those little bell-shaped flowers should be, but I know that tulips come in many colors. I did some Google "research" and found some pictures of flowers to use for a reference. 

I ended up with an orange tulip and a blue "bell flower." The pointed-petal fritillary is not actually blue, but in my world, you can color flowers any old way you wish! {grin} My goal to color with realism only extends so far! {giggle}

I hope you have fun with the challenge this month, and please tell your friends! It will be great to have a lot of participants in our FIRST Blossom Challenge at Power Poppy!

Make sure you visit the Shop, because there are a few NEW things to grab! Plus there is a 25% off sale on the spring offerings!

To see all the inspiration, and to read the challenge details, visit the Power Poppy Blog HERE. 

Inspiration List

Power Poppy Blog
Christine
Barbara C.
Lisa
Gloria - YOU ARE HERE
Essie

Power Poppy Stamps: Sketches of Spring Vol. 1 Digital Stamp, So Grateful Clear Stamp (Retired)

Cardstock: WorldWin ColorMates Smooth and Silky Sapphire Blue, WorldWin Treasures White, Neenah Desert Storm 80#

Gel pens: Pentel Pigment Gel Ink White, Gelly Roll  Moonlight Blue Grey

Ink: Memento London Fog

Enamel dots: Echo Park Travelers Notebook Coffee and Friends

Die template: Heartfelt Creations Eyelet Rectangles and Basics

Adhesives: Scor-tape, ATG, Art Glitter Glue