Sending Hugs … and Holiday Photos ❤️

Hi everyone, today I would like to share my first crafty project for a couple of weeks, due to the fact that I just got back from a holiday with my darling husband to celebrate our 40th wedding anniversary which fell last Sunday (I posted the card that I made for him here). I’d also like to share a few holiday photos, so grab a cuppa for a long post! 

As I mentioned on my anniversary post our favourite romantic holiday destination is the Greek island of Santorini … so that’s where we have just spent 9 days relaxing for our special anniversary. It was a very last minute booking due to me losing a lot of confidence following the disaster I had in Dubrovnik (for anyone who doesn’t know what I’m talking about there’s more info here), but eventually I concluded that special anniversaries only come along once so I should crack on!  In the end we had a lovely time even though we had a day of rain and a couple of very windy days … the hotel was lovely, we had some great meals, and of course we saw some gorgeous scenery and fabulous sunsets! Photos are at the end of this post.

So, on to today’s card. I wanted to get another entry in for this month’s Lavinia Creative challenge plus a few other autumnal challenges. Here is what I made.

I stamped Lavinia Forest Leaf onto a piece of cream stamping card using Pinecone VFC, and heat embossed then coloured the leaves with Cosmic Shimmer iridescent watercolour paints … I haven’t used these for a long time but they give a lovely sheen. I die cut the image using a stitched rectangle die, then cut a larger piece of cream card to cover a 7” x 5” card front, and stencilled it with a Lavinia stencil and Elements inks before adding some background text stamping. I edged my image panel with blended Distress Ink, then added gold Posca spatters. When dry I assembled the card and added a stamped Uniko sentiment.

Here is an angled picture to show the shine of the Cosmic Shimmer paints.

Stamps: Lavinia Forest Leaf, Winter Spice; Uniko Simply Said Blocks II;

Media: Versafine Clair (Pinecone, Sand Dune); Cosmic Shimmer Iridescent watercolour paints; Lavinia Elements inks (Paprika, Russet Orange, Sahara); Tim Holtz Distress ink (Walnut Stain); Posca pen (gold);

Tools: Lavinia stencil - Leaf Trails; Hunkydory Moonstone Duo-Stitched Rectangle dies.

Challenges I would like to enter: 

Allsorts #799 - Get Well/Anything Goes - TOP 5

Country View Challenges (September) - Autumn Richness (3rd entry)

Crazy Is Our Fame, Stencils Are Our Game (September) - Use a Stencil with option Fall Frenzy

Cut It Up #313 - Colours of Fall/Autumn

Daring Cardmakers - Leafy Lushness

Double D - Fall Leaves

Festive Fridays (September) - Fall Is Coming (3rd entry)

Four Seasons (September) - Fall (2nd entry)

Hand Stamped Sentiments #447 - Inspiration Mood Board

Lavinia Creative Challenge (September) - Autumn Hues (version without sentiment) (3rd entry)

Little Red Wagon #774 - Sew What?

Make My Monday #235 - Create Your Own Background

Papercraft Challenges #110 - Fabulous Fall

Simon Says (Wednesday) - Make Your Own Background

Simply Create Too #204 - Autumn (2nd entry)

Sparkles #180 - Autumn

We Love Stamping (September) - Hand Coloured Image (2nd entry)

Word Art Wednesday #665/666 - Anything Goes (3rd entry)

Here are a few photos from our holiday …

Picturesque Scenery

Oia

Oia

Church in Oia

Church in Firestofani with view of caldera (and cruise ships in the bay!)

Wall sculpture of Santorini in Firestofani

Fira 

Bronze Age city archaeological site at Akrotiri

View from the hotel

More glorious sunsets over the caldera

Relaxing nights out

Our anniversary dinner

So now it’s back to normality (sigh!) but the special sights and atmosphere of Santorini will linger in our memories.

Take care and thanks for visiting.

Hugs,