Two Tries

I liked the layout Beate posted on her blog as her weekend sketch challenge, but for some reason I had a hard time making it work. Maybe it would have been better if I'd tried a square card instead of a standard sized one. Anyway, here's what I came up with.

This card was actually inspired by the American Crafts flower ribbon I used across the bottom. I loved the fun fall colors, so that led to a fall colored, flower themed card. I used Stamping Bella's Flowahbella image here. I colored her with Prismacolor pencils and added details with Stickles. The sentiment is from a Papertrey Ink set.

The big flower embellishment is actually 4 different velvet Prima flowers, layered and held together with a rhinestone brad from Target's Dollar Spot. The flowers on the ribbon reminded me of the Cuttlebug Bloom Dots embossing folder, so I used it on the cardfront. I'm not sure about this one. Maybe it's too busy?

Here's the other card I created. It doesn't quite match the sketch, but it's pretty close. It uses the Stem Silhouettes set for the main image and sentiment. I colored the image with markers, then stamped it on Very Vanilla cardstock. The little blossoms are covered with Dazzling Diamonds.

And, to add even more shimmer and shine, I used some Bronze Glimmer Mist over the image. I've seen lots of people do beautiful things with Glimmer Mist, but I just can't get the hang of using this stuff! I shook the bottle up real well, sprayed from a distance and moved the bottle as I misted, but there are still globs on my cardstock (and my bathroom sink, but that's easy to fix at least). I do have to admit that where it isn't blotchy, it does make a really cool effect. Anyone have any helpful tips for me on using this?

Materials Used:
Flower Card:
From Stampin' Up!: Basic Black and Chocolate Chip Classic ink; Pumpkin Pie, Really Rust, and Whisper White cardstock; corner rounder; pop up glue dot
Other: Flowahbella stamp (Stamping Bella); sentiment (Papertrey Ink's Green Thumb set); Bloom Dots embossing folder (Cuttlebug); velvet flowers (Prima); Fruit Punch and Candy Cane Stickles (Ranger); ribbon (American Crafts); rhinestone brad (Target); red textured paper (?)
Stem Silhouettes Thank You:
From Stampin' Up!: Stem Silhouettes and Sanded stamp sets; Old Olive and Chocolate Chip Classic inks; Old Olive and Ruby Red markers; Old Olive, Ruby Red, Creamy Caramel, and Very Vanilla cardstock; Chocolate Chip wide grosgrain; ticket corner punch; corner rounder; mat pack and paper piercing tool; Dazzling Diamonds; dimensionals
Other: Bronze Glimmer Mist; brads (Making Memories)