A color challenge for sure!

Hi! How's it going? Ever have a challenge that's more than the kind of challenge you were looking for? Well, this card represents such a challenge! I created this card for the Clear Dollar Stamps Weekend Color Challenge over on Paper Craft Planet. The CDS Weekend Color Challenge is a new challenge and the wonderful thing about it is, that it is a 2-day event, each weekend! You have two whole days to come up with something amazing...

Well, amazing this, isn't...LOL. Laurie Wilson, our CDS Team Coordinator is hosting the CDS Weekend Color Challenge this weekend and she chose these colors which are beautiful on her card, but not so much on mine! ; ) The colors for the challenge was Rose Red, Baja Breeze, Certainly Celery and More Mustard. I didn't have Certainly Celery, so I used Mellow Moss as a substitute. We could use a cream or vanilla as a neutral. Well, I didn't have that, either! And I thought I was well-stocked in cardstock! Okay, here's the deets:

Stamp Sets Used: Clear Dollar Stamps "Bountiful Branches" images
and "Designer Garden" sentimen
Cardstock and Papers: Unknown blue cardstock (sorry...it's something I've had forever!), K&Co. Remake Yellow Designer Paper Pad, Colormates Medium Racy Raspberry, Colormates Medium Glorious Green, Paper Trey White Cardstock
Inkpads: Stampin' Up! Rose Red, Mellow Moss, So Saffron Inks and Stazon Black Ink
Accessories and Embellishments: Cuttlebug, Labels Two Nestabilities Dies, Martha Stewart Rose Leaf and Fern Punches, Paper Piercing Tool, Sewing Machine, Thread, Spare Parts Paper Flowers, JoAnn's Fuschia Silk Flower, Bo Bunny Blue Brad, Hero Arts Fuschia Butterfly Brad
Techniques: Paper Piercing, Machine Stitching

DIRECTIONS:
A card base was cut to 5" wide x 10" high. A square mat of K&Co. Remake Yellow Designer Paper was cut to 4.75" and set aside. I cut the blue mat to 4.5" square and hand stamped the background floral and leaf design using CDS "Bountiful Branches" stamp set using Stampin' Up! Rose Red and Mellow Moss Inks. The stamped floral mat was glued and machine stitched to the larger yellow square mat.

Using my new Labels Two Nestabilities Dies, I created 3 mats for the focal image. The first mat was cut out of Colormates Medium Racy Raspberry, the second mat was cut out of Colormates Medium Glorious Green and the smallest mat was cut out of Paper Trey White Cardstock. I stamped the tree branch and leaves onto the smallest white mat using Stampin' Up! Mellow Moss, Rose Red, and So Saffron. When dry, I stamped the sentiment "Friendship" from the CDS "Designer Garden" stamp set with Stazon Black Ink onto the stamped focal image.

Using a piercing tool, I hand pierced around all 3 die-cut mats, and glued them together, and then glued them to the card front. Using a Click-It Hole Punch, I punched a hole through the entire card front and attached the big yellow and fuschia flower with the Bo Bunny blue brad and secured to the back of the card. These beautiful yellow paper blooms are from Spare Parts, and were a birthday gift from my friend, Traci Major. Thanks, Traci! The flower leaves were punched out of Colormates Glorious Green using a Martha Stewart Rose Leaf Punch and a Martha Stewart Fern Leaf Punch. I glued them around the flower petals for more interest. I punched another through the card front to attach the Hero Arts Fuschia Butterfly Brad. By the way, these brads are beautifully detailed and they were a gift to me from my friend Vicky Yeakley. To finish the card, I glued the completed card front to the 5"x10 Paper Trey White Cardstock.