Pink Gingko

Firstly, can I just say a big thank you for all the lovely comments left on my blog recently, I've been quite astounded, what a lovely bunch of creative people you are out there.

Anyway without further ado Pink Gingko....

Craft Stampers 'Take it Make it' challenge this month is to include potato printing! I don't have any lino cutting tools so after a bit of a think I dug out some Gingko leaf cutters I had from when I made sugar flowers (another occasional creative life). I thought they would work for petals of a flower. Worked really well placing the cutter in the potato and then cutting away the outside.

I'd originally thought of California poppies in red and orange but the paint I used didn't work for me so after a few attempts, I ended up using some Luminarte acrylic silk glaze in 'Love Struck' and Ginger flower' (it has a lovely shimmer). As you can see the the potato started to dry out and crack which I then enhanced to look like veins in the petal.

I stamped the large paler petals first, then masked them off whilst I used the sequin waste stamp from The Artistic Stamper as a background. I've used antique linen DI and before stamping just softened the edges of the impression. I then added the remaining flowers, once dry I drew in the stems and veins in black and added a few gold veins to the larger flowers. The background is DI with a little old paper and tiny bit of walnut stain around the edge and some water spritzing. 

The sentiment is from a much used and loved Lin brown set and I felt the font lent itself to placing centrally at the base in the style of old prints of flowers with the botanical name at the bottom. The shimmery colour doesn't quite show up but hopefully you can see the texture. I did enjoy doing this though potatoes can be a bit difficult to hold properly for stamping! 

I am also entering this in the Artistic Stamper creative team blog challenge  'In the Garden'  and Country View crafts challenge 'Natures Glories'. Thanks so much for visiting.