The Promise of Spring

Hello all!  There's a new challenge starting on A Vintage Journey today.  The lovely Nikki would like us to Get Sentimental... so she wants to see lots of sentiments on your projects, be they words, quotes or poems.  As always, there's lots of amazing inspiration from my fabulous fellow Creative Guides, so do hop across to take a look.  But first, here's my offering for you.

I've created a couple of springtime panels using my own PaperArtsy quote stamps from EAB06 Spring Edition, and Scrapcosy's lovely word stencils.  And yes, I do know I'm in the wrong season, but in these sultry summer days I think it's rather nice to remember the gentleness of the fresh spring breeze!







I used a technique learned from the lovely Raquel a.k.a. Scrapcosy to create my wood effect in the background.













You can find out how to do it yourself by watching her brilliant tutorial video here.

I added some extra pen work to doodle some knots and imperfections though, in the end, they've mostly been covered up... ah well!












The covering up started with adding these torn strips from the Tim Holtz Wallflower Paper Stash.  I'm not sure why I chose the eggs.  There was just something about the soft blue of the "wooden planks" which put me in mind of duck egg blue, I guess!










And it was the eggs which triggered the springtime theme.  I knew (obviously) that I had plenty of springtime quotes to choose from in my EAB06 Spring Edition.  This one is by Charles Lanman...












... and the second one is from a writer called Byron Caldwell Smith (a name to conjure with).  They're stamped in Watering Can Archival, edged with Stormy Sky Distress Ink, and mounted on padded tape.













All I needed now were some other reminders of cool spring breezes.  These lilies of the valley have featured before (on my Glimpses of Springtime mini book), and I daresay they'll feature again, as I have a large bunch of them, handed on to me by a friend who no longer wanted them for home decor purposes.













For plastic flowers, I think they're actually really pretty.  There are some Tim Holtz Garden Greens Thinlits tucked in behind for extra greenery.














And at the top of each panel, I added another lily of the valley bud and a little sprig of leaves, punched from the same paper with one of the TH punches.













The little bluebirds are also done with a TH punch, cut out from some Stormy Sky-inked card.















A touch of white spatter, blossom falling in the spring breezes, finishes everything off.









So that's my sentimental memory of springtime.  I hope you'll be inspired to Get Sentimental with us this month.  If you're in need of some more inspiration, you'll find plenty of it over at A Vintage Journey, where my fellow Creative Guides have been their usual brilliant selves in creating magic to share with you.

Thanks so much for stopping by today.  If you can take the heat, you can come back later this evening for another helping of Words and Pictures... but for something a little different.  Hope to see you soon!

If it’s going to be a world with no time for sentiment, it’s not a world that I want to live in.
Christopher Isherwood