Coneflower in December

It's December, but I still have autumn flowers in my head.

Here's another coneflower made using punches. To add a little more texture to the petals, I used the Designer Series Paper that is one of the level one hostess gifts. I stamped the French Script background with Old Olive ink onto Naturals Ivy cardstock. I cut a narrow strip of paper for the stem. For the leaf I punched an oval of Old Olive cardstock, scored it, crumpled it, and cut around the edges. The banner is made from a swath of Really Rust card stock. I inked up just part of the thank you stamp from Sincere Salutations for the short and sweet greeting.

All supplies Stampin' Up!:
Stamps: French Script, Sincere Salutations
CS: Naturals Ivory, Chocolate Chip, Old Olive, Really Rust,
More Mustard DSP from the hostess packet.
Ink: Old Olive, Really Rust
Accessories: 1''circle punch, oval punch, paper snips

Oval Punch Flowers

Inspired by Nature [see link on side-bar] is a new stamp set that I've seen people use well.
The elegance of the flowers and grass is lovely.
However, I don't have that stamp set, and was trying to make a coneflower similar to the one in that set.

I've recently gotten two oval punches and was playing around with them.
I have seen people create entire cards from punched shapes, without even stamping anything,
so that got the wheels in my head turning...
...and this is what I came up with:

Here's a "Just Thinking of You" card using Chocolate Chip, Kiwi Kiss, Really Rust, and So Saffron, card stock, Really Rust Classic Ink, Kiwi Kiss Satin Ribbon :), oval and circle punches, and Sincere Salutations. I repeated the same salutation over and over again a-la-French Script Background Stamp.

For this one, I changed up the color scheme by replacing Really Rust with Pacific Point card stock and ink. I also heat embossed the center of the flower with Chocolate Chip craft ink and clear embossing powder. I scored an oval of Kiwi Kiss card stock for the leaf (though it's hard to see from this photo).

Ribbon: (see p. 187)
The Kiwi Kiss satin ribbon is a high quality, very silky, double sided, 3/8'' wide ribbon. It is Very Vanilla on one side and the Kiwi Kiss on the other (111879 $7.95 for 10 yards).

Punches: (see page 188)
1" Circle punch 109046 $10.95
Large Oval punch 107305 $15.95

Stamp Set: (see p. 140)
Sincere Salutations 105156 $20.95