I have had a wonderful holiday visiting with family and catching up with old friends and doing quite a bit of travelling which I’ve enjoyed being out with the family. Hubby goes back to work on Monday and I’m now getting back into the swing of things with my first stamping of 2010!

Mind you I nearly missed this challenge as I didnt realise today was Saturday (duh me) hence the lateness of my post.  Hope you’ll forgive me.

If you are new to visiting my blog I participate as part of a weekly sketch team with the lovely ladies at Utah Divas International blog.  The Utah Divas International is a group of Stampin’ Up! Demonstrators from all over the world getting together and supporting and encouraging each other. Its a great group to be a part of (more like family really) and if you are a Stampin’ Up! Demonstrator and interested in joining the group then email me and I’ll get an invite organised for you.

Now onto the sketch ….

The lovely Carol does our sketches each week and I’m continually amazed at all the different ones she comes up with and once you start working with a sketch then those cogs starts turning and you get so many ideas.

For today’s sketch I wanted to do something simple and it was then I remembered one of my best friends birthdays is this week so I went with a birthday theme.

I also wanted to show you how to step-up a simple card and make it just that little bit special.

So here’s my card for the sketch challenge ….

I’ve used the lovely new Wagon Full of Fun stamp set from the Summer Mini Catalogue. This is a great set as it has 10 stamps in it and 6 of these are images and 4 are sentiments.

Actually this card has used up a few of my scraps or offcuts. I’ve used a piece of patterned paper from the Kaleidescope Designer Series paper and I’ve then just used the colours in that piece for my cardstock colours being Pretty in Pink and Pumpkin Pie.

The cupcake is stamped in Jet Black Stazon onto Stampin’ Up!’s wonderful watercolor paper. I’ve then watercoloured the image using my trusty Aqua Painter and the classic ink pads. The Sentiment is stamped in Jet Black stazon but in two stampings as this sentiment is actually on one line.

The card is finished off with tying two pieces of ribbon around the centre – Pretty in Pink Taffeta and Pumpkin Pie Grosgrain.  Stampin Up! just make things so easy to coordinate!

Now the card is lovely as it is but since this card is for my good friend Karen I wanted to make it a little special. So I stamped the cupcake another two times so I could layer it a bit similar to paper tole. I’ve then also added some glitter to the icing and flame on the candle.

This image shows you the dimension in the card and also in the candle image. The candle image actually now how three layers – first on the main piece of watercolour paper which has the whole image there. Then the second layer is just the icing and the candle. The third and final layer is just the candle and the flame.

I’ve then gone around the swirls in the icing with my two way glue pen and then sprinkled the lovely dazzling diamonds over. Once the glue dries it is clear and it just looks like the glitter sticks to where I put the glue.

Here is the final card

I do hope you like my card – its a little hard to see the glitter when taking these photo’s but you can see it just a little bit.

Dont forget to popover to the Utah Divas International blog to see what the other ladies have created.

Thanks for stoppin by