Five cards with the Thankful Garden bundle

How did I overlook the Lovely Garden Suite?

This beautiful product suite from Stampin’ Up!® features big floral stamps, coordinating dies, paper, embellishments and ribbon... plus a set of five Thankful Garden Decorative Masks (AKA stencils) for really easy and effective colouring.

I ordered this Suite as part of the June Stampin’ Up!® promotion. I purchased the Lovely Garden Suite at full price, then a second suite at half price.

Top tip for the June 2025 Suite promotion: ordering two items at similar prices will give you the best deal. If you want four or more items from suites at mixed prices, in many cases it will pay you to place multiple orders.

Today I have five cards using the Thankful Garden bundle from the Lovely Garden Suite from Stampin’ Up!® Some of them use Lovely Garden Designer Series Paper, while others use paper from my stash.

 

First up is this gorgeous Fresh Freesia card.

I began by covering the card front with some Lovely Garden Designer Series Paper. Any card base will do – in fact, this technique is perfect for when you find a white card base in your stash which has an ink smudge on it, because the Designer Series Paper covers it all up. 

This pretty and delicate Fresh Freesia design is the reverse of the green paper, so you’re only actually cutting into one sheet of Designer Series Paper for this card. I’ve layered it on some white cardstock; it’s actually just two strips, one at each side, because I was trying to use up some scraps.

I absolutely love hydrangeas so wanted to try the Thankful Garden stamp in different colours. 

Here it is in beautiful blues, this time with a woodgrain background from Country Woods Designer Series Paper. 

 Even though there are distinct tones of colour, it's all done with just two ink pads: Blueberry Bushel and Garden Green.

That’s because stamping and colouring with Thankful Garden stamps and decorative masks is is nothing short of magical, and you can do it in any order, although if you are using a water-based black ink for the outline, it makes sense to do this last. 

I use my retired Stamparatus when using Stampin’ Up!® masks/stencils because it keeps everything in position and makes it even easier. Simply use a blending brush or sponge to apply colour through the stencils, one by one. You don’t even have to change colour because the build up of ink will add the shading you need.

Finally, you can add a layer of black ink to outline the image, if you wish. Everything is designed to fit perfectly. 

Prefer pink hydrangeas? I’ve used Melon Mambo ink on this one and, as you can see, the light touch at the top right gives you a really pale shade, all from one ink pad. 

 

The die-cut leaves at the back are cut from white cardstock and coloured using a blending brush with Garden Green ink pad. 

I’m not sure what these flowers are but they look equally pretty in lots of colours. To save washing my masks, I have created projects here in the same colours of Melon Mambo and Blueberry Bushel. 

 

The masks are easy enough to wash, simply by running water on them from the tap, but you do need to make sure they are fully dry before using again, if you want to avoid spoiling your project. 

 

My final project uses the same flower in Melon Mambo, with some retired Designer Series Paper. You can see from the flowers next to the card in the next photo what they look like without the black outline. You get a pretty “no-line watercolouring” effect.

 

I hope you like my Thankful Garden projects and I apologise for being so late to the Lovely Garden Suite party. It just shows that while we are oohing and aahing over the newest releases from Stampin’ Up!®, there are still plenty of lovely products which have been around for a while.

 

 

Questions? Please message me via my website