Dandy Garden Suite: Garden Wishes or Dragonfly Garden?

The Dandy Garden Suite is ‘my’ suite. I love everything about it. Many Suites are lovely but none has spoken to me like this one has. But which stamp set is best? 

 

Garden Wishes?

Or Dragonfly Garden? 

I couldn’t decide so had to have both. In fact, I think I ordered the entire Suite Collection. 

To justify my investment, I decided to hold a big event. Normally I would hold an all-day event at this time of year, hire a local hall and get together with customers for a fun day of crafting. We may not be able to meet in person but I wasn’t going to let lockdown stop me from holding my event. So, just as I have been doing since last spring, I held it on Zoom.

This was a day of choices. I realised that not everyone would want to spend an entire day Zooming so offered the opportunity to book just for the morning or the afternoon. Turns out everyone was quite happy to spend the whole day on Zoom after all!

I couldn’t decide whether to run it with the Dragonfly Garden or the Garden Wishes stamp set... so I gave the guests a choice. Of course, this meant I had to make double the samples but it did show off the versatility of the sets beautifully. 

Both sets feature a tall flower stamp. Both feature a beautiful insect. And both co-ordinate with the Dandy Garden Designer Series Paper. Everyone received half a pack of this, giving them lots of options – and it also meant everyone who chose the Dragonfly Garden stamp set could cut out bees from the DSP, and everyone who chose the Garden Wishes stamp set could cut out dragonflies, just as you can see in the cards above. The top card has a dragonfly cut from the Designer Series Paper, while the bottom one is stamped and lightly coloured in.

We made so many projects that I am going to split them across two blog posts. Please come back on Thursday to see the second batch.

 

Half of the day was spent making these four cards. This one is probably my favourite, using gorgeous Blackberry Bliss. I blended some ink around the bottom of the white cardstock using Blending Brushes. Those who don’t yet have these amazing brushes could use a sponge instead. 

To get the spatter effect, squeeze your ink pad to create a pool of ink in the lid. Using a wet (but not too wet) paintbrush, pick up some of this ink and splash this across the card. I do this by holding the paintbrush horizontally and tapping the top.
NB: The wetter your paint brush, the bigger and paler the spatters will be.

 

 

I made these Bumblebee cards deliberately different, to showcase the versatility of the DSP. They look so different with the bold designs on the right, or the subtle Bumblebee designs on the left, but which do you prefer? I can’t really decide. 

When attaching strips of DSP in a design like this, start with the two outer edge pieces, then finish off with the centre. That way you retain an even border around the outside edges of the card. 

 

This card again shows the versatility of the Dandy Garden Designer Series Paper. The card on the left uses a bumblebee cut out of the DSP, while the one on the right is stamped from the Garden Wishes stamp set. The images in the DSP meant nobody had to miss out, regardless of the stamp set they had chosen for their kit.

If you love these products as much as I do, I would urge you to act fast. No, they’re not going anywhere but if you order before the end of February, you can take advantage of Sale-a-Bration. 

 

Order both of the above and you can of course choose TWO Sale-a-Bration items or one Level 2 SAB item.  If you are in the UK and would like to order, please visit my store and, if you use the February host code D6PKN76U, I’ll send you a thank you gift in March!

To make it easy for you, please shop using this link

However, for the best value of all, I would recommend the Starter Kit, which gives you £130 of craft supplies of your choice, plus five packs of Designer Series Paper worth £53.75. It’s shipped to you free of charge and entitles you to discounts and sneak peeks. Please do message me via my website to find out more or click here to get started. 

Please message me via my website

 

Serene cards with the Dandy Garden Suite

 

Have I mentioned how much I love the Dandy Garden Suite? Thought so. But is that going to stop me telling you again? No way! Here are some of the projects I’ve been making with this Suite lately.

I needed to replenish my stock of ‘Thinking of You’ cards after my Mum totally cleaned out my last batch. She said she needed two cards so I sent her everything I had so she could choose and the box came back empty. 

 

This set is just perfect for simple, understated cards for such an occasion, so I made a handful by stamping the tall flowers image from Dragonfly Garden onto white cardstock and lightly colouring the image using Stampin’ Blends. The greeting on this card comes from Peaceful Moments. 

On most of the cards, I adding some background using our fabulous new Blending Brushes. These are so easy to use and create lovely soft backgrounds. On top of this I flicked some clean water to create a speckled effect, a technique I love for its simplicity.  The greeting on this card some from Field of Flowers. 

 

I mounted them onto some card blanks I’d made previously (I keep a box of these on hand from leftover Make & Takes and projects where I change my mind partway through) and soon rustled up a batch of these landscape cards, finishing off with a greeting from Woven Heirlooms and some Linen Thread.

For something a bit more complex, I used a big chunk of my craft supplies, starting with the Dandy Wishes Dies. These coordinate with the Garden Wishes stamp set and are available as part of a bundle, too.

The image panel is created using Tasteful Labels Dies, which are probably the most-used dies in my craft room since they were released last summer. The greeting here is from Happiest of Birthdays, which is probably my most-used greeting stamp set of the past 12 months, too. The background is one of the Greenery Embossing Folders, another much-loved product in this house. 

Inside I used Happiest of Birthdays again, along with a dandelion image from the
Garden Wishes stamp set. 

  

The entire Dandy Garden Suite is a must-have, in my opinion! If you’d like to order any of the items shown here, or indeed any other Stampin’ Up!® products, please head on over to my store and, if you use the host code YK2NNMYW, I’ll send you a little thank you gift in February! 

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Does your wish list come to more than £99? Please get in touch and I will help you get more for your money and unlock discounts all year round.  Please message me via my website.

 

Sneak Peek: 10 cards using the Dandy Garden Suite

 

During December we demonstrators get the privilege of ordering from the new Jun-Jul Mini Catalogue - this is one of my favourite perks! Another perk was if we attended OnStage@Home we could order EVEN EARLIER from a smaller selection of products so I quickly snapped up a whole bunch from the Dandy Garden Suite.

This is a new mega-suite of products and, if you love the natural world as much as I do, you will LOVE it. So as a special end-of-week treat, here are not one but TEN projects using this fabulous Suite!

Indulge me while I wax lyrical about this gorgeous Suite for a moment. There are TWO gorgeous stamp sets – one with a co-ordinating dragonfly punch and one with co-ordinating dies.

There is an absolutely stunning pack of 6"x"6" Designer Series Paper packed with deep, rich colours, bold floral designs as well as delicate detailed monochrome sheets.

There’s a pack of fine laser-cut paper, including detailed dragonflies, intricate seed heads and delicate leaves. There are tiny bronze-effect ladybirds. And remember that beautiful woven linen thread we had before? It's back - but in Mossy Meadow.

I'm so excited about this suite that I'm sharing everything I've made with it so far. Some are adaptations of projects from the Stamp & Share section of OnStage@Home and others are actually completely from my own head (I know, right!).

Take a look at what I’ve been making...

These were some of the most fun to make as I got to use a new tool. We have some new blending brushes which are so pleasing to use and so effective – they give you a much smoother effect than blending with sponges.

I stamped my main images in Mossy Meadow, coloured them with Stampin’ Blends, then blended ink with the new brushes around the edges of the cardstock. Inspired by Stampin' Up!® concept artist Melody Hyde, I then stamped around the images with a greeting stamp, repeatedly and by stamping off onto scrap paper first. I really liked this effect when Melody demonstrated it at OnStage@Home.

I LOVE these dies, they are JUST what I've been craving. And don't they go perfectly with the Dandelions Embossing Folder which I've had for months but – gasp! –hadn’t used until I made this card. 

This Suite is perfect for the monochrome look. There are several sheets of DSP which are monochrome;in Misty Moonlight (as shown here), Blackberry Bliss (yum!), Bumblebee and Calypso Coral. Shall I tell you a secret about this card? It was supposed to have a folding back front, but I used the cutting blade instead of the scorer! Oops.



A splash of Bumble Bee goes so well with Misty Moonlight – this is one of our OnStage@Home Stamp and Share projects which we made during the event. 

This last card was a Northern Lights background which hadn’t gone quite to plan. It wasn’t working for the Christmas card I had planned but I think it looks great behind this Dandy Laser-Cut Paper and combined with some much-maligned Purple Posy.

I hope you love this Suite as much as I do as I will be holding a Big Event with it in February. Watch this space or my website for details. 

And if you can’t wait that long and want to get your hands on these fabulous products NOW, please get in touch about purchasing the Starter Kit. I would love to have you in my team so I can help you get the best value out of your Stampin’ Up!® crafting. Please get in touch via my website here.