ATC - distressed bumblebees and butterflies

Oh I have missed being able to create and blog this week, but, more importantly, Mum is home from hospital. Between us, my sister and I have managed to overcome some of the beaurocracy and get Mum back into her own environment. She needs care, and at the moment that is me, (hence no cards or blogs this week) but she is on the list and we hope to hear very soon.

That said, I did manage to grab a few hours last night which resulted me staying up till 1.00am, but this is the outcome. The two photos show the difference light can make to the same image. The first one was taken laying flat, the second one was standing up, and you can see what a difference it makes, but by comparing the two, the details and the shimmers can be seen.
I haven't made ATCs for a while but found Fun With ATCs challenge blog and this week shadows need to be included, so I thought I would experiment to see what I could do. It is just possible to see shadows behind the foliage and the butterflies and I double stamped the bee to get it to look as though it was really buzzing around. I used the swirl and butterflies stamps from the Shabby French collection by TH, the bee and the foliage are tiny stamps that I purchased at the weekend at the Farnborough Make It craft show and are from Lavinia Stamps. The Tuesday Taggers challenge this week is to include swirls and curls, they are being sponsored by Crafty Individuals. The flourish has been coloured with Promarkers (and I added to my collection at the weekend - money, money, money!!!). The background is distressed using TH distress inks and water, spritzed onto my craft mat and fits in with the Pollycraft challenge for distressing. I added perfect pearls to it as well to get the shimmer.  I highlighted the foliage with sepia accents and the butterflies with crackle accents to get the glossy, glassy look for the Cuttlebug challenge. The colours fit Think Monday ATC orange challenge and the Pink Elephant green challenge. Finally I edged the card with my Sakura glitter pens.
I love all this experimenting with new techniques and feel this is a good result for what I set out to achieve. It just so happened ,when I had finished, I realised that the content fits my blog name. Result!!
I am adding some photos at the bottom of the page that show that Spring is really on it's way. They were taken Tuesday morning along lovely Oxfordshire lanes as I was on my way to work . It was such a gorgeous morning and, as I was early for my appointment, I was able to stop a few times to take photos. These I just love for the colours and fabulous blue sky, but also because I felt very uplifted to feel the warmth of the sun and see the beautiful snowdrops.
Thankyou for looking I hope you are having a good week.
Take care. Luv Bxx