Lavinia Stamps "Poppies" Thinking of You Card

I had a stencil and stamp play this morning making this sympathy card.  Fortunately, I don't need it at the moment, but I always keep a few to hand... just in case!

I started with a piece of white card.  I lay the Lavinia Stamps "Red Brick" stencil over the top, so that the stripes ran vertically and secured with a low tack tape.  I then added rows of tape so that I had two sections that I could ink up on the left hand side of the card.  

On the far right I used "Lost Shadow" Distress Ink.  On the far left I used "Garden Patina" Ranger Archival Ink. I then lifted the tape and repositioned it so that I could colour the central area, this time I used "Violet" Ranger Archival Ink.

After lifting and cleaning the "Red Brick Stencil", I then lay another Lavinia stencil over the top of the card, this time using the "Ornate Stencil" again, securing the stencil with low tack tape.  Working from the left hand side and fading out to the right, I applied "Watering Can" Ranger Archival Ink with a blending brush.  This resulted with the pattern being stronger over the coloured background and gradually getting lighter to the right hand side of the card.

I then moved on to the stamping.  I selected two Lavinia stamps:  the "Garden Poppy" which is the taller of the two and the "Wild Poppies" stamp.  I stamped both in Versafine Clair "Nocturne" black ink.  Stamping the Garden Poppy first, so that I had the correct height and then the "Wild Poppies" either side.

While the "Nocturne" was out, I also stamped the "Thinking of You" sentiment which is part of the Funky Fossil Designs stamp set called "Stripped Back Sentiments".

I mounted the card on to a piece of black paper and then on to a card blank.  Finally, I added some touches of white gel pen and yellow Posca Pen to the poppy heads.