Hello There Birdie - A Feathered Friend For The Paper Players

It's Sunday and time for this week's challenge over at The Paper Players - and this week it's a double does of excitement as I am hosting my very first challenge with this wonderfully talented group of ladies. 'Feathered friends' is the theme of my clean and simple challenge this week so I'm looking for a bird (or two!) on your card! Here is the wonderful challenge badge that the lovely Nance has created for this week's challenge:

This is one of those challenges when I was truly spoilt for choice - there are lots of great bird images around at the moment. I decided after my busy week that I was definitely in need of some theraputic colouring, so decided to reach for the quirky bird stamp in the Spring-Summer hostess set, 'Time To Celebrate':

Since this bird doesn't look like any I've ever seen in my garden, I decided to throw caution to the wind and colour him in some totally tropical colours and really go to town! I used my Daffodil Delight and Rich Razzleberry Blendabilities markers and a Tempting Turquoise Stampin' Write marker and got colouring. I love that you can colour images like this and you really don't need to be any kind of expert to get a good result. Here's a close up of my bird so that you can see just how imprecise my colouring is: 

I really would urge anyone who is reading this and not tried colouring with Blendabilities to give it a go - I guarantee you'll like the results! I paired my bird with a piece of brightly coloured 'Sweet Taffy' paper and added a few simple banners in co-ordinating colours to finish off my card. I love the colours I used on my card today - Brights are my favourite of the Stampin' Up! colour families, and whilst there isn't a huge amount of 'white space' on my card due to my piece of bold, patterned DSP I love the finished card, which I think still has a clean feel with minimal layers and embellishments.

Before you reach for your ink pads, do visit the other design team members to see what interesting ideas they've had this week:

I look forward to seeing your bird projects in the gallery this week, whether chirpy, quirky or just plain feathered! The children are on half-term holiday this week so we are having a more restful week than usual. I was almost ready for a sport-free day today, when Ben was selected to play in a basketball tournament this afternoon. He is really excited about it though as it's his first one and he LOVES basketball, so is really looking forward to it.

Back tomorrow with another project; until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Time To Celebrate Clear Stamp Set	Sweet Taffy Designer Series Paper	Whisper White A4 Card Stock	Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad	Circles Collection Framelits Dies
Big Shot Magnetic Platform	Big Shot Die-Cut Machine	2-1/2 Inch Circle Punch	Pumpkin Pie A4 Card Stock	Rich Razzleberry A4 Card Stock
Daffodil Delight A4 Card Stock	Tempting Turquoise A4 Card Stock	Stampin' Blendabilities™ Markers Rich Razzleberry Assortment	Stampin' Blendabilities™ Markers Daffodil Delight Assortment	Brights Stampin' Write Markers