Hello! Welcome back to my blog. The theme for this month’s sampler page was ‘Plants, Plants, Plants’. I knew I wanted to create a page using the Simply Succulent stamp set and Potted Succulent die set, and when I saw the Bloom Where You’re Planted designer series paper it was a done deal.

The class attendees were able to stamp and colour the large group of succulents however they wanted, and they could also choose any of the plant and pot combinations to fussy cut from the designer series paper. Big choices such as these are always interesting to observe in a class setting. Some people are decisive and quick to piece the many options together, and some take a little more time to consider their options and try out different combinations. Either way, I allow plenty of time in the class so that there isn’t a time pressure forcing decisions, and so that no one is rushing putting their sampler page together.

To provide inspiration for the many different colour combinations for succulents, I simply Googled succulent images and printed of two which showed a mixture of colours. The class attendees found these handouts helpful on the day. We coloured the succulents using Stampin’ Blends. The alcohol-based pens were great for softening and blending even different colours like Blackberry Bliss and Pool Party.

For the two side panels we snipped a narrow piece from a sheet of Paper Lattice and adhered it to the designer series paper. After deliberating over the pots and plants and die cut pieces, and adhering them together, we adhered thin strips of Soft Suede cardstock to create shelves from three of the plants to sit on. For the fourth plant we made a faux macrame hanger using some of the Gray Granite from the Bakers Twine Essentials Pack.

So that the large group of succulents and pot were grounded, we used a thin strip of the brick pattern designer series paper and adhered it to the dark green foliage patterned panel. We used the Lovely Labels Pick a Punch to make the base for the bottom sentiment and adhered a die cut Blackberry Bliss succulent in behind the heat embossed ‘Extraordinary’ sentiment, and for the top sentiment we stamped and embossed the ‘Make the Ordinary’ sentiment then die cut it using one of the dies from the Potted Succulents dies.

To finish off the sampler page we adhered a number of the Genial Gems around the page, and adhered a die cut Blackberry Bliss succulent on top of the centre succulent piece.

Happy crafting x
Megan