If you couldn’t tell from my earlier posts, I really love Stampin’ Up’s Honey Bee stamp set. Unfortunately, this set will retire on June 3 when the new annual catalog launches. Today’s post is my final tribute to the Honey Bee stamp set and the Detailed Bees die set.

I wanted this series of cards to be soft looking, so my color scheme is Very Vanilla, Sahara Sand, a touch of Early Espresso, So Saffron, and gold.

This first card didn’t require any stamping at all. I used the large bee die from Detailed Bees set and the largest oval die from the Stitched Ovals sent. Instead of sandwiching my paper between two cutting plates. I sandwiched it between a rubber embossing mat and a cutting plate so the paper has a raised detail to it. Then, I used a sponge dauber with Sahara Sand ink to give the paper an antique look and highlight the raised images. The design for this card was inspired by the technique featured in this YouTube video by Allison Okamitsu.

My next card in the series is simple and requires no other techniques beyond stamping and coloring. I love using Wink of Stella on the bee wings because it gives them a subtle gossamer look. Unfortunately, you can’t see the sparkly wings on this picture, but they’re there. I also daubed Sahara Sand to soften the edges of the paper. I colored in the bee with a So Saffron marker and stamped the sentiment in Early Espresso. I sketched in the “bee trail” with a Sahara Sand marker.

My final card takes advantage of the Golden Glitz Delicata ink featured in the January-June Mini Catalog, which unfortunately is currently unavailable. If you can get your hands on some, I highly recommend it.  I really liked this ink because it provides an embossed look without having to take the time to pull out my heat embossing tool and embossing powders. Also for the bee images, the Delicata ink shows more detail than embossing powder would. The only caveat with this ink is that you must be patient and let it dry fully before handling your paper again.

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Over the next few weeks my blog posts will feature Stampin’ Up products scheduled to retire when Stampin’ Up’s 2020-2021 Annual Catalog launches on June 3rd. Look at the Last Chance Products page in the Stampin’ Up store to see what else is retiring. The items on this list are available until June 2nd or until supplies run out.

Today, I begin my farewell to the Honey Bee stamp set and coordinating Detailed Bee dies. This set is by far my favorite from the January-June 2020 Mini Catalog.

Most of the time when I design a card, I don’t have the finished product figured out. I end up making different elements and then decide how to put them together. Sometimes this approach works very well and other times the end result is a bunch of different pieces that didn’t end up working together. That’s what almost happened with this card. I had the bees stamped, the paper colored, and the ribbon figured out, but when I tried adding a tag with the sentiment on a white tag, it wasn’t adding up. I was about to give up when I realized that putting embossing the sentiment in white on a black tag was the perfect thing to do. I don’t know why it took me so long to figure that out, but I’m glad I did.

This card features the Golden Honey DSP from the Sale-a-bration catalog. Hopefully, you got some when it was available. The flowers on the Golden Honey paper are black and white. I colored them in with Purple Posy Blends. The great thing about Blends is that you can use them to color things other than paper. I used the dark Highland Heather Blend to color in the white stripes on the ribbon.

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