Homegrown with Love Stamped Backgrounds

It's no secret that I love to stamp my own backgrounds. Especially when there are fabulous solid images like there are in the Homegrown with Love stamp set. I made three cards that give me all the country feels. It reminds me of home!

Can I tell you a secret? I cried making these cards. Not sad tears, but happy tears. The Homegrown with Love stamp set is so perfectly named. Each one of these cards represents something special that I remember about home.

Let's start with a silly story. I moved a lot as a kid, but the house where I spent my high school years was on a dirt road and it wasn't anything crazy to see a cow wandering down the road. You'd just go grab him and steer him back towards home! Nothing strange about that, right?

I created a rustic looking card with cows all over the background. I created a similar version of this card when I first got the stamp set and used my stamp positioner to make sure that the cows were crisp and black, but this time I wanted them to be more distressed, so I used an acrylic block and kind of "swiped" my ink across the stamp slightly so that I would have imperfections. I used Raven Hybrid Ink because it's a dark black ink that dries quickly. I cut a piece of red checkered patterned paper from the Farmer's Marked 6x6 Paper Pack with a Stitched Square Die and added a stamped and die cut sentiment from the Homegrown with Love stamp and die set.

Ready for another childhood story? When I was about 15 my dad decided to raise chickens so we would have fresh eggs! They were free range chickens and would run all over our yard. We lived in the country, so we had a yard and woods out back and I always thought it was amazing that each chicken would make his or her way home every night. We used to hold them and they would sit on our laps or our shoulders. He still has chickens today! We haven't bought store eggs in years!

So of course I had to make a chicken background! I wanted this background to be nice and solid, so even thought I used an acrylic block for my stamping I made sure to ink up the chickens really well before stamping. I used just one stamp from the Homegrown with Love stamp set, but two colors of ink - Iced Tea Hybrid Ink and Dan-D-Lion Hybrid Ink. I alternated my colored stamping until the background was full. I finished this card with a die cut patterned paper from the Farmer's Market 6x6 Paper Pad that I cut with a Stitched Square Die. I stamped "thank you" from the Homegrown with Love stamp set with Raven Hybrid Ink and used the matching die from the Homegrown with Love die set to cut it and added it on top of the blue plaid paper.

My last card reminds me of my mom. She came into my life when I was 17 and she's been there for so many pivotal moments in my life. She makes something she calls "orange drink" when there's a special occasion or just when we all come home. It's just fresh squeezed oranges, a lemon or two, some sugar, and water and it's sooooo yummy!

I was going to fill the whole background with the orange slice from the Homegrown with Love stamp set, but I went with a little bit of green as well. I stamped the orange slice with Tangerine Dream Hybrid Ink and the leaf with Prickly Pear Perfection Hybrid Ink and alternated between the two stamps all over my background. I stamped the jar ( which we actually drink out of jars at home! No cups in the cupboard! Haha! ) with Raven Hybrid Ink then stamped the sentiment in the middle with Tickled Pink Hybrid Ink. The Hybrid Inks from LDRS Creative are waterproof, but I wanted to have the label stand out a bit more, so I stamped the image right on top once more with Watermark Emboss Ink and heat embossed it with Clear Embossing Powder. I watercolored the jar and die cut it with the Homegrown with Love die set and added it to my card.

So these are the three cards that take me back home! I hope you've enjoyed going down memory lane with me! See you soon!