There are days...

...when nothing turns out how you pictured it.

I needed to get my Mum's birthday card sorted ready to be able to take it with me today so that she would have it to open on the day (Friday 20 February). I made two cards but neither looked 'right' so Saturday I headed over to Barleylands for some inspiration.

The two cards I had tried were in Mum's favourite colour; blue. However, when that didn't work I started looking for other things that I know she likes.

Mum has a thing about owls...I think it harks back to when she was a "Brown Owl" (leader of a Brownie pack)...and she has a collection of ornaments in glass, china, metal, stoneware and a number of pieces of jewellery.

I wandered around for some time but kept coming back to a "Sweet Dixie" die set called "Owl & Branch 2"...it ended up coming home with me.

The die is very detailed and took a couple of passes through my Big Shot to ensure that it was cut and then I passed it through to emboss it - I love it.

I was in two minds as to the colour scheme for the card but settled on this...

...the card base is 6x6 black Bazzill and the die-cut frame is a coated black CS from Papermania. The owl was die-cut from kraft CS. I added some strands of burlap tied down the spine of the card.
As you can see...

...the embossed detail on this owl is fabulous and I love how the kraft colour stands out from the black background.

I didn't put any sentiment on the front of the card as this will allow Mum to frame it and add it to her owl collection. I also don't have to worry about sharing this on here as Mum doesn't blog or use any form of social media.

Hope she likes it.....................................................................