Butterfly Flowers Card, Featuring the Colorado Hairstreak

It's great fun discovering that one of your punches can be used for a different design that it was intended. I've used my Fiskars butterfly punch many times over the years, but this is the first time I've used it as petals. Notice that I have the butterflies facing out on the left and facing in on the right. I couldn't decide which I liked better, so I put them both on the same card!

Obviously, I could have chosen any color for the butterflies, but I wanted to use one of the most beautiful state butterflies, the Colorado hairstreak. Affiliate links below. 

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Butterfly Flowers Card

Materials:

• white cardstock
• sky blue ink
• blending brush
• butterfly punch (the brand I have is no longer sold; this looks similar)
• circle punch
• Ohuhu markers
• green cardstock
• scissors

Steps:

Use white cardstock to make a card in your desired size. Blend blue ink on the paper to make a sky background. 

Punch out the desired number of flower centers and color them a yellowy orange using Ohuhu markers. Punch out butterflies (5 per flower) and color them as desired. I love the purple, orange, and black (and tiny white spots) of the Colorado hairstreak, but you can model yours after another species or just use your imagination. 

Cut stems and leaves from green cardstock. Then glue everything in place. I'm still not sure whether I prefer the butterflies facing in or facing out. 

In case you were wondering, Colorado's state flower (the columbine) doesn't look like this. It would have been really cool if I could have used the state butterfly to make the state flower. If I come across a state with a coordinating butterfly and flower, I'll definitely be doing that!