It's Your Day To Relax

This sloth is how I feel right now! I started off my stamping the sloth and thought bubbles and island scene from the Clearly Besotted Hung up on you stamp set in black memento ink. I then masked them off and stamped the Clearly Besotted Into the woods stamp. After removing the masks, I coloured it in with my copics. 

I die cut the image and a mat of blue card using Simon Says Stamps Stiched rectangles and glued them onto a 5x7 card blank. I stamped the sentiment from the sloth set in black versafine as I find it gives a darker black than the memento ink and added glossy accents to his dream to finish. Simples! Hope you all have a great week and that the weather makes its mind up!

Be Happy

Saturday already, I'm sure time's moving more quickly than it used to. A super quick and simple card to share with you today. Oval cut with Memory Box Cool Cloud Collage die, I was going to frame the oval, but out of the 4 sets of oval dies I have, none were the right shape. Honestly, you don't have that problem with circles! I stamped a sentiment from the MFT Seaside Gulls set on the card, then used foam tape to affix it to the blue card and then glued it onto a 5x7 card base. I stamped one of the seagulls from the set and coloured it with copics before fussy cutting it out and adding it with foam tape. As per usual, I decided to add faux stitching after sticking the card together - just as well I'd used plenty of foam tape to support it! 

Be Yourself

I found this Stamping Bella image and sentiment lurking on the bookshelf the other day, I'd previously stamped it and coloured it I think with the Dreamees' blender pen and their dinky inky ink pads and then abandoned it! 

I rummaged about and found this soft yellow gingham paper in my stash (think it may have been Craftwork Cards) which matched perfectly this left over card from Lidl. I simply trimmed down the image and added some faux stitching to fit on a 6x6 card blank. Originally, this wasn't my intended layout, but I kept messing up my measuring of the yellow card and as I had a limited amount, it evolved into this. The yellow either side of the gingham are actually narrow strips as I didn't have a wide enough strip and I was worried that the paper would sag in the middle if I cut it in half to tuck it either side. Yay, for my new paper trimmer cutting fine strips! Quite pleased with this card, It actually turned out better than my original plan!

You're Mermazing

I had some leftover coloured and fussy cut elements from making my Oceans of Love card last week and thought I'd better use them rather than adding them to the abandoned bits box. 

I painted two backgrounds with pixie powders to create the sea and sand. I stamped a few of the weeds and tiny fish from the MFT Mermazing set and then arranged the rocks, creatures, shells and mermaids on them. I added glamour dust to the mermaids again with a quickie glue pen. On the first card I added one of the sentiments from the set on a fishtail banner. On the second card I used the sentiment die from the Hunkdory Moonstone die in mirridazzle card and inlaid the letters with black card. As I did last time, I trimmed a 5x7 card to fit and added a mirridazzle mat behind the image. Simples!

Sweet Stampin' - Cake!

Saturday already, where is the time going? I'm sure the universe has speeded up! To console us, we have a yummy theme at Sweet Stampin' this week, CAKE! Definitely worth shouting about.

My mojo had gone walkabouts this week (it may have decided to follow the bunny to see if there's a chance of eating that cake), so I made a very simple card with this gorgeous stamp from Lili of the Valley. I brushed water on my Tim Holtz watercolour card cut down yo make a square, and then watercoloured in the sky using by zig clean colour pens scribbled on my glass mat to make a wash. I dried the panel off with my heat tool and then stamped the image in versafine using my MISTI. I then coloured in the image using my zig clean colour pens and paintbrush. I when finished I added the Clearly Besotted sentiment using my MISTI to get a good impression.

I decided to doodle a border, but forgot that the watercolour card slurps up the ink and so my lines ended up thicker than I wanted. Should have used my other pen, oh well, I'll leave it for a day or two and may amputate the border and remount it if it still annoys me. I added a matching border on a 6x6 card base to match. Simples! 

I'm looking forward to seeing all your yummy creations this week, just remember that you need to stamp on your project for it to be considered for our top three. Right, off in search of cake now, did anyone see where that bunny went?

Oceans of love

So, the stash diet this month, is going as well as the actual diet.... This MFT Mermazing stamp set somehow ended up on my door mat. No idea how, honest guv!

I started off by stamping my background on a piece of Tim Holtz watercolour card with black versafine.  I masked off the rock to create a rockier scene. After it had dried, I made a water colour wash with cosmic shimmer pixie powders in teal wash and peacock green and painted the sea. I did the same for the sand using mango blaze, bronze blush and golden mint pixie powders. The pixie powders are similar to brushos, but contain mica and so add a soft shimmer. As I'd painted over my stamping it knocked the black back a little, but I liked how it softened things. Once dry I painted in the rocks and shells, using my zig clean colour pens and a wet paint brush to blend the colours.

I stamped lots of elements from the stamp set on a second sheet of watercolour card, but on the reverse, so it gave me a smoother surface to work on. I then coloured in all the mermaids, fish and shells etc using my zigs and again using a wet paint brush to move the colour. Personally, I find a paintbrush easier to control than a waterbrush when colouring this way. Once dry I fussy cut them all out.

I then arranged them all on my background and glued them in place. The "nemo" fish are cleverly drawn with the position of the eye so that you can turn them to face to other way, without them looking like they have a swim bladder problem and are upside down! I had a tiny speck of orange at the top of my card from the pigment in the pixie powder, but it bugged the heck out of me. I inked up one of the tiny fish stamps in versafine again and stamped over it to hide it. As I said before, the black ink had been knocked back by the wash, and so this one set of three fish was more vivid than the rest. I therefore stamped a few extras on the card to tie it in. I ended up with a few more fish than I intended, but I really liked how it added more depth to the scene. I mounted it on Hunkydory mirridazzle card, amid trimmed down a 5x7 card base to 4 3/4x6 to fit it. Oops, almost forgot to say that I added some glamour dust to the mermaid with a quickie glue pen. A final pic to show some of the shimmer.

Congratulations

I was asked to make a graduation card for an ex-colleague whose daughter is graduating with a degree in town planning. She told me that she had been working in London recently and liked blues and greens. I'd made a card for her other daughter's graduation and she'd commented at the time that Milla wouldn't like anything so flowery.

With those thoughts in mind, I started off by using the Mo Manning graduate with rose digistamp, sizing it to go on an 8x8 card and printing it off on 160gsm paper, and colouring it in with my copics. I then fussy cut it, snipping off the rose that she was holding in her right hand.

I stamped and heat embossed with black embossing powder the sentiment using the MFT Well Connected Alphabet. To add some interest to the background, I inked up the Crafters Workshop 6 inch City Grid stencil with versamark and then pressed it down on the card over the sentiment and then heat embossed it in clear embossing powder. Hopefully Milla will spot the reference! I then repeated this to extend the background, wiping the edge strip of the stencil clean to blend the join more. I knew the join would be covered by the graduate, so I didn't worry too much about it matching perfectly.

As Milla had worked in London, I thought the Joanna Sheen London skyline die would work perfectly. I die cut it out of black card and added it to the top of the card, covering where the stencil stopped. The die was slightly short and so I cut it a second time and then snipped off a bit to complete the skyline, knowing that the join would be behind her head.

I faffed about for a while trying to decide what to put at the bottom of the card, playing with repeating the London skyline, but after discussion with Hubby, decided to use this town scene, part of the Tattered Lace Winter Town set, which was the perfect length. Hubby was also involved in the placement of the graduate. She fitted best where she is, but I was concerned that her feet weren't on the bottom of the card. Hubby pointed out that she was obviously jumping for joy at graduating, so problem solved! 

There was a bit of a gap in the bottom right corner and so I stamped the hat from the TPC Studio graduation set and fussy cut it out. The tassel was on the wrong side though, so I turned the hat over and drew in edge of the hat with a white pen to define it. I assembled the card on a mat of green cardstock and added the graduate on 1mm foam tape to add some more dimension. Simples (sort of)!

The Flower Challenge #10 reminder

We're halfway through our current embossing challenge over at The Flower Challenge and so my teamies and I have created some more inspiration for you.

I used up the leftovers from my original card to make my reminder card. I had some of the card that I'd embossed with the Quilted Flower embossing folder left and so I used this on my 8x8 card, but flipped it over this time so that the debossed side was showing. I used some of the same card that hadn't been embossed above it and added a strip of red card to cover the join.

I still had some of the Stampendous Pretty Poppy flowers and leaves that I'd painted left over and so I arranged these on the card. I added some gunmetal stickles to the centres of the flowers to add some texture. I used an Elizabeth Craft die to cut the sentiment in black and red and then layered them up to give a shadow. Simples really. Don't forget to make flowers the focal point of your image and if you can add our cue card to your post that would great.

Sending Hugs

Yesterday, I was in the mood to do some colouring and so I stamped lots of elements from the Lawn Fawn, Fairy Friends set. I coloured them in with my trusty copics and then, despite having the dies to go with them, I fussy cut them out as I fancied doing something with my hands whilst half watching telly. I know mad, I started regretting my decision when I got the bluebell type flowers! I added glamour dust to their wings with a quickie glue pen.

I found a background I liked in my stash of batch background making. I'd obviously made it with cosmic shimmer pixie powders and a star stencil, but no idea on the details! I trimmed it down to fit on a 7x5 card blank and added a green mat behind it. I stamped the sentiment from Happy Little Stampers Doodled Flowers set in versafine and added the elements around it. To finish I added a doodled border round the panel. It's super sparkly in real life, hopefully this photo gives you an indication of it.

Rescue Me!

So, this is the rescued version of my original card for the Sweet Stampin' challenge. It is more centred top and bottom than it looks in the picture, honest!I used this fun X-cut shadow die fairground set to create my card. Originally, the top layer was the coral pink that is in the middle of my alternative card, but that was where the worst of the paper damage was. 

To rescue the card, I trimmed off the card blank to leave me with the die cut image. I got my craft knife under the sentiment die (a waffle flower one I think) and scrapped it off the card to make it as flat as possible. I recut the top layer in peach card and glued it over the damage coral layer. I'd had to slightly trim the image panel when I rescued it, but cut the new piece to the original size as the edge of the panel had gone a bit wonky with the trimming. This left me with a slight overhang, so I used some foam tape snipped into slivers to support it before gluing it onto a new card base. I recut the sentiment and layered it up twice to give it some strength before adding to the card. No idea how I magic to get a curve on it as it is a straightish die, but hey ho!

The only downside of all this rescuing was that I ended up with a really thick image panel. It was already thick with 5 layers of card, but I think it ended up with about 7 as you can see! Definitely a card to hand deliver.

Butterfly Challenge plus cobweb and tiny spider phobics avoid last pic!

Over at the Butterfly Challenge they want to see keys and/or vermillion. Immediately, I knew what I wanted to do. Apologies, for the rubbish photo, it looks so much better in reality due to all the sparkle and shimmer.

A while ago hubby cut me out some mdf shapes and so I used a heart one for the base of my project. I put some red and topaz starlights paint side by side on my craft mat and dabbed them down the sheet with a piece of cut n dry foam so that I blended the colours side by side on the foam. I then dabbed the foam round the edge of the heart, keeping the topaz side to the edge, so that I ended up with red starlights edged in topaz on the heart. I then filled in the centre with cut n dry foam dipped in the red starlights. Once dry I stamped the sentiment from visible image in the centre in black versafine, once dry I carefully over painted it with black paint to fill in where it hadn't quite stamped due to the texture and to make it pop a little more. 

After leaving it to dry, I stenciled some imagination crafts chartreuse sparkle medium through their trailing vines stencil round the edges. There is more definition to the stencilling that shows on the photo.

To create the butterflies, I played around with several different shades of red card and different glittery embossing powders before settling on this deep pink card. I stamped the butterfly from the Sheena Douglass True Clours stamp set (this was a freebie when Crafters Companion joined Hochanda) in versamark and heat embossed with black twinkle embossing powder. I fussy cut two of the butterflies and trimmed down the wings of one to make it smaller. 

To make the bodies, I went a bit steampunk and cut the two keys from the All Occasions key die set. I layered them up in black card a couple of times to increase their rigidity. I then added some white gold Chameleon Wax (which has a fabulous orange smell) to make them look more like metal. I backed the head of the keys with the deep pink card. I cut the heads off the butterflies and stick them behind the keys so the antenna showed.

I then shaped the wings of the butterflies with my fingers and added them to the heart. A few more photos to hopefully show a bit more detail.

Right, cobweb and spider phobics look away now, this poor spider had set up camp outside my back door and hadn't counted on a glittery crafter living here...

Keep looking away if scared, 

Hide behind the sofa now....

A very glittery web (with my rhubarb lurking in the background!).

Sweet Stampin' - Photo Inspiration

Saturday, so it's time for a new challenge over at Sweet Stampin'  and this week we have some photo inspiration for you.

I used the colours and the flowers as my inspiration. I die cut the Xcut Just For You panel die and mat and layered it up on a 6x6 card blank. I then stamped and heat embossed flowers from Happy Little Stampers Doodle Flowers, and Craftwork Cards Stamp It III and fussy cut them out. I used white embossing powder rather than black ink to keep the soft feel of the photo inspiration. I added a touch of darker colour to the centre of the flowers with my Zig Clean Colour pens and some nuvo glitter drops to the centre of the flowers to finish.

We're looking forward to see what you create this week using the photo inspiration. Just don't do what I did originally... I made my DT card and I'd planned to stamp the sentiment on it as we're a stamping challenge and so need to see stamping on your cards. I couldn't find the stamp I intended to use and scrabbled about in my stash to find an alternative. It was only after I finished the card that I realised I'd used a a die and so there was no stamping on my card. Cue a last minute rush to create a suitable DT card. To add insult to injury, I left the original card on my craft table and didn't notice that my damp Lawn Fawn Stamp Shammy cloth was touching it until it was too late and the card had absorbed the moisture and bleached the colour and buckled the card. Whoops!

The Flower Challenge - Embossing

It's time for our next challenge over at The Flower Challenge and this month we want to see embossing along with your flowers. You can use dry embossing with embossing folders etc or heat embossing or both!

I used the Stampendous Pretty Poppy stamp set to stamp various blooms, leaves and stems on white card from my stash. I'd like to say that I watercoloured them using my gansai tambi paints, but in reality I just slapped paint on! Nothing technical. I felt that the vase in the set was too small and so I used another Stampendous set and used the vase out of that (no idea what the set is called but it has roses, hydrangeas and daisies along with two different vases). I them fussy cut all the elements and worked out an arrangement.

I embossed a piece of grey slightly shimmery card with the Creative Expressions A4 Quilted Flower embossing folder. I trimmed it to fit a 5x7 card blank and added black and red mats behind it. I glued it all into place and ten added gunmetal stickles to the centre of the poppies, patting it with my finger to spread it out and giving it texture. I added glossy accents to the vase and once dry added a second layer and added glamour dust up to the water line in the vase to give the idea of water in the vase.

I hope you all enjoy playing along with us this month, we can't wait to see your creations.

Monday already!

Monday and July! Where is the time going? I hope you all had a lovely weekend. I ended up at the emergency vets at 7.30pm on Saturday as my little Bramble bunny developed gut stasis, which can be fatal. Fortunately, we caught it early and with injections of strong painkillers and gut stimulants, the following morning she was boinging about and eating again. She's still on tummy and pain relief meds for a few days, but she seems back to her normal self. The vet was lovely and don't tell her boss, but only charged me the Saturday consultation rate, rather than the out of hours rate. Of course, I'd happily pay whatever was necessary, but hey, more money for crafting!

On Sunday, Hubby treated me to lunch at the local garden centre (brie, bacon and cranberry panini, yum) and they have a craft section where he bought me an 8x8 paper pad, Travel Notes by First Edition. This sheet of arrow paper in the pad was perfect to team up with one of the left over animals from the freebies from this month's Making Cards magazine. I used one of the Tattered Lace Sahara Labels dies to cut out the aperture in the paper and mounted it on some green card. I cut a fishtail banner out of the same card (although it randomly looks darker in the pic) and stamped the Paper Smooches sentiment before adding it to the card on foam tape. I also added the raccoon with foam tape and gave him googly eyes to finish. Simples!