A few challenges

I wanted to try for a few challenge cards today, but the creative juices weren't at their best sadly...and neither was my photography. I think I do the same thing every time, but sometimes they turn out OK and others...well, not so good.

Anyway this is for the challenge at Case this Sketch and it's almost closing!
Sentiment - Alley Way Stamps, Lady Bugs  Elizabeth Craft Designs Dies. DP Stampin' UP.

The next one is for Dynamic Duos 

I used the sketch layout from Clean and Simple on Sunday!

The colour looks a little vivid here, but in fact are fairly close to those prescribed.
Paper Smooches sentiment and Clearly Besotted butterfly. SU Die cut.

This last one is for the Muse challenge #15. 

On the right is the card I cased fairly closely from Jen Mitchell.

It employs a little home made washi tape a Clearly Besotted butterfly stamped in black and embossed in WOW Silver Pearl , before being die cut.

The sentiment is from Paper Smooches and dry embossing from Cuttlebug(flowers) and Sizzix (music)

Curry Thank You

My son has been doing some out of hours surgeries and the GP he was working with treated him to some curry suppers. He wanted to say thank you in an appropriate way and so asked me to make him a card. I thought about elephants and things like that, but then spotted this stamp amongst my collection and thought it perfect.

It's a stamp from Chocolate Baroque's Indian Elephant set, simply embossed in gold onto black card with a sentiment from Personal Impressions.

Tara (Craftilicious) suggested that I stamp with Turmeric... not quite sure how I'd do that, but it sounds an intriguing idea.

Take a sketch

Jen is such a star at technology stuff and has drawn this super sketch for us at "Less is More" this week

For the first card, I bought the stamp from Rubber Stampede at the NEC for £1. (In fact I think it was part of a deal... 6 stamps for £5) I coloured it with Stampin' Up markers in various shades of purple and green before stamping it and die-cutting the card with a Nestie. 

Whilst still in the die I gently inked the card surrounding the image using sponge daubers and then stamped a  Lavinia stamp of a few tiny stars in gold around the image.

The sentiment is from Hero Arts.

This is a Magenta stamp, coloured in Grey with just one coloured bloom which has been gently twinkled with Glamour Dust.. The sentiment is from Kaisercraft.

Details of these last two cards are on the" Less is More" blog, they were fun to make.

My son just asked me to make a curry themed Thank You card... should be interesting, I wonder what I will  manage to come up with for that one...watch this space!

Cute One Layer

The other day I saw a cute image on someone's blog and so visited the Digi Stamp Boutique to get one for myself. I ended up not only buying the image I had seen, but a few more to go with it, of which this is one.

Hasn't this sheep got the sweetest face!

The Paper Players are requesting a one layer card this week and so here is one!

The sentiment is computer generated.

Just in fun!

I couldn't seem to get a decent picture of this, the sun was casting lots of shadows and in trying to avoid them this is rather an odd shade. Anyway, I used my new stamps from Acid Drops and Whatnots, which are such fun.

This is Algernon, doesn't he look snooty!

I need to have a play with these stamps to get the best use from them, I bought a whole bunch of them from Ally Pally recently. DO check them out!

The cue card at CASology this week is Giggle... and these stamps certainly make me do that!

Flowers for a friend

I was asked to make a whole bunch of cards for a friend as she had rather a lot of significant birthdays to buy cards for.

This one is in fact for a mutual friend, a retired doctor, who like me, loves music... but is also a keen gardener.

I die-cut the flowers using a Crafts Too die, from a piece of card coloured with my squished leaves and flowers technique. I had to use several shims to get enough juice out of the flora to transfer to the card this time.

I twinkled the tulips with a little Glamour Dust.

The computer generated sentiment is on a label from a Stampin' Up die, which was paper pierced using a  Stampin' Up pricking template.

The embossing folder is from Sizzix.

It's for the Addicted to CAS challenge

Back from my Rhine Cruise

We went on a fabulous river cruise up the river Rhine last week, starting in Amsterdam and finishing in Basel. We had a wonderful time and made lots of new acquaintances. The food was amazing and there was an open bar, so this week we're back on a diet before the next sortie!

This is a paper pieced card using a fab set of stamps which I bought at Ally Pally, I can't remember the name of them, although I've a sneaky feeling that they may be Dylusions... I'll have to check with my friend Anne, as she bought the same set. I think they're terrific and are tailor made for this technique.

I used scraps from the drawer for the clothes and also found a little set of There She Goes clear sentiment stamps, which until now had never seen ink.

It's for Dynamic Duos Colour challenge of Grey and Black with the added element of being for a chap.

It's also for the Casual Friday's challenge for a birthday card.

CASe It

At Less is More this week we have a challenge to CASe my and/or Jen's cards. I have made two, using the same technique, in the same layout. This one has a positive theme for breast cancer. 

This one just has a theme of love!

The process involves stamping the same image or images on two separate pieces of card, one of which is die cut and the letters or word is superimposed over the second image, so that the design aligns completely.

These die-cuts are from W Plus 9 dies.

Although I have used a specific technique,  people could use any aspect of the card to make their case.

It will be so interesting to see what everyone comes up with!

Ally Pally

Yesterday may have been a rainy old day, but we had such fun at the craft show at Alexandra Palace.

Here are 4 LIMettes on a lunch break.

L to R

Val (Canonbury Creations) Me, Anne (Stargroves) and Jenny (Crafting in the country)

Sylvie (Gibmiss) was somewhere in the building, but all 5 of us never managed to be in the same place at the same time. There may be a pic of Anne and me with Sylvie, if she emails me a photo!

This is what found its way home with me.

The bag of stamps in the foreground was a £5 grab bag from Rubbernecker stamps. It's such fun to find out what you have bought when the package is opened. One that looked like a clump of seaweed turned out to be a lion with a magnificent mane!

There was a stamp stall of a new company making humorous clear stamps in 1920's  & 1930's style, called Acid Drops and Whatnots. I couldn't resist them, so watch out for some cards using them in the not too distant future!

One layer films!

By the time lots of you read this I shall be on my way to Alexandra Palace to the craft show, where I shall hopefully be meeting some LIMettes also indulging in a little crafty retail therapy!

What fun!
Here are my cards for the "Less is More"challenge this week!

The theme is to be a film and the genre is one layer!

Lots of you know how much I love chickens... especially Penny Black ones and this card is self explanatory of the film title. I could watch it again and again.

This one is 'While you were sleeping'... another of my all time faves, it's such a fun film!

Mo Manning's images are so full of humour!

This was a real quickie... a Digi Stamp Boutique image of a cute little piggy for the film 'Babe',  gently coloured with watercolour pencils and a water brush. The sentiment was computer generated.

I'm really looking forward to seeing what everyone comes up with... I found it a little tricky!

Recycle it

I love the effect of kraft card and so my supplies seem very special to me. This is why, when stamping goes a little awry, I turn over the card and use the other side, as happened here. There was a tiny gap in the line around the label image and so I turned over the card to use the other side before die-cutting it. I don't suppose too many recipients disassemble their cards to find that there is sometimes apparently  random stamping on the back of some elements.

Here Stampin' Up images have been embossed with white detail embossing powder and the sentiment is from a Cuttlebug die.

It's for the Paper Players  recycle challenge and it looks as though I'm just getting in under the wire.

Seize the birthday

Today my back is really sore, maybe I slept awkwardly... I intended going shopping but stayed home and made a card instead. 

Here is the masculine card I made, from the sketch at Seize the birthday. It's an image, sentiment and embossing from Stampin' Up and the woodgrain background stamp is from Impression Obsession.

My husband has gone to watch Hampshire in the first game of the cricket season, and the sun has just come out for him. It's still a bit too chilly for me to go and sit outside all day, maybe when the weather warms up a little I'll go!

Choo Choo!

I was playing around with some Clearly Besotted stamps and this card emerged.

It's such a cute little train and I had to practise stamping accurately onto the die-cut, I'm not sure if there's a real knack to this, but I'm not terribly expert at it I must say.

The paper is from Pink Petticoat and the sentiment from Stampin' Up.

It kinda fits with the challenge from CASology where the theme is travel... well sort of... trains travel don't they... and this is for someone just starting out on the journey of life!

Couple of cards

There's a new blog on the block called Fusion Card Challenge, where there are 2 designs or themes which may be used separately or as the name implies... fused together.

This card is the latter for Challenge#1

I have taken both the sketch and the inspiration colours to make this simple Get Well card.

My zig-zags are somewhat as nature intended and the colours a reference to the flowers in the photo.

My second card follows a fab technique which I saw on the CASe Study challenge.

 There is a superb tutorial to follow here, by the Guest muse JJ Bolton. On looking back I think that this card would have been more effective if the letters had been mounted on dimensionals instead of directly onto the card, which does not give as much relief.

I started simply with just one stamp, but may get a little more adventurous and try something a little more complex in time.

The basic premise is that you stamp an identical image or images onto two separate pieces of card and cut out the sentiment from one piece which is then superimposed onto the other. I guess it wouldn't have to be a sentiment in fact but any image/die-cut could be used in this way.

Here I used Stampin Up's image and Memory Box dies

These were both fun cards to make!

Less is More Colours!

How the weeks roll by and it's time for another colour challenge at "Less is More".

This time it's LIME and BLACK

I really like this combo and I used stamps from the Sponsor for this month which is Stephanie from Clearly Besotted Stamps.

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This is simply a little stamping, a little die-cutting and a lot of mounting. The colours really please me!

More Clearly Besotted stamps here... a fragment from Beethoven's 5th Symphony and a lovely leaf spray. The sentiment is from Hero Arts.

We have been spending a little time at our son's in Bury St Edmunds. Yesterday we visited the Moyse's Hall Museum, something we have intended doing ever since our son moved here after graduating as a medical doctor several years ago. It was a great visit and there were some very interesting exhibits... including a few gruesome ones!

Today a visit to Southwold is planned, it should be fun!

Next Saturday of course, I should be at Ally Pally for the Craft Show. I hope to see some of you there!