Hello

Another week as Guest Designer at Stamp & Fun = Creativity

This time the challenge is to use Grey plus 1 other colour. Here I chose grey and green. The little elephant is a die from The Works and I think he's a real cutie, I believe the leaf that he is holding is from a die set The Works too.

After I had cut him out, I stamped him with a crackle stamp in Versamark to make his skin look a bit crinkly. I coloured the leaf by daubing with Distress Oxide inks.

It would be great if you could join in with the fun too, we'd love to see you there.

 

Merry Christmas

I had some new stamps to play with today and this cheery bear was one of them. He's from MFT and I also availed myself of the set of matching dies. The trees are from a Poppy Stamps set, but I cut those out by hand... the sentiment is from Memory Box and the few tiny stars are from a freebie set.

I simply die cut the hillside, coloured in the images with Copic pens and added a little Glamour Dust. A few of the elements are popped onto foam tape.

Christmas Card Throwdown

The Holly and Ivy challenge - Anything Goes

Christmas with the Cuties - Clean and Simple

Merry Little Christmas - Anything Goes

 

I love you

I had fun messing around making this card this morning. I saw this sketch over at the Paper Players and thought I would have a go.

This cute bunny is by Alexandra Renke and comes with a little three legged stool, but today I thought I would let him have a go on the swing. I found a scrap of wood texture card and used that for the seat. In order to give some perspective I used a die which actually makes one quarter of a frame, I've had it for a long time and have no idea where it came from. It's from a set which makes different sized frames. I merely punched holes in each end and threaded through some twine.

The rectangle is actually dry embossed with clouds etc, but being white on white is scarcely visible!

This bunny reminds me of Anita Jeram's Little Nut Brown Hare in Guess How Much I Love You....hence the sentiment.

The seat and the bunny are stacked.

AAA Cards 

I'm sorry you can't really see the clouds, but I did emboss them!

Addicted to stamps and More

 

Be Merry

I have always enjoyed following a sketch, as long as it is not too cluttered... there are some challenges where more is decidedly more  and that's just not my style. Today I spotted this sketch from 

CAS Colours and Sketches

This one is definitely my style.

I used an svg file from Silhouette, to cut the little penguins, and popped them onto a snowy backdrop with a little Christmassy sentiment. I simply cut the base shapes in black and then the rest in white, colouring the beaks and feet with Copics. I love the embossing folder used for the snow, it's by Sheena Douglass but is sadly no longer available.

ABC Christmas K kids

Merry Little Christmas - Anything Goes
The Holly & the Ivy - Anything Goes

 

Ho Ho Ho

I haven't done much card making for challenges recently, partly due to the fact that I have been doing quite a bit of sewing and partly because I really don't get on with this new version of Blogger! I have had quite a lot of commision cards to make, but I don't often put those on my blog.

This one is my DT card for the challenge at Christmas Craft Creations, where the theme is to make a shaped card. I saw this little chap in the store on the Silhouette site when I was looking for something else and thought he was kinda cute. Once cut out he looked rather flat and so I added some shading the different parts of him, to give him a little more appeal! There was a gap at the top left of the card base which I thought was the perfect place for a 'Ho Ho Ho' so I made those and cut them with my Portrait. The joy of making sentiments using an electronic cutter, is that you can choose the font you think looks most suitable. I usually try to weld the letters together so that adhering them to the card is a much more simple process!

The Holly and the Ivy Christmas Challenge - Anything Goes

 Make My Monday -Christmas in September

Merry Little Christmas - Anything Goes

I hope that everyone is staying safe; these are such strange times. Take care everyone!

 

A touch of purple and more

I think that these images from Jane's Doodles are such fun! Here they were just coloured with purples and cut out, before being gently twinkled and mounted on dimensional pads, then popped onto a card stamped with a Stampendous sentiment. I think my granddaughter would love it!

It fits well with TIME OUT's challenge

... and Seize the Birthday

Clean and Simple of Friday

Black White and one colour

Addicted to CAS 

This simple card was stamped with a Docrafts stamp, which was a gift many moons ago from the lovely Julia Budd (Dunnit) of WOYWW fame. I just coloured it with pencils and blended the colours with a water brush, pure and simple. The sentiment is a composite of two different 

companies, I liked the  script'hello' from a SSS Baby set and the friend from Clearly Besotted.

CASology

Lots of dies

I love this colour combination. It's a mix of inks, card and scrap paper.

I sploshed a little Distress Ink in Pumice stone and Festive berries onto a piece of card before spritzing with water  then die cutting the flowers (by Alexandra Renke) when dry. For the squares, I simply daubed a little Pumice Stone ink randomly onto the card before die cutting.

To compose the card I began by stamping some grunge dots before layering the die cuts over each other and adding a little fine twine bow. The sentiment from Avery Elle was stamped onto a piece of scrap paper/card from the middle of a roll of wrapping paper and embossed in white.

Just Us Girls

 

The Flower Challenge - Anything Goes

I remember from my teaching days the wonderful stories by Barbara Firth  and also by David Bedford about a Big Bear and Little Bear and this stamp set from mama Elephant makes me think of those stories. 

They each love the other to the Moon and Back!

I layered the die cuts and because the bear has a grey outline (Memento London Fog), I decided to add a grey base layer to the stacked word die cuts and offset it slightly so it can just be seen.

Both parts were liberally sprinkled with Glamour Dust. I started off with the bears stamped directly onto the card, but it looked rather out of place against the dimension of the sentiment, so I stamped another and added it on dimensional pads over the first image.

CAS of Friday

Die Cut Words

You're a deer

After the frustrations of this morning, this card was more straightforward.

I chose several challenges to base the design on.

AAA Cards - Could be any of quite a few Christmas songs... I think I'll go with White Christmas

ABC Christmas - R is for Reindeer

Merry Little Christmas  - anything Christmas

The Paper Players

The tree line die is from Memory Box, the elf from Hero Arts and the sentiment and reindeer from MFT

Fantasy

Happy Little Stampers CAS Challenge for November is Fantasy 

My card is really simple, the Unicorn is from Jane's Doodles, coloured with alcohol pens and popped onto dimensional pads.

The sentiment is partly computer generated and partly die-cut.

I make my computer sentiments in Word and if I set the view to 105% on my machine, the size correlates to the exact measurements of an A4 sheet.

I draw a box the size of the card front in order to get the position of the words just where I want them, I then write the words in  text boxes which can be moved anywhere on the page. 

I hold up the cut out sentiment and image against the screen.... (all very technical) and adjust the printed words to where I think they look good. I then make sure that all all the text box lines are removed and print!

Hey Presto!

The font for the sentiment is My Own Topher and the 'Magical' die is from Cutplorations. Sadly I dropped the dot from the i, I'll pop it on when either a) I find it, or b) I've cut another!

Our winner for this challenge will receive a $20 coupon to spend at the shop! Check out all the details HERE.

IF YOU USE STAMPS BY HAPPY LITTLE STAMPERS AND YOU ARE OUR RANDOM WINNER, YOUR PRIZE WILL BE DOUBLED!

Rainbow unicorn

Here is a card for a couple of challenges!

I used the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches

...and the Theme from CAS on SUNDAY/Friday...

which is to use a TAG!

The unicorn is an image from Jane's Doodles, mounted on a backdrop made from strips of coloured card. The sentiment is from Stamplorations.

Quite a change in the weather today...we have some much needed rain and the temperature is much cooler, but my back is feeling a little rheumatic; old age has a lot to answer for!
This is also for the challenge at Seize the Birthday with the topping 'Stripes'!

Over the Rainbow

A little masking, a little daubing with Distress Inks and hey presto a rainbow. The cute little unicorn is from Jane's Doodles, coloured with alcohol markers and twinkled with Glamour dust.

It's for the challenge at AAA Cards

It looks a little as though he's flying over the rainbow.. there is a rainbow stamp in the set, but I didn't want to go over the top of CASness!

To the moon and back

It's time for another Clean and Simple challenge at Happy Little Stampers!

Our winner for this challenge will receive a $20 coupon to spend at the shop! Check out all the details HERE.

IF YOU USE STAMPS BY HAPPY LITTLE STAMPERS AND YOU ARE OUR RANDOM WINNER, YOUR PRIZE WILL BE DOUBLED!

For this card I used an image and I LOVE YOU sentiment from Mama Elephant adding the bit about 'to the moon and back' with the computer.

I coloured the bears with Promarkers, cut them out and popped the image onto dimensional pads.

I stamped a couple of hearts and the moon from the same set and twinkled the latter gently with some Glamour Dust, also popping it onto 3d pads.

Pussy cat

A second card in  one day... what is the world coming to?

This one is for two challenges

                    

Freshly Made Sketches ...                          and Addicted to CAS

The sentiment is from Clearly Besotted and the image,  as many will recognise, is from Penny Black.

I simply cut a couple of tags from MFT pennant dies and embossed one with a Couture Creations embossing folder.

The image was coloured with a variety of alcohol pens. I have various makes of pens and I simply used colours from those sets which hadn't actually dried up.

Down Under

The challenge at Less is More is entitled Down Under this week, as our sponsor this month is Kylie, from Happy Little Stampers who is also the Guest Designer this week.

Here I used a kids copyright free colouring page image for this cute kanga and joey.  It's simply coloured with alcohol pens and surrounded with a simple frame. The sentiment is from Happy Little Stampers

I'm just back from a couple of weeks in Florida and a cruise around the Caribbean and the Bahamas, so it's down to earth again!

 I do apologise if I didn't get around to commenting whilst on my vacation, but I'm sure you'll understand!

One Layer Week at "Less is More"

The theme for one layer week at "Less is More" is SNOW!

I have had such a busy time this week, with lots of engagements singing carols... three times at Manor Farm for their Nativity in the farmyard, one rehearsal on the Isle of Wight plus our normal choir rehearsal for our Christmas concert this evening. Phew!

Here is an emboss resist , with various snowflakes (mainly freebies), stamped in Versamark and clear embossed. The ink was applied with sponge daubers in Bashful Blue and Soft Sky SU ink. A few extra snowflakes were stamped on top of the ink and embossed in silver.

The sentiment is from Butterfly Kisses.

Here are a couple of digi images from Dearie Dolls. They are coloured with Mirage Pens and twinkled with Glamour Dust. I think they're fun!

For this last one I used a Memory Box stencil with Pearlescent White Embossing Paste, again sprinkled with Glamour Dust whilst still wet. In order to get the sentiment to match I did use a die from Clearly Besotted. To be truly one layer I should probably have used the negative of the die cut as a stencil too, but sticking all the loopy bits in was a little daunting and as I've had a busy week, I'm afraid I chickened out! It is also twinkled with Glamour Dust!