Just a note

It seems that I have been AWOL from my blog for a while so I thought I should remedy that. Here is a card made using part of a stencil, which I masked and inked with Hickory Smoke Distress Oxide ink. It was applied with a blending brush, using less colour the further up the stencil I went, to give an ombre effect. I added a couple of birds, stacked several times to give definition and a simple sentiment from Personal Impressions. I believe the birds are Memory Box.

CAS on Friday - Stencil

Happy Little Stampers - Anything Goes with Dies

Addicted to CAS - Animals

Christmas WISHES

I was having a little fun with embossing powders for this card. It's a background stamp by Kaisercraft, which I embossed with a mix of Gold and Silver embossing powders. The WISHES is part of an extremely old die whose origin has long since escaped me, the rest of the dies are by Alexandra Renke. I stacked the words three times, but on looking at it I think that I should have used black instead of white card for the lower layers.

I made it with the challenge at CAS Christmas in mind as it requests Silver and Gold!

 

 

Happy Birthday

Today is my friend's birthday and we will be joining her and her husband and another couple to celebrate the occasion over a meal. I will be giving her this card, however it is not the one that I made for her originally as that one has mysteriously disappeared! It must be somewhere hiding in plain sight but I can't find it... if it does reappear it will have to do for next year as I did put her name on it!

For this one I used the foliage, circle and tag die cuts by Alexandra Renke, colouring the leaves with a couple of shades of Distress Oxide inks and then stamping some splatters with one of the colours. The 'happy' is from The Greetery and the 'birthday' from Create a Smile. Both are stacked a few times.

The three ladies concerned in this celebration (Ladies who lunch) will be spending a day closer to Christmas meeting alpacas and doing a wreath making workshop, it's our gift to the birthday girl and should be great fun... but first to celebrate this evening!

The Paper Players

Watercooler Wednesday - All things Feminine

 

Noel

If there's one kind of card that I never tire of making it's Christmas cards, as I know that none will ever be wasted. Some cards which I make for challenges sit in my box of finished cards for years, but Christmas cards always find a home. I seem to send so many each year, for many friends it's my one annual communication with them, so it's important for me. I haven't bought a Christmas card for many years now and I think that the recipients of my cards enjoy the fact that I spent time making them!

This card uses a word die from Florartistry entwined with a couple of holly and ivy die cuts, the origins of which I have long since forgotten! I stacked the NOEL a few times to add a little definition and mounted it on a pierced die cut panel, adding just a few pearls for the holly berries!

ABC Christmas V for Vocabulary

Happy Little Stampers Anything with dies

Merry Little Christmas - Anything Christmas Goes

This one follows the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches

The bauble dies were freebies from a magazine! Tiny tags by Alexandra Renke.

Christmas 24  Simply Snowflakes

 

Sending smiles

Here is another card made from a botanical print.

This is one of two pieces of watercolour paper that I squished a fuchsia flower between,  by running it through my Cuttlebug. You can see where I die cut the pansies (by Alexandra Renke) from this image. I will be able to get quite a few more cards in one guise or another from what is left.

I always think that pansies look as though they are smiling at me so this sentiment by SSS seemed perfect! Both the flowers and the sentiment are stacked three times. I stamped a tiny distressed  background stamp by Stamplorations behind the flowers and tried to match the colour by using Milled Lavender Distress Ink.

For mixed media my card is decidedly simple, stamping for the mini backdrop, plus the squished flowers and die cutting!

The Challenge at CAS Mix Up is still open, so do give it a try!

There are links to all sorts of techniques on the CAS Mix Up Blog!

 

Celebrate

This is a celebratory card for a couple of special occasions. 

The 5th birthday of the The Flower Challenge

and AAA Cards

who are celebrating their 200th game.

CAS on Friday  CIRCLES

I used Memory Box embossing circles, a small background stamp and 'celebrate' die from Stamplorations plus some crocuses by Alexandra Renke. 

I made a puddles of colour on my glass mat with Distress inks and water and flapped the die cut flowers into them, adding a little Wink of Stella when dry. The sentiment was stacked a few times, with one fewer layer under the 'c' where  it overlaps the stems.

 

Sending Smiles

Here I coloured the dies by Alexandra Renke by smooshing them in some Peeled Paint Distress Oxide ink and water on my craft mat. I dabbed the strawberries with a little Festive Berries ink and then spritzed them with water. I cut out the circle in the panel and stamped that with some splatters, then spritzed and when dry, put back into the panel, which is raised on foam tape. The sentiment by SSS was stacked with extra layers under the part which fits into the recess in the panel.

CAS on Friday

CIRCLES

 

Happy Birthday

I simply love this bellflower die from Creative-Depot. Here I stacked it three times and added some Peeled Paint Distress Oxide Ink with a sponge dauber. I used the edge of the dauber to drag some of the colour up to the petals from the stem and then spritzed it with water to diffuse the colour.  The trellis is from a Sizzix die and I stamped a few splatters behind it. I stacked the sentiment and intended having it green, but the colour was much too harsh and so I added another white layer on the top! I like how the green is peeking out!

Craft Rocket - CAS

Simply Create - Monochrome

The Flower Challenge - Use  a Die

 

Merci

Here is another card playing around with my new dies from Simply Graphic. Somehow this didn't workout quite as effectively as I had hoped. I found the juxtaposition of the leaves quite tricky to arrange. I would lay out the pieces until I found an arrangement I liked but by the time I had picked up the pieces to add the adhesives, I couldn't seem to find exactly where I had previously put the leaves.

I made this with two challenges in mind.

Just Us Girls - No Stamping and the sketch from CAS Colours and Sketches 

I found the no stamping bit rather tricky when it came to colouring the leaves. I wanted to add some dots to add interest, for which I would normally use a splatter stamp, so to get around this, I cut a stencil with Sizzix snowstorm die and added the contrast colours through that. They looked a little stark, so as they were distress inks, I spritzed them with water and the colour improved.

For the front panel, firstly I embossed a piece of card with a Cuttlebug folder and then cut it into two, leaving a gap between the pieces.

The dies are from Simply Graphic.

Joy

I think that Christmas cards are my very favourite to make, so here's another, this time inspired by the challenge at ABC Christmas where I have chosen M for Mistletoe.

The foliage die is stacked three times with the top layer coloured with some Rustic Wilderness Distress  Oxide ink, applied with a blending brush. I purposely tried to get an uneven coverage of ink so as to give a more natural appearance. I embossed the inner part of the frame with a retired  Snow EF from Sheena Douglass and added an extra layer to the frame to add definition! The berries are flat backed adhesive pearls. The stem part is stuck to the backdrop but the leaves overhanging the frame are popped onto dimensional pads.

CAS on Friday 

Green

Happy birthday

A bit of fun with dies here. I started with the Mum flower frame by Simon Says Stamp and used a slightly larger die from Presscut to make it a complete frame rather than just an aperture. Using the same Presscut die I cut a square and then embossed it with the flower die to give me an idea where to place the colours of Distress Oxide inks, which I applied with blending brushes.

I then cut out about three more of the outline dies and stacked them. I had part of a sheet of the dotty paper left so decided to use that for the  edge of the card and added a simple birthday sentiment. 

Since last evening one eye has been very sore, there doesn't appear to be anything in it, but hopefully it will sort itself out soon!

It's another for the challenge at Just Us Girls

and CAS on Friday

GREEN

 

Green birthday

I tried a different approach to colouring this die cut by Paper Rose. I use a couple of shades of green watercolour pencils to add random colour to the foliage then then spritzed some water in the air and wafted the die cuts through the mist a few times. It moved the colour just enough, I did add a little Wink of Stella on it afterwards but I was quite pleased with the overall result. I cut three die cuts and stacked them to add a little definition and couldn't resist adding a little spotty paper to comply with the parameters at Just Us Girls

I was lucky enough to have my submission for their last challenge chosen as the winner, which really thrilled me.

Since having a new laptop,  I have tried a few times to print some Pink Petticoat papers, only to have them print just down the edges of the paper rather than the whole sheet of paper. This paper is  from a different source and printed correctly. I can't image why the others didn't print properly, I was about to dig out my old lap top to see if I could still print correctly from that.

CAS on Friday 

GREEN

 

Be Merry

Today I am trapped upstairs until about 4pm whilst the screed on the floor downstairs 'goes off', which probably means that it changes from liquid to solid.. We will be having a new floor through the hall, dining room and kitchen and that will be laid starting tomorrow. Downstairs, there is no way of getting to a loo without going over some of the screeded area, so I'm playing it safe and staying upstairs, with my picnic! We have also got problems with our internet and the Virgin engineer has been around to try to suss out the problem and it seems that during our kitchen refurbishment something untoward happened with the cabling and we need to get a new bit of cabling done... but of course the engineer can no longer get into the kitchen until the screed there has 'gone off'!

Such are the joys!

Anyway here is a card for a couple of challenges.  I used the colours from Fab Friday

and the stash Challenge from 52 Christmas Card Throwdown

I'm not sure of all the makes of the dies etc, I think the bow is from a bra set from MFT, the sentiment I think maybe from Penny Black and I can't remember the origin of the wreath die either. The wood plank stamp is from Impression Obsession.

At least the sun is shining!

 

Noel

I don't often think about making tall or long skinny cards, unless a challenge suggests it, so here is one for the challenge at Christmas Card Throwdown.

I used a tree from Artemio and stamped it many times in my stamping platform, adding several colours of Distress inks for each stamping. The sentiment is from a Sizzix die stacked with 4 layers.

CASology

Merry Little Christmas

Anything Christmas Goes

ABC Christmas F- Fir Trees

Christmas Kickstart. Green Christmas

My kitchen is so near completion... however, I'm dreading having to move a lot of heavy furniture out of the way for a new floor in the dining room, hall and kitchen.

photos of the completed work will be coming soon I hope!

Colour Challenge

I think that Christmas cards are my absolute favourite kind of card to make, probably because they all get used, whereas some which I make for challenges, never quite have the appropriate recipient and so they sit in boxes forever... just waiting!

Here is a really simple card for the challenge at Christmas Card Throwdown

I was intrigued by the colour combo and set about looking through my stash for ideas. I came across this ridged grey card and so started from there. I wanted the white to be a snowflake and so I needed to add some rose gold. I cut a square and embossed it many times with a mix of Copper and Gold embossing powders, the finished colour IRL is really rather nice. 

I ummed and ahhed about whether or not to add a sentiment and decided in the end to leave it as is.

Hopefully the Covid restrictions should start to be eased as more and more people are vaccinated. I have heard that sometimes there is a reaction to the second dose even is the first was symptom free, I should be getting my second next month, so fingers crossed that all goes well!

Stay safe everyone.