Hello there. The builders have gone and I made a card for the both of them – who says a man can’t have a card with flowers on? Not me!
I used the Altenew ‘Antique Roses‘ again – love, love, love them flowers, and I mentioned in a previous post ‘Grey Antique Roses’ that roses are my favourite flowers:
The leaves stamped in the Gentleman Grey inks, and added the background of the Altenew ‘Dotted Swirls Debossing Cover Die‘ for some subtle interest. The sentiment is also Altenew from another stamp set.
I took this photo against one of our flower troughs – I liked the contrast of the flower colours, and here is one without:
Hello there. There is another challenge starting at The Holly and Ivy Christmas Challenge. The them is anything goes as long as it’s Christmas. I took the opportunity to break-out my Polychromos pencils to colour a Poinsettia stamp:
I do have to apologise for the light on the photo – but we’re in the middle of a lot of high winds and rain, so I’ve had to manage with what I have….. :)
I bought this very large poinsettia stamp at a recent craft show, from Sheena Douglass. Now Sheena is someone I have watched and admired for many years – I like her style of stamps, her water-colouring, her designs – I just wish I could emulate even half of what she does.
During the craft show I must have stood and watched her for over an hour, and she has broken out on her own producing a range of stamps, card, and water-colours – a couple of items I have used here.
I began by stamping the image in a red Stazon ink – I wasn’t sure if I was going with water-colours, but in the end I went with the Polychromos pencils. Four or five shades of red to begin with, then realised that the red Stazon gives a good dark impression on the veins of the leaves, so I went with three red colours mainly.
I was considering some green leaves – but love the overall effect of the red…..very much ‘in your face’! This image was die-cut on my Scan’N’Cut – I think I;m getting to grips with it now – it’s still a work in progress, though.
The background is a piece of water-colour card, wet with water, then I dropped some of the green Sheena water-colour ink onto the card – tilted it a little to make it run more, as I wanted a kinda messy background for the poinettia.
The sentiment is from the same stamp set and embossed in silver, and I even added some silver flourishes – from the same stamp set – behind the poinsettia before sticking it to the card.
I do hope you can come and join us for this challenge, and I look forward to seeing your creations in our gallery. :) :)
Hello everyone. More time to craft today, so I have created a card using my new Altenew ‘Antique Roses’ stamp set:
I began by stamping the flowers using Altenew ‘Gentleman’s Gray‘ oval inks, using all four colours for the flowers themselves, then using the black ink for the centre detail. I did the same with the leaf clusters, but these are only three layers, so I used only the lighter three inks.
The background grid is from Waffle Flower, a die I have had for a while, but never used, and cut out of a grey card stock.
The sentiment is from MFT – a very well loved and used stamp set…….
Here is a photo where my actual rose bush is casting a shadow on the card – quite fitting, I think:
The only part of my garden I have anything to do with, and don’t let the gardener anywhere near, is my rose bush and little miniature rose garden. (I let him do all the heavy garden work – but my roses are sacrosanct) These roses smell absolutely gorgeous, especially in direct sunlight where you can catch the aroma just by walking past.
I shall be entering the following challenges: Fusion card challenge – photo colours as inspiration
Hello there. I have had a wonderful crafting day today. The weather outside is very blowy and rainy – the perfect day to craft. The builders aren’t here at the weekend – so a quiet and peaceful time. Hopefully they’ll be finished by Monday……..the bathrooms looking fabulous – if I do say so myself!
Anyhoo – the card I am posting today is for a few challenges I was inspired by, especially as a very, very fast delivery of some of the new Altenew stamp sets from Seven Hills Crafts:
The weather meant I had to take photos indoors, and even though I have a light box and a light tripod – it still doesn’t seem good enough for the photos – so please bear with me.
I used four Catherine Pooler inks as these stamps are quite solid, and I knew I would get a good stamp with those inks.
I played around with the layout until you see what I ended up with – and it’s even a one layer card……..a complete change for me!
There are so many little images in this stamp set, I am sure there are hundreds of ways to make a card with them, but I like how this came out, and even that the sentiment just straddles the image.
Hello there everyone. There is another challenge starting at ABC Christmas Challenge, and this time the letters are ‘P’ for Penguins, ‘Q’ for quarters, and ‘R’ for Reindeer.
Here are my cards for this challenge:
P for Penguins, Q for QuartersR for Reindeer
I was so inspired by this challenge, that I did cards which covered all three letters. I hunted through my MFT stash to come up with the images, and I even enjoyed colouring them! I know – I don’t usually…..
For the first card I used some Distress Oxides and ink blended a background, cutting out four squares as a backdrop for the penguins. The embossing folder is from Sue Wilson. The die-cut sentiment is from Altenew, and stacked with three layers for dimension to match the height of the squares.
For the second card I used the same embossing folder, ink blended – just a little – some of the blue Distress Oxides, but used the de-bossed side, instead of the embossed side.
I hope you can come along and join us this time, I am sure you have something suitable in your stash for at least one of the letters – if not all of them. I look forward to seeing your creations in our gallery. :)
Hello there. Peace and quiet here again today, so I’m making the most of it. I have been swatching some of my inks and have done my Distress Oxides and my Catherine Pooler inks, moving to my Altenew inks – but run out of the little stamp pockets.
They are due to be delivered from Amazon again today – but an email to say they couldn’t access my house – ridiculous. No-one has come near me this afternoon – and I have CCTV to prove it!!!!! This has happened a few times before – I think it’s a Sunday driver who can’t be bothered. I’ve called Amazon – but what can they do about it? Nothing. Zilch. Nada. Sometimes I wonder why I pay for Amazon Prime……….
Now – rant over – over to the card I have made:
I first stamped the Uniko ‘Large Background Tropical Paradise‘ stamp using Altenew ‘Obsidian’ ink – a gorgeous clean and crisp image from this ink. Love it.
Then I die cut the Hero Arts ‘Wood Frame Infinity die‘ out of black card stock to frame to stamp.
Moving on to the flowers, I used Altenew ‘Hibiscus Garden 3D’ die set, cut out of white card with double-sided sticky sheet on the back, then each layer coloured with three tones of reds with my Copics.
Three leaf clusters from that same die set cut of black card, and all put together as you see. with the leaf clusters hanging over the edge of the frame. I do like that look, and have used it before – and bound to do it again, I’m sure.
Hello yet again. I thought I would have time to craft yesterday, but the builders – still working on my bathrooms – were noisy, and my parents came over, so I didn’t have much time. However – today hubby went to golf early, the house was quiet………and here we have what I created in the nice and quiet and peacefulness:
This order of ‘Party Like a Panda‘ from Simon Says Stamp takes less than a week to me – and no added postage or customs…………a lot quicker than my sister in Canada even! I fell in love with this collection from day one and have been waiting for a chance to play with it.
I stamped all the images you see, masking the individual presents, stamping again and again, to create a pile or presents. I used a few favourite Copic combinations to match the colours from a challenge. I like when other people show what colours they have used, so I am trying it here. Is it helpful?
I stacked three rolls of double-sided sticky tape together to use as a container – I think that’s ingenious………….if I do say so myself!
Now for the cutting………….I don’t have the matching die sets. One new purchase is the Brother Scan’n’Cut CM900 at the Doncaster craft show the other week. I was thinking of the newer version with auto-blade, but as a card-maker, I think this machine will be more than suitable – I hope so! My time is spent on YouTube figuring it out – but it’s actually quite simple once you get your head around it…………maybe!!
I was nervous cutting this lot of images out, as I had spent a couple of hours colouring them – but – perfect! I added a little border around each image for some definition, as I knew the Panda would be standing in front of the presents, and I wanted him to stand out a little and not blend into the background.
The only thingI need to do in the future is think about the balloon strings, I must adjust the settings or something because it cut one of them off – so I drew it in.
I also forgot to put the white highlighter marks in initially, but the first photo above is including them – here are some without – and what a difference:
Hell again. There is a new challenge starting st Cardz4Galz, and the theme this time is – Summer Fun…….. I am sure that inspires lots of thoughts and ideas, and there are some great ideas from the Design Team.
I went with a calm and peaceful day, tree swing, chilling atmosphere:
I had forgotten how beautiful the Card-io range of stamps are, until I went to the Doncaster craft show the other weekend and saw their stall. They always have some fabulous samples – of which I have failed to emulate – but came up with this idea for this current challenge. I have linked to one of their pages here – for the uninitiated……….. :)
I first stamped the tree branch, swing, birds, and cat in black, then took another vine stamp and used three of the Altenew inks, using second and third generation stamping too, to create a frame.
There were also some grass stamps there – so I stamped them too…..
I was toying with the idea of ink-blending some colour in the background, or putting a scene in the background – but I like how CAS this is……I may have play with their stamps some more………..
I hope you can join us and show us your ‘Summer Fun’ creations, and I look forward to seeing you in our gallery………. :) :)
loopyloocards 