A Cat and a Frog……

Hi there. A second posting today with a couple of CAS one layer cards. When I was typing the title – it seemed like it was the beginning of a joke – ‘A cat and a frog walked into a bar……….

Anyhoo, here are my CAS cards:

For the first card I stamped a couple of cocktail glasses onto Lawn Fawn ‘Vanilla Malt’ card stock, added the frog, speech bubble and sentiment as you see, colouring the frog in three different light green Copics – dotting instead of actual colouring, to maintain a CAS style.

For the cat card, I stamped the stack of cups from Clearly Besotted, masked the top cup, then stamped the kitten in the cup. So – the masking of the top cup – I forgot to mask off the back of the top cup – so I created stripes on that solid cup to cover the mistake……….

Coloured with Copics, just the two colours for the mugs/sups, a couple of greys for the cat, then added the Honey Bee stamps sentiment underneath.

I shall be entering the frog card into the following challenges:

Simply Less Is More – one layer card with theme ‘cheers’

2 Crafty Critter Crazies – anything goes critters

I shall be entering the cat card into the following challenges:

Festive Friday Challenge – 3 from the inspo list (cat, pet sentiment, CAS)

Crafty Animals Challenge – anything goes with animals

A B C Christmas Challenge ‘U’ and ‘V’….

Hello everyone. A new challenge has begun at ABC Christmas Challenge. Julie is the host for this month’s letters – ‘U’ for Up In The Air, and ‘V’ for Vixen. Julie has also provided a prize for the winner – so please head on over and join us.

These are my cards:

The Penguin swinging in the air on a string of lights is a digital image from Whimsy Stamps, printed, then coloured with Copics.

I had a play with using the ‘N’ greys in Copics, and had even more playtime with the lights. I had a go at trying to create a glow around the lights – following (kinda) instructions from a Kit and Clowder class last year.

I used three colours of red and three yellows – then went around the outside of the colours with the colour-less blender to give an impression of a glow:

The sentiment is from Avery Elle ‘Bring On The Joy’, the striped frame is using a Hero Arts die set, and I think the striped paper is from Stampin Up – though I may be wrong.

For the second card – the reindeer card – I used a digital stamp from Bugaboo, printed then coloured with Copics, adding glossy accents to the eyes.

Using the same striped paper, I also cut a green layer from Altenew gradient card-stock. I thought it looked a little plain, so I searched through the Color My Life app for ‘holly’ and came across a stamp set from Clearly Besotted which had this holly stamp and die.

I stamped four times, coloured with Copics, die-cut, then stuck down in the top corners as you see, also adding Spectrum Noir clear sparkle to the berries.

Two cards made using digital images – I am finding these quite easy to use, and at a fraction of the cost of polymer or rubber stamps – I tend to look for these now when a theme comes up for my DT cards and when I can’t find anything in my stash to match, or which inspires me.

I hope you can come and join us, getting your Christmas stash well on the way, maybe winning the prize from Julie – but I would also love to see your creations in our gallery. xx

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Reindeer card:

Colour Crazy Challenge – anything goes colouring

2 Crafty Critter Crazies – anything goes with critters

Merry Little Christmas Challenge – anything goes Christmas

Penguin card:

Creative Fingers Challenge – anything goes

Crafty Animals Challenge – anything goes with animals

Christmas Blog Challenge – Christmas and Penguins

SPREAD THE MERRY LITTLE LOVE AND GRAB A BADGE!

Floral Circles

Hi there. I have a CAS card to share today, which actually took quite a bit of sorting out – where to place the circles, do I layer them on top of anything? How on earth do I stick down the little pieces themselves?

I came up with this:

And then I came up with this with the negative pieces:

I’m not sure I like the strip of embossed card under the circles, but I had already stuck it down – which is why I went with fiddling with the negative pieces to create the second card – thank goodness I had saved them to one side and not binned them straight away!

I used a couple of images from the Pink fresh Studio die set, and cut them out after I had coloured an area for each circle with a red, orange, and purple Copic.

The first card is sticking those main die-cuts onto a circle stitched piece of card before putting together as you see. I toyed with the idea of putting the circles on the left side, then the right side, and decided the middle was the best way to show-case these die cuts.

The second card was a little more taxing……

I cut the images again out of white card, then stuck that onto the circles, then inlaid all the coloured piece from the first card.

But – can you see the little itty bitty piece on the red leaf? Well – that went walk-about. That little bitty piece flew away – goodness knows where to…. I was tempted to colour that little hole with the red marker – but I would have totally messed it up! So I left it as it was – did you notice before I told you? Hmmmm….

For a sentiment – I decided not to put one on the front of the card. I am making cards currently for ‘just because’ reasons, just to send out, for no particular occasion – just so I can write a little note to pop inside – that’s when I’m not creating cards for DT challenges anyway…..

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Color Throwdown – orange, red, purple

Cut It Up Challenge – make a card and include die cuts

Gold and Cream Thank You

Hello there. I hope everyone is keeping well. I had a crafty Zoom meeting yesterday with my Stampin Up Demonstrator – just chatting and crafting – and I’ve yet to complete a card from that.

I have, however, made a another card I would like to share with you today:

Using the colour scheme from Colour Hues Challenge, I made the layer on the white card base just slightly smaller, and embossed it with a Crafters Companion embossing folder.

On another strip of cream card, I stamped and heat embossed some leafy images from Altenew ‘Freeform Greenery‘ using Altenew gold embossing powder.

The strips either side of the sentiment are also embossed using that same gold powder, this time on a strip of double-sided sticky tape. I heat embossed these strips twice to get a smoother appearance.

The sentiment is from a new Stampin Up stamp set – just kinda sitting there on my desk – stamped, heat embossed, then used a tag punch for the end of it.

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge – anything goes

CAS(E) This Sketch – sketch

Just Add Ink – thank you

Color Hues Color Challenge – gold and cream

Poinsettia Christmas Tree

Hello. A new challenge has begun at The Holly and Ivy Christmas Challenge. The theme is always ‘anything goes Christmas‘, Here is my card:

I decided gto go CAS with this card as I think the poinsettia tree can stand on it’s own.

This is a stamp set from Stampin Up, two layers – one for the leaves, and one for the flowers – such a cute image when stamped, I think……there is also a little tree trunk to add to the bottom of it.

CAS and one layer card – well – maybe I’m getting the hang of these now! Finally!

I used the Concord & 9th ink cubes – very vibrant colours in this set – I’m glad I managed to get them when they first arrived here in the UK – I seem to be using them a lot!

I can’t remember where the sentiment came from – I’ve tidied my desk since then :)

I hope you can come and join us. xx

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Merry Little Christmas Challenge – anything goes Christmas

12 Months Of Christmas Challenge – Christmas and a sentiment

Crafty Hazelnuts Christmas Challenge – anything goes Christmas

Crimbo Crackers – anything goes Christmas

AAA Cards – CAS one layer card option of coffee – not taken

Please feel free to copy to your sidebar

Let’s Hang Out…..

Hello there. A new challenge is beginning at The Alphabet Challenge. We have reached the letter ‘M’ and Meg has chosen the theme of anything beginning with the letter ‘M’ – here is my card:

I think my ‘M’ is quite obvious – using these Clearly Besotted Monkeys on my slimline card.

The monkeys themselves were stamped with Gina K amalgam ink, then coloured with Copics. I knew I wanted a three window slimline card – so I could get as many og these little monkeys in at once, and then turned to thinking about the background of those circles.

I thought about ink blending, then remembered this scene stamp – also from Clearly Besotted, so I stamped it twice, then coloured with Copics, then die-cutting with a stitched circle in a different area of each scene I had stamped for some variety behind each monkey.

The third circle is using a branch from the same stamp set so I could have the monkey swinging from it, again coloured with Copics.

The sentiment is from the same stamp set – using some stamp surgery to cut it apart – something I actually don’t have a problem with – though the first few times I did that I was a little nervous – not any more!

I hope you can come and join us with your ‘M’ themed creations, and I look forward to seeing you in our gallery. xx

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Crafty Calendar Challenge – anything goes

Crafters Castle Challenge – anything goes

Creative Fingers Challenge – anything goes

Colour Crazy Challenge – anything goes colouring

Cardz 4 Galz One Layer

Hello there everyone. A new challenge is beginning at Cardz 4 Galz. Dawn S. has chosen the theme – One Layer Card.…… Here is my card:

I went very CAS here only using a couple of stamps. The flower border is from Clearly Besotted, stamped using Gina K amalgam ink, then coloured with Copics. The sentiment is from the same stamp set.

As this is one layer, I used the thicker Neenah card-stock so it would stand on it’s own. I have found in the past that I don’t like using Copics on this card, but as these images were quite small, and didn’t need much blending – I am pleased with how it turned out.

I hope you can come and join us with your ‘one layer cards’ – whether you go CAS or ‘full-on’ – I hope to see you in our gallery. xx

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Daisy Chain Challenge – CAS

Aud Sentiments – anything goes with a sentiment

Colour Crazy Challenge – anything goes with colouring

AAA cards Challenge – CAS up to one third with option woodland animals

Layered Faux Stained Glass Flower

Hello there. I hope you are all well.

I have been trying out a new technique – well, I tried it once 18 months ago and liked the effect – so I thought I’d give it a go again…..forgetting how much work and waiting time has to go into this technique.

Here is my card:

This card took me a couple of days – mainly because of the waiting time, but also because I wasn’t quite sure where I was going with it…..

I knew I wanted to do the faux stained glass technique using this die from Pink Fresh Studio, but this time I cut the die out if white card stock several times, stuck two layers onto a piece of grey card, inlaid the flower and leaf cut-outs – yep – that was challenging to find the right ones for the right spaces….then coloured the petals with cool grey Copics and a couple of green Copics.

Then I added glossy accents to the flower petals only – waited until the next day for that to dry – then added a black die cut as a frame on the top.

Phew – this took a lot of fiddling, I must say……

So – the grey behind the flowers and leaves is the base layer, then a couple of frames of white, inlaid white pieces, Copic colouring, glossy accents, then a black layer……..I think you can see the different layers and the shine from the glossy accents on these last two pictures.

The sentiment was added as you see and there we have it.

I think it may well be another 18 months before I do this again……

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Color Throwdown – grey, Kraft, Green, White

Lil Red Wagon – nature – flora or fauna

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge – no stamps

Time Out Challenge – Adventurous

Twofer Trees

Hi there. I’ve been trying some new techniques in my craft room, but have also had time to create a couple of CAS cards for the current challenge at Twofer Card Challenge. These are my cards:

The aim of the game at Twofer is to create two different designs for two different occasions using the same stamps/dies and/or stencils. The current challenge prompt is ‘TREES’.

I used one of the trees from Altenew ‘Moments In Time‘ stamp set. The first is stamping with tree to create and edge or border, and adding a stamped and die cut ‘awesome‘ from Altenew ‘Super Script‘ in the same colour card stock.

The second card is using the same tree with a sentiment added – clean and simple and one layer.

The tree images on both cards were stamped using Concord & 9th ink, and the banner for the turquoise card is also Concord & 9th card stock.

Even though these now look quite simple – it took me ages to actually plan what colours to use, and where to stamp the images – absolutely ages. It takes me longer for these kinds of cards than ones with more images and layers……………..

So – these two cards for the current challenge at Twofer.

Christmas Cardinals

Hello there. A new challenge is beginning at The Holly and Ivy Christmas Challenge – the theme is – as always – anything goes as long as it’s Christmas or festive related. Here is my card:

I decided to use a pre-coloured image from Jan’s Digis. I don’t think I’ve used a pre-coloured image before, and it took a lot of research to enable me to manipulate the images, background and sentiment – layering them, bringing some to the front, some to the back, then getting mixed up in what the heck I was doing!

It must have took me longer to do all that than if I’d coloured the image myself – but I like what I managed to achieve here.

The sentiment is also from Jan’s digis, and I decided to add a blue background – again using ‘Word’ manipulation – but leaving the bottom open – just like snow.

It definitely took me more than 2 hours, but once I had printed and die-cut the rectangle – I was away.

I added some coloured layers as you see – and I also added some glitter pen to the snow, and created some glittery snow drifts on the bottom.

I hope doing things like this gets easier…………

I was going to leave the card at that, but I felt it needed a little more, so I used Stampin Up ‘Poinsettia Petals‘ to add a poinsettia and some leaves, then some clear Stickles to the centre. The ink must not have been dry, so the stickles took on the red colour – quite liking that effect.

Anyhoo – I hope you can come and join us. I’m looking forward to seeing you in our gallery. xx

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Trimmies Craft Challenge – Christmas

12 Months of Christmas Challenge – Christmas and a sentiment

Jan’s Digi’s Challenge – anything goes

Watercooler Challenge – occasions

Make My Monday Challenge – Christmas