All kinds of wonderful….

Hi there. I have created another card to share with you today:

I began by stamping the Altenew sunflowers in the yellow inks, with one of the colours being a mustard shade – I think!, then adding brown – as an added neutral – for the centre of the flowers.

The leaves were stamped in navy blue – just using the solid leaves and not the layering leaves. All these were cut with my scan’n’cut. (I did have to adjust the blade a little as the card I used was thicker – but I managed to sort it out….thank goodness!)

I then took the Honey Bee Hexagon cover plate dies, cut one layer in navy blue card, the second layer in a cream card, and the third layer in a coral card, and placing all as you see.

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Color Throwdown – navy, mustard, coral, cream

Time Out Challenges – words inspiration (sun for the sunflower)

INTAAS – layer it up

Color Throwdown

TIME OUT Challenges

Simply a Beautiful day

Hello yet again. The painter has finished, the builders left a couple of weeks ago – I have my house back. Now trying to sort things out, including looking through my crafty stash – possibly to sell on – yet to be decided.

Here is a card I created yesterday – quite a clean and simple card, yet I feel quite effective:

I stamped the tree from Honey Bee Stamps – Birds and the Bees – and added some extra leaves in some places, then stamped the bee hive and several of the bees.

All these coloured with Copics – simple colouring, just a couple of shades of each colour.

The sentiment if from Altenew – Birch Land – and this stamp set has quite a few lovely sentiments which I must use more…………

A quick update about dad – still waiting to plan his funeral as he died in Germany – the international death certificate etc – but he is in UK now, so is mum, and my sister has come over from Canada to stay with her for a while…..definitely until after the funeral – which may not be for another 2-3 weeks. We just carry on, don’t we………….?

This is probably the reason why my sentiments over the past couple of weeks have been more generic, more of wishing people well….

I shall be entering the following challenges:

CAS Colours and Sketches – Garden Green, Soft Suede, Pumpkin Pie – trying to Copic match.

Crafty Sentiments Designs – anything goes

water-cooler Challenges – feminine

Colour Crazy Challenge – anything goes

Blue Bouquet

Hi there. I’ve been doing some water-colouring with the Arteza Real Brush Pens – one of those products I thought I’d try………..and loving the colours:

I first stamped the Waffle Flower Bouquet Builder 5 and embossed with gold, then took 4 or 5 of the blue Arteza pens and played around……. I also tried with black embossing, and white embossing – just so I could try the pens out and play around – but I liked the gold embossing the best.

I used the Waffle Flower micro grid as a background again, but this time left all the little squares inside – I only lost one of them (which is behind the flower), and then framed this with the Hero Arts Infinity Wood frame largest rectangle.

The sentiment is from Mama Elephant and stuck to the bottom of the card base.

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Crafting Happiness Challenges – blue

Addicted to Stamps and More – make your mark

A Bit More Time To Craft – anything goes

The Flower Challenge – anything goes with flowers

Sparkle and Texture Christmas

Hi there. A new challenge has started at ABC Christmas Challenge. The letters this time are ‘S’ for Sparkle, and ‘T’ for Texture. Here is my take:

I die cut the Stamps By Me Bauble outline of of green shiny card, then the actual bauble inside from Crafters Companion glitter card, adhering them together.

The white piece of card is embossed using the We R Memory Keepers Next Level embossing folder called ‘Gemstone’. I liked the ‘fractured’ look of this folder, almost like ice crystals, I think.

The whole card is 5×7 inches, a size and shape I like to work with quite regularly.

The Altenew die-cut sentiment put to keep the card quite clean and simple. I was toying with the idea of putting some red on the berries, but I like this green look for the card, and adding another colour didn’t seem right.

I hope you can come and join us for this challenge, and I look forward to seeing your creations. Feel free to pop along to the challenge and see the other amazing creations from the Design Team. :) :)

Challenges I shall be entering:

Crafty Hazel nuts Christmas Challenge – atg Christmas with option of something beginning with ‘S’ (sparkle)

Simply Less Is More – CAS metallics

2 Sisters on the Blog – something beginning with ‘S’ (Sparkle)

Merry Little Christmas Challenge – atg Christmas

Copic Coloured Ocean Scene

My intensive therapy crafting continues, and here I have a card to share for several challenges:

This is the first time I’ve attempted a background using Copic markers, and chose 3 or 4 colours for the sea, the sand, and the rocks – just basically playing around with colour and shadow. I didn’t mask anything off – just went for it.

The fishes, crabs, whale and octopus are all from the stamp sets listed to the side, using bright and vibrant colours for a cheerful looking card – just what I need currently.

I used my Scan’n’cut to cut all the little images out, which makes things so much easier and quicker, instead of putting each individual die on each stamp – and if you have stamped multiple of the same image – going through the die-cutting machine again, and again, and again.

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Colour Crazy Challenge – anything goes

Daring Cardmakers – underwater life

Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge – ‘S’ is for……starfish, sea-weed, shellabrate…..

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge – anything goes

Addicted to Stamps – anything goes

Coloured Vellum Strip

A quick post today, for the new challenge beginning at Cardz 4 Galz. The theme this time is to use vellum on your project – lots of choices of where to go with this, and I look forward to seeing your creations:

I used The Ton ‘Fab Day Peony‘ stamp set on some Lawn Fawn vellum – heat embossing with gold, coloured the back of the images with the colours you see, die cut the edges with Lawn Fawn ‘Stitched Scalloped Borders‘, and stuck down.

I’m trying to keep my Design Team duties and responsibilities going, and crafting is helping me get through losing my dad a few days ago – very therapeutic and healing to create – it is helping me deal with things – but my blog posts will be a little shorter than usual.

I shall be entering the following challenges:

INTAAS – flowers

Happy Little Stampers – CAS only one third

Color Throwdown – orange, pink, yellow, green

Allsorts Challenge – feminine

Red and Sparkly Christmas

Hi there. There is a new challenge starting at The Holly and Ivy Christmas Challenge. The theme is anything goes – as long as it’s Christmas. I went with a very sparkly background to my deer and other small images:

It seemed very strange taking the photo when it was very hot and sunny outside, but I could get some of the sparkle in the photo quite easily.

This card actually took me quite a while to make, and took quite a lot of thought behind the placement of the images, but the main thought process was the actual frame!

I didn’t think about the frame initially – I really should have done. These images are actually cut from a design on my Scan’n’cut – resized of course. The actual design is about 12 inches square…….until I had a play.

It was a little fiddly – some double-sided sticky sheet onto a white card base, then each of these individual pieces stuck painstakingly down – piece by piece – with the sheet sticking to my arm, my craft mat, my pricking tool, my pick-up tool…….finally I figured out that the backing to the double-sided sheet could be used to cover the part not being worked on! Doh!

Anyhoo – each piece added, then some Cosmic Shimmer glitter pressed into the sheet – obviously it didn’t stick to the die-cut elements. Then to the frame……

I don’t have any rectangle dies the shape of this card – which is why I should have thought of that first! I used my ‘O’ level maths – only 40 years ago!! – and managed to use the Misti cut-a-line, a blade, and figured it out. Then I embossed the frame for some more detail.

Gosh this card was challenging!

I hope you can come and join us for this challenge – I look forward to seeing what you create. :) :)

Challenges I shall be entering:

Crafters Castle – atg

Simon says Stamp Monday Challenge – ‘S’ is for – (Sparkle)

Crafty Hazelnuts Christmas Challenge – Christmas with option of embossing

Meadow Motifs

Hi everyone. A very short post for this card for a few of challenges. Therapy crafting today:

and one with a cat in the background – because I could:

The stamped images coloured with Copics, then die-cut and arranged as you see.
Challenges I shall be entering:

Color Throwdown – purple, blue, turquoise, yellow

Happy Little Stampers CAS challenge – use only one third

AAA Cards – CAS along the edge

Craft Rocket Challenges – atg

Funky Floral Hello

Hello. I’ve been doing some more crafting – and yes – despite all the die cutting from the other day – I did more for this card:

I used the colours from the current challenge at CAS Colours and Sketches to colour the white die-cuts from using the Tim Holtz/Sizzix Funky Floral 3 die set. This time, I forgot to use double sided sticky tape on the back, so the flowers are constructed with glue – not my favourite way of sticking little bits together – but I was patient…..kinda!

I used the Hero Arts ‘Wood Grain Infinity dies‘ again to create the frames so I could mimic the current sketch at Freshly Made Sketches

A little close-up of the flowers and frames:

The sentiment is from Altenew, and I also used the teeny tiny dimensionals I received recently behind the frames – a little dimension. The flowers aren’t completely stuck down – I do like to create some movement when using flowers like these, and so I tend to tuck them inside a frame like this, or just stick the stalks into some 3D glue behind other images.

I even took a photo – slightly dark I’m afraid – against some flowers which almost seemed to match the colours:

As well as the flower colour, and the photos with my garden in the background – there is a lot of green around at the moment. We have had quite a bit of rain, and I am looking forward to the promised sunshine and warmer temperatures for this Bank Holiday weekend in the UK.

The challenges I shall be entering are:

CAS Colours and Sketches – Gorgeous Grape, Crushed Curry, Highland Heather (attempted matching with Copics)

Freshly Made Sketches – sketch

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge – CAS

Try It On Tuesday – In my garden is…….

Also – I’m trying to link photos from challenges to their challenge site – and not just write down the challenge and theme etc …..can you let me know if it does or doesn’t work? I’m playing a little here………. :) :)

CAS Colours & Sketches

Freshly Made Sketches

Try It On Tuesday

Simon Wednesday Challenge Blog

You’re Amazing…..

Hello again. After working the past few days, I have found time to craft, and played with the new Altenew ‘Polish Papercuts 3D die‘. There are a lot of dies in this set, for layering and creating many different lay-outs, and it is indeed a labour of love to cut them out time and again – it took a while……especially when using more than one colour card:

I die cut all of them with card double-sided sticky sheets – that way I could use every nook and cranny on the piece of card, and they would be easier to stick together than using wet glue – I always get into a mess using glue with such small die-cuts.

I played around with the lay-out and moved things around, changed the layers sometimes too, until I came to this design.

I am thinking of doing this using just one colour – maybe white, or even black and white – I think that would look stunning too………..if I can push myself to do all that die-cutting again!

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Hand Stamped Sentiments – Pretty Peacock, Cherry Cobbler, Soft Suede

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge – CAS

INTAAS – flowers