Copics

Let’s Celebrate

Hello there. It’s the 100th Challenge at Cardz4Galz, and we want you to come and join us in celebration. In fact – that’s the theme for this challenge – Celebrate.

We’d like to see any of your paper-craft creations which follows this theme. This is my rather colourful and sparkly card:

I used the Mama Elephant Birthday Bash stamp, coloured with a few Copics – some shading, but a fairly restricted colour-scheme. Well – for the actual stamp, anyway.

I used a Catherine Pooler ‘celebrate’ die, and cut it out of gold, then added a drop white shadow, then added a further drop black shadow.

The balloons were coloured with Spectrum Noir Sparkle pens, and then I went overboard creating the background.

I basically wet a piece of water-colour paper, painted on some sparkle pens, and washed it around. Then splattered the same colours. Once dry, I added some ink blending through a Tim Holt stencil to crate a very subtle sun-ray effect – very subtle…..I didn’t want to wipe any of the glitter away.

The edges were die-cut with a Catherine Pooler border die.

So – there we have it. A very bright and sparkly card for celebrating. I hope you can come and join us, and I hope to see you there. :)

I shall also be joining the following challenges:

Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge – make your own background

Crafty Sentiments – bright colours

Inkspirational – use 3 or 5 of something (three bunches balloons)

Santa and a Chimney

Hello again. I have been trying some new techniques on this card, as it is a new challenge at The ABC Christmas Challenge. The themes is/are ‘L’ for Little, and ‘M’ for Masking:

I first stamped the Santa from Crafters Companion ‘Christmas Stamp and metal die set – Santa‘ and then coloured him in Copics. The stamp itself has quite a bit of shading on it, so I just followed those lines – basically – to create some shading. I then stamped him again on some masking paper and fussy cut him out – realising afterwards that the stamp set comes with a die that cuts around him – oh well……hind sight…..!

I masked him off then went hunting for a stencil of roof tops, or chimneys or anything I thought would go as a background, and found my Sheena Douglass stencil from her ‘Remember When‘ set called ‘Big Chimney‘.

I ink blended a couple of Distress Oxides for the chimney and roof top, then thought about the sky area……so then ink blended from a cloud stencil I have from Inkylicious.

I then removed the Santa mask, some more thought about the snow area, and decided to try out my new buy from Hero Arts – the ‘Snow and Froth Technique Kit‘……with heart in my mouth as I had virtually completed the card.

And – it worked:

I didn’t dare do any more snow technique on the rest of the rooftops and chimney, as I felt the card was complete aside from a sentiment, which is a die from Birch Press.

I hope you have time to join us and follow our two themes – either on one card, or even two different cards – one for each letter – and I look forward to seeing your makes in our gallery. :) :)

Wise Owl Graduation

Hello once again. There is a new challenge up at Cardz4Galz, and the new theme is ‘Graduation‘. Here is my card:

This card actually took quite a bit of time to get together. I didn’t think I had anything which in any way meant to be graduation and I did spend a little time thinking about die-cutting a mortar board hat and adding a sentiment – but then didn’t think I had a graduation sentiment……….

So – hunting through my stash I came across this new stamp set from Clearly Besotted – not yet put away from buying the recent release – and saw…….a mortar board hat, and a scroll, and the little owls in the same set I could play with.

I stamped the images, coloured them with Copics, then die cut them. Now to the background……..

I decided to keep this quite simple and used the ‘Polka Dot Plate‘ die from Avery Elle, cut in white card, and placed on a black base card. Then to the sentiment………

and came across the Lawn Fawn stamp set ‘Reveal Wheel Spring Sentiments‘ bought with – you guessed it – the reveal wheel dies………….and there we had a graduation word. I cobbled together the sentiment you see, and stamped onto a black square, heat embossed in white.

I did toy with the idea of putting the square like a diamond, like a mortar board hat, with a little tassel, but went with what you see.

When I placed the images, I even cut into the owl’s hand a little so he could be holding the scroll:

I hope you can come and join us for this ‘Graduation’ themed challenge – the design Team have some fabulous varied inspiration for you. I look forward to seeing you there and seeing what you come up with. :) :)

I shall also be playing along with the following challenges:

Dragonfly Dreams Challenge – anything goes

Colour Crazy Challenge – anything goes colouring

Clean and Simple on Friday – CAS Polka Dots

XOXO Balloons

Hi again. I said I was back from holiday, and here is another card I was able to put together:

I began by stamping the balloons from Clearly Besotted ‘Magical Plushies‘ and colouring them with Copics. I actually stamped the image several times, as I wanted to play around with colours, and this is the one I liked the best.

I didn’t have any shading on the balloons, but decided – for the first time – to use a white gel pen for some highlights. I watched a YouTube video by ‘DrawingWiffWaffles‘ where she reviewed quite a few white gel pens, and then bought the one which came out the best from Amazon. Isn’t it amazing how these white lines change images? I’m definitely going to use this technique again.

I then stamped a cloud image and after playing around with the design, coloured the edges with three different Copics – going from darker to lighter blue. Without this, the cloud kinda got lost in the base card.

The frames is one of the layers from the Reverse Confetti ‘Stitched Note and Frames’ die set, and all three items added to a card base as you see. I wanted it to look like the balloons were floating away with the cloud……

I shall be entered into the following challenges:

CASology – Colour

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge – Stitches (frame and cloud)

AAA Cards – up to one third with optional twist of bright colours

Curious Cats

Hello everyone. It’s time for another challenge at Cardz 4 Galz, and this time it’s a recipe challenge.

We would like to see one focal image, one sentiment, 2 patterned papers, and three embellishments. Here is my card:

and a little close-up:

If you have seen my blog frequently, you will know I don’t use many patterned papers – I just don’t know what to do with them! I am so pleased I joined the Design Team at Cardz 4 Galz, as it makes me experiment, and try doing other things with my card making.

For the focal image, I used a new stamp set to me from Honey Bee Stamps ‘Oh My Whiskers’. You will also surely know by now that I have cats, love cats, and anything to put cats on my cards is always a great idea to me.

I stamped this image and coloured with Copics, trying to get three different coloured cats, then used the matching die to cut it out. I then thought about the sentiment and background papers….

I have no idea where these papers came from – the darker green, and the muted stripey bluey paper – but I liked how they looked together. They are both 12×12 inches, so I could play around adding them to this 7 inch square card base.

As the cats in the bucket looked a little curious, I used a stamp from Honey Bee Stamps ‘Purrrfect Sentiments’ , and then looked to my stash for anything cat related to add as embellishments. I think I bought these metal trinket things at a craft show, they may be for jewelry, and placed the butterfly and bee as though the cats in the bucket were looking at them, and added a separate cat trinket just above the sentiment.

The Design Team has come up some fabulous inspiration – very varied – and I hope you will be able to join us. I look forward to seeing what you create with this recipe.

:):)

Wild animals and orange flower

Hi there. I have a couple of cards to share with you today. The first is inspired by the current challenge at The Rainbow Card Challenge – I am more than stoked that I was the winner for the first challenge :) – with the theme this time being orange:

I used the orange range of inks from Altenew and their ‘Japanese Mum‘ stamp and die set. The green inks are also Altenew, and I am a fan and firm believer in their first green inks release,using them virtually 99% of the time.

The background die is from MFT, the ‘Star Grid Cover Up‘ using some orange card from my stock, and matted and layered as you see. I haven’t added a sentiment………I couldn’t actually think of one or find one that I could put onto this card, without spoiling the look of it…..so I’m going to put a little verse and words on the inside – when I find some I like!

This second card is inspired from the current theme at Cardz 4 Guyz with their current theme being ‘wild animals’:

Well, actually, I made two cards:

As you can see – some wild animals having a group hug – which is what this Waffle Flower stamp set is called – ‘Group Hug‘. They may not look particularly wild to you and me – but I think they will fit into the theme nicely.

I added the hat and sun-glasses to the first image, so a little more masculine slant.

And – you may ask – why orange again? Well – I had just completed the first card above, and had the card stock out, and went a little ‘wild’ with the colours for the animals, and felt these backgrounds suited quite well. Vibrant and colourful – kinda what I was after.

I haven’t put a sentiment on this second card either……working on that one!

I enjoyed colouring this image – to a certain degree. I don’t find colouring particularly relaxing, I don’t enjoy spending oodles of time doing it. I get to a certain stage, then I find I am rushing to get it finished, then I make mistakes which I can’t correct, then get disheartened, then frustrated……….sheesh……walk away from the colouring, Lynda! Walk away!

It seems crafting is a school of learning, constantly learning new techniques, and also the psychology of crafting and card-making? Blinking Heck! I think there should be a degree course – at least – at University for studying that phenomenon!

I hope you’re having a good weekend – or middle of the week if you’re reading this later – and I’ll catch you later. HUGS :)

Robots and Bears

Hi again. I have had a crafting marathon today, and made several cards, inspired by several different challenges.

Here is my first card for the current challenge at CASology, with the cue word being ‘wave’:

I used the new stamp and die set from Heffy Doodle called ‘Bots of Love’ stamped, then coloured with Copics, then die cut. The word is die cut from a spare piece of water-colour card I had from a previous card posting, using the Altenew Bold Alphabet dies. Using this spare piece of water-colour card, meant I matched the colour of the robot – an orange robot? I think it works..

This second card is taking inspiration from the current challenge at The Card Concept and the large red cushion, and the colours of red and grey; using the layout from the current sketch at CAS Colours and Sketches; and the cue word or theme from Inkspirational – ‘Text‘:

The background text heart is stamped in a Simon Says Stamp grey ink using the stamp from Concord and 9th ‘Cuddles and Hugs‘ stamp set – I’ve had this for ages, and never really used it that much, but I think it works for the text in the heart, and as a lovey-dovey background.

The bear is from MFT ‘Joyful Heart Bears’ from Stacey Yacula – again, a stamp and die set I’ve had for a while and never used, coloured with Copics. The sentiment is from Uniko, and their latest release.

This third card is using the same stamp set, again coloured with Copics, with the stripey background another Uniko recent release:

This card will be entering the following challenges:

As You See It Challenge – when I think of simple I think of………..’CAS card’

Addicted to Stamps – anything but a square

It seems I’m on a roll here, so I am sure I will be back soon…….. :)

You have a beautiful heart

I’ve been on a roll today, probably as I won’t be able to post so much next weekend as I have previous things arranged. This time a quick post for the card using the colours from Color Throwdown – black, brown, white – and the theme from Time Out challenges – Loving -:

This flower is one of the freebies when I attended the Altenew day in Daventry last year. It is a three step layer flower and leaves set, but I decided to colour with my Copics because – well – I could!

The outline of the flower was stamped in Gina K amalgam ink, then coloured with four – yes four – brown colours. I’m getting very daring with the Copics, aren’t I?

The leaves were stamped in Versafine black onyx, and the two layers stamped with the Altenew grey inks – the grey is my ‘added’ neutral.

The background is a purchase from Seven Hills Crafts with a couple of gift tokens from my family for Christmas. How lucky am I?

I hope you have a good week, and I’ll catch you all soon. :)

Have a wonderful day

Hello again. I hope you are well. I have had some new deliveries this week, and there is more to come, but some of that is from Simon says Stamp – so I’ve no idea when that will arrive. It takes 2-3 weeks for my sister to get her stuff and she lives in Canada………..I’ll let you know.

I have made a card I would like to share based on the colour scheme from Color Throwdown:

This stamp set is one which arrived yesterday from Crafters Companion, and when I saw it for sale on the website – it kinda just jumped into my basket. I particularly like that you can also die cut the whole image – or either side of it – which is what I did here.

I took me a little time to figure out which part to cut, which part to place under my cutting plates – it looks so much easier when someone else does it!

I coloured the image with yellow and green Copics, die cut one side of it, then stamped a sentiment from a Uniko stamp set.

The black card was embossed using the fabulous We R Memory keepers next level embossing folder, and the whole thing put together as you see.

I thought the white was a little too – well – white, so I added a few black Nuvo drops.

I even managed to get outside and take the photo – even though it’s a little grey and dull. Here is the embossing a little closer:

I shall be entering this card into the following challenges:

Color Throwdown – yellow, green, black, white

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge – something new (stamp set)

Cardz 4 Galz – anything new since Christmas – (stamp set)C

Merry Christmoose

Hello there. Phew – it’s been a busy week. I have made time to practice my Copic colouring, but found I was colouring loads of things – but never making a card. So – here is one I made this evening:

I ink blended a background with three blue colours, and decided not to splatter or splash or change those blues, as I like how clean and almost pure it turned out. This was placed behind the Lawn Fawn backdrop die. The sentiment is from Clearly Besotted ‘Merry Christmoose’ stamp set.

Once I had stamped and Copic coloured the reindeer/moose I die cut them and stuck them down as you see. I only used a couple of colours on these images, as I am still learning about shading etc.

The trees are from MFT ‘Ready, Set, Snow‘ also coloured, die cut, and slotted into the background. This time I used three green colours – gosh…….I’m getting very fancy, aren’t I? :)

I added some sparkle to the tress and to the top of each of the hills, which is slightly showing on the photo – much better in ‘real life’.

The photo was taken in a light box I recently purchased, as I found that being able to take bright pictures at this time of year – winter, UK – is quite difficult. This is the other picture:

This is something else I’m trying to get to grips with – but I think I need a bigger box………..gonna have a look later….

So, what with the light box and colouring, it’s a learning curve at the moment for me. I bought some Copics recently, and am really loving playing with them. I also joined the Kit and Clowder Monthly Colouring Class, and even just playing with the first two lessons – video and work-sheet – I feel I have learned lots about using Copics, and using a light source. 

Here is my practice sheet:

The odd coloured berry at the top is using a different set of reds – not bright enough for me so I changed them……………I don’t think I’ve done too badly with my first lesson…..positive thinking!

I shall be entering the card into the following challenges:

The Alphabet Challenge – ‘R’ for Reindeer

Crazy 4 Challenges – a card that features a tree

Try It On Tuesday  – winter wonderland

Inkspirational challenge – anything Christmas