gems

Friendly Pink Flowers

Hello everyone. Cardz 4 Galz has started a new challenge. This time the host is Billie A, and she has chosen the theme of :

add pink flowers

Here is my card:

I first stamped the Altenew images then used the matching layering stencils to colour them in. I added slightly more ink towards the centre of the flowers and the base of the leaves to create more dimension, die cutting them with the matching die set. This set also has an embossing folder to add details to the florals, but I didn’t use that this time.

To highlight the florals and the colours, I chose to use a mid grey coloured card stock, and embossed using an older We R Memory Keepers 3D embossing folder with the basket weave pattern.

The sentiment is gold foiled, and some gold gems were also added.

I hope you can come and join us with your creations following our theme.

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Triple B – birds and/or blooms and/or butterflies

Lil Patch of Crafty Friends – anything goes

Ellibelle’s Corner Garden Party – anything in or from the garden

Beautiful Blossoms – florals anything goes – optional mood board

For Someone Special

Here is a card using items from the list provided by Festive Friday:

I chose to use the elements of silver, white, and rhinestones.

For this I used a new product from Waffle Flower Crafts – the ‘Happy Chevrons’ die. I first cut it out of white card, then silver glitter card, snipping the two edges so I could alternate the white with the silver.

I then started by placing the top white piece flat to a piece of card, adding the silver with 3D foam to raise the image and create some dimension, and on downwards to fill the panel.

This was then layered with another piece of silver glitter card, then attached to a card base, the gems added, and then the foiled sentiment.

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Festive Friday – 3 items from the list – silver, white, rhinestones

Time Out – all that glitters

Die Cut Divas – die cuts and something new

Craft Rocket – something new

Purple Flowers

Hello yet again. When I didn’t have access to the internet last week for quite a few days I spent a lot of time crafting, and luckily had been able to access a few challenge pages on my phone whilst out and about.

This card was inspired by the current challenge at Pinspirational:

Here is the inspiration photo:

As soon as I saw all the purple and blue tones, I knew I wanted to make flowers, and this Concord & 9th set seemed perfect to me – large and bold flowers to go with the large and bold colours.

This die set is from their 2025 Winter Retreat and has a stitched background to enable you to match the layout they provide -but you know I went my own way with this….

I die cut flowers and foliage from card stock from Concord & 9th, Spellbinders and others from my stash.

I ink blended the larger flowers a little in the centre of each layer then glued them together. I did the same with the light blue die cuts – just a little extra interest.

The background panel is light grey, and I also used another of the products received for that same virtual event – the ‘Double Card Front‘ which adds some stitched lines. This creates stitched lines onto an A2 panel, but as this card is 5 x 7 inch, I did have to play around with the stitched die a little, some partial die cutting, so I could lengthen it to fill the whole size.

Once this stitched panel was adhered, I then played around with the layout, adding the flowers first with 3D foam, then adding each of the leaves and extra small flowers with glue and 3D foam as I felt was needed.

The final steps were to add the foiled sentiment and gems:

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Pinspirational – colour board

Triple B – birds and/or butterflies and/or blooms

Love To Craft – anything goes

Tulip Birthday

I have a card to share inspired by the current challenge at Festive Friday. When I saw their them was National Tulip Day, and aw the list to choose three items from the list, I remembered I had this die and stencil set from Waffle Flower that I have never used – time to play:

The first step was to die cut the panel, and then ink blend using the matching stencil set. I chose to use orange and yellow for the flowers, two colours from the provided list, but then I also added a backing piece of red paper which you can see behind the die cut panel.

Once all attached to a card base, I stamped and die cut the birthday sentiment – another item from the list – and adhered as you see.

I wanted the sentiment to be quite bold, which is why I chose black, so I also added some black enamel dots.

Quite a bright and cheery card to help get over this snow hump we are having in the UK at the moment. xx

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Festive Friday – at least three items from inspiration list – orange, yellow, red, birthday, tulips,

Lil Patch Of Crafty Friends – anything goes

Black & White Christmas

Hello again. The ABC Christmas Challenge has reached the end of the alphabet, and therefore this challenge is for the letters ‘Y’ and ‘Z’. The Christmas themes for these letters are:

Y is for Yummy (food) and Z is for Zebra (black & white or stripes)

Here is my card:

I obviously followed the black and white Christmas theme, creating what I think is quite a dramatic card.

I took an A2 panel and stamped some Gina K Designs snowflakes on a random pattern all over it, then cut it down slightly and matting with a piece of black card to create the edge.

The black banner/label for the centre is from The Greetery, and the die cuts out this filigree frame – but I decided I wanted all the details of the frame to stay in place, so I placed them all back in and applied some double sided tape to the back – keeping them secure.

The sentiment was stamped, then die cut with the matching die.

The final touch was to add some black gems to the snowflake centres, and a couple of smaller gems in some of the white spaces.

I hope you can come and join us for our final challenge of the year with your Christmas creations following one or both of our themes. xx

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Cupcake Inspirations – let it snow

Merry Little Christmas Challenge – anything goes Christmas

Addicted to Stamps & More – Christmas

Fab ‘n’ Funky – Christmas

Peace On Earth – anything goes Christmas

Lil Patch Of Crafty Friends – anything goes

Poinsettia Season’s Greetings

Hello again. It is time for the new challenge at The Holly & Ivy Christmas Challenge. The theme is always ‘anything goes Christmas‘. Here is my card:

I wanted a dramatic and different look for this die card, with a lot of dimension.

The background panel is a piece of black shimmery card stock, and dry embossed using a Spellbinders embossing folder.

The main image is a Pinkfresh Studio die and layering stencil set, and as the background was black and dramatic, I also went with a different colour scheme.

The layering stencils were ink blended using Pinkfresh Studio inks, then die cut with the macthing die set. I added a couple more layers to the flower image, then attached to the black embossed panel.

I also added gold gems to the centre of the flowers as they are my favourite embellishments to use, and there is rarely a card I make without some sort of gem or jewel around it somewhere. I feel they add a certain interest and detail which doesn’t take over the card.

The sentiment is gold foiled.

I hope you can come and join us with your creations following our Christmas theme.

I shall be entering the following challenges:

As You Like It – favourite embellishment – gems/jewels/enamel dots

Stencil Fun – stencils – option to use some gold taken

Craft Rocket – Christmas/Winter

Triple B – birds and/or butterflies and/or blooms

Beautiful Blossoms – florals – optional mood board

Build Me A Snowman

Hello again. Caz is hosting the new challenge at Cardz 4 Galz, and she has chosen the theme of:

Build Me A Snowman

Here is my card:

I wanted to try out the die set from The Greetery I had for a while, and finally managed to obtain a few of the honeycomb additions.

The snowman was die cut and assembled, then the honeycomb added. I used small black gems for the eyes. These honeycomb elements are fun, but I definitely have to hand this to the recipient…….

The background blue was embossed using a Spellbinders embossing folder, the silver foiled panel was created by using a background toner panel – I think from Picket Fence Studio, but I may be wrong there. It’s the first time I’ve used the toner panels with my Gina K Fuse machine – how quick and easy is that? I did have to watch one of her YouTube videos just to make sure I had the correct heat setting, but I did play with several panels on this machine and therefore have a few on hand for future projects.

I cut the snowflake foiled panel with a Pinkfresh Studio die, and cut the centre out – the snowman kinda got lost without die cutting that centre out.

No sentiment, I think it’s pretty clear what time of year this is meant for….

I hope you can come and join us with your projects following our theme. xx

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Addicted To Stamps & More – die cuts and/or stencils

12 Months of Christmas Link-Up – Christmas – option of sleigh not taken

Christmas Bingo – column O – no stamping – free – gems

Love To Craft – anything goes

Merry Little Christmas Challenge – anything goes Christmas

Greetings For This Holiday Season

I have another card to share after being in my craft room for a few hours yesterday – can you tell hubby has been away for a few days? Lots of crafty play time…..

I used quite a few Spellbinder products to create this card, but the skates are from Memory Box.

The card itself is a larger 5×7 inch as I knew I wanted to get more on it than usual.

For the colour scheme, I wanted a teal for the skates, and red for the cardinal and flowers, so I searched through my colour cubes to see what background colour would work with those colours. There were serval darker options, but I wanted a lighter background,

The background panel is a piece of sage card stock, cut slightly smaller that the card base to add a white border, bringing in some of the white on the other elements. This panel was then embossed using a Spellbinders embossing folder.

I then set to die cutting all the things

The memory box skates were die cut using teal, white, and silver card stock, then layered together. I stitched red twine through the holes for the laces, then set them aside.

The sled was die cut in silver and white, then glued together, before turning to the flowers, foliage and the bird.

I used a combination of glue, 3D foam, and small pieces of spare card to attach all the elements, playing with the arrangement a few times.

The final addition was the sentiment, layered a couple of times for stability, then gold gems added to the centre of the poinsettia.

A lot of die cutting, but that is actually my favourite way to create.

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Ally’s Angels – anything goes

Peace On Earth – anything goes Christmas

Die Cut Divas – die cuts and critters

A Cut Above – anything goes with die cuts

Triple B – birds and/or butterflies and/or blooms

Christmas (Or Not) Bingo – column O – no stamping – free – pearls/gems/enamel dots

Merry Little Christmas Challenge – anything goes Christmas

Snow & Wreath

Hello everyone. I have a card to share that I have been procrastinating over for the past few days. I finally managed to decide on how I wanted the wreath to look:

The starting point for my card was the top row of the current challenge at Tic Tac Toe – wreath – foliage/leaves – stencil.

The background is using a Simon Hurley stencil received from a recent virtual event, and also using his Unicorn Horn Lunar Paste. Whilst this panel was drying, I searched through the CML app for foliage, branches, leaves, poinsettia and holly, and picked out three or four of the Spellbinders die sets I have.

I used a few shades of green for the foliage, a brown for the branch dies, red for the poinsettia layers, and I used silver glitter card for the holly leaves. Once all die cut, and the back panel was dry, I created a circle frame using some nesting circle dies and stuck that down, so I had something to follow when arranging all the elemnts.

The branches and leaves were glued down – just the tips so there was movement and dimension, then the poinsettias attached with a little circle of 3D foam, the holly leaves added lastly.

Silver gems were glued to the centre of the flowers, then the silver foiled sentiment from Lawn Fawn – stacked a couple of times – was glued down to the bottom of the card.

Lots of glitter and shine on this card, and I’m so pleased I actually managed to finish it…

I shall be entering the following challenges:

Tic Tac Toe – top row – wreath – foliage/leaves – stencil

Die Cut Divas – anything goes with die cuts

A Cut Above – anything goes with die cuts

12 Months of Christmas Link-up – anything goes Christmas – option of snowfall taken

Crafters Café – anything goes – option of Christmas taken

Making Spirits Bright

Hello everyone. The Holly & Ivy Christmas Challenge has started a new challenge – anything goes Christmas. Here is my card:

There’s a lot of glitter and shine with this card, and I’ll try and show you on the following pictures.

To begin, I started with the Pinkfresh Studio ‘Whispers of Poinsettia’ die and stencil set. I started by using the stencil and ink blended all the layers with different coloured inks, then used the matching die to cut it out.

To add more drama, I used a black panel and cut to an A2 card base size, then used another Pinkfresh die set to cut the frame out of black, and used an embossing folder for the cut out portion of the frame. The poinsettia panel was also die cut with the larger of the frame dies, placed behind the frame, the black embossed panel added behind, and then I added some splatters that with some gold shimmery acrylic paint from Liquitex.

When I say ‘some’ splatters – I kinda went to town with it….

A gold glitter card stock panel was cut, and all the layers added with wet glue.