Friday 29 April 2011

April Showers

I was going through my crafty magazine rack and I came across some freebie papers from HunkDory featuring the Raindrop character. A quick play and I came up with the following:





You might also notice the use of I used one of the backing papers that came with the freebies from Crafters Companion.

I used a Martha Stewart edging punch on the card and some of the backing papers to create the layered effect.

The image is from the Hunkdory freebie and is a simple decoupage image which I edged with peel offs. The sentiment is also edged with peel offs and I have added some buttons because they were on my desk and seemed to fit.

I am entering the card in the following challenges:

Allsorts Challenge week 100 - April Showers.

Crafters Companion - Easter Competition No. 2

With so many Crafters Companion freebies, it only seemed right to make another card.





The card is based on one of the oval toppers. I have die cut a spellbinders oval scallop in copper mirri board. I used one of the backing papers edged with a Martha Stewart punch. I then used my MS punch around the page with some copper textured paper to create the next layer. The base card was edged with peel offs. I made some flowers using spellbinders flower dies from more of the freebie backing paper, coloured with wild honey distressing inks, which I layered together to create the flowers with a red gem in the middle. I also die cut some leaves and coloured them with forest green distress ink.

The card was finished off with some copper ribbon and a Nancy Watt's knot.

Crafters Companion - Easter Competition

Crafters Companion had some gorgeous free downloads over Easter and I couldn't resist having a play.



The card was inspired by the butterfly decoupage. I cut out three haphazard triangles from some of the free backing papers and mounted them on blue holographic card and then cut around with deckle edge scissors. The triangles were mounted on an A5 card made from white centura pearl card.

The decoupage butterfly image was mounted in the centre.

I coloured some gold peel off flowers, added a ribbon and bow and some embellishments to finish.

Saturday 23 April 2011

Less is more - challenge 12 - Off Centre

Its Saturday and time for another Less is More challenge. I think I am a glutton for punishment. However, this week the challenge is a lot less daunting as it is a recipe with the simple instruction - OFF CENTRE.

I have been practising with Flowersoft so I thought I would use some of the flower stalks I created and came up with the following:






A simple recipe: five flower stalks, a pot and a stamped sentiment, all on a square lilac card.

Unfortunately in a moment of madness I put my coffee cup on top when I thought Man U were about to score and turned to look at the TV, but thanks to my lack of ability with the camera you can barely see the mark!

A wedding card

Not surprising that there are few wedding card challenges at the moment. Can't think why? But thought, I may as well have a go and came up with this:


The card is a 6X6 square card to which I have added a red spotted background from Red Hot Bed.

The image came from a My Craft Studio collection, but I forgot to make a note of which one and, of course, I can't find it again. Yes I have too many MCS cds. I created a background for the image using the old faithful denim blue and forest green distress inks from Tim Holtz.

I cut the image out using an oval spellbinders die and then matted onto blue pearlescent card (Crafters Companion) cut using a slightly larger scallop oval die from spellbinders.

The flowers were cut from a sheet of flowers from Red Hot Bed that I have had for ages and so had forgotten about. I layered them up and added a blue flower sequin and gold gem to finish.

I finished off with a peel off sentiment on the same blue pearlescent card, cut around with scallop scissors and edged with silver pen.

I am entering the card in the following challenge:

Crafty Cardmakers - challenge 44 A Royal Wedding.

Speaking Professionally

The challenge this week from Daring Cardmakers is "Speaking Professionally", so I dusted off the Crafters Companion Occupations CD and looked for inspiration and came up with:





The image is a pyramage image of a farmer which I have edged with a gold peel off (not that you can see it in the picture), layered onto brown card which I have then cut with deckel edge scissors and edged with a gold pen (see previous comment about the photo).

The background is printed from the same CD and then cut with my new punch around the page Martha Stewart punch. Oops, been shopping again!

A bit of ribbon, some gems and a peel off sentiment, also on the brown card, cut with the deckel scissors and edged with a gold pen to finish off.

As my dh and his mate from Staffordshire would say "Jobs a good un!".

Sunday 17 April 2011

Easter chick card

Well, since I have all that yellow stuff and since I have to make an easter card...



The base card is a 6"x6" card made from white card stock. I cut out the backgrounds from various yellow paper in the Docrafts goody bag and then coloured the edges with distress inks to make them stand out from one another. I then edged them with peel offs to highlight them more. The circle scallop was edged with glitter since I haven't the patience to put a peel off round all those scallops.

The circle and scallop circle were cut using the trusty spellbinders dies!

The decoupage image is from a freebie cd containing Honey and Hugs characters. The chick (Honey?) is perfect for Easter. I sprayed the decoupage with Crafters Companion spray and shine. Try as I might cannot get a photo of the card that does not glare off the shiny bits.

The eggs were some oval peel offs that I stuck on various buts of paper and cut out and then decorated with peel offs or gems.

The sentiments were from my new Xyron design runner which I cut out with scallop scissors, edged with gold pen and then sprayed with irridescent spray from Crafters Companion.

I am entering the card in the following challenges:

Allsorts Challenge blog - week 99
Daring Cardmakers - Spring Fling

Charisma Cardz Challenge - Pink, Black and Green

Pink, Black and Green - sounds like an awful colour combination doesn't it? But if you look at the wonderful cards made by the Charisma Challenge design team, it is anything but awful. So I thought I would have a go...



The base card is a long piece of A4 white card, folded in half and then trimmed to fit the size of the elements chosen.

In my stash I found a piece of paper that had pink and green on it and used that as my background. The paper was edged with a Martha Steward punch and overstamped with a glitter girls flourish (not sure that shows up on the photo).

I then searched through my stash of Crafters Companion card and found some matching pink and green card. I die cut various circles and scallop circles using spellbinders dies from the pink and green card and some black card. Using a smaller spellbinders die, I then cut three white circles from glossy photo paper.

I stamped three cupcakes from a set of stamps that I got from a magazine (probably Papercraft Essentials or Crafts Beautiful but not sure). I coloured the images with promarkers using the same green/ pink theme.

I stuck everything together, added a sentiment and some ribbon to finish the card.

Saturday 16 April 2011

Less in more - challenge 11

Another Less is More challenge and another difficult one, but it gave me a chance to practice with acetate and try out an idea I had a while ago.

I have a few embossing folders which I sadly neglect but I had thought about trying to emboss on acetate to use as an overlay, so this is what I came up with for the Less is More challenge this week:






The image was stamped onto glossy photo paper and cut out with a spellbinders die. I then embossed a piece of acetate with a pattern and again cut it out with a slightly larger version of the die.

The two pieces are attached to the card using silver brads.




On the same theme, I stamped the image directly onto acetate and used black and then silver embossing powder to fix the image. Again the images were cut out using the same spellbinders die and attached to black and white card respectively with silver brads.

Need to practice that technique a bit more though.

Crafty Cardmakers Challenge - Recipe

When I saw the challenge from Crafty Cardmakers, I knew I had to enter. Why? Because the main colour to use was YELLOW and I still have loads of yellow stuff left over from the Docrafts January goody bag.



The base card is plain white card folded to create an A5 blank. I have overlayered it with a piece of yellow spotted pattern paper from the goody bag which has been edged with a Martha Stewart punch. The card and the paper were edged with faux stitching using a green glittery Sakura pen.

I added some green ribbon and a bow to add a bit of highlight.

The image is a stamp that I found when tidying up my collection. I think it came from the Glitter Girls. I stamped the image on glossy photo paper and coloured it in with promarkers. The green elements are the same green sakura pen that I used for the stitching and I also added some gold sakura pens to the flowers on her hat which you can't see in the photo but is very glittery.

The image is layered onto more yellow paper cut into oval shapes from my Spellbinders sets. The layers were warmed up using Wild Honey distress inks and edged with a gold pen.

Using scraps of the yellow paper, I punched out a lot of small flowers and layered them up to make the smaller flowers. The larger flowers were in the goody bag, to which I added some green glitter as a highlight. In the centre of each flower is a gold gem.

I then punched out some butterflies from more of the scrap paper, sprayed them with Crafters Companion glitter spray and used them to link the flowers and the stamped image together.

The sentiment was made from more scrap paper and using my new Xyron design runner (yes, I have been shopping again...) I printed out the Happy Birthday and then cut the whole thing out with scalloped scissors. The sentiment was edged with a gold pen and stuck on with foam tape.

Crafters Companion Monthly Challenge 11 - Aqua and Brown



The card base is some brown pearlescent card from Crafters Companion. Using some aqua textured paper, also from Crafters Companion, I created two panels which I edged with a Martha Stewart punch. Over the top of the panels I have stuck pieces of ribbon (using the xyron sticker gadget).

The image is a stamp from CC and one of my favourite Popcorn stamps. The 'relax' sentiment is from the same set. The image was stamped onto glossy photo paper and coloured using promarkers. The background to the image was made using distress inks applied with cut and dry foam. I used the same inks to colour the sentiment.

The flowers were made from a My Craft Studio backing paper and various flower digital punches from the MCS program. I cut them out, scrunched them up, coloured them with distress inks, layered them together and then used gold flowersoft to create the centre.

I am entering the card in the Crafters Companion Monthly Challenge 11.

Saturday 9 April 2011

Less is more - challenge 10


The Less is more challenge entry.

Having taken on board the helpful criticisms on challenge 9, I sat down to compose a card for challenge 10. Making a sentiment the focus of a card is not easy. My first attempt was a bit ropey but I think fulfilled the requirements of the challenge. My second attempt was a better card, but was the sentiment the focus of the card or the border edge. A couple more options ended in the recycle bin so I went back to the first attempt and did it again.

This time I decided to use Centura pearlescent card as that would enable me to emboss the ink and make it stand out without the need of a border. I used to sizes of spellbinders dies to create the frame and with lots of masking tape and making sure all white areas of the card were covered up so that my inky fingers didn't leave any unwelcome marks, I added forest green distress inks to the borders using cut and dry foam. The card lets the ink stay wet long enough to add embossing powder (Wow clear holographic). The sentiment from Clarity stamps (one of the first I bought) was embossed with Wow ebony fine embossing powder.

As usual, my camera skills don't seem to be able to show off the embossing to its best effect...

Thought you might also like to see the rejects:

The first attempt...
My favourite???

The rejects...
Inky fingers.

Tuesday 5 April 2011

Bling and sparkles

Two of my favourite ideas for cardmaking!



The card base and the yellow backing paper came from the never ending January goody bag from Docrafts. I haven't even got close to using everything yet.

I have warmed up the edges with wild honey distress ink and punched a border on the bottom using a Martha Stewart edging punch.

The image is from the Penny Black 'wonderful' set. I have coloured the image using glittery Sakura pens. The hedgehog spines are a copper glitter stuck on using a Sakura glue pen. I have edged the image with the same glitter.


The sentiment is from the same PB stamp sheet.

Then I have gone a bit mad with gold gems.

I am entering the card in the Charisma Cardz challenge 9 BLING & SPARKLES.

Less is more - challenge 9

I was playing around with some Clarity stamps as I have various corners. I was practising pattern building when I made a frame. It seemed perfect for the Less is more challenge and so I stamped the frame onto a white A6 card. I added a flower stamp in the centre which I coloured red with a promarker and then glazed.

The sentiment is one of my favourites from the Clarity range.

I really enjoy the Less is more challenge. I have always loved making cards with lots of bits on but now I am learning to make simple cards as well.