The final front ear!

Good morning, if you are looking for my Cards und More post please click here.

As it's Tuesday it means a new challenge at Cardz4Guyz, where we hope to show you that making cards for the men in your life is easier than you think!

This week our theme is-

FLIGHT

That's quite a broad topic so where will you go?

I went with this as my card.

I looked through my stash for something to do with flight but couldn't find much other than a few cigarette style card images. I've wanted to try the technique for making galaxies for a while, (you will find a link on the technique tab) so thought this the perfect opportunity. I also wanted to use another greeting from my STAMPlorations Noteworthy set. To make the rocket I used some scraps of card and a few dies and punches plus a freehand flame section! The small stars and text were embossed in white after the panel was made and the whole panel was mounted onto a black base card.

So whether your card is of aircraft, balloons, birds or as mine is space we'd love to see them.

For more inspiration pop over to the blog to check out the rest of the DT's inspiration.

I would like to join in the fun at -

Loves Rubberstamps - Use at least 2 dies (at least 3 and the same number of punches!)

Another Baby Card

Good morning, I hope I find you well.

Double post Tuesday again. First out of the trap is a new challenge at Cards und More. Our latest theme is:-

BABY

I seem to be making a few of those recently!

Anyhow as my teddy from the STAMPlorations hop was still out I thought I would use it here.

A very simple design. 

White card panel with tag shape cut out but not removed before embossing with a Cuttlebug folder. 

The teddy was coloured with Copics, matching the ribbon to the base card, then fussy cut and shaped with an embossing tool to give it some depth. Greeting from the same set and some ribbon from the stash. Panel mounted on pads over a pink base card, tag at an angle and that's it!

Pop over to the main blog and check out the rest of the DT's inspiration, then why not join us.

I would like to join in at-

It's Recipe Week

 include

a TAG

 

Thanks for stopping by, see you in an hour for the latest challenge at Cardz4Guyz.

Distressed Butterfly Panel

Good morning all.

Well that was great while it lasted, the weather that is! Back to normal temps and a bit of rain.

Today marks the start of a new challenge at Fantasy Stampers. This time our theme is -

DISTRESS IT

Now that's not really my comfort zone so while Googling for inspiration some of the results referred to Distressed Inks and they are my comfort zone so that's how I ended up with this -

I'd seen the card over at Muse by Marion Vagg and loved it and wanted to take part as I've not got around to playing for a couple of weeks. This is her inspirational card-

To start I inked up a piece of card with a couple of DIs, then die cut the butterfly with a MB Pippi Butterfly then cut the panel with my MFT pierced rectangle die. I added a spritz of water and a few drops of water to bleach out some colour then stamped Thank You and embossed in white.

The background panel was stamped using my Stampin Up Woodgrain background with Versamark then heat embossed with detail white. I wanted the butterfly to be more of a contrast to the panel so wet it with water, let it stand and then mopped up the excess colour with a cloth. I added a few sequins to finish my card.

So what ever your interpretation of Distress why not have a go and join us. Just remember we need to see some traditional stamping on your project, NO DIGIs. 

Pop over to the main blog and check out the rest of the team's inspiration.

I would also like to join in the fun at -

CASology- Ombre

Thanks for calling around and all your supportive comments.

Tag it

Good afternoon crafters.

Today I'm back to share a tag I made as GD for the team over at Tag You're it!
I was top pick a while ago, so Tracey asked if I would like to be GD for this week, so here I am and here is my take on this week's tag,

and this is my and your inspiration.

I love the colours on this and the white embossing of the seed heads. It reminded me of a walk through the fields with Max the other day, blue skies, new grass waving in the soft breeze, and butterflies skimming the tops. So that's where I went with my tag. 

I stamped the grasses in Versamark then embossed them using white ep. When cool I inked the background with DIs to get an ombre effect and over stamped the tag using the same grass stamp from Woodware in Mowed Lawn DI, it gives a bit more depth. I inked up my Kaisercraft butterfly and roses stamp and cut out the 3 butterflies and coloured them with Copics to look like the butterflies I saw on the walk, well as near as damn!

The 'thank' was stamped and embossed in white and the 'You' is die cut.

OK, that's about it. Thanks for the Tag it crew for asking me to be their GD.

I'd like to  join in the fun at -

Uniko - Things with wings

STAMPlorations April Blog Hop day 4

Welcome to day 4 of the April Blog Hop to celebrate the launch of these new stamps

Today we are focusing on -

HEAVEN SENT

Aren't the images just too cute?

Here is my card using the teddy and some of the words. It's up to you how you put the phrases together as they mix an match.

I used a pretty yellow colour scheme so it could be for either a boy or a girl. 

I started by cutting the panel using my MFT Sun Ray die in white then again in an assortment of yellow DPs from the scrap box. I then reassembled the diecuts and glued them onto a yellow base card. The teddy was stamped and then coloured with Copics and die cut using a MFT stitched circle and mounted on a Spellbinders Lacey Circle in white. The greeting was stamped along one of the rays in black. Voila!

Check out what the rest of the team made! You'll find links to all our projects here.

Stops on the hop:

                                                                           Darnell - Guest Designer

Cornelia

Deepti

                                                    You are here - Julie -  Me

Maria

Monika

Shery

Shirley

Vicki

Wei Wei

 Comment on this post and the rest of the team's blogs for a chance to win one of the prizes. Commenting closes on April 27. Winners will be announced on April 29.

Prizes:

• FIVE (5) commenters randomly drawn from the designers' blogs will each win a $10 gift certificate.
• ONE (1) commenter randomly drawn from the STAMPlorations blog will win a $25 gift certificate
• + surprise prizes 

What's your excuse for not joining in?

I'd like to join the fun at -

(PIN)spirational Challenges

Due Date

Thanks for popping around and for your supportive comments. 

Blog Hop Day 3

Welcome back STAMPloration followers to day 3 of the April release blog hop. Today the team are show casing the NOTEWORTHY set.

When trying to come up with a suitable design I wanted to make the words the focus, so for my first card I kept the stamping down to that. The words 'Remember the good times' brought a sympathy card to mind.

I splodged a few spots of colour using watered down Marvey marker in eggplant onto white card then added some stems and foliage with another w/c marker and a bit of DI using a fine brush. The same DI was sponged into the square after the panel was embossed with a Spellbinders Fleur de Lys square die but before the die was removed. I'd seen something using this idea of the embossed die ages ago but not sure of the link, my apologies. I stamped the sentiment in Memento Grey Flannel. The mauve mount was plain white edged in eggplant using a water brush.

My second card is a total opposite to the first. It's very blousey in it's colouring. I was trying something different, sploshing the colour on  very loosely and a bit messy, I tend to be too controlled sometimes!

This time the sentiment echoes the bright vibrant colours of the coloured panel in this one-layer card. In the end I had to sharpen up the design with an inlaid die cut frame!

Here is the actual set with the rest of the sentiments.

NOTEWORTHY

The card for my Sketch #32 post also shows one of the new sentiments. (here)
OK, that's about from me for today.

Comment on this post and the rest of the team's blogs for a chance to win one of the prizes. Commenting closes on April 27. Winners will be announced on April 29.

Check out what the rest of the team made! You'll find links to all our projects here.

Stops on the hop:

Darnell - Guest Designer

Becca

Cornelia

Deepti

You are here     Julie - Me                

Maria

Monika

Shery

Shirley

Vicki

Prizes:

• FIVE (5) commenters randomly drawn from the designers' blogs will each win a $10 gift certificate.
• ONE (1) commenter randomly drawn from the STAMPlorations blog will win a $25 gift certificate
• + surprise prizes 

Thanks for calling by, see you tomorrow for more STAMPlorations inspiration.

I'd like to join the fun at

Creative Insprations - Anything Goes (Daisy card)

Paper Players - Watercolour CAS ( Daisy)

Curtain Call  (Sympathy)

Up up and away

Good night, good morning, good evening, good afternoon, depending where you are!

Hope I find you fine and dandy.

This is a late night post from me to announce the latest challenge at ATSM and to show you my DT card.

This week our theme is 

ANYTHING GOES

and we are sponsored by -

who are offering 4 digis fro their store for the winner.

Anything goes is a great theme if you are entering a challenge but a bit more difficult to come up with an idea when you're not, so I went in search of a few challenges as inspiration.

At Less is More the theme is Up up and away and the one at CAS-Colours and Sketches is colour week. So that was my starting off point.

If you are a regular reader you may realise that I love die cuts and love trying new techniques, so I got out my NEBUS Avery Elle Happy die and MFT Balloon Stax set and had a play.

I die cut the happy out of the white panel then from plum, turquoise and rose card reassembling them slightly off center so that a little bit of each colour shows, it creates a nice shadow effect. The balloon I cut from more card then stamped a few tiny stars in the same colours then tied a piece of linen thread to the bottom of the balloon and joined it up to the side of the 'h'. I stamped the birthday in the space between the h and p, job done. 

So why not pop over to the main blog and check out the rest of the DT's fab inspiration and then join in.

I would like to join in at -

 

Up up and away

Thanks for calling around see you back soon. :)

Footy

Good morning crafters, I hope I find you well.

The sun has been blazing the last couple of days and looks set fair for the next couple of days.

The footy season is coming to a close around these parts, my team hopefully will be in the division 1 playoffs, fingers crossed for a Wembley win this year.

So rather appropriately the theme for this week's challenge at Cardz4Guyz is-

FOOTBALL CRAZY

So anything to do with soccer or American football is OK with us.

I went straight to my LOTV stamps for this card, choosing very appropriately - Football Crazy.

Another of their stamps that is no longer stocked. :(

I must admit I went a little ball crazy with this design using that part of the stamp to create my own DP and added embellishments. This will go into the stock of cards for Ben's parties. Nich will hate the colour way but husband will be more tolerant!
I used the latest sketch over at Sketch Saturday for the layout.

I coloured the little chap using Copics and added some grass for him to play on! The stripey DP is NitWits, sentiment Woodware and '5' MFT little numbers.

OK, that's about it. Pop over and check out the rest of the DT and GDs for more inspiration then join in.

I would also like to join in at -

(Hope number in the singular will be OK. Loving the new look)

Cutie Pie Challenge - All about the boys

Allsorts - Quick and Easy Does it

Thanks for calling around, come back soon. :)

Sketch #32

Good afternoon and welcome. 

It's time for a new sketch challenge at STAMPlorations. Here is my card -

and here is the sketch -

I had quite a few ideas for this challenge but eventually went for a card influenced by the challenge over at Fusion and a card made by my teamie from ATSM, Sarah. It was the colours in the photo that caught my eye with the cerise silvery mirror and blue. I must admit I added a few other colours for the flowers but the central panel and stenciled background are definitely cerise!

I started off by inking the Shutters stencil from ARTplorations with Picked Raspberry then I turned to the flower element. I used Eclectic florals to stamp using DIs and then softened the edges with a paintbrush and some water, dragging the colour into the petals. When dry I fussy cut them and shaped them using an embossing tool and some foam. I die cut the swirl of green using a Marianne die and stamped two butterflies in blue using the Trendy Butterflies set. The sunshine and warmer weather has brought out a whole range of butterflies around here so I had to include some!

For the central panel I used a polaroid frame like Sarah's card instead of a circular aperture I was going to use. I inked the central panel with the same Picked Raspberry then did some water stamping with some more of the butterfly set to give it some depth and embossed the greeting from the new Noteworthy set in silver.

I inked up the edges of a slightly larger panel in Picked Raspberry to mount the top panel on, it does help if you haven't got matching cardstock, then onto a white base card.

Don't forget you can use stamps by other companies in projects that you enter to our challenges but we ask that you please not use our challenges for the sole purpose of promoting another stamp company if you are a design team member of that company. If you have our stamps and/or stencils in your stash, we'd be tickled if you use them!

As usual Shery is offering the following prizes:-

Winner

(voted by the design team)

prize: 2 stamp sets (3" by 5") if you use STAMPlorations stamps, 1 stamp set if you don't

+ guest designer spot in a Sketch Challenge

Top picks

prize: 3 digi stamps 

+ the option to be a guest designer too in a Sketch Challenge if you will use  STAMPlorations digi stamp (to be provided )OR if you already have STAMPlorations clear stamps

All winners and top picks will receive a personalized guest designer badge that they can display on their blogs, as well as a STAMPlorations guest designer watermark.

Frequent Players Spotlight. Play in all 3 challenges for the month for entries to the random draw. Prize is always going to be a stamp and stencil pack valued at $10.

So no excuses to have a go and join us.

Pop over to the DT's blogs for more inspiration and info on their designs and check out our fab GDs.

Suchi GD

Robyn GD

 Coni  GD

Becca DT

Laura Jane DT

Sari DT

Shery DT

Tenia DT

Wei Wei DT

I would like to join in the fun at -

As you like it Challenge - Alcohol markers or Distress Inks

DIs are great if you want a softer effect for your image, I use them especially for flowers.

Thanks for calling around, see you back soon. :)

Sweet

Afternoon bloggers. Hope the sun is shining where you are today, just as it is here.

It was a tad chilly when I took hubster to a farm sale of machinery but by the time he got back at lunch it was gorgeous. The cheque book stayed firmly in his pocket as the things he wanted went for more than he was willing to pay!

Anyway while he was out I finished my card for this week's CASology challenge.

I'd been thinking about this and so many ideas came to mind but as usual too many ideas means I can't settle on one! Then I saw these donuts on the odds n ends pile, which I was going to use on a project way back but never did so I stamped some text from the same STAMPlorations 'Sugar Rush' set embossed in white then washed over with DI Picked Raspberry, sort of candyfloss colour, and you can't get sweeter than that!

I shall also join in a JUGS as their challenge is brown, white and one other colour!

My extra is pink!

Thanks for popping round. 

Splatter

Evening folks.

An extra post this week 'cos I've not gone to my craft class with Di as we are still at home, hubster has a bad back so didn't want to drive over. :(

Anyway I had a little crafty time after my Daughter and Grandson went home after a lovely visit earlier today. I think they took the sunny weather back with them as it is now rather dull and a little chilly. Log burner and a bit of telly later I think!

Anyhow here is the card I made after they left.

I made it with a couple of challenges in mind. 

I'd thought about the card I would do for Less is More's challenge this week but wasn't sure about the colours I was going to use until I saw the photo over at Card Concept. I'm not sure which of their categories it fits into, I always struggle to say. Anyway it's CAS and it's a one layer card. I was influenced by the chevrons and the bright pink splashes of colour as well as the black and grey upholstery.

I stamped a butterfly in black then masked and inked some splatters in Picked Raspberry DI through a Tim Holtz stencil. I then wanted to suggest the chevrons so I made a stencil using diecuts and added some Fun Flock and Weathered Wood DI. 

OK, I suppose I better go and see what the dog is barking at!

Thanks for stopping by,

Joining in at -

One Layer week - Splatters

Jungle Fever

Good morning fellow crafters, I hope I find you well.

As it's Tuesday it must mean a new challenge over at Cardz4Guyz. This week we would like to see your masculine projects on the theme of -

EXOTIC/JUNGLE WILDLIFE

Now again that rather stumped me but never one to be defeated I had a trawl through my stash and came up with a few ideas. I must admit that a challenge is a good springboard for my card design but this time the ideas wouldn't come together so looking at my paper stash I came across some jungle paper from Nancy Watts in an old Making Cards mag. The digi stamps I had in mind didn't really work so rather than buy more I thought about punch art and came up with this.

I made the giraffe using various die cuts and punched shapes from some scrap card which I inked around the edges with Vintage Photo DI and then pinched a few googly eyes from my Grandson's craft box in the kitchen. I did buy him some to replace them!

The foliage was cut with dies and punches from the leftover DP and arranged on a die cut panel of off-white textured card floating around on the desk. and then stuck to the base of khaki coloured card. 

Die cut circles were cut from the top panel and DP and mounted on foam pads after the giraffe was arranged peeking through the gap. The circular greeting from Molly Bloom was stamped in Versafine Olympia Green and mounted on a slightly larger circle of khaki card.

OK that's about it, pop over to the main site to check out what the rest of the team have been up to and then why not join us this week.

I would like to join in at the following challenges -

Simply Create Too - No Digis or Stamped images

Sweet Stampin' Challenge - Children's Cards

(PIN)spirational Challenge - Anything Goes

Thanks for stopping by and if you left a message thanks again.

Kraft CAS

Good morning, I hope I find you well this Saturday morning.

Today marks a new challenge over at Fantasy Stampers. For this challenge we would like to see your creations that are:-

CAS - Clean and Simple

Yippee, my favourite style, no added extras, minimal embellishments and no frills! We just need to see some good old fashioned stamping on your creation.

So without further ado here is my card -

I went a little out of my comfort zone with this creation as I don't usually use kraft as a base but the challenge over at CASual Fridays is to weld kraft with flowers and twine.

I die cut a panel of kraft with my MFT pierced rectangles and then stamped and masked the daisies from STAMPlorations with Versafine Onyx Black. 

I used white w/c pencils to colour the petals and added shading with a black one and a little bit of softening with a w/c brush. The daisy centers were coloured with the same set in yellow, orange and brown then softened with water and a brush. Where necessary I added a little white gel pen to brighten up the petals. The twine was added to the base card along with a stamped label from LOTV and the panel mounted on a bright yellow piece of card then mounted on the base with pads.

So that's about it. Check out the rest of the DT's inspiration and join us for the next two weeks.

I would like to join in the following challenges:-

Loves Rubberstamps - Anything Goes

Mainly Black

Hi, and welcome to my late night post to show you my card for the latest challenge over at ATSM.

This week our theme is -

CAS

and here is my card

I made this with one or two challenges in mind as well as this week's sponsor which is -

Shery is offering a $10 gift certificate to the winner.

Over at Time Out they are Casing a card by Kim Makortoff and this is Kim's card.

I took out some black card and thought straight away of the challenge at Less is More, which is 'Predominately Black' so that was my starting point.

I stamped and then heat embossed in white on vellum some flowers from STAMPlorations Eclectic Florals set and from SU Stippled Blossoms. After cutting out, I shaped them with an embossing tool and foam and rearranged them on the black panel, not right so I took them all off!

Next I embossed some swirls in clear EP and then arranged the flowers on top. A little better but it still lacked something so I sprinkled some chunky white EP then added the flowers and a few sprigs of bright green punched leaves.

Job done!

The sentiment is from Clearly Besotted, stamped and embossed in detail white.

OK, that's about it, so why not check out the rest of the DT's inspiration and join us this week over at ATSM.

I would like to join in at -

Time Out - Case the Card

Predominately Black

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for your wonderful recent comments.

Super Hero

Good morning.

Hope you all had a great Easter Holiday and are raring to go with a new challenge at Cardz4Guyz.

We had some great entries last week beginning with S and this week we hope you like the theme of -

SUPER HEROES

I won a voucher for a challenge entry the other month and I used it to buy a set from Mama Elephant called 'Tiny Heroes'. Here is the card I made -

I used the latest sketch over at MFT for the layout.

I took a few liberties and mirrored the sketch.

The circle was cut away using a stitched circle then the skyline border was cut in three shades of grey and layered up. The 'tiny heroes' were stamped and coloured with Copics and then fussy cut except the roundel which was die cut using a MFT stiched circle. There wasn't a suitable greeting with the set but I did like the Super Duper part of one so I masked off the parts I didn't want and replaced them with parts of a Personel Impressions set.

That's about it from me, pop over to check out the rest of the DT's inspiration and join us.

I shall also join in at -

Creative Inspirations - Anything Goes

Cutie Pie Challenge - All about the Boys