Remember this

Do you love a bargain, I do. My besty Di, told me that The Works had a great set of stacking and single dies in store and did I want her to get me some. Well as she was over not long after, we buzzed over to a branch and I couldn't resist, the prices were so cheap. Anyway while I was out the other day having a coffee with the OH, I spied a branch across the road so went in for a browse and came out with a few more including a fab oval scroll die I used in my inspiration card for the latest challenge over at the Alphabet Challenge blog where the theme is -

O is for OVALS

Here's my interpretation.

I die cut the frame from silver mirri card and again from a panel of fun foam. Leaving the fun foam die cut in the panel I cut it from, this stops it from loosing its shape, I glued the silver one on top. When dry, I removed both pieces from the fun foam panel. Must admit that the really tiny scrolls didn't fair well as I removed it, so I snipped the fun foam away from these! Setting aside, I then went looking for some flower stamps. I chose these fab blooms from Altenew's Remember This, stamping and embossing in white EP before fussy cutting. Then using the colours from Altenew's September challenge photo, I watercoloured the blooms with my Zigs and a water brush. When dry I arranged them around the frame. I decided that the plain base looked a little too plain so I splashed some of the Fushia Pink, Persian Green and a mixture of the two, makes a lovely purple, over a panel of the same card as the base before attaching the frame and flowers. The sentiment, also Altenew, was stamped on black and embossed in white and slipped under the blooms.

OK, that's it from me, please check out the rest of the DT here and why not join in.

Joining in over at:-

    

     

Wonderful news

Morning all.

We've a brand new challenge over at Cardz4Galz. This time our theme is -

DRAGONFLIES

We have some fabulous dragonflies that buzz around our meadow in high summer, they are quite wonderful but somewhat scarey when they flit over your head when you're not expecting it!

Anyway these dragonflies are not scarey!

I used the STAMPlorations 'Winged Things' set and the matching dies and used some autumnal tones of DI to create a background, then stamped assorted images in the same colours over the top. I was influenced by this card by the wonderful Bonnie, loved how she used a die to create a frame by embossing instead of cutting it out. The die cut dragonfly was cut from white and the matching solid die from vellum, trimming away the long body before attaching it under the white outline die cut.

The sentiment, free from a mag completes.

Check out the rest of the team here for more fab inspiration.

Joining in over at:-

   

                                                   Things with wings

May you never outgrow bubbles

Hi and welcome to a late night post to announce the start of a brand new challenge over at ATSM.

This week it is our free for all challenge -

ANYTHING GOES

This is great for participants but I never know what to go with as there are so many ideas floating around in my head! Anyway here is what I finally made as my inspiration for you.

I bought these cheeky StampingBella chicks a few weeks ago, I just couldn't resist, well could you?

They were put away for use later and then when I saw the sketch over at LIM, I knew I had to use them! The circles in the sketch made me think of the bubbles.

Must admit I took a bit of a liberty with their sketch in this layout, hope that's OK, the basis is the same just flipped! I investigated how to colour the bubbles, using my Copics and although I didn't have the same colours, the overall effect is very effective I believe. 

After colouring the chicks, I fussy cut them and placed them on a pain white base card, adding a few extra bubbles in between. I then popped the chicks up on pads, leaving the extras uncoloured. The sentiment was stamped onto a die cut banner and slipped under the popped up chicks. 

For more inspiration check out the rest of the team here.

Joining in over at :-

  

Hope it's not too much of a liberty with the sketch

# 92 - Paint The Flying Spirit Of The Birds Rather than its Feathers

From our home to yours

Hi and hope you are all as well as can be expected!

My son got a new sofa the other day and as we were due to visit along with our small dog Max I thought I better get a throw so that the dog didn't mess up the new pale grey sofa!

Anyway after picking one up in Dunelm, I just HAD to pop into The Range to see what they had.

After surfing the craft aisles I spied a Trim Craft street scene coverplate die which just happened to find it's way into my shopping basket! It was the perfect thing for this week's challenge at Cardz4Guyz.

ARCHITECTURE

I always wanted to be an architect and was always drawing floor plans and elevations of my ideal house when I was a young teenager. Sad to say I didn't go down that route, "Girls aren't architects", according to the school's careers officer. I should had stuck to my guns but by the time I had the confidence to stand up for myself, I had dropped the relevant O level subjects. I did finally get to design my ideal house though, but I had to make the most of an existing barn!

Any how, here is my card for your inspiration.

I didn't use the whole of the cover plate die, just the large foreground buildings, trimmed to fit a 5 x 7 base card and give me a border. I stuck it onto a piece of festive, red Argyll NitWits DP inked over with Candied Apple DI for a better colour. My printer doesn't print as well as it once did, the colours are washed out, not sure why. I decided to use red instead of blue just to ring the changes more than anything else!

I left some of the die cut bits in situ for texture without the colour. The sentiment is from a couple of Uniko sets, stamped in red and then embossed with clear EP. The finished panel was popped up on a fun foam panel on a white base card.

OK. that's it, simple, the die did all the work. Check out the rest of the girls here for more inspiration.

I'm joining in over at:-

    

                 Use a die cut                  #35 Anything Goes Christmas

Christmas Typografia

Hi and welcome to a post to announce the launch of a brand new set of stamps from STAMPlorations. We are having a little blog hop to celebrate with the chance to win some fab STAMP goodies.

Here is my first card for you showing one of the new release.

A simple chalk board treatment for this one, white embossed sentiment on a black die cut panel, with the addition of a few festive die cuts including the leaf from Trendy Spring Blooms and jute string.

My second set took inspiration from a pair of cards I saw here. I saw them ages ago but when I saw the new stamps from Shery it was the perfect opportunity to try the technique out.

These are a little more complicated than the first card and was really only possible because of my MISTI. To start I stamped the sentiment on a panel of white card cut using my middle die from the crazy double running stitch rectangle set, in green Memento and then embossed with clear EP. Without removing the stamp from my MISTI, I repeated this with a green panel and gold embossing.

To get the die cut baubles in the same place, I fastened the two panels together with a little low tack tape and cut the shapes with a small balloon die. This might not work if the card is too thick though.

The white panel was popped up on pads after adding some gold thread and the green and gold baubles slipped into the openings, carefully matching the text. The green panel was stuck flat on the white base after gold thread had been tied and stuck to create hangers. The white baubles were popped up on pads.

These were my second try and I have to say it was easier the second time around but I do like the red and white colours of my first attempt more.

The white bauble in the first are actually another panel stamped and embossed in red and clear EP, then tucked under the red panel. Again only possible because I still had my original stamp on my MISTI!

There are lots of other fab stamps in this TYPOGRAFIA set as you can see here.

So for more inspiration hop along to the STAMPlorations page and have a look, commenting as you go for a chance to win, One commenter will win their choice of 3 Typografia Christmas stamps. The winner will be randomly drawn from all comments left on the STAMP blog and participating designers blogs, commenting closes on Monday, September 25th.

Don't forget if you fancy indulging yourself and buy some of these fab new stamps you can get 20% of by using this code.

Joining in over at:-

Use leaves on your Christmas/Holiday project 

  Get ready for Christmas   

 

                              Anything Christmas                           

T is for Trio (of baubles)

Sending Love and Hugs

Morning all.

Just stopping by to share a card I made just for the fun of it for a change.

I wanted to enter this month's Altenew challenge and the current Card Concept one too, so I combined them both with this. ATCAS have since started their Floral challenge so I shall enter there as well.

I started this last week but my grandson and his Ma and Pa were here until this morning so it was put on the back burner, but now I'm free to share. He is growing up so fast, only just 7, size 2 shoes and aged 8-9 clothes. He's also developed the back chat I remember so well from his U Chris, my youngest. In fact he resembles him in so many ways!

Anyway back to the card, made using fussy cut flowers from Altenew's Extra Special with a little help from Beautiful Day, Adore You sentiment and SU's hardwood in the background. The frame is cut from silver Mirri card using an old Spellbinders die popped up over a stamped distressed wood panel. I took my inspiration for this from the distressed door in the CC picture, adding a few Copic coloured, bright pink booms and a little of the bright blue, the colours of the Altenew pic. I used Memento London Fog for the Adore You sentiment and embossed it with clear EP.

Joining in over at:-

     

                            CAS Mixed Media?                                

     

Welcome little one

Morning all.

Still no dry weather around here, so the hay is still standing in the field and we will probably need the tractor to cut the lawn! Hopefully the weather will stay dry for a couple of days so I can at least get the lawn cut asap!

Over at Cardz4Galz we have a new challenge for you.

WELCOME LITTLE BABY

So any birth related projects so long as they are of a feminine nature!

Here is my card for your inspiration.

Quite a simple one to make once I thought up the design but it went through a couple of redesigns and a lot of wasted silver mirri board before I ended up with this!

Originally I stamped my giraffe from STAMPlorations Tweet love, and made a frame from the mirri card but it was too small to enclose the image as I wanted it to. After a lot of faffing and panic that I would not get it done in time I glanced down and saw the die for the giraffe which matches the set and then went down a totally different route with just the negative space left from the die cut of the giraffe. The DP was from the scrap box and the bow was made with a scrap of ribbon I cut from a new top that kept poking out when I first wore it, coloured with a green Copic marker.

The sentiment is from another STAMPlorations set, Heaven Sent. I popped up the front panel over the dots and silver by cutting the same die from the center of a piece of fun foam and gluing it behind. I did this because the die cut is quite open and the foam supported the small edges better than bits of foam tape.

For more inspiration check out the rest of the team and why not join in.

I'd like to join in over at:-

CASeing Bev

Welcome to a scheduled post to announce the start of the brand new challenge over at ATSM.

This week it is our CAS challenge and this is my inspiration card for you.

I decided to use a few challenges for inspiration for this card. LIM have a one layer card challenge, CAS on Friday and LIM want us to use colouring pens and Time Out are CASEing Bev from Uniko.

So I took a plain white top fold card and stamped the Gerbera from Uniko's Pure Florals set in Versamark Onyx Black, then masked it and added the striped background from Uniko in Memento London Fog. The outline Gerbera was then coloured using my Zig Clean Color brush pens. A few drops of Glossy Accents and a simple sentiment complete. 

For more inspiration check out the rest of the team and join in.

I'm joining in over at:-

CASEing Bev from Uniko

I was influenced by the stripes and the bold bloom for my card

Color me Pretty 
Use Pencils or Markers, I used Zig Markers for the flower

From the herd

Morning all.
The weather has been so unpredictable this summer, we've had a wet August and the hay is still to be cut but it is nothing compared to the devastation of hurricane Irma and her predecessor. Hope you are all safe and well. Mother Nature unleashed is such a powerful force for destruction, let's hope the scales are balanced soon with some good.
Over at Cardz4Guyz our new theme is appropriately -

NATURE

I went with a light hearted image for my masculine card.

A friend of mine was selling off some of her SU stamps recently and I snapped this up. This is it's first inking. Making a card on the subject of nature for a bloke really eliminates the use of flowers, so I thought of animals or perhaps trees, but in the end I went with this image.
The layout was based on the latest challenge at Sketch Saturday and as the stamp is quite busy kept it simple. Starting by stamping my image in Memento Onyx Black I then cut a mask and added some background colour with Tumbled Glass and Weathered Wood DI and then used Copics to colour the image. I stamped the sentiment from the set on a die cut banner, then trimmed my panel and mounted it on a white base card. A few dots of Glossy Accents were added to the eyes of the animals for some extra dimension.
For more masculine inspiration check out the rest of the team here.

I'd like to join in over at:-

AG