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

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

Have a Blooming Good Day

evening all.

The year is whizzing by, September already, where has this year gone?

Anyway it's time for a brand new challenge over at HLS Anything Goes with Dies.

As always so long as you use dies it's a free for all!

Here is my inspiration card for you.

I had a few die cut flowers left over from a craft class project using MFT Stitched Flowers, so thought I would use them in my project, adding some punched ones to finish the bouquet. 

I started but cutting a circle in the center of a square of white card then embossing the outer with a freebie EF. The flowers were coloured using DIs in a mix of summery colours along with some die cut leaves.  A few jewels and pearls were added to the centers before arranging the blooms, leaves and some dried gypsophila around the aperture. On a slightly larger beige panel I stamped the freebie sentiment in Onyx Black Versamark and mounted the top panel over it with pads. 

If you need more reasons to join in why not pop over and check out the rest of the team here and then join in.

I'm joining in over at:-

#80 Handmade Flowers

Embossing/Distress Inks/Sentiment

edited 9/9  Fauna or Flora (Thanks for the reminder Sarah)

Love both but you can't beat flowers for a summery feminine birthday card

40 Sensational Years

Good morning crafters.

Well we've whizzed around to the 1st of September, what happened there?

Anyway a new month it may be but it's also time for a new challenge at the Alphabet Challenge blog.

This week it was my choice of theme, so I went with 

M is for Make Your Mark

This week we would like to see you Make Your Mark by using pens, pencils, chalks, paints, brushes etc. 

Here is my inspiration project.

I made this Ruby Wedding card for my best friend from school and her hubby. I don't get to see Ali as much as I would like but as soon as we get together, it's like we've never been apart. Don't you just love to have friends like that. We have so much in common, they have two children like us, they escaped to the country and built their own house as did we and we both married engineers, hers is civil, mine is electrical!

Our Ruby Wedding was last Sunday, Ali's and Rik's is this Sunday, I can't forget that now can I? We had to plan our honeymoon around their wedding.

I used Altenew's I Adore you stamp set, stamping and embossing the flowers on MM paper before colouring with a mix of Zig Pens, Distressed inks and Brusho. I the preceded to fussy cut the individual elements and arrange them in a bouquet. On a die cut panel I splashed some Inka Gold wax in gold (a little wax mixed with water is a good substitute for gold paint) then added the bouquet with glue and a few flowers popped up on pads for added dimension. I used a creamy card stock as I think white was too stark a contrast to the red blooms. I cut a banner from some scrap and stamped the greeting from Uniko, adding gold cut numerals. I used a free die set for this. The gold Congrats is the old faithful Cuttlebug die cut from mirror card,

Please check out the rest of the team for more inspiration then why not join us in Making your Mark?

Joining in over at:-

Anything Goes

Anything Goes

Anything Goes