Toot Toot!

Good morning folks, time for a new challenge over at Cardz4Guyz.

This time we would like to see your masculine cards on the theme of -

WHEELS

Lots to go at there then, small wheels to huge ones, ones powered by engines and those by hand. Continuing my aim to use up all my scraps during lockdown, I found this LOTV image stamped out and ready to colour and some odds and sods from the bit box, nothing new was used in the making of this card, well other than the actual card!

The image is Toot Toot, a digi I think as I don't own the rubber version, but I could have stamped it when my friend was around a couple of years ago. The background DP is part of an old motoring atlas and the card is from the back of an old card. 

After colouring the outline of the car and driver with Copic markers, I fussy cut it and put to one side. The map panel was trimmed to A6 size and the background panels cut out from scrap using some MFT pierced square and rectangle dies and a banner die. 

Using another LOTV set I stamped the greeting and added it to my background panel, the squares were coloured with Copic marker and added before the panel was glued onto the DP. The fussy cut car was set to the far right to give the impression of movement and some shadow was added to ground the image with some more Copic markers.

So where will you go with this challenge? We'd love to see what you make of the theme.

For more inspiration from the team check out the Cardz4Guyz blog.

Joining in over at:-

Anything Goes

Stitching, real or faux

Color Hues #16

 Good afternoon fellow crafters. You didn't make it easy for me to choose my winners for the pink and green challenge, check out here to see if you caught the eye. 

We're halfway through April already so hope you are up to the challenge of a new colour combo over at Color Hues. Here is my take.

A very grown up colour combo I think so it deserves a classy card!

I used my favourite technique for colouring on a dark background, that of paper piecing. Normally I just use plain card that I've coloured with either watercolours or Copic markers but for this take I used another way and used some yellow patterned paper.

After having a root in my yellow scraps drawer, yes I'm sad enough to have sorted my scraps into colourways, I chose a couple of yellow DPs from a really old Papermania set that has sat unused for more years than I care to remember! One is self coloured stripe and the other white dots on yellow. 

I stamped the design for the card using Altenew's 'Remember This' onto an A6 panel of grey with white EP. I did consider using white EP for the pp blooms but decided to use grey ink instead. Rather than leave the pp blooms flat, I added some shading using a couple of Zig w/c markers in yellow and yellow ochre to give them dimension. When dry, I added the darker bloom to the back and the brighter one towards the front. My sentiment was an Altenew freebie in a magazine, stamped and embossed in white EP.

For more yellow and grey inspiration please check out the rest of the girls fabulous inspiration over at the CH blog.

Joining in over at:-

plus Fussy cutting, Heat embossing, watercolouring and masking

STAMPlorations challenge, a reminder

 Afternoon folks. Just popping by to remind you that there is still time to join in over at STAMPlorations for the Theme and Photo challenge.

Here's my inspiration based on the theme and photo.

This time I took inspiration from the theme of curves and the colours from the photo.

After stamping out my Cup Full of Blooms #3 image, I used Copic markers to colour the fab flowers, taking the colour of the pink drinks with dark purply black berries, purple blue from the fabric and acid green of the slices of lime.

Once coloured, I fussy cut the booms and cup laying them on pads over a white panel embossed using the Circles all Over Texture Coverplate. I used the sentiment from Carved Flowers stamped in black to complete.

So where will you go with your take? We'd love to see what your interpretations are. 

Check out the rest of the team here for more inspiration as well as all the Ts and Cs.

Joining in over at:-

  

Butterfly Hugs and Kisses

Evening folks, as we are roughly halfway through April, it's time for a new challenge at Perfectly CAS.

At Perfectly CAS we hope to see lots of CAS inspired projects in our gallery, just as it says in the title but please note what our definition of CAS is, as there have been lots of fabulous entries which don't follow our very strict rules over the last few months.

Hopefully I've been a very good girl and adhered to the rules and the CAS police wont come after me!

To be on the safe side, keep your design to just 1/3rd of your card front!

So a check list for my design goes as follows:-

 1- Design in only one third of my card front - tick

2- ONE main focal point - tick

3- Lots of OPEN (no pattern) space- tick

4- Minimal embellishments - tick

5- Minimal layers - hopefully got away with that one!

During that brief warm spell leading up to Easter, I saw lots of butterflies around, probably last years hibernating adults so when I saw the theme of wings that's where I decided to go and Allsorts want butterflies, birds and or bees for their challenge.

Rather than use white for the die cut outline, I went with black as the butterflies were mainly Small Tortoiseshells, with a white plain matching die cut as a backing. The colour came from the same MB Lunette butterfly die as the black outline which I cut from a panel of orange and yellow smooched watercoloured card from my scrap box. I used some Distressed Inks in Mustard Seed and Ripe Persimmon or it could have been Spiced Marmalade but the resultant colour is not solid and I thought it would add a little bit of detail and interest to the butterfly's wings. I glued the small sections onto the white background MB Oriel die cut using the whole die cut as a template, leaving some of the tiny dots out so that the white would show through. The black overlay was glued in the center and the body added along with my tiny greeting banner, allowing the black wings to float over the background. The whole butterfly was then added to an A6 white note card.

Where will the prompt word take you? We'd love to see but please keep it CAS!

There's plenty more winged themed inspiration over on the Perfectly CAS blog if you need more inspiration.

Joining in over at:-

Butterflies, birds and bees

Merry and Bright at Uniko

 Good morning all. Hope you had a fab weekend and the weather didn't put too much of a dampener on it! I was certainly in the mood for making Christmas cards this weekend with lots of white fluffy stuff coming down, definitely a time to stay indoors, abandon the garden and get crafty! Still it wasn't cold enough to stay around for long here but my tomato plants in the greenhouse must have been feeling the pinch of this arctic blast of the last few days.

Anyway, I'm sharing my makes over on the Uniko blog in a Merry Monday post, as opposed to my Festive Friday ones of the last couple of months, I couldn't wait to share them 'til Friday!

This month I've been inspired again by the wonderful ladies at CAS Christmas where this month they are getting colourful with rainbow colours at Christmas. Here are a few ideas I came up with.

All are pretty simple, using the small stamps from some Uniko sets.

Here are some close ups.

  

I really enjoyed making these cards so why not check out the Uniko blog for details on how I made them?

Linking up at:-

  

Rats or Mice

Good morning peeps.

It's time for a brand new challenge over at Cardz4Guyz.

For this challenge we would love to see you make a masculine card with:-

SOMETHING NEW in your STASH

I don't know about you but the only retail therapy I've been doing these last 12 months has either been the weekly shop from the supermarket or on line. I would much rather browse a box or shelf of goodies but needs must in these strange times. A couple of weeks ago, I treated myself to a few bits from Seven Hills, there's far too much choice on their site! Anyway, I was intrigued by all the Anita Jeram stamps from Colorado Crafts that I've spotted on blogs. I looked at a few but many were out of stock but decided to splurge on the Birthday Wishes set featuring a cute bunny, hamster and these rats!

I say rats but they could be mice, I'm not sure! As they looked more suited to a masculine card than the cute rabbit I went with them, using a couple of challenges as inspiration.

Anita Jeram's illustrations are watercoloured, so I decided to go down that route and stamped the images onto some MM paper and coloured them with my Zig watercolour markers. When dry, I fussy cut them out and put them to one side. I always try to match my DP to the colouring for a more cohesive look, so took the colours from this strip of striped NitWits paper. The happy was cut using a Wplus9 die from white card and I used a blue Copic marker to colour, matching the stripe in the DP as near as possible. I found the middle of an aperture die cut on my table and added some embossed stripes with an EF as a background.

Using the sketch at Just Add Ink, I added the strip of DP to a cream base and the 'rats' above the happy. On a scrap of card I stamped the birthday with Espresso Truffle ink, cut down to size and added. 

Voila!

Please check out the rest of the DT for some fab inspiration.

Joining in over at:-

Z is for Zoology

 

Go Boldly

Just like London buses, three posts in quick succession in a day, well it is the beginning of the month so its a brand new challenge over at HLS CAS!

Here is my inspiration based on this month's theme.

It took awhile to decide where to go with this challenge, you could go down the route of fires, indoors or out or maybe candles, but I went with the flames coming from this Paper Smooches rocket ship.

Once I had the idea the design came pretty quickly.

I stamped a couple of flames and the rocket from the Space Cadet set, coloured them with Copics, then fussy cut them. The sentiment and a few stars were stamped in black on the white background, the rocket added with some foam pads and the overlapping flames from the rocket were glued flat on to an A6 base card. Simples, it could be a birthday card or just a card for encouragement.

For more flame/fire CAS inspiration please check the DT here.

It might be Good Friday and the days are lengthening, but the weather has decided that winter isn't over yet, so I must make sure that my tender pepper and tomato plants are tucked up warmly for the night in the greenhouse. I hope temps don't drop too low overnight, it would be a shame if those plants got frosted! Hope the lambs are tucked up with their mum's too, most of them have shed their temporary raincoats so will have no other protection.

Mail Chick, GD at CAS on Friday

Welcome back to a post to share a card made for the brand new challenge at CAS on Friday.

Last month I won their 'Spring' challenge with this card, so was asked to GD for their latest challenge :-

HAPPY MAIL

For my take I used this cute Stamping Bella, Mail Chick.

A very simple card, a little bit of NitWits DP behind the chick and a frame made using an MFT Stitched Scalloped Circle frame die on some linen effect card. My chick was coloured with Copic markers and then fussy cut. I love these chicks from Stamping Bella and have one or two in my stash now, he can be used for lots of different occasions I think. The sentiment is from the same set, stamped with Altenew Obsidian completes.

For more 'Happy Mail' inspiration check out the Cas on Friday DT.

Joining in over :-

I'm going with feathers!

Uniko Challenge reminder

Good morning and welcome to my post to remind you that there is still time to enter the latest challenge over at Uniko. Here is my inspiration for you.

In my first card here I went with the daffodils in the photo as my first signs of spring and are definitely something to lift the spirits but this time I brought out my Spring Botanicals - Tulip. Tulips emerge a little later than the daffs and I have to grow mine in pots because of the soil conditions but in the proper place they look fabulous en masse, in all colours and shades, I can also see them better as they are near the patio doors!

I went with the en masse theme rather than the specimen bloom for my card, masking and stamping with Versamark before heat embossing with white EP on mixed Media paper. I then watercoloured the blooms with a selection of DIs including Twisted Citron for the leaves and stems and Wilted Violet, Picked Raspberry and Carved Pumpkin for the flower heads. The background is a wash of Salty Ocean. I added a little bit of shadow to the leaves and stems with Mowed Lawn. 

When dry I used an MFT pierced rectangle die to cut my panel. The sentiment from the same set was stamped on a white strip in black and the finished panel added on pads to a faux linen base card.

For more Signs of Spring/ Easter inspiration check out the rest of the team and our GD Stephanie here.

I'm joining in over at:-

Color Hues #15

As I said earlier today, it might be April 1st but there is no pranking on this blog! Anyway tradition says that all April Fool's day pranks have to be done by noon or the joke is on the prankster!

The new challenge at Color Hues is launched and it was my turn to choose the colours, so I went all spring like and chose pink and green. Here is my card using those colours and shades there of!

The colours shouted flowers but which sets to use?!

In the end I decided to use my one and only Concord and 9th set, Blooms fill in. I'm never sure which is the right way up for this large stamp but I think that means it can be used both ways!

I used two sets of Altenew inks for this, Rose Petal and Tropical Forest. It makes life so much easier, when looking for matching shades of a colour as they've done the hard work! I chose the greens 1st because they are my favourites and second because they are crisp and fresh, perfect for a springtime card. The pinks chose themselves too, ranging from soft baby pink all the way to hot fushia pink!

Once I had stamped and filled in my panel, I couldn't decide how to complete the card so after a bit of googling, I went with a diagonal cut and partial die cut spray. The partial die cut posy was enhanced by the addition of die cut foliage in white and the darkest of greens, more detailed infill stamping and a stamped, die cut bloom. 

To complete, I added a thin line of the darkest green below the cut edge and a matching white strip to stamp my sentiment on. The finished panel was trimmed down to fit and added over an A6 white linen base card.

So for some fab DT inspiration check out the Color Hues site and why not join in.

STAMPlorations April Theme and Photo Prompt Challenge

 Good morning, it might be April 1st but there's no April Fool pranks here just a post to share the start of a new challenge over at STAMPlorations Theme and Photo Prompt.

Here's my card based on this month's theme and photo.

The starting point for this design was the colour of the drinks and the fruit floating amongst the ice cubes.

I was having a root through my collection of Gelli plate prints when I found the perfect background. It uses the Wavy Dots Slimline Stencil, perfect for the colours AND the curves! 

The original pull was a mix of Picked Raspberry and Seedless Preserves DOx with the second over the same but using the stencil. I decided to keep the topping quite plain so as not to detract from the background, I simply cut out three of the Trendy Blooms dies flowers and three sprigs of foliage. To echo the bobbing berries in the glasses, I coloured the centers of the blooms with Copic markers before arranging them in the bottom right corner. The sentiment from Blossom Dreams, was stamped in black and the panel mounted on pads over a white linen effect A6 base card.

So it's as simple as that. For more inspiration and to find all the Ts and Cs check out the STAMPlorations blog here. 

How will you be inspired? We'd love to see your take in the gallery this month.

I'm joining in over at:-

AG option of Monochromatic