Keepy Upies

Hi, it's a lovely warm and sunny Bank Holiday here in the UK, very unusual.

As a result we are staying close to home as being retired, every day seems like a Bank Holiday, we also get to miss the crowds which accompany a warm sunny Bank Holiday!

So here I am with the curtains closed to keep the heat out with a card I'm linking up to a few challenges.

This is another of the fab LOTV digis from my stash coloured in my Son in Law's team colours of Liverpool, hence the choice of DP too. I found the sketch on Pinterest and have used it a couple of times as it allows the image to shine. 

For once I decided not to fussy cut my Copic coloured Striker image, simply layered him onto some red card, adding some DP and zig zag detail to make up for the size of the image panel. On more red card, I mounted some matching NitWits DP, finishing with a LOTV stamped sentiment. The whole panel was then added to an A5 card base.

Joining in over at:-

 

#850 Anything Goes

Happy 17th Birthday ladies

#838 Special Anniversary Anything Goes

Happy 17th anniversary too.

Uniko FB Challenge

Just popping by to remind all Uniko followers that there is still a couple of weeks to join in with the FB VIP Challenge on the theme of ANYTHING GOES and the chance to win £15 to spend in store!

Here's a card I made recently for my daughter's friend's birthday, all details are on the Uniko blog here.

Joining in over at:-

Happy 7th Birthday!

A Cosy Jumper

 Morning all. I can't believe a month has gone since the last Cardz4Guyz challenge went live but it must have as there's a new one!

This month it was my choice and I chose the theme of -

SQUASH IT!

In other words use an embossing folder to do all the hard work!

I love EFs and have a box full of them, though I don't always use them as often as I should. They range from geometrics to florals, those that add texture and even some that create a scene. For this simple card, I've used a cable knit one that was a freebie in a mag I believe. With out much effort you have a very effective sweater.

To begin, I chose some camel coloured card cut a partial circle from the top of an A6 panel, then embossed it, centering the cabled to achieve a balanced look. I remembered just in time to cut the opening as if not you run the risk of squashing all that lovely definition in the embossing! On another piece of the same card, I used two nesting circle dies to cut a piece which I laid over the original opening. A scrap of white linen textured card was then glued behind to suggest a T-shirt. I trimmed the panel to slightly less than A6 before adding to an A6 base card in the same cardstock.  A simple die cut sentiment, Uniko was added to complete. 

I've used this technique a few times to create simple masculine cards, here are links to other projects, here, here and here along similar lines.

So what EF will you incorporate in your designs? We're looking forward to seeing all your MASCULINE makes in our gallery but if you need further inspirationj, please check out the Cardz4Guyz blog.

Color Hues #133

Afternoon all. As we are over halfway through May already, its time for a brand new colour duo from Color Hues. Here's my take.

I was walking around the garden the other day whilst my pooch was on a sniffari and I noticed that the iris I split up 2 years ago were about to burst into full bloom. Last year they seemed to resent their splitting up and didn't make much but this year they have gone mad! Although as of the time of typing this they are still in tight bud, they should soon be in full bloom!

So as I was looking through my stash for inspiration for the latest Color Hues challenge, I landed on Altenew's Build an Iris stamp and set too with my watercolours. Of course the blooms had to be violet but the throat is usually orange or yellow but that's NOT ALLOWED, so I improvised with dots of white toned down with some of the lime green paint I used on the stems and leaves. I'm not sure which iris the designer was looking at for this stamp but mine don't have curly leaves, I suppose it's artistic licence! As usual I painted each petal and leaf in turn as in the peony from last month, keeping away from the last until it was dry to reduce bleeding, adding a little bit of neutral Paynes Grey for the shadow. The papery bud wrappings, are a mix of Burnt Umber and the Violet

After fussy cutting, I mounted the blooms on a panel of embossed white card and then added a die cut stamped sentiment, also Altenew.

So that's me done, but there's lots more inspiration from the rest of the team for your delectation! Looking forward to seeing your makes in our gallery.

Joining in over at:-

Color Hues #132

Afternoon and welcome to a post for the brand new challenge from Color Hues.

It's a new month, so we have a new colour duo for you, here's my take.

As regular readers may know, a friend and old work collegue is a MASSIVE Leeds Rhinos fan and every year I try to incorporate their colours into her birthday card, along with the odd rhino! Well as the latest Color Hues colours match, here is her 2026 card!

I've used the ever faithful MFT Birth-Yay set, stamping and colouring the stacked buddies. I also fished an older happy birthday background stamp out of the stash, also MFT, which I stamped and heat embossed with white EP before inking all over with Blueprint Sketch DI.

To make the card, I stamped and coloured with Copics the buddy stack and then fussy cut it. The embossed and inked panel was cut to fit my base card and a thin sliver of Copic coloured card was glued against the edge to introduce more yellow as it was a little blue heavy! The sentiment was stamped in black and the fussy cut pals were added on foam pads.

That's all from me but please check out our GD and the rest of the team over on the Color Hues blog page.

Joining in over at:-

 

Uniko FB VIP Challenge Reminder

This months Uniko FB VIP Challenge is all about GEOMETRICS. Here is a design I came up with using some of the smaller stamps from lots of different sets and the Postage Die set from Waffle Flower.

I found a ready cut panel of white card in the die packaging, so used that to create my design. The stencil which comes with it was used for ease but I could have easily masked off each section before I added the background inking and stamping.

Each of my rectangles was inked with DI, either Salty Ocean, Peacock Feathers or Twisted Citron, then with the masking still in place, the stamp detail was added with the same ink. I used BB Pinstripe, BB Triangulate, Bee Happy, Balloon Bash, BB MOD Circle Builder and Uniko Style stamp sets

Finally all masking was removed and the sentiment stamped. Birthday and Christmas Sentiments and a few small silver die cut dots complete. The panel was matted onto some black card and then on pads onto a 5 x 7ich white base card.

There are lots of fab Uniko geometric themed stamps and stencils to use, if you don't have any, think outside the box. Looking forward to seeing all your different geometric designs in the FB VIP gallery!

Joining in over at:-

Clean and Simple Birthday Fishes

 Morning all. Another month has flown by and it's time for another challenge from Cardz4Guyz.

This month Helen has chosen the theme of:-

CLEAN and SIMPLE

Well I'm a simple girl with simple tastes, so this suits me down to the ground. I also think CAS is the way to go when you're struggling to make a card for thoses pesky males! Here's my take.

I've used a few of challenges to inspire this make, CAS Colours and Sketches, The Paper Players and AYLI.

Using the sketch from CAS Colours and Sketches and the theme from the Paper Players, I used the smallest fish from MFT's Gill Friend to create this design. The fish always remind me of the films Finding Nemo and Finding Dory, especially the smallest ones.

On a piece of scrap card, I inked some Mermaid Lagoon and blended it with some Peacock Feathers DI, spritzing with some water before cutting a trio of circles out with a die. On some Copic friendly card, I stamped 3 of the smallest fish along with some vegetation from the Birthday Fishes set. After colouring with Copics and fussy cutting I added them to my circles which were then added to my white base card. A simple sentiment from the same set stamped in black completes.

What will you make? We're always happy to see your MASCULINE creations in the Cardz4Guyz gallery, where you'll also find more CAS masculine inspiration from the rest of the team!

Joining in over at:-

Simple or Fussy

Simple is the way to make a successful masculine card, in my opinion! Good job I'm not a fussy and fancy girl!

Color Hues #131

Afternoon all.

We are over halfway through April so it's time for a brand new colour pairing from Color Hues. 

This time I've gone with a floral themed card using the colours and Uniko's Pure Florals Peony. What do you think?

To start, I used Altenew's Limestone ink stamped onto Mixed Media paper, to create a no line look, then I smooshed some of their other inks onto an acrylic sheet to use for a watercolour technique. I used Coral Berry, Grapevine and Coral Bliss for the petals and Olive, Moss and Evergreen for the stem and leaves.

Each petal was painted separately, first with plain water then with the paler Coral Bliss and darker Coral Berry, allowing the water to blend the colours. It's best to paint sections that don't touch one another to reduce the risk of colour bleeding until each section has dried. Some of the lightest areas had virtually no colour and the off white paper showed through to suggest hilights. I repeated the technique for the leaves, using first Olive then Moss.

To create an even greater sense of depth, I went back into the bloom, first with a damp brush, I wet the areas that needed to be in shadow before going in with the Grapevine ink. For the green shading I used the Evergreen ink. Once dry, I fussy cut it out and concentrated on my background. 

A Mama Elephant die was used to cut an eyelet panel from white card, then I removed the center with a rectangle die to create a frame. Using the magnets in my Misti, I held the frame and bloom down whilst I placed the greeting from Uniko's Originally Organic. Once happy with the placement, I removed the frame and bloom and stamped it in Memento London Fog. The frame and bloom were then glued to my A6 white base card.

That's all from me but please check out the rest of the team and our GD over on the Color Hues blog for more fab inspiration. As usual you have up until the 29th April to link up your green and coral makes, have fun.

I'm joining in over at:-

In the Garden or AG

Simple or Fussy 

I've never been happy throwing on the fripperies and embellishments, so this is as fancy as I go. I'm a simple girl at heart!!

Color Hues #130

Afternoon. It may be April Fool's Day but here in the UK it's after noon so if you do trick me it's all on you! Any how, it's also the start of a new colour duo from Color Hues.

Here's my take.

Stamping Bella's Edna was another from my to colour box and I thought she would look great in the new colours! For those of you who are interested I used Copics RV02, 04, 06 and RV17 for the fuchsia element and B34, 37 anf 39 for the navy. 

After colouring and fussy cutting her out, I stated on my background. A freebie EF sorted out the wave effect and an OI die, a bargain from a local shop that was closing down, supplied the frame, which I popped up on foam pads. 

My sentiment is from Uniko and the PPP sequins, which started off as clear, were coloured with B39 to match her outfit.

So that's about it from me but please check out the rest of the girls over on the Color Hues blog.

You have until the 14th April to enter BUT please stick to the rules, use only the colours given plus the usual neutrals, please note GREEN is not a neutral, we wouldn't want to disqualify your entry after all your hard work!

Uniko Product Revisit

Morning, there's no March release from Uniko, so Bev and the other Uniko Brand Ambassadors are revisiting the two releases from earlier in the year.

I've chosen the fabulous Bauhaus Blocks Spring Layering Stencil for my focus, here are couple of ideas.

I started by covering an A6 panel of white card with the various elements of the stencils, using Cracked Pistachio, Picked Raspberry and Squeezed Lemonade Distress Oxides. When I had covered the white  panel, I realised that I had made an error in one of the flowers, so it stood out like a sore thumb, so not wanting to waste the panel I cut it up and made two cards!

This first card uses a part of the panel.

Another error was that my A6 panel wasn't, about 5mm too narrow! I had to make a decision and decided to use it, trimming it down so that it fit an A6 topfold note card, with a white border showing. To emphasise the gap, I added a panel of paper inked on my Gelli plate. I used the Squeezed Lemonade and Cracked Pistachio to give a kind of speckled effect. The Oxide inks blend so well like this, I prefer it to straight inking. The combination of yellow and the soft green gives a lovely spring feel to the card. A stamped and embossed sentiment completes.

Remember that error on my original panel, well here is what I made with that.

The error was front and central, so I just covered it with the sentiment! More of my Gelli plate paper and some Greetery dies complete.

I wonder what the rest of the team have been inspired to create? Why not pop along and check their blogs and Instagram accounts out to find out?

Don't forget to comment as you go for a chance to win some Uniko goodies.

  Anita

Bev

Izzy

Julie - that's me

Natalie

Steph

Vinita

 Hope you left some comment love along the way, Bev will randomly select a comment to win the £20 eGift certificate to spend in store.  The winner will be announced on Monday 13th April 2026. 

Happy crafting!

Under the Bonnet

 Good morning and happy St Patrick's Day to those who celebrate it.

We have a new challenge for you from Cardz4Guyz where our theme this month is :-

LIGHT BLUE and BROWN

Here's my take after a bit of head scratching!!

I've known about the challenge for quite sometime and had lots of ideas buzzing in my head but I couldn't quite settle on just one, so this card was made a bit last minute! It nearly didn't get made at all as when I started to colour my LOTV digi image, my E57 Copic marker decided not to play. Perhaps I had neglected it and it had dried but all it did was leave a blotchy mark. So I abandoned it and went to watch the new Scarpeta on Amazon Prime. It's base on the books by Patricia Cornwell that I've read, about an ME in the USA, a bit gory and the stream played up, but overall I quite enjoyed it. Nicole Kidman and Jamie Lee Curtis were great as Kay and sister Dorothy but Lucy, not what I had pictured in my mind's eye. Benton wasn't quite as suarve as I imagined but Marino is OK. Anyway, back to my card!

Coming back to the image the next day, I thought I could rescue it, waste not want not, and I think I have, adding some white gel pen to create a tweed cap which I then coloured over with a blue marker.

After finishing the rest of the colouring, I fussy cut it out, printed off some matching DP from NitWits and got ready to assemble.

Textured shaped panel on foam pads over DP onto a card base and a stamped Uniko sentiment, the image was also added on pads. 

There are a couple of other challenges around that are featuring blue and brown, so I will join in there too.

If you need more inspiration please check out the rest of the Cardz4Guyz team here. Looking forward to seeing your makes in our gallery.

Color Hues #129

Good afternoon. 

As we whizz through the month of March its time to start a new colour challenge at Color Hues.

This time Marcia has chosen a fun and cheery colour combination, here's my take.

First of all I thought of crocus with purple petals and rich yellow anthers as they were dancing in the longer grass in the garden but I couldn't use green for the leaves, so abandoned that choice and went for this Gorjuss image that was another from my to stamped but not colouired box. It's an old one I stamp sometime ago when an old friend was visiting for some crafty time. 

The girl was coloured with Copics and fussy cut. I usually have the light coming from one side or the other when colouring but this image had shadows already quite prominent to suggest front on light and so I went with that, not as much option for shadows that way though, but the hair was quite a large part of the image!

My background DP is from an old magazine and the white panel was an equally ancient EF that matched. Another elderly item was the purple ribbon on which I perched my girl. A couple of sentiment banners were stamped and added under the edge of the embossed panel, the layout an other oldie from Sketch Saturday (on pause).

That's about all from me but please check out the rest of the team and our GD here for more colourful  inspiration.

The first signs of spring in our fields, who doesn't love a cute lamb?! The mum's started coming home from the lambing sheds last week with their little ones.

Joining in over at:-

Uniko VIP FB Challenge - Spring

Good morning.

As it's the 11th March, there's a new challenge over on Uniko's VIP Facebook page.

This time our theme is:-

SPRING

So anything associated with that season, just use Uniko products as your main focus. Here's my take using approprately, Spring Botanicals -Primrose.

 

 

Over at the Paper Players their theme is Rainbow Colours and at AAA Colourful the pic reminds me of a rainbow too, so I thought I would use that as my starting point. I know it's not quite April yet, so we can't have April showers but there's always a chance of one with hopefully a rainbow afterwards! 

Using the newly released Layering Rainbow stencil, I created a blended one for my vellum polyanths to sit over. They come in so many different colours, they really do look like a rainbow when spread out on the garden center benches. The ones in my garden have been in bloom for a few weeks now, mainly the bluey purple and white ones as the birds like to pinch the more colourful petals from the pinks and reds!

I stamped Spring Botanicals- Primrose in Versamark onto vellum and heat embossed with white EP before fussy cutting them out. On the reverse of the image I added some colour to the leaves and the flower centers with coloured pencils, arranging them over the rainbow, using the embossed lines to hide the glue. My sentiment is from Sping Botanicals - Tulip which I stamped in black.

That's all from me, but looking forward to seeing your makes in the gallery.

Joining in over at:-

 

Color Hues #128

Afternoon folks.

Where did February go? Well it's the first of the month so it's time for a new challenge from Color Hues. Here's my take on the new colour pairing.

 

I still had my Uniko layering rainbow stencil out on my desk when I sat down to make a card, so decided to use it in combination with this cheeky leprechaun that was lurking in the bottom of my finished colouring but 'what do I do with it now' box. I think, I had thought to use it for a card some time ago and then used something else. He's from a magazine, must be over 15 years ago now with a photocopiable page of 'magical' creatures. So I printed him off and coloured him with Copics and fussy cut him out. Getting the gold for his buttons and buckles was tricky, but there is a Copic called Lionet Gold, Y28, so used that and some paler ones from the sames group. 

The rainbow was inked using a selection of Altenew greens and the gold 'coins' are some very old Craftwork Cards card confetti, the sentiment is also from Uniko. Our Irish friend was then added on foam pads after I'd run a ball tool over him from the wrongside to give him some shape.

So that's it from me but please check out the rest of the team and our GDs Darnell and Donna here. Looking forward to seeing your makes in the gallery.

Joining in at:-

Birthday Release Day at Uniko

It's here, the February 2026 Birthday Release is finally available on the Uniko website HERE! 

Before you dash off to get your hands on the new stash, we're having a bit of reprise of all the release along with a Blog Hop and GIVEAWAY!

But first, here are the details of all the items in the Birthday release and some more inspiration!

First up is Background Blocks Birthday Scramble,  a fun, instant, sentiment block, a partner to the Christmas themed one from last year. 

Background Blocks Birthday Scramble £6.50

Copyright Uniko Ltd 2012 - To Date

www.uniko.co.uk

Here is a card using the new Layering Stencil, Retro Rainbow and Background Blocks My Favourite Colour is Rainbow.

Stencil - Layering Retro Rainbow £14.50

Copyright Uniko Ltd 2012 - To Date

www.uniko.co.uk

Background Blocks My Favourite Colour Is Rainbow £6.50

Copyright Uniko Ltd 2012 - To Date

www.uniko.co.uk

For this card I used the stencil to create the rainbow, moving it slightly between layers to get the overlapping colours. The overlap isn't perfect but you get the idea of a more blended rainbow. Another fussy cut Cloud 9 stencil cloud hides any misalignments. The sentiment from the stamp set was simply stamped in black and the rainbow coloured appropriately with Copic markers.

Bev is very proud of her innovative Ink & Flip Stencils and this one going to be a firm favourite I'm sure. Retro Flowers is a two layer stencil. One for the flowers and one for the flower centers. They can be used together or individually for even more creative options.

 For this card I used some leftover fussy cut blooms from yesterdays card and a few scraps of card and a Gelli plate print made at Art group that went wrong. 

 

I just love the way the lime green Gelli pull shimmers, the acrylic paint I used must have had been pearlescent! I also used an new to me die set from The Greetery which cuts the pattern, mount AND base card. I'd seen Aryth Percy-Robb use this technique in one of her You Tube videos and as I only had a few blooms decided to try. I used 4 blooms in total, 2 cut up into halves and 1 into quarters and arranged them onto my green panel along with a fussy cut thanks from Simply Said Blocks. This was mounted onto one of my die cut white panels and then onto a slightly larger one, edged with some matching Picked Raspberry DI, finally adding the whole onto my die cut base card.

Stencil - Ink & Flip Layering Retro Flowers £8.00

Copyright Uniko Ltd 2012 - To Date

www.uniko.co.uk

So that wraps up this little Birthday release. We hope you love the products as much as we do, just to prove it, there's even more inspiration from the Brand Ambassadors on their own blogs and Insta accounts, just follow the links below

Be sure to comment along the way for your chance to win a £20 eGift Certificate to spend in store. Winner will be announced Monday 9th of February 2026.

  Anita

Bev

Izzy

Julie that's me

Natalie

Steph

Vinita

Happy Hopping!