Uniko January 2025 Release - Introducing - Ink & Flip Layering Geometric Gem and Sparkle Sentiments Clear Stamp Set

Morning and Happy New Year!!

So it's also day 2 of introductions for Uniko's New Year release. Today we are featuring another of Bev's ingenious Ink n Flip stencils and a sentiment set that will hopefully add some extra sparkle to your designs!

Firstly here's my take on the stencil.

After my initial play with the stencil, I was quite pleased with the result of using a WOW embossing pen in the spaces of the gem instead of inking with a dauber and Versamark. I added sparkly silver  WOW EP to the first stencilled area and heat set before wiping the stencil and flipping. This time I used silver glitter EP, I love the effect using the different powders gives. The central panel was then cut from my stencilled panel and a die cut semi circle arc from a scrap of gold mirror card using 2 stacked circle dies, creates the suggestion of a gold ring. A simple sentiment in black Memento completes the panel. The panel was then popped up on pads to leave a border over an A6 note card.

My second card uses the Sparkle Sentiments stamp set. As you can see it would link really well with the stencilled diamond but for this card I've used the two different sizes of text and a stamped diamond which I've stamped and embossed with white EP and a few sparkle hi lights in silver sparkle.

Once I'd embossed the text onto a panel of MM paper, I added some Sea Grass Brusho and spritzed with water and let it stand until dry. The excess ink on the embossing was removed with a damp paintbrush and some kitchen towel before the silver sparkles were added. Panel trimmed it was added to an off white base card. 

I'm sure there are lots of wordy sentiments you could come up with using this set and a simple treatment like this will show them off, no artistic input required.

So that's all for today but be sure to check out the rest of the team below.

 Anita

Bev

Julie -that's me

Izzy

Steph

Vinita

I'll be back tomorrow with plenty more inspiration.

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No option for me this time!

Nature's Treasure II Dies Release Blog Hop and Giveaway

Morning all. 

It's release day for the new Nature's Treasure's dies at Uniko and as is tradition we are having a blog hop and give away. The release is timed to coincide with the Stamping Together festival at Port Sunlight, so if you're heading there you could be one of the first to get hold of the new goodies and say hi to Bev too!

Spring has truly sprung, the hedgerows are buzzing with life and I saw my first swallow of the year on Tuesday and one again on Thursday, well it could have been the same one of course! So green features heavily in these designs.

Here's my first offering, using one of the small stamps from Nature's Treasures II set and the large solid die from the new release.

On a panel of mixed media paper, I smooshed some DI, Peeled Paint, Mowed Lawn and Twisted Citron, onto a craft mat and dragged the paper through it until I had sufficient coverage. Once dry, I trimmed it down to size for my frame and randomly stamped the small leaf in a mix of inks, the DI's I used for the background and some Altenew ones, Bamboo and Parrot. 

The frame was made using a couple of rectangle dies behind which I attached 3 of the leaflets cut from the same card. A sentiment was stamped and attached before the whole lot was placed over the inky background with foam pads and added to an A6 white base card.

My next card is my take on a Jennifer McGuire card I'd seen on You Tube and wanted to have a go at, using the new dies and Nature's Treasure II stencil and masks.

My background was created using the masks from the stencil set and then I die cut a few of the solid leaves, a mix of large and small to create the garland from it. To pop up the leaves, I also cut matching pieces of white fun foam which I glued to the back of each die cut and then reassembled the panel onto a base card. A few of the tiny flowers from Originally Organic Additions dies were die cut, adding a coloured pearl for the centers. These are bog standard plain pearls coloured with a Copic marker! My sentiment is from the Sentiment Block series stamped in black on white.

While I had my craft mat out for the first card, I smooshed some die cuts cut from MM paper in a mix of watery Mowed Lawn, Peacock Feathers and Twisted Citron DI. I then simply added them on pads to a white base card, trimmed off the overhangs and added another of my gold framed sentiments made from die cut circles and a Doodle Flower sentiment.

Here's the full set of dies, fab aren't they

OK, that's all from me but please check out the rest of the team for more ideas on how to use these fab new dies. 

 Anita

Bev

Izzy

Julie -that's me

Steph

Vinita

One more thing before you go, make sure to leave a comment here and on all the stops for your chance to win a £15 eGift Certificate to spend in store. You have until midnight Sunday 30th April 2023 to comment. The lucky comment winner will be randomly selected and announced shortly after.

Introducing Nature's Treasures II Dies

Good morning. I'm here this morning to introduce some more inspiration using the soon to be released Nature's Treasure II dies from Uniko with my fellow BA Anita. I love these new dies and had lots of ideas of how to use them.

Spring is supposedly here, not that you would know it with the weather we've been having, but the leaves on the trees are finally bursting into life and the hedgerows are becoming green, so leaves are really on my mind! My first card uses the Nature's Treasures II stamp along with the matching die and a sentiment from Doodle Flowers. 

I used the large more solid stamp in the Nature's Treasures II stamp set to stamp 3 leaf sprigs with Altenew's Bamboo ink and used the matching solid die to cut them out. In my rush to play, the stamping on my first leaflet was a little patchy, so rather than waste it, I decided to colour the leaflets with a matching Copic marker and added some veins with a darker Copic to see what it looked like. I liked the look so did the same to the other two! You can still see a little bit of the original stamping showing through the Copic colouring, it has reacted with the Altenew ink to create additional detail which I quite like. I wanted a little bit more dimension, so simply scored along the center of each leaflet and carefully folded along the score line.

Using a selection of circular dies, I cut a gold frame, a vellum circle and a small white one, onto which I stamped and embossed my sentiment in gold EP.

On my base card, I flicked some of the Bamboo ink along with some darker Moss and added some random dots with the same dark Copic marker I used for the veins, YG 17 if you are interested. The three sprigs were glued behind the sentiment panel, glue added along the underside of the score line and added to the base card.

Just to prove I can stamp without messing up here's another idea using stamped and die cut leaves.

I stamped one of the leaf sprigs, in Altenew's Bamboo and one in Parrot, I also cut one from vellum, tying them together with a bit of silver thread from my embroidery box. 

Using the string of circles from Background Builders Circles, I stamped three rows across my card in Altenew's Silver Stone, the spray of leaves was then added and my sentiment from Everyday Sentiments stamped in Altenew Industrial Diamond.

Here's my final idea using just the dies to create a white on white background for my English Country Garden butterflies. The butterflies aren't around much at the mo, I have seen a few on sunny days but the cold wind will have given them a bit of a shock! Can't wait for them to be dancing amongst the blooms.

To make the background, I die cut a few of each of the dies, then glued then onto an A6 top fold note card. Two of the dies have cut away centers but for this, any that fell out were glued back in!

I die cut a few of the small butterflies and stamped them using the small detail stamp. I used Copic pens to colour over the stamping before arranging them onto the background. I only attached them at the body so that the wings could be given some dimension.

My sentiment is made up of a white embossed and fussy cut Fabulous from Yes You and Have a Birthday from Doodle Flowers stamped in black on strips of white card, a few sequins complete the design.

That's it for me for the moment but Steph and Izzy will be showcasing tomorrow and then it's release day on Saturday!

Joining in over at:-

 

Anything Goes with option of "Create your own background"

 Anything stamped option CAS

Spring                                                                                                                                 

In the Garden                                            

Introducing ... Mid Century Modern Frames

Morning all, it's day 2 of the Uniko release and today we are previewing Mid Century Frames. A set of 3 frames and some text for you to use in lots of different ways. Here's my take using just one of them.

On a panel of white card, I stamped an arrangement of the simplest frame in black. On a Post-It note I stamped the same frame and cut away the center to create a mask. Using the that, I inked the centers with a rainbow of colours. When dry, an assortment of sentiments from Everyday Sentiments and Floral Sentiments were stamped in Versamark and heat embossed with white EP.

The panel was trimmed and added to an A6 base card to complete.

Here's another card using another frame from the set.

A simple retro themed card using the text and atomic stamp as well. The black pole was added using a black fine liner and the Mid Century Modern stencil

The frames were stamped and coloured with Copic markers, sentiments added for a quick graphic card.

That's it for today but I'll be back for the final release introduction. Check out the rest of the team for some fab inspiration as well.

Uniko June Release Full Reveal and Blog Hop

Good morning. Have we whetted your appetites with the latest Uniko release? Well just to show you how fab the sets are here are a few more ideas.

Here is one card using the large lemon stamp from Organically Zesty.

As with my orange in the introducing post here, I watercoloured this large stamp and fussy cut it out. On another panel of MM paper, I stamped the BB Grid a couple of times diagonally, with Versamark, not being too careful about full coverage. In fact after I added the EP but before heat setting it, I removed patches of the EP with a fine brush. Once heat embossed, I added a wash of Mermaid Lagoon DI and left it to dry. The panel was trimmed to leave a border when added to my base card and the the lemon was placed in the top right. On matching card, I cut a banner and stamped the sentiment.

My second card uses the Zesty stencil but instead of using the whole panel, I die cut the larger segments. I found that an old Spellbinders die (Standard Circles Large, next to smallest) embossed a line in exactly the right place on the slice to leave a gap that suggested pith and peel.

Once the slices were cut out, I inked the outside edge and blended out the colour to soften the whiteness left buy cutting them out. On some scrap card, I stamped the BB Diagonal Stripes twice in Altenew's Obsidian and stamped the sentiment on another strip of white card. The stripes were added to one side of the A6 base card and the sentiment strip added before layering on the die cut slices.

Next is a gift card featuring Background Builders - Hearts.

I initially intended to make a standard A6 card but after I'd done the stamping I thought it wasn't quite working so I tried it as a gift card and I think it works better.

The dotty hearts were stamped and embossed with silver EP and the central outline heart stamped in black and embossed in clear glossy EP. The congratulations from the Everyday Sentiments set was stamped and embossed with silver EP. The stamped panel was then cut to create the rectangle and matted onto silver card.

This next card card was a result of an experiment. I wondered what sort of rainbow the wrong side of the rainbow stamps would make. It worked pretty well until the last section which is solid, so I fussy cut a mask and stamped the final arc, then removed the mask, I quite like the look.

A few stamped and fussy cut clouds were added and the same cloud die was used to create the bottom panel as on this card, was stamped with the sentiment from Beautiful.

Finally I've combined the rainbow stamp with the raindrop stencil to create this slimline card.

I die cut a scalloped panel and inked it in Stormy Sky DI, fading it out towards the place where the rainbow was going. I then stamped the wrong side of the rainbow stamps as before but overlapping each layer a little bit for a more seamless blend. 

Using the stencil, I added some raindrops with the Stormy Sky for a tone on tone effect and three die cut and coloured rainbow brollies (Memory Box). Finally I added the sentiment with Versamark, white EP and heat embossed. The finished panel was then added to my base card.

So that's it, what do you think of the release? Something for everyone I think.

As always we are having the regular BA blog hop and giveaway.

Simply leave a comment on all of the stops along the hop for your chance to win a £20 eGift Code to spend in store.

All the details are on the Uniko blog but here are the links to the other BA's posts for this hop, so you can check out more ideas on how to use the new release. So don't forget to leave a comment before you hop along to the other BAs for your chance to win.

All Ts and Cs and further details can also be found on the Uniko blog.

Anita 

 Bev 

Hannelie

Izzy

Jane

Julie -that's me

Steph

Joining in over at:-

 

Color Hues #42

Good afternoon, I hope I find you well.

This year is whizzing by, already the start of a new month so a brand new colour combo from Color Hues for you to play along with. This time Hannelie has chosen a bright and bold combination, here's my take.

I had so many ideas flitting around my head, that it was difficult to settle on one particular idea. In the end I decided that I really ought to ink the rabbit up from the Anita Jerram Birthday Wishing set by Colorado Crafts. I've used the cute hamster and the rats but so far not the rabbit with his balloon.

The colours reminded me of a card I saw a while ago but can I find it on Pinterest, can I, so I apologise to the crafter responsible for not giving full credit! 

I liked the idea of using a polaroid style frame for my background to sit in, which is made by stenciling Black Soot DI, lightly onto the central area over my MFT cloud stencil. That was certainly worth the purchase prize as it gets used a lot! I popped it back into the aperture and put to one side whilst I stamped, coloured with Copics and fussy cut my bunny. 

To create the two panels, I first thought of using some DP I had but the yellow wasn't as intense as I would have liked, so I used the Background Blocks Horizontal Stripes from Uniko and stamped with Altenew's Fresh Lemon ink. The spotty panel is also from Uniko, BB Scattered Polka Dots stamped with Altenew Obsidian ink.

The layout sort of happened accidentally as I'd placed all my elements to one side whilst I made an A6 card base. The stack slipped and created a very effective layout!

The sentiment from Uniko's Everyday Sentiments was stamped on a strip of black and heat embossed with white EP, trimmed and added to the card.

So where will the colours take you? If you need more inspiration, then check out the rest of the team and our GD here.

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#643 3 or more layers

Release Day at Uniko and a BA Blog Hop and Giveaway

Good morning. 

Well the day has finally come when you will be able to get your hands on the 10th Birthday release  from 10am GMT over on the website HERE.

Here are a few more ideas for you, using the new stamps and stencils.

My first card uses BB Splatter and Cogs, with quite a masculine result.

  

On a panel of black card, I stamped the splatter stamp with Versamark and added platinum EP. Before heat embossing, I brushed away some of the thicker areas, as I only wanted a suggestion of the pattern in the background, before I heat embossed. The BB Cogs was then stamped over the top and embossed using Brass WOW EP. The trimmed down panel was added to an A6 black note card and the Everyday Sentiment added with the same brass EP.

Just to prove that grunge isn't just for masculine cards, here is the same BB Splatter used in the background of this very feminine card.

I used the colours at Color Throwdown, a mix of Altenew Forest Glades and Frayed Leaf ink and matching Copic markers for the leaves and a couple of pinky tones of Copic marker for the rose. The sentiment is from the very useful Everyday Sentiments.

After stamping the BB Splatter image a few times to create my background, I took a scrap die cut circle and inked it with Forest Glades ink, popping it up over the splatter with pads. The fussy cut Pure Florals Rose bloom and leaves were added along with the sentiment banner.

This next card uses the Flower Power#7 stencil and a range of pink DIs. The Everyday Sentiment was stamped on a panel of matching card and embossed with white EP. The colours and pattern remind me of a bedspread that was sold in M&S when I worked there in my holidays in the early 70's!

The finished panel was trimmed and mounted on a scalloped die cut square and inked with Kitch Flamingo DI and added to a white square base card.

My next card is very similar to the introducing post but this time the image is flipped and the panel trimmed to fit a square format, double mounted and added to a base card.

 

This next card was inspired some retro fabric I saw on Pinterest and another using the Fun Flower stencil and masks and Flower Power#7 stencil and masks.

I arranged the masks over a panel of white card and inked over with Mowed Lawn DI. I then used the masks and stencils to fill in the blooms. Some of the larger bloom masks moved a little but I quite like the white showing through in places. I used a mixture of blue and green DIs for the blooms.

The You from Big n Bold You sentiment set, was stamped and heat embossed with white EP on black and fussy cut, adding the large phrase with white EP on a black banner.

My final card uses the Balloon Frame set for this fun interactive birthday card.

I made one of these surprise pop up cards for a BA post a couple of years ago here and thought I would revisit it and CASE it! The original video by Jennifer McGuire, showing the process for the mechanism can be seen here.

To begin I stamped the panel and infilled the empty space with the small confetti stamp with a light grey ink and coloured using Copic markers.

On the large balloon, I stamped Time To from Birthday Sentiments and Celebrate form the new Everyday Sentiments in Versamark and heat embossed with white EP. The smaller inside balloon uses the same combination of sets to create a different sentiment.

Here's what it looks like in close up when you pull the tab!

So what do you think of the new release?

To celebrate we are having the regular BA blog hop and giveaway to finish of the month in style. 

Bev has one last GIVEAWAY today, simply leave a comment on all of the stops along the hop for your chance to win £10 eGift Code* to spend in store. You have until Midnight Sunday 6th March 2022 to leave your comments.

Due to an unprecedented amount of entries during the month long celebrations and quests, it will take us a little longer to check all of them and randomly select the winners. ALL winners including this GIVEAWAY will be announced here on the blog Monday 7th March 2022.

All the details of all the challenges are on the Uniko blog but here are the links to the other BA's posts for this hop, so you can check out how they have used the new release. So don't forget to leave a comment before you hop along to the other BAs for your chance to win.

Anita

Bev

Hannelie

Izzy

Jane

 Julie -  you're here

Steph

Wiebke

 

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