I am an on-the-side and increasingly up front papercrafter who loves nothing more than getting inky and creating pretty things with paper and stamps!
I am also a wife to lovely hubby and mummy to a wonderful 14yr old princess.
Grabbed some more of those Memories and More cards I have kept on the desk to try and get some use out of them and made up this cute birthday card.
I added in a panel of the Pale Papaya which I had run through the alphabet embossing folder.
I then added the gorgeous image from the Splendid Thoughts set which I blended the green and blue inks over. I then added the little die cut in the Pale Papaya vellum as a sparkly accent.
I stamped the sentiment onto a strip cut off another one of the cards and cut a little bird out of the middle of the card I had put at the back as the accent embellishment.
Then I decided to grab the little flowers from the stash and add those too.
Really cute card. And I do love these Memories and More packs for providing everything you need to make colourful card toppers … I know they are meant to be for memory keeping really, but as I’ve fallen out of the habit of that at the moment, this is a really good use for them.
So this project was inspired by my coming across the Forever Greenery foil laser cut pack that I hadn’t really used much of and the Expressions in Ink dsp piece that happened to catch my eye when I was putting some stash away … Next thing I knew I was making 9 Christmas cards!
I mean that Green foiled dsp is so pretty and then with those die cuts on top it doesn’t need much so I just stamped and die cut lots of foliage from the Christmas Season set and then a heap of sentiments (some of which I heat embossed) and started clustering them together.
I used a mix of distress inks to stamp using the stamp platform so they were more varied in colours.
I interrupted my crafting to go see Top Gun with the hubby and then came home and finished them off! I also added some twine and ribbon from the stash to add some different textures in.
On this first one I also added small panel of the soft sea foam which I had run through the Fern 3d embossing folder… love the texture on this.
So happy with this set of cards and what a fun little project. It really wasn’t difficult to put them together as the paper and the foil laser cuts do most of the work. I don’t have any of the larger pieces from this set left now … but still have lots of the rectangle panels and some small leaves … but the leaves I am going to keep on my desk for now in a bid to remember to use them up!
So the lovely Martin’s Mayhem shared this card on his blog and on his socials and I fell in love with it… then he also did a YouTube video showing how he made it. I absolutely wanted a go and realised that the dies in the In the Pines set might work in creating some landscapes.
So I went for Basic White and cut out lots of circles and then cut some of those circles with the landscape/ snowscape dies and started layering them up along with some of the tree die cuts.
I did ink the edges of my snowscapes but only lightly using a fairly dry Night of Navy. I inked the trees using Old Olive and Night of Navy to give them a shadowy muted look.
Once I was happy with my circle landscape I decided that the Snow Crystal background stamp might make a nice background for the moons first I blended the Night of Navy for the sky and then stamped the Snow Crystal using the Pale blue ink (Soft Sky). When I then added the circle die cut for the moon (which I had also inked a little) it looks like the moon beams are snowflake shards!
I then added the circle element to the card front panel with some foam for dimension and then decided it needed another tree so again the pine trees set came out and I did a few die cuts and inked and stacked them to make this a sturdy and chunky tree with the more delicate one on top.
I was a little stuck on sentiments as the ones I kept trying were all too big and covered too much of the circle landscape… then remembered these little stamps in the Peace and Joy set and I think they work perfectly.
So this was absolutely inspired by the incredibly talented Martin, but I am pleased with how my version finished up.
Entering into the Anything Goes Christmas challenge at CHNC.
Well I attempted another Sheet load of cards using the template by Call me Crafty Al but I messed up the cutting … still i managed four cards, and have plenty of leftovers for other projects, but absolutely not really following the template and not as many cards as it should have been… but you know what I am happy with the results so don’t care that it took a different turn!
I decided to use three sheets of the Expressions in Ink dsp but didn’t quite follow the template on one and also my cutting into triangles went squiffy so ended up giving up on the real template and just winging it. To be honest that’s more my thing anyway otherwise I would have ended up with cards that were all too similar and that’s not really me.
Once I had done the cutting I then set to on all the stamping I thought I might use for embellishment….
As the papers were a mix of Pale Papaya and Polished Pink and I don’t own those inks I did a mix of Calpyso Coral, Melon Mambo, Crisp Canteloupe and More Mustard to get some colours that would compliment the Pale Papaya in the dsp.
Most of the leaves were Old Olive but I did do a few in Pear Pizazz to give some variation.
Then I did all the die cutting and fussy cutting needed (fussy cutting the sentiments mainly). And then started to put together the cards. I did end up die cutting some of the standalone elements from the set too and that added some different finishes to some of the cards. I did assemble most as card toppers and then added them to card bases rather than straight onto card bases as I went along.
I also varied on one card and used Splendid Thoughts and Splendid Stems to embellish … just like to mix things up occasionally!
I didn’t however get round to doing much more than putting four cards together properly … these ones where black became the base!
As you can see most of the stanping I did wasn’t used on these… but I’ve die cut everything and put it in a pouch for coming back to … you never know I might get to it soon but I lost inspiration a little after these ones.
I love the drama of the black and the gold … and that Polished Pink alcohol ink effect is everything!
Entering these into the Anything Goes challenge at Crafty Katz
Next time will definitely make an effort to do more with the Pale Papaya … which is gorgeous but I just don’t have the inspiration right now!
Another design team contribution to share with you today. Once again this is for Happy Little Stampers. This is a card I’ve had all the bits and pieces hanging around for ages but only just managed to put it together into a card… and made it a special one too!
So it started with the cover die panel which I die cut for a project back in March which left me with some bits left over I didn’t want to waste so I made up this panel. Now it is really difficult to tell on the picture but the little individual pieces are all different heights as I added extra layers to some of them as I stuck them in. This adds extra texture but doesn’t show at all in the picture!
I still had a large piece of the paper that was perfect for using as a background on this 7×7 card. I then added the flourish die cuts and a butterfly to become the focal point. I also added the die cut sentiment and some linen thread to add texture.
I added wink of Stella and glossy accents to the Butterfly too.
Inside the card I added a couple of strips of the patterned paper and a stamped sentiment with little added stamped details. This then became a card for my auntie’s birthday.
Super happy that I finally used these pieces and love what I created.
Well I feel honoured to be part of yet another Design Team, this time with Creative Knockouts. So you’ll get to see me playing along with new challenges and using a few different things that I’ve not played with in a while… like digital stamps. I have quite a large selection but I just got out of the habit of using them when I had printer or laptop issues… now those are sorted it will be good to get back to experimenting.
I chose to use the One Small Step image and teamed it with the fab star background die from Creative Expressions.
I started with the image printing onto Basic White cardstock and then I coloured it using my Stampin Write markers in soft sea foam and smoky slate colours so it is a very soft green with the grey. I did pull in a promarker for the cool grey moon base colour too.
Then I stuck the printed image to another piece of basic white before fussy cutting out. This gave it some sturdiness as I knew I wanted to raise it up with some foam. I also cut out the flag twice from the same image again to give it some dimension.
Onto the flag I stamped the love you from the Funky Fossil stamps. I intend to give this card to my hubby next week (good job he doesn’t read my blogs!) so a simple love you does the job!
Then I grabbed the Big shot and my star cover plate die and ran it through using both black and the glimmer paper from last years SU catalogue.
I cut down the black background into a 4″ square and mounted it onto white cardstock and then pieced back in a few of the glittery stars.
Then mounted the spaceman on the moon onto some foam and added him to the front of the card. I decided then that a glossy accents finish would work best on his visor so added that too.
Really this is a simple card as the die cut does all the work … but so cute to include that fab little space explorer to create the focal image.
I had some scraps of the Heartwarming Hugs dsp on my table and this made me create a festive card… so the strips of dsp became a border on a Real Red card. I added some circles and then stamped and fussy cut the Holly leaves and the flower from Merriest Moments stamp set.
Next I added the embossed sentiment from Christmas to Remember which I again fussy cut out.
And that was that… another Christmas card for the stash.
I started with a piece of mop up glossy paper. I always do this when I do ink smooshing… I use photo paper to mop up the ink off the glass mat.
From this I die cut three flowers from the Tim Holtz dies.
Then I cut some squares of scrap cardstock and added one of the flowers to this.
I then double mounted on scrap white cardstock so it gave the card some simple definition. I also added a simple sentiment mounted on the coordinating cardstock.
I used the slimmest of the diecuts for adding to a strip of cardstock for decorating the envelope.
Then inside I added three tiny banners and the larger die cut.
Love how this card turned out… and pretty much all from scraps and in a change from my usual style … pretty CAS!
So for this card I went for 2 different kinds of pink … warm and cool pinks … aka Petal Pink and blushing bride… mainly because I had them in my stash of scraps.
I decided to use the beautiful Fancy Phrases stamp set as its so easy to do quick colouring on this as it lends itself to a messier style.
I fussy cut some of the image and then created a panel by straight cutting the rest. It’s a bit fiddly but worth the effort I think.
Then I mounted it on one colour pink cardstock and made the card blank out of the other. This gave it two tones but I think they work well together. I added the sentiment strip which I punched using my Pick a Banner punch. I added some little pink gems and a twine bow to finish.
Inside I added the panel of white with the small branch stamped and coloured.
Happy with how this turned out. Pretty and most importantly Pink!
Hi there! Another design team contribution to share with you today. Once again I’m joining the Happy Little Stampers CAS challenge and this month the theme is Christmas!
Now as regular visitors to my blog will know I often make Christmas cards all year round so this one was not exactly a challenge as a theme… but the CAS element still challenges me … especially as of late my cards have been all about excess not clean or simple. So a quick reminder of the rules…
Clean and Simple design with one focal point, lots of white (or open) space and minimal layers and embellishments
OK with these rules in mind… this is what I made…
I went for a smoky slate cardstock and a modern feel. I embossed a foliage stamp in white (stamp from Creative Stamping magazine stamp set) and added some depth of colour with grey watercolour to the leaves then added splatters of both grey and white.
Next I embossed the sentiment using a holographic embossing powder. The sentiment is a Claritystamps one. I then fussy cut that out, added foam behind it and then adhered it to the panel.
I finished with some pearls.
Love the simplicity of this and how pretty and modern it is.
Inkyfingeredcat 