Author: Catherine

Today on the Back to Basics and Beyond challenge blog there is a bingo card to play with.

I chose to use the middle column… blue, flower, pearls… and made this card.

I chose patterned papers from the stash that had blue within them and mounted a few panels with blue cardstock. I teamed these with a doily to soften the background. Then I added the digital image I had printed and coloured with promarkers.

I added the stamped sentiment and then pearls and a flower so I could fulfil the bingo card.

Fun to make and a pretty card as a result.

Wonder what line you would make for your bingo? Why not join us at the blog?

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Some more coins and more Black ones. This time the background also had the metallic splats from the Gorgeous grunge set.

I then added the embossing from the Handcarved stamp and black powder to add more texture.

Then I stamped and embossed the plane image from a magazine freebie set and added some detail to the images using the sparks paint. Finally I added the sentiment stamped and embossed in white and a bit of gel pen doodling.

Love the shine and the texture on these coins but kept them so they could be quite masculine too… would make a fab coin topper for a male card.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Today I have the inchies I made for the February colour palette swap. This is the colour palette I was working with…

Lots of lovely pinks!

So I cut my inchies and grabbed my pink tones promarkers to add colour.

This gave me lots to go with but I decided to add the same image to each and keep them simple. I love this flower image from Zinski Paperartsy stamps.

I edged each inchies with silver pen and then mounted them onto the three coloured cardstocks.

Think this could make a lovely card front.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

This month the swap over at my UK swap group on Facebook the theme is “Back to Black”. I love the Amy Winehouse song and when I heard it on the radio I knew that it would be an interesting theme for the group.

So I made my coins mainly black with a tiny touch of blue and the white stamped image!

I used the mdf coins and coated it with black gesso. Then I die cut the swirly image from black cardstock and added that. Next I added stamping and embossing first in black and then with the Deep sea Baked Texture embossing powder (This is the touch of blue as it is translucent but blue tinted).

Then I added the main image which is a Paperartsy inage which I stamped in White pigment ink onto shrink plastic.

I finished with the sentiment stamped and heat embossed onto black cardstock and wink of Stella added for shimmer.

Finally I used black puffy paint to add dots around the edge of the coins.

This last photo shows all the shine and the dimension on these coins as the sun caught it perfectly!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

It was one of the princess’ friends birthday this week and so I made a card especially for Lily.

I stamped and coloured the image using promarkers to look a little like Lily… this included researching her eye colour by following her on Instagram! Yes I was thorough in my research! Ha ha ha!

I decided that the phone image was perfect for Lily as I often see her via Snapchat videos on M’s phone!

Once I coloured her I found this patterned paper that colour matched nicely and some grey and tranquil tide cardstock.

I dry embossed the tranquil tide cardstock with an embossing folder and then used the star die to emboss in the grey card. I then also die cut it from a scrap to provide the star embellishments which I added the spectrum noir silver sparkle pen to.

I then did some stamp surgery so I could have the long banner type sentiment using this Eclectic Expressions stamp.

For the envelope I added splodges of Tranquil Tide and some letter stamps to add Lily’s name and more of the star die cuts.

Love how this turned out. Really enjoy creating for the girls in M’s life as I know how important they are to her.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Whilst I’ve been doing a massive clear out in the craft room I’ve come across a few random pieces that I decided to make into a card to break up the tidying task!

This one was a piece of tissue wrap already torn off and a fab arty piece I think I was gifted in a swap at some point.

I started by adding the tissue wrap to some mixed media cardstock cut into a 5×5 panel and dry brushing copper acrylic paint onto it. Then I used a Paperartsy stencil to add the block pattern down one side using some deco art fluid acrylics and a sponge.

Next I adhered the arty panel and then used the sewing machine to add texture around the edges.

Then I added stamping using a couple of Paperartsy Hot Picks stamps and black sparks paint.

I finished by rubbing the leftover sparks paint round the edge to frame it and then added it to a 7×7 card blank.

I love how this came out… elegant and funky all in one.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Today I have another ATC swap… this time with the theme of Under the Sea.

I made these two using the Art by Marlene papers and die cuts and techniques she taught at the class I attended in November.

I’m super happy with how they turned out. Hopefully the recipient is too!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Carrying on with yesterday’s theme… today’s ATCs all have a sewing theme.

I used the button stamp again over the fluid acrylics for this, along with some sewing zig zags. Then I layered the stamped fabric piece onto some patterned paper and sewed it into place with a mixture of stitches.

This uses the Bronte sisters stamp on acetate and some different fabric backing (canvas and denim cotton) with Paperartsy fresco finish paints and some buttons and lots of hits of sewing to adhere the layers.

This time some different hot picks stamps with the dressmakers model and some text and lace. I started with a background of inks and then stamped the images onto vellum. I then coated the vellum with wax and let it cool.

I then used handsewing (cross stitch) to add more texture.

Love how all three and different but all the same theme.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Another swap… this time button twinchies… and I made this set of four.

The theme was buttons so I used a Paperartsy Hot Picks stamp for the background over a piece of card I coated in Deco arts fluid acrylics and stamped the buttons image with black gesso.

Then I created the label with more painted card and stamping in black gesso. Then I raided the stash for buttons that I liked to go onto the twinchies.

Next I created a panel for them to sit on smooshing distress inks.

Hope the recipient likes them as much as I enjoyed making them.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

The theme for this month at UK stampers forum ATc swap was winter… and I wanted to use up some book print I had added Dylusions to so I created these using the book print strips as a background on the black gessoed ATC blanks.

I added the white embossed star and then the sentiment embossed on black card. I also added the copper thread to add more texture.

Love how these came out.

Happy crafting!

Catherine