Author: Catherine

Despite my immediate reflex of grabbing those Alex Syberia dies I managed to instead use something different for the theme of Festive Flora for today’s #30daychristmascardmakingchallenge

I instead went for some oldie but goodie stamps from Creative Stamping magazine and decided to do the messy watercolour embossing technique I find so effective for floral images.

I stamped on watercolour cardstock, used inks to water colour and then stamped again using the gold embossing powder.

I love this technique so much. I then added the sentiment and the splatter using Gorgeous Grunge stamp, also embossed with gold.

I then trimmed the panel down to be slightly smaller than the card base. I used a dark green base which framed it nicely.

I then added those lovely enamel dots to finish off.

Inside I stamped the images again on a panel for the inside but this time in a light green.

A fun and quite easy card but I think effective!

Probably the best way to understand how this came together is to watch my video so please do check it out.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Decided to make some cards inspired by Tim Holtz’s Simon Says Stamp class he did on Facebook. Except I totally didn’t have either the watercolour pencils or the stamps he used – but hey that’s ok – I made it my own! I videoed the process if you want to follow that!

I used distress ink for stamping all the foliage elements spritzing them with water and doing two stamping per inking to get some with different levels of saturation. I used the Painted Christmas stamps which I think are not too dissimilar to the ones Tim was using.

I kept to three colours of distress ink – Shabby Shutters, Evergreen Bough and Candied Apple. I love the mix of tones.

I kept both cards similar with the layout of the foliage and just turned one upside down to make them a bit different.

The red ribbon, die cut circle and the red card blank really help make the cards pop.

For the background I used the two greens and also some tumbled glass and then ran them through the fern embossing folder for the texture. Love how this came out.

I also added the small panel of the gold angel hair ‘paper’ to ground the foliage but probably should have made it a bit bigger as it’s barely visible!

Inside the card I added a little more foliage just to the corner to keep the theme going inside!

Cute and I think a fun technique – could absolutely have filled multiple sheets of card stock with the stamping. Really fun to do!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

I went well out of my comfort zone and decided to use shrink plastic for my snowglobe to turn a large stamp into a smaller focal point.

I didn’t really have a clue what I was doing after that but ended up with some very old bits being used and I actually really like the final result.

I love the combo of the foiled cardstock and then the softer elements of the punched sprigs which have owned for years!

And then of course all the splatter!

Please do check out my video to see this come together.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

So my version of the colour combo was Crisp Canteloupe, Faded Jeans and then for the green I went with a mix of Peeled Paint and Peacock Feathers.

I also decided to make this my Christmas in July November card where our theme for this month is Bring on the Baubles.

If you want to see this come together please see my video over on YouTube.

Absolutely love this card – those Alex Syberia dies are just so good to work with – and I loved the colour scheme. Such a pretty combo.

I love the shine and shimmer and also that waxed thread for adding a different texture.

A lovely way to combine the challenges.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Today’s theme is North Pole Workshop and I remembered that there was a North Pole signpost in the acetate and vellum kits from Kingston Crafts – and that became the idea for this card!

It really was a simple card to put together – lots of the acetate bits, two of the sentiment banners, a couple of pieces of card, patterned paper, some shimmer splatter and of course the waxed thread bow!

If you want to see me put it together – check out my YouTube.

Love this fun card!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

For this fortnights challenge at ATSM we are working on the theme of Make your Mark! And so my alcohol markers came out to play and I made a rainbow themed floral birthday card! A real contrast to all the Christmas cards!

I started by stamping the floral image (an old magazine stamp set) twice and colouring it in a similar way for each using most colours in the rainbow 🌈 – it is missing red and yellow but otherwise it is there!

I then fussy cut some of the image but left two sides straight so it would sit at either end of the card background.

The card background is a panel of the Kingston Crafts spring slimline set – I love the pattern on this – a fun checkerboard rainbow!

I added a slim panel of the white too before I adhered the floral elements to give somewhere for the sentiment.

Once it was all adhered in place I stamped the Happy using my stamp wheel so I could make sure of a good impression of the stamping and could stamp multiple times to make sure it was black.

Then I die cut the two Lawn Fawn birthday dies to create the rest of the sentiment – such a cute font.

I then used foam adhesive to raise it up.

I used the card candi to embellish and called it done!

A fun and bright card!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Back to playing with a sketch again!

I decided to play with the Christmas tags and more dsp – in particular the panel with the wreath creating a border. I decided that could create the divider between the bottom and the top of the sketch.

I fussy cut along the top of the wreath and then used the candy canes cut from one of the cut apart panels for the main focal point.

I raised up the candy canes, along with a few holly leaf elements, on the foam adhesive. I then chose an acetate embellishment from the Kingston Crafts kit which I cut apart from the larger image.

I decided to step up the card a little bit – I added a panel of shimmer vellum from my stash. This added a really nice luxury feel to the front of the card.

I then used glossy accents to accent the berries in the wreath and the holly elements.

Inside the card I added a panel of white and then a little extra die cut to bring the holly inside the card too.

A fun and bright card – and I love that wreath edge at the top – certainly a bit different! Process video on my YouTube 💚

Happy crafting!

Catherine

I didn’t have any images I could use to really get today’s theme to work so I went to All Dressed Up digital stamps and found this gorgeous image of the three girls carolling and bought it. Digital stamps are so affordable for this kind of challenge to just boost your supplies! And All Dressed Up is a favourite of mine – I love the style of the images.

I went super shimmery with both the image and some shimmer paints and the background with the shimmer spritzes from Kingston Crafts (these are a sneak peek of colours which will be coming soon!).

I also added the glitter glue to the frame of the image and really love how sweet this came out!

I kept the layout simple and added the little charm to create a different texture and then the sweet little die cut sentiment to finish off.

Really love the sweet nature of both the image and the pretty finish with all the shimmer!

As usual check out my YouTube if you want to see the process and listen to my waffling! 🤣

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Today’s theme was cookie exchange and at first I was stumped but then I remembered the gingerbread biscuit images from the Kingston Crafts acetate kit and the Big Dots cover die from Waffleflower and I went to town!

I mean how cute?

Full of dimension and fun elements I think this worked so well! I did video the process so you can watch a short video of this coming together!

Also love that I used more elements on the inside – when there are so many elements in the kit you don’t feel precious about using a lot on your projects!

So a delicious treat of a card made – not bad considering I had struggled with this theme at first!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Wasn’t sure I would get to some scrapbooking as not feeling 100% and also obviously I’m in the middle of a lot of Christmas card making – but I reminded myself I just needed to grab one of the ‘kits’ I had put together from old papers and start sticking things down! And so this page was made!

If you want to see me put this together please check out the video. 💚

Loved scrapping these pics of the Millpond at Stoke Gabriel from our holiday in July.

Happy crafting!

Catherine