Author: Catherine

Hello hello hello … and here is what will probably be my only Halloween card of the year made as part of the challenge over at Creative Knockouts blog. The challenge is actually anything goes but I was given this fun Coso Pumpkin image to work with by Mirtallemente so Halloween happened!

So I actually did something a little weird with this … I printed it out and coloured it using stampin write markers (alcohol markers moves the printer ink so hence the normal pens instead).

But after colouring it I coated it with three layers of versamark and clear embossing powder to create a shiny tile type effect. I love the transformation and the way this traps the ink.

I mounted the panel onto black and then worked on the background. I used some orange cardstock and cut a card blank and then a slightly smaller panel for the background. I added inking to the edges and stencilled some bats using an old Tim Holtz stencil.

I then grabbed some random pieces of patterned paper which I thought worked with the image I decided and went for the distressed look by curling the corners and placing some underneath to peep out. I also inked the green a little and then gave it a massive amount of splatter using both the black soot ink and also some black wink of Stella for shine and sparkle.

I added the focal image with some black brads and then I black heat embossed the sentiment onto the orange and then fussy cut it out.

A perfectly spooky fun card … really enjoyed making this card. I’m popping it in the post to my cousin who I know loves Halloween!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Don’t know why (other than the fact it is gorgeous) but I am addicted to painting with shimmer water colours at the moment. This time I grabbed a digital stamp that was already printed (Alex Siberia one I used a few weeks ago) and painted it using the shimmer watercolours.

I then let it dry before fussy cutting it out.

I then chose a piece of mop up paper and added more inks to it in the colours that went with the flowers.

I also went to town with splattering the shimmer watercolours too.

Once that was dry I ran it through the embossing folder and again added a bit of ink to it to make sure it highlighted a little of the embossing.

I decided to use a scrap of vellum to emboss the sentiment on in gold rather than my usual go to of a sentiment strip. I pierced holes in the vellum to look like it has been stitched. I adhered it too right and then I added a couple of eyelets so I could thread through the cord and adhere it at the bottom. The top left is held in place by the floral element.

I didn’t have quite the right colour of cardstock to mat the panel and I felt it needed more pink so I took petal pink cardstock but inked it heavily with picked raspberry. This gave it the right kind of tone to match with the other colours.

I then added three gold flower embellishments to finish off. Shimmer is not the easiest thing to photograph so this is it under the spotlight to show some of the shine and reflection.

Wonder how many more shimmery cards will get made … or should I pack away my pack of watercolours to make something less shiny?

What I need to do is watch less YouTube videos with people using distress mica sprays … I think this is what is making me go grab shimmer paints and go ultra shiny! 😂

Right that’s that for today. Love this. Love the final effect and really enjoyed having another go with that digital stamp image, it’s probably been one of my favourites I’ve ever been given as part of a design team.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Todays card is featuring watercolour shimmer once again but a real change in pace as I went really simple with four stripes of watercolour and then a digital image water coloured with inks (not shimmer).

Seriously so simple and an elegant (and suitable for any gender recipient) card … well that’s what I think!

I chose neutral colours from the palette (my shimmer watercolours are just cheap ones from hobby craft) and did two wider stripes, one mid size and one narrower.

I made sure I had put down a fair amount of the paint to give it a good amount of colour and shimmer.

I then set it aside to dry.

Next I coloured in the digital image. I’ve used this before for a design team challenge so already had it printed and ready to go. Once that was dry I set it aside before chopping it down into a panel. I then created a mat layer for that and the background from Kraft.

I then heat embossed the sentiment in gold. Layered that onto Kraft too. Adhered it to the front.

I felt it needed an embellishment but something less shiny than a gem or a pearl so I grabbed a screw head brad and added that instead.

Simple but super effective using that background to create a cool and elegant card. Thinking that doing the stripes again in another colour but brighter would also look amazing … but that will have to be another day!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

These two cards came about from a random piece of the Tahitian Tide sitting on the desk begging to be used!

I decided to heat emboss the image across the panel with a blue embossing powder and then played with the shimmer watercolours to colour them in. Finished off with a splatter over the whole panel. It’s so shimmery!

I remembered that this image looked nice on book print so I stamped it three times on some book print and embossed with the same blue powder.

I then blended blue and green inks over the three images and fussy cut them out (I forgot I owned the die to save me fussy cutting! 😂)

I then decided that it needed something fun as a layer under the leaf image so I grabbed this piece of bandage and pulled at it so it was different weave… funny how out of date medical supplies end up in my crafting stash!

I secured the bandage into place with brads and then decided that I only wanted one leaf image but it needed shine so out came the shimmer watercolours again.

I then chose the sentiment from the Artistically inked set and embossed it as a long strip and then mounted on the Tahitian tide card to go across the whole panel. The helped to adhere the leaf image to the fabric too.

This left me with two book print images left so decided to create a trio with the middle one not being on book print and instead just on white with the shimmer watercolour. I wanted to keep this card simple … a textured background, the three images and a sentiment … oh and three gems to finish.

I did give the white panel a layer of the blue cardstock (I gutted the centre to not waste the cardstock as this is my last bit of this cardstock I think).

The shine on those shimmer paints is fabulous … it really captures the light and changes the shade of the colour as the light moves across it.

I did paint them quite generously so there was a good layer of the shimmer and the embossing helped to keep the sections separated.

Loved how they both came out … really fun playtime was had making them too!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

My lovely friend, who has been my manager for the last couple of years has left to go to a new job so here is the card I made her. Went pink and flowery.

I chose to stamp lots of the rose flowers and leaves first and then die cut them out.

I chose a range of pink coloured inks so each was slightly different.

Then I created the background using the leaves and wreath builder tool to create a base of leaves. I then covered most of it up as I had created so many die cuts but still I know it is there.

I also added lots of splatters and then added the die cuts.

I inked a panel for underneath this and then stuck those together . I wrapped the ribbon around the card and then tied a bow to the side.

I then die cut and stacked the letters using Playful Alphabet dies with the top layer using the glimmer paper.

I then inked and punched the banner to stick those onto. I did stack a few other pieces underneath the banner to strengthen it before adding to the side of the panel.

Inside the card I did an inked panel with lots of stamping of random (but clearly meaningful) sentiments including the fab halftone Everything stamp from Altenew.

Zoe has now started her new job and I know she will do a great job (although I also know she has her work cut out for her!). Wishing her all the best.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Today I’ve got a cheery birthday card made using some bits and pieces from one of the patterned paper playtime pouches…

I had quite a few flowers left so I created my own background panel and stuck them onto the petal pink card stock.

I then mounted that on white and decided to use this fun spotty ribbon from the stash to wrap round.

I then stamped and embossed and die cut the sentiment using the Picture Perfect Birthday stamps and the stitched framelits. I die cut it three times to make it a nice chunky panel. I also added some ribbon tails coming out from underneath.

I mounted the whole panel onto foam before adding it to the card base made from the same petal pink.

I finished off with some pretty gems from the stash.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Yesterday I made a card using the idea of colouring the outline of the image once coloured in so that it had a dark background. I liked the autumnal feel one I made yesterday so I went with pinks and purples for this one but then the original idea I had of die cutting the zero waste leaf die and using that behind the image didn’t look right so ended up making a third card to use that and added the coloured background to a grungy background instead.

So this is the card I ended up with … I used a darker grey ink for the outline and background this time which is more dramatic and then black ribbon and black mat layers for the background and the sentiment.

The background was a piece of mop up on photo paper which picked up some pattern from stencil it was wiped from. I added the script stamp over it to add further interest and the gold sequins as embellishments.

It’s quite a moody card but I think the white sentiment panel and the gold embossing helps to lift it.

The final one is similar colours but watercoloured and kept it with the white background.

I used the zero waste leaf die and cut from another mop up on photo paper so all those leaves are glossy and I also added quite a few of the little die cut circles too.

Some of the die cuts I raised onto white die cuts and others straight onto the cardblank so they have different dimensions going on.

Love both these cards … this one is more my usual style but the dark one was what I was attempting and I think it looks cool too.

And clearly all three are very different takes on the same digital stamp and very different in style and techniques.

Also must share this pic of the companion I had for crafting! Next doors cat … Simba … who decided to sleep in our house in his fave place next to the window and the basket.

Little cutie!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

So I had an idea … it was just something I wanted to try with a digital stamp (Alex Siberia) and I ended up making three cards all at once but only sharing this one today … the other two I will blog tomorrow.

Ok here is the final card…

Super autumnal and a bit grungy and very much influenced by the style of some of Prarie Paper and Inks as I was binge watching her videos but not exactly a case of any of hers specifically…. More it was lots of inks and splatters including some shimmer!

Anyway the idea was to colour around the image before I fussy cut it out to give something other than a white edge. I printed the image four times in total (twice on each sheet of A4) and I then added inks using blending tools … turns out that this moves the printing ink so it doesn’t lend itself to lighter colours but this orange and green colour scheme it is fine.

I actually coloured the flowers on a separate image and fussy cut them out to layer onto the background and the leaves.

Then I added a smoky slate stampin up border/background. This took on the colour underneath from the blending but made it darker than the colour on the images and I think it worked well.

Next I created the background from a piece of mop up using similar colours of inks. I then splattered both the image and the background with black gesso, white gesso and the shimmer rose gold ink.

The background I then embossed it with the fern embossing folder to give it texture. I added more inking to pick up the texture and darken the edge a little.

I mounted it onto Kraft that I had inked in brown at the edge to make it darker and richer in colour.

I then heat embossed the sentiment onto Kraft with white and again added brown ink to the piece to darken it a little and make it work with the other colours.

I found this glitzy ribbon in the stash and folded it beneath the sentiment and added some strips of scrap card underneath to raise the sentiment and then added it onto the panel.

Popped it onto a 5×7 card blank and called it done.

Love how this came out … want to see a completely different take on this idea of colouring round the edge, pop back to my blog again tomorrow to see that one too.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Hello!

Welcome to another design team contribution for Addicted to stamps and more and this time the challenge is ‘make your mark’ which basically means colour in!

So I grabbed this cute From All Of Us image and coloured it in with my promarkers before fussy cutting it out.

I decided to use lots of layers of speciality paper under the image and also a die cut wreath to frame the image.

Underneath I embossed the sentiment.

Love the contrast between the cute image, the glitter cardstock and the handmade paper with the torn edge.

Also love the embossed sentiment.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Ok so I make cards for my parents to send as well as some for my aunties and then I build up a stash that I can use too … I usually end up donating some to charity shops to sell too because I make far too many cards! But I love it. Although here is the catch … I love floral and girly looking cards more than anything … and I really don’t enjoy masculine cards very much at all. But as there are men that we all need to send cards to I have to push myself and try a more masculine card every now and then.

Now I don’t mean blue and green equals masculine… my favourite colour is blue, my daughters is green … but when the card is quite graphic like this one it becomes suitable for use for both male and female recipients. So that’s the best I can do! 😂

I grabbed the Happy Celebrations stamp set … which I love and have used often. I decided to create the background with stamping and overlapping one of the happy stamps in different blues and greens. I then splattered it with some black gesso.

I mounted it onto the Tahitian Tide cardstock and set it aside.

I then heat embossed the boxy happy stamp with black embossing powder and water coloured using the same colours of ink as the background stamping again overlapping the colours.

I waited till it was dry before fussy cutting the letters out.

I heat embossed in white the rest of the sentiment onto black and mounted it on white before adhering it to a panel of the blue to stretch across the background.

I added the letters individually to hang off the top and then added some foam behind the panel to give it dimension.

And that was that … added to the 5×7 card blank and called it done. No bling, no ribbon. So suitable for a male or a female. And a departure from my usual girly flowery cards!

Happy crafting!

Catherine