I'm going to take Bella for a walk shortly but thought I would post this card on my blog before I run out the door!!
The current challenge at Simply Create Too! is 'Something New'. I was very lucky this week to get my hands on my first Mama Elephant stamp set from my friend Michelle. I couldn't wait to play with the little puppies and so I got colouring straight away:
This Mama Elephant stamp set ('Playful Pups') has five puppy images that are just the cutest and I had a lot of fun colouring them with my pencils. I fussy cut them out and put them to the side while I made the background.
I'm a HUGE fan of Melania Deasy and she creates the most magical blended ink backgrounds I've ever seen. She certainly inspired me to try creating a background that's a lot different to my normal 'all-white' design. I started out by using Distress Ink 'Cracked Pistachio' with my mini-blending tool towards the bottom of the card front and then moved up into 'Peacock Feathers', eventually blending them together. I then used my paint brush with water and flicked water droplets over the ink and gently removed the water with a tissue.
After die-cutting the frame (by Pretty Pink Posh) twice from white CS, I glued them together and then adhered to the card front. Once the puppies were set in position, I stamped the sentiment (from the same stamp set) and added sequins, also from Pretty Pink Posh.
I'm over the moon with how this turned out, just need a lot more practice with my ink blending and pencil colouring!!
Off into the gloomy, slightly raining day I go! Took Bella to the river last night and I think she found every single rat that lived along the bank. Will take her where the rabbit holes are today, so that will be a change of smell for her!! Take care Shona
About to drop Max at a friends place and Phoebe and I are going to buy the last of her new school uniform. Not a terribly exciting day but nice to not be rushing around. There is also no sign of the sun till Monday, so don't really want to be outside anyway!!
The theme for the current Simply Create Too! Challenge is 'Something New'. I received some stamp sets from Concord and 9th a few weeks ago and hadn't had a chance to really sit down and play with them. This was the perfect chance to experiment:
One of the reasons I purchased the Concord and 9th 'Love you. Mean It.' stamp set is because of this fabulous scribble round stamp. I don't know what it was but I loved how the circles overlapped and thought I could do some interesting designs with it. Hence this crazy card!!
On a large piece of white CS I stamped the circles four times, overlapping each time while trying to get the pattern balanced. Once the ink had dried I used two tones of pink pencil to colour in some of the image. I cut the panel down to size so it was slightly smaller than the card front, and adhered to the card. I stamped the sentiment (from the same stamp set) on a small square of white CS and popped up on foam tape. A few gold sequins from Pretty Pink Posh finished it off perfectly!! Love how it turned out and have a few more ideas with this stamp, so watch this space!
Its 10am Saturday morning, I'm sitting here in my pyjamas (as are the kids) and I suddenly realise that I have 56 minutes to link my card to the A Blog Named Hero challenge!!
Their theme for this months challenge is 'One Layer' and as you all know I love to create a completely flat design every now and then!!
Unfortunately I don't actually own many Hero Arts stamps/dies but I do have one floral set that I love, and my design came to mind straight away:
I'll be honest, there isn't anything truly spectacular about my card (you should look at entry No. 36 by TaeEun, its incredible!!!!) but I'm loving using dark colours (like black and navy) to add details to my cards. This set by Hero Arts is called 'Let Love Grow' and it gives you lots of ways to layer up some flowers and leaves. I actually like using the layering parts on their own, they add such interest to a one-layer card. And this is a new colour combo for me, I think its really pretty!!
And will also link to the CASology Challenge Week # 182 where their theme is 'Adore' which is how I feel about this stamp set:
I've gone a bit crazy making cards of late, which feels amazing!! So will have a few to post over the next day or so. Nice to be getting my mojo back and being allowed more time to create. We have three days of the school holidays left and the weather is cloudy and yuck, so nice to relax with the kids and enjoy our laziness before the rush of school starts on Tuesday morning...eeeek!!
Amazingly I was able to make another card for the Winnie and Walter - Rerun challenge last night. Once again I had to think outside the box but we 'Kiwi's' are very well known for our ingenuity!!
The focus for this 'Rerun' challenge is the Winnie and Walter 'Scenery: The Party Hangover' stamp set, which I don't own.
After I saw this fantastic card by Kate Capper, I knew I could do something similar using another Winnie and Walter stamp set:
I started this card off by grabbing a stamp from Winnie and Walter 'Big Bang Bling' that is a short row of square sequins. I stamped these side by side across the card front in two rows. I then die-cut the Winnie and Walter 'happy' from the middle and also from some pink and white CS. I added a panel of white CS across the back of the 'happy' negative to give the inlaid word something to be glued too.
I glued the white CS word in first and then the pink word over top. I then added the 'happy' that was die-cut from the card front on top and up slightly, so you could see the pink CS underneath. I also glued in the middle of the 'P's' and 'A' with the left overs after die-cutting the stamped area. After stamping the 'birthday' in black (from Winnie and Walter 'The Big, the Bold and the Happy'), I added some silver and pink sequins from Pretty Pink Posh.
It was really good doing this Rerun Challenge because it caused me to use a stamp set that I hardly ever think of. Will definitely use it more often now!!
Its become very quiet all of a sudden, so better go and check what the kids are up too. Finally have all the stationary that the kids need to start school next week. Now I just need to cover all the books, which is a horrible job because I have to use this sticky plastic material!! Can't believe we have been on holiday for nearly six weeks, it has just flown by. We didn't do anything exciting but the kids and I have spent nearly every day together, which I've loved. And the late mornings have been heaven...... Take care Shona
Its actually raining here today and the temperature has come down a lot, so everyone is feeling a lot less sweaty and tired. Phoebe stayed the night last night with her BFF Ella, so Max and I watched a few movies and I managed to make some cards at the same time!!!!
For this months Winnie and Walter - Rerun challenge, they are looking at the 'Scenery: The Party Hangover' stamp set, which unfortunately I don't own. But, I loved a couple of the cards created by the Design Team, so used another stamp set instead.
This is the card by Lydia Evans that I absolutely loved. The colours are gorgeous and I love the pattern across the bottom half of the card. I had to really think of the box for this one, as I don't own any border type stamps from Winnie and Walter. This is what I came up with:
I grabbed one of the larger stamps from the Winnie and Walter 'Big Bang Bling' stamp set, it has 7 open sequin circles on it. I used a grey ink and stamped it across the whole of the card in rows. I then used the single solid sequin stamps (try saying that 3x fast!!) and stamped to fill in some of the grey circles with pink, mint, yellow and turquoise inks.
After die-cutting the Winnie and Walter 'happy' die from turquoise, mint, pink and white CS, I glued them on top of each other on the card front. And of course I had to add some real sequins from Pretty Pink Posh for some sparkle!! So happy with how it turned out!
I was having so much fun last night with Max I managed to make another card for the 'Rerun' challenge, so will post that one next. Was so nice to be creating again and not be in a rush!!
I'm slowly melting in my corner where my computer and craft stuff are stored, so hopefully I make it to the end of this post......Its been a glorious few weeks with lots of sunshine and incredibly hot days. Perfect for our end of the school holidays!!
Our theme this week at Addicted to Stamps and More! is 'Holiday' which can be any holiday at all. Maybe Valentines, Christmas, Easter....there are quite a few to choose from!! Our Sponsor this week is DRS Designs and I'm sure they will have a little something for the winner of this challenge!
After my complete failure at getting any of my Christmas cards posted last year, I want to make sure I have a huge stock of cards so there is no excuse to be un-organised next time around. So I took this opportunity to make one more:
I had the idea to make this card back in early December when I received the stamp set (from Neat and Tangled 'Happy Ornaments') and after procrastinating forever, I finally sat down and made it. And I'm so glad I did!!
I started off by stamping the ornament twice on white CS and heat embossing in gold. I then fussy cut them both out and glued them together back to back. This gave it more stability and if it twirled around it would have the embellishment on both sides. When gluing together I also stuck in a piece of gold thread in between, so it had something to hang from. And I also tied a bow around the top using some Glossy Accents to keep it in place.
I used a circle die (from Couture Creations) to die-cut the front of the card. The thread was held in place with some washi tape and a panel of white CS glued over-top to cover it up. I stamped and heat embossed the sentiment (from the same stamp set) on some white CS and cut it into a banner. This was adhered to the card front with a few gold sequins from Pretty Pink Posh for a bit more shine!!
You have until next Wednesday to link your projects to the Addicted to Stamps and More! challenge and if you need any help with ideas or inspiration, the rest of the Design Team have some beautiful projects on the blog. Can't wait to see what you come up with!!
Happy Friday everybody!! Only one more day to get thru before the weekend can be enjoyed! It also means its time for a new challenge at Just Add Ink. For this weeks challenge we have a sketch to inspire you:
For some reason when I saw this sketch, I immediately thought of snowflakes. I received some snowflake dies before Christmas which never got an outing, so thought I would take them for a spin:
This was a very simple card to put together. I die-cut the snowflakes (from Little B 'Holiday') from silver-glitter CS and also from white CS and glued them together, for a bit more stability and dimension. I used my mini-blending tool and Distress Ink 'Peacock Feathers' to create the background and then adhered the snowflakes like the sketch. I then stamped and heat embossed the sentiment (from CAS-ual Fridays 'Must Love Snowflakes') in silver.
You have until next Wednesday to link your projects to the Just Add Ink Challenge and if you need any help with ideas and inspiration, please visit the blog to see what the rest of the Design Team have created for you. Can't wait to see you in the Gallery!!
Its 11.50pm Thursday night here in New Zealand and its a billion degrees. The kids are still awake because they are so hot, which means so am I. It was a beautiful day and we even went to the pool twice because of the heat but I'm tired now and would love to sleep...... Oh well, can't have it both ways I suppose!!
This weeks CASology challenge is 'Clear', which is so handy because I had an idea for a card I've been fiddling around with and it fits the theme perfectly:
A few weeks before Christmas, I received some purchases from Winnie and Walter, which included this Faceted Star Die. I love anything geometric, especially anything with triangles, so really wanted to play with this one!! The Faceted Star Die also comes with a Solid Star Die and I used that first to die-cut the star from the card front. After die-cutting the Faceted Star from gold mirror CS (from Craft Smith), I carefully glued a piece of acetate to the back of the star. This way I had something to glue the gold Faceted Star onto, so it became 'inlaid'. And it worked like a charm!! I stamped and heat embossed the sentiment in gold (from Winnie and Walter 'My Precious') on a strip of white CS and popped up on foam tape. A sprinkling of gold sequins from Pretty Pink Posh finished it off with some extra sparkle. Always so cool to make a card with a front you can see-through!! I'm also going to link this to the Stamplorations CAS Card Challenge - January but without the optional twist of using Silver.
The house is sounding quiet now, so I might be able to slip off to bed. Although I'm so behind with all my tv programmes I could watch a few sneaky episodes since I'm still on holiday and don't have to get up early in the morning. That is beginning to sound like a very good idea.......now where did I put that spare bag of Peanut M&M's........
Another two weeks have whizzed around again, so its time for a new challenge at TIME OUT. Its a very exciting challenge for me as we are CASEing a card designer who I've admired for a long time:
This card is by the spectacular Marika Rahtu and her blog is Me and Minime Crafting. I'm sure you will have come across her cards somewhere in blogland. Her colouring skills are unbelievable and she comes up with such unique ways to make her cards stand out. It was from a video that Marika made that I learned how to use my pencils to colour on the back of vellum. She really is a genius and its an absolute honour to CASE one of her cards.
The grey of the flowers really grabbed me first when I saw this card. I could never even attempt to replicate her colouring of the flowers, so chose some stamps that worked with layering:
I started off by stamping the flowers (from Altenew 'Painted Flowers') using only two of the layers, with grey on the bottom and black giving the detail. I also stamped some single leaves in black as well and fussy cut them all out. Pink and grey is a colour combo I love, so decided to use my mini-blending tool and some Distress Ink 'Picked Raspberry' to give a very soft colour to the card front.
I layered the flowers and leaves using double-sided tape and stamped the sentiment (also from Altenew 'Sohcahtoa') in black. I then added some small clear and pink sequins from Pretty Pink Posh.
You have two weeks to link your projects to the TIME OUTchallenge, so hopefully that will give you plenty of time to come up with one or even two designs. And of course the rest of the Design Team have some gorgeous cards on the blog to help you with any inspiration you may need. Can't wait to see what you come up with!!!
Phoebe and I are off to spend the night with my Mum (Nana) tonight and have a 'girls night'. I'm sure there will be lots of junk food consumed and many Modern Family dvd's watched (can't really watch our usual Horror movies with Phoebe around....). Should be a lot of fun. Not sure if I can take my card making supplies with me yet or not, Phoebe might want me completely all to herself!!
This Seize the Birthday challenge has a 'Clean and Simple' theme. I'm not sure my card falls under this idea, so will go with a 'No Topping' theme just incase:
Yep, its that stamp set again!! Love this flower stamp (from Create A Smile 'Botanical Love') so much, I decided to try some masking. It was rather fiddly and something I'm not very confident with but happy with how it turned out. I had to create two masks to get this look. I trimmed the panel down and then stamped and heat embossed the 'wish' in gold (from Create A Smile 'Make a wish'). The panel was then adhered to the card front. I then stamped the 'birthday' from the 'Make a wish' stamp set on a strip of white CS and popped up on foam tape. And to finish off I added two different sized gold sequins from Pretty Pink Posh.
This will be my last entry for the Create A Smile - February Guest Designer Call. I would so love to be a part of their blog for a month, so will be crossing everything I can physically cross for luck!!!!
Better start packing for our overnight adventure. Dave and Max are staying home and having a 'boys night'. I'm sure it will involve KFC/McDonalds and a Star Wars marathon. Think we will all be having a great night!!
Its been a very warm day again today and was very glad I went gardening first thing, so I didn't wilt away as the day went on.....The only problem is that its very warm now 10.30pm Friday night. Going to be very hard to get to sleep again, not quite prepared to go nude, too many chances of earthquakes and mosquitoes flying in the windows!!
The is the gorgeous colour combo for The Challenge this week and funnily enough, when I was playing with a new stamp set, I had this combo in mind:
I've wanted this new stamp set from Create A Smile 'Botanical Love' for so long, the first thing I did after dinner was stamp the flowers out and grab my pencils. I coloured this flower with my favourite teal pencil, creating an ombre effect with the leaves towards the tips. I then added orange to the centre. After fussy cutting it out, I added foam tape to the back.
I die-cut the tag (from Pretty Pink Posh) from white CS twice, glued them together and then adhered to the card front. The flower was popped up to the side and I stamped the sentiment in Navy (also Create A Smile 'Make a wish'). A few co-ordinating sequins (the orange from Neat and Tangled and the blue from Avery Elle) finished it off!!
One more card to post and then off to bed. Think I will need to go and check on the kids shortly as I don't think they are asleep yet. Its just too hot, so will get them some cold flannels to help them out. They are already skilled at spinning them around really fast to make the flannels cold again!! Take care Shona
Hi everybody and welcome to our first Just Add Ink challenge of 2016!! At Just Add Ink we always like to start the year off with a blog hop to showcase the first challenge of the year. You should have arrived here from the always amazing Jodene's blog.
This year Rochelle has
suggested we all 'Just Add Something New'. Now I know that won't be
hard for the Stampin Up! demonstrators out there as the new Occasions
catalogue and Sale-a-bration promotions have started! If you don't have
anything new from SU! please join us using whatever new product you have
and be sure to let us know what it is.
To make the blog hop extra special the design team have donated new
SU! SAB items as prizes to the winner and two honorable mention
participants. Talk about lucky!!
Please note, to be eligible, you must create a
"NEW" project using "SOMETHING NEW TO YOU" and leave a comment on all
the design team blogs, be or become a JAI blog follower and blog your project
exclusively linked to Just Add Ink. Any entrants that link to
additional challenges will be disqualified. (The prizes are open to both international and AUS/NZ participants).
We look forward to kicking the year off with a celebration of new
crafty goodness and inspiration and hope you will join the challenge
with us!!
I was very lucky over the last few weeks to have received a few new stamp sets and papers and couldn't wait to use them. And with Valentines on its way, I thought it would be good to make something lovey-dovey:
I started off by cutting a panel of white CS slightly smaller than my card front and die-cutting a heart from the middle of it. After gluing a piece of acetate to the back of the heart, I cut a piece of patterned paper and adhered to the card front, so it sat behind the heart. Lots of foam tape was added to the back of the heart to form a barrier for the beads/sequins and also around the panel itself for stability. As I wanted to line up the top tip of the heart with the middle heart on the paper, I added my shaker mix to the paper and then pressed the panel down over top.
I then stamped and heat embossed the sentiment in gold and fussy cut around it. This was popped up on foam tape and a few more gold sequins were added for a bit more shine. I love the new paper pad this paper came from and the stamp set only arrived a few days ago!!
The heart shaped die is from CAS-ual Fridays. The seed beads are all from The Ton. The pink shaker sequins and gold sequins are from Pretty Pink Posh. The patterned paper is from Crate Paper 'Hello Love' and the sentiment from Honey Bee Stamps 'Beautiful Life'.
You have until next Wednesday January 20th to link your projects to the Just Add Ink challenge. I can't wait to see what new goodies you have in your craft stash and what you create with them!!
Your off now to visit with the fabulous Chantell to see what new goodies she has been playing with!!
My goodness its warm this evening!! Its about 20 degrees (celcius) which is warm for trying to get to sleep. So all the windows are open, which the mosquitoes are loving!!
Its a birthday celebration for the Fusion challenge, they are 2 years old!! Its a challenge I've always loved entering. Even my most popular blog post was when I won the Christmas Challenge with my round shaker card in 2014....and I still see it being pinned on Pinterest!! So Fusion has a special place in my heart...... I have a few ideas with this gorgeous inspiration photo and sketch. Hopefully I will get some time to make the others before I miss out. This card came about after playing with my new stamps last night and I immediately went for these flower colours:
I stamped the flowers from my new Create A Smiles 'Botanical Love' stamp set and coloured with my water colour pencils. I fussy cut them out but didn't include the stamens, as they were too fiddly to cut nicely. I also stamped two small and one large leaf from the same stamp set, coloured with pencils and fussy cut as well.
The frame (from Pretty Pink Posh) was die-cut twice from white CS and once from black CS and glued together. I added lots of foam tape to the back and put it on the middle of the card. I glued the leaves to the back of the flowers and then put them on foam tape as well. After stamping the sentiment (from the same set) I added co-ordinating sequins from Pretty Pink Posh. Love those Summery colours!!
Right, I'm off to bed as I have to get up really early to go gardening. Its supposed to be even hotter tomorrow, so will try to get the weeding finished before I melt. And I'm sure the kids and I will then be off to the pool. There is a piece of cheesecake in the fridge with my name on it, so will sneak it off to bed and read for a bit. Can burn those calories off in the morning before I have to put my togs on.....fingers crossed..... Take care Shona
Hi everybody, just popping in to remind you about our current challenge at TIME OUT. Our theme for this challenge is:
BIRTHDAY: with optional twist of 'sponging'
If you do twist with us, you have the chance of winning a Gift Voucher from our Challenge Sponsor Uniko Stamps.
I continued along in a 'rainbow' theme for my card this week, as I need as much practice as I can get with blending inks together. I'm pretty sure its the card stock I use but since I can't afford to buy any internationally all the time, I need to get good with what I've got:
I feel I must have had Laura Bassen sitting on my shoulder while I was making this card!!
I gathered a big pile of Distress Inks and my mini-blending tool and created a rainbow effect on a piece of white CS. I then had the fun of cutting out 12 individual hearts using a stitched heart die from MFT 'Hot Cocoa Cups'. I tried to cut each one where the colours were blending into each other. I then heat embossed in white (on black CS) the sentiment from Happy Little Stampers 'Butterfly Birthday' and adhered straight on the hearts. Love all that colour against the white background!!
I'm going to link this to the Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge where their theme is 'Ombre'. I hoping my gradually blending into each colour fits the bill!!
You have one more week to link your projects to the TIME OUT challenge and the rest of the Design Team have some beautiful designs on the blog to help with any ideas. I really hope you can join us!!!
This means you can create anything you want!! Maybe some much needed birthday cards? You could start getting ready for Valentines Day? Or maybe a friend needs a boost?? Its all totally up to you!
Our Sponsor for this challenge is Stamplorations who are giving the winner a $10 gift certificate. Lucky them!!
I was very lucky to receive some new Winnie and Walter goodies last week and have been having great fun playing around with them. I need to send quite a few cards around the world to friends, so thought this would be a chance to add to my collection:
I stamped the Winnie and Walter 'Mini Scenery: Madison' on some water colour paper and heat embossed in white. I then got myself comfortable in front of the tv with my blue Ziggie, a fine brush and some water. The colour was added to the pointy bit of the stamp shape and using a wet brush, I pushed the colour to the top, fading it as I went. Once it was all dry, I cut it out with some scissors and adhered to the card front.
I really wanted that stamp and water colouring to be the star, so decided to frame my painting. I cut a panel of white CS slightly smaller than the card front and used a rectangle die from Couture Creations to cut the window. This panel was then popped up on lots of foam tape. After die-cutting the 'hugs' (also from Winnie and Walter) three times from white CS, I glued them all together and popped up on little pieces of foam tape.
And I couldn't help myself by adding some bling with some turquoise sequins from the new Pretty Pink Posh 'Share Kindness Sequins Mix' and also some small clear sequins. I just love blue and white!!!!
You have one week to link your projects to the Addicted to Stamps and More Challenge and if your needing any help in the 'inspiration' department, pop over to the blog to see what the rest of the Design Team have created. Those girls are incredible!!!!!
Hi everybody and welcome to the first Waffle Flower Crafts Challenge of 2016!!! And we have the most gorgeous photo and technique to inspire you this month:
Our technique this month is 'Stenciling'. We have a sketch to help with some layout ideas and this amazing photo with all those shades of purple to help with your colours.
Just to remind you, you don't need to use Waffle Flower products to enter the challenge. An overall winner will be chosen from people that do use Waffle Flower on their designs but also a 'random winner' is chosen from all entries, which gives you a chance to get a stamp set of your choice!!
Stenciling is not a technique I use very often in my designs, mainly because I don't have many stencils but I'm also not confident with doing it well, so this was a great challenge for me! I knew I wanted to create something using the purple colours and found a stencil that co-ordinated with the shapes I was using:
I stamped on vellum and heat embossed in white, two types of Lotus flowers from the Waffle Flower 'Lotus' stamp set. I used the large Lotus flower once and the other Lotus flower stamp, that has a side view, 3x. I turned them all over and used my pencils to colour them from behind. Once finished I fussy cut them all out. I found a stencil from Teresa Collins 'Basically Essentials', that had shapes similar to the shapes of the lotus leaves, so thought this would make a fantastic backgdrop. I adhered it over the card front and used my mini-blending tool and Distress Ink 'Seedless Preserves' very gently, to create the design. The three 'side view' lotus flowers were arranged in a fan over the stencil and adhered with double-sided tape. The larger Lotus flower was then popped up on foam tape. I then stamped the sentiment from the Waffle Flower 'Leafy' stamp set in black. The Waffle Flower Challenge ends on Monday 25th January, so still plenty of time to get creating and link up your project. And if you need any help with ideas, the rest of the Design Team have some amazing projects for you on the blog. Can't wait to see what you come up with in the Gallery!! Take care Shona
Woke up this morning to pouring rain and strong winds, so gardening was out of the question. The sun is out now, the wind is stronger and its so muggy, I'm constantly having to go and stand in front of the freezer!! We are going to go swimming shortly but before we go I wanted to share a card with you.
For the latest Seize the Birthday Challenge they have 'Anything Goes' as their theme. I have a lot of birthdays coming up over the next few months, so need as many cards as I can make!! I received some new stamps and dies from Winnie and Walter the other day and got to play with them last night. I was just stamping out random colour combos and came across one I loved:
Using the stamps from Winnie and Walter 'In Bloom: Lola's Bouquet with Joni Andaya', I stamped with black Versafine Ink and Mama Elephant 'Bubblegum'. I always forget about black with flowers, makes them seem more modern and stylish some how.
After die-cutting the 'happy' twice from white CS and once from black CS, I glued the white ones together and the black one on the bottom so it was showing slightly. I then adhered it to the card front along with 'birthday' from Winnie and Walter 'The Big, the Bold and Happy', embossed in white on a strip of black CS. And for once, no sequins necessary!!
