Welcome to Thursday everyone and also to a new challenge at TIME OUT. We have a one week challenge for you and this time we have a card for you to CASE.
This absolutely stunning card is by the incredibly talented Therese Calvird of Lost in Paper. I've been a huge fan of hers for a few years now and she is also the sweetest and most helpful person you could meet. Her colouring skills are out of this world and her videos are a joy to watch. If you haven't visited her blog before, I really encourage you to do so!!
CASEing a card is basically taking inspiration from the card itself and creating your own design. You could like the layout, the colours, the techniques used etc. Its all up to you!!
Our Guest Designer for this challenge is Birgit of Crafting While I Wait. Birgit is a 'jack of all trades' when it comes to her designs. She can colour like a pro and uses die-cuts for all sorts of incredible ideas. You really must visit her blog and see all the different projects she has made!!
I pretty much loved EVERYTHING about this card, so ran with the same layout and use of vellum but in a slightly different colour:
Why have I never created a striped background with my water colours before??!! It was so fun and easy to do and looks fantastic. Thank you Therese for this inspiration!
I cut a panel of water colour CS and used my Gansai Tambi water colours to create the striped background. Once this was dry, I adhered it to the card front. Next I cut a piece of vellum the same size as the card and used a curved die to cut the edge. It was a little hard to adhere to my card but I used small strips of double sided tape to hold it in place.
The flower was stamped and heat embossed in white on some water colour CS and I used the same water colour paints to colour it in. I dried it with my heat gun and then fussy cut. This was popped up on some foam tape, along with the sentiment and some sequins. I really hope Therese likes it!!
The flower is from Hero Arts and the sentiment from Altenew. The curved die is from Simon Says Stamp and actually also has 'thanks' die-cut with it but I hid that under the flower. The sequins are from Pretty Pink Posh.
As I mentioned before, you only have one week for this challenge, so please link your projects by Wednesday 6th July. And of course the rest of the Design Team have created some beautiful projects on the blog to inspire you. Looking forward to seeing how your inspired by Therese's card in the Gallery!
Take care
Shona
Hi everybody and welcome to not only our 200th challenge but its also our 4th birthday at Addicted to Stamps and More!! Woo hoo!! Congratulations to our leader Kylie who created this challenge and keeps it ticking along beautifully!
As its our birthday, we have a birthday inspiration photo for this weeks challenge. Not only will you help us celebrate but you will be able to build up your birthday card stash too!!
And there are extra prizes too this week!!! We not only have a $30 gift certificate from Happy Little Stampers, we also have a $25 gift certificate from Paper Smooches AND 3 digital images from QKR Stampede Stamps. Talk about exciting!!
I love all the colours in the inspiration photo this week so decided to make them the focus of my design:
I sat down with my Gansai Tambi water colour paints and had a blast painting rainbow stripes on a piece of water colour CS. Once it was dry, I used a 'happy' die from Whimsy Stamps three times and also cut three more from white CS. I glued the white and rainbow die-cuts together (for a bit of stability) and then to the card front. I covered all the die-cuts with lots of Glossy Accents and stamped the sentiment (from Whimsy Stamps 'Happy Everything') in black. There's so much colour going on I didn't think it needed any sequins, which is unusual for me!!
I'm going to link this to the Virginia's View Challenge # 22 where the theme is:
Happy birthday to all my ATSM team mates and to see their gorgeous birthday cards, pop over to Addicted to Stamps and More. You have until next Wednesday July 6th to link your projects and I can't wait them all in the Gallery.
Take care
Shona
Hi everybody and welcome to the combined Blog Hop of CAS-ual Fridays and Imagine Crafts. You should have arrived here from the blog of the creative Nadine Carlier but if you've lost your way or want to start at the beginning, pop over to the Imagine Crafts Blog to see the full blog hop list.
Imagine Crafts in an online store that stocks all sorts of wonderful craft supplies and tools and it's so exciting to join members of their team on this hop!!
We were very lucky to be supplied with some goodies from their store and I chose some Memento Dew Drop Dye Inks. I've seen quite a few people using these and they are such a cute little size. And the choice of colours is incredible!!
The colours I chose are gorgeous and so much fun to use. When designing my card for this hop, I decided to try something different with them. I had never seen anyone blending with these inks before so thought I would give it a go:
I cut a panel of water colour CS the same size as my card front and heat embossed a flower from the CAS-ual Fridays 'Wonderful Words' stamp set in Rose Gold. I then grabbed my mini-blending tool and Memento Dew Drop Inks - 'Lilac Posies', 'Grape Jelly' and 'Sweet Plum' and blended away in the middle of each flower. The ink blended so beautifully and was a softer version of when the inks are stamped. I also wasn't too worried about keeping the colour within the flowers , was happy for it to have a more relaxed design.
While blending I also used the 'Grape Jelly' on an extra piece of water colour CS and die-cut the 'Smile' from the CAS-ual Fridays 'Smiling Fri-Dies' set. I also cut it twice more from some white CS and glued them all together to give it some dimension. This was adhered to the card front and covered in Wink of Stella.
For the rest of the sentiment, I stamped 'you are loved' from the CAS-ual Fridays - Calling All Sistahs 'Hope Ribbon' stamp set and heat embossed in Rose Gold. I used my mini-blending tool again to add some 'Grape Jelly' carefully around the edge and then popped it up on foam tape.
I'm over the moon with these Dew Drop Ink Pads and to know I can not only stamp with them but also blend means I can get twice as much use out of them!!
The next person on the blog hop is the always fabulous Vicki Dutcher and I can imagine she is going to blow you away with her hop creation!!
Make sure you comment as you hop along for a chance to win a prize from both CAS-ual Fridays and Imagine Crafts. Good Luck!!
Take care
Shona
I can't believe I've made so many 'coffee' themed cards in the last few days and even have another one on the go. Must be after seeing all the other entries for the Summer Coffee Lovers Blog Hop and being inspired by their creativity!!
Since the theme is 'Summer', I wanted to try and add some fruit into my design somewhere. I played around with all sorts of die-cuts and stamps, and in the end I decided to just add them directly to the coffee:
I stamped the cup, banana bunch and pineapple on to some white CS and coloured with pencils. I fussy cut them all out and then carefully cut a slot in the coffee part of the cup and pushed the fruit in. The cup was then popped up on some foam tape.
I stamped the sentiment and then realised it was missing something. I was searching through my dies looking for ideas and came across this frame left over from a card a few weeks ago. Perfect!! It has the colours of the sea which goes so perfectly with the fruit to give a 'tropical' feel. So I adhered it to the card along with some clear sequins and it was finished!!
The frame die is from Pretty Pink Posh, as well as the clear sequins. The sentiment is from My Favourite Things 'Hug in a Mug'. The coffee cup is from Waffle Flower 'Warm Wishes', as well as the pineapple and banana bunch from 'Willy and friends'.
I have four other challenges I would like to enter:
Stamplorations CAS Challenge - June
Addicted to CAS Challenge # 90
Curtain Call Challenge
Taylored Expressions - Share Joy Challenge # 40
Think I might need to go on a hunt for some peanut M&M's...my eyes are getting very heavy but I need to make at least one card before I go to bed. And I don't even have an idea for the design yet. Chocolate can be very inspiring.....I hope.....
Take care
Shona
The theme for the Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge this week is 'Animals' and I thought this would be a perfect chance to show you a card using the new 'Mermonkey' stamps from Waffle Flower.
I knew I wanted to create some sort of underwater scene, so out came my Distress Ink and blending tool:
Mermaids seem to be all the rage at the moment with new stamp sets. I'm so glad that Waffle Flower joined the trend and even happier that they combined the mermaid idea with the already cute monkey characters.
I started off by stamping all the images (from the 'Little Mermaids' set) on white CS and colouring with my pencils. I was then able to use the matching dies to cut them out. I used Distress Ink 'Mermaid Lagoon' (how appropriate!) to create the blue background and stamped the bubbles (from the same set).
The rock was adhered to the card front along with the seaweed, fish and starfish. The beautiful mermaid was popped up on foam tape, the sentiment stamped in black ink and some clear and aqua sequins added (from Pretty Pink Posh) for some shine.
I have one more card to post on my blog and then I better get started on some more cards. I'm off to Auckland next Thursday (June 30th) so trying to get myself organised in advance for blog posts and DT cards that are due, as well as making cards to take with me for the Expo. I so wish I didn't have to sleep, I would be able to get so much more done!!!
Take care
Shona
My goodness, just before I started writing this post I checked the amount of entries linked to the Summer Coffee Lovers Blog Hop.........382!!! That's incredible and I can't wait to see what the final total will be.
I don't actually own too many 'coffee' themed stamps and dies, so have to try and think of new ways to use them for each hop. I did though realise that I purchased one little stamp set just after the last hop and it had hardly been used, so needed to remedy this straight away:
I thought some bright, Summery, rainbow colours were in order for this card and had a lovely time colouring away with my pencils! This was a lovely easy card to put together. I stamped the cup/plate image (from Waffle Flower 'Warm Wishes') 8x on some white CS, coloured with my pencils and then fussy cut out. I went around the outside edges with my black pen to tidy them up and then popped them all up on foam tape.
The sentiment was stamped on white CS too, fussy cut and put on foam tape too. I love all that colour against the white background!!
I'm also going to link this to the Virginia's View Challenge # 22 where the theme is:
I have a few other cards to post this evening but I'm off now to read with Max in bed and see if I can get him to let me sort out a splinter on the bottom of his foot. Its very sore but he doesn't want me to touch it, so will see what I can do......A bit of a bribe might be in order...
Take care
Shona
Time is just flying by as usual, and I can't believe its time for the Summer Coffee Lovers Blog Hop already!!
Like everyone else in Blogland, I so look for to this hop. Its always so much fun and even though I don't drink tea or coffee (don't hate me!!) I do love a good hot chocolate and love to see all the different stamps and dies that are available now on everyone's cards.
For this first card (I have another one to photograph and another half way done, had a water colouring disaster.......) I found the perfect paper pad that's all about Summertime, so I decided to let the paper do the talking:
I don't use patterned paper very often but of course have a drawer full of them because they are just so gorgeous! I've have this paper pad by Pebbles called 'Fun in the Sun' for six months and never used it. Today is the day!!
This was really simple to put together. I decided not to put any sentiment on it because all the words on the paper were all mentioning what Summer is all about and that way it could be used for all sorts of reasons!!
I adhered the patterned paper to a piece of white CS (to give it some stability) and cut it so it was slightly smaller than the card front. The coffee mug (from My Favourite Things 'Hot Cocoa Cups') was die-cut from the panel and I glued a piece of acetate behind it. Lots of foam tape was added to the back, especially around the mug itself to incase the beads.
I added round and long seed beads in greens and blues (from Papervine), just like the paper colour and like the sea, and pressed the card front on to it. Now the shaker was all sealed and ready to be shaken!!
And once again I realised that I've created another card that could pass for Masculine....whats going on with me!!
The Summer Coffee Lovers Blog Hop started on June 17th and finishes June 24th, so plenty of time to get your cards linked and there are SO MANY prizes to be won too!!
I've got three other challenges I would like to enter too:
Stamplorations CAS Challenge - June
CASology Challenge Week # 202
Taylored Expressions - Share Joy Challenge # 40
I have a huge amount of emails to catch up on, some commenting to do and some more coffee cards to make so better get a wriggle on. I don't have any gardening jobs this week but I'm taking Phoebe and some of her classmates to the Schools Gymnastics Competitions on Friday and will be there most of the day. Will take them to a practice on Wednesday afternoon too, so better go and buy an air freshener for the car for those girls who aren't used to a 'wet dog' smell......
Take care
Shona
Hi everybody!! Its Sunday afternoon for me here in New Zealand but probably only half-way through the weekend for a lot of you on the other side of the world, so I hope your all having a fantastic weekend!!
Its my 'Girl Friday' day on the the CAS-ual Fridays blog and I have a black card for you with a wee bit of water-colouring too:
Its not very often I use a black card base but really wanted to make the water coloured pattern pop!!
I started off by stamping and heat embossing the 'Tin Roof' stamp set in white on a piece of water colour CS. I then used a wet brush and Distress Ink 'Picked Raspberry' to colour all the little dots and petals in the pattern. Once it had dried (I used my heat gun), I die-cut it using the larger of the 'Scallop Tag Fri-Dies' and also die-cut a paint chip in a dark pink colour too. I stuck them together with the pink tag showing underneath and then adhered to the card front.
The 'Smile' from the 'Smiling Fri-dies' was used on the same paint chip and also die-cut twice from white CS. These were all glued together to give it some dimension and then to the tag. The rest of the sentiment (from the 'Pretty Posies' stamp set) was stamped and heat embossed in white on a strip of black CS. This was glued straight to the tag along with some pink and gold sequins from Pretty Pink Posh.
I hope this has inspired you to do some creating of your own and if you like the look of any of these CAS-ual Fridays products, don't forget to use my special code to save yourself some money while you shop!!
Enjoy the rest of your weekend or if your on my side of the world, have a good evening and here's to a quick week at work!!
Take care
Shona
Phoebe was home sick today again (third time in three weeks....) with a very sore throat. It got better as the day went on and she is now just attached to the tissue box (like myself...still....) but it meant a very quiet day at home for both of us. This gave me a chance to create a few cards and join this challenge!!
Shelly is one of my team mates for the Waffle Flower Challenge and when I saw her card for the CASEplorations challenge this month, I knew I would have to play along!!
I love the Neat and Tangled products Shelly used on her card and I thought I could use some Waffle Flower ones to CASE her design:
This wood veneer paper is so cool and I wish I could use it on every single card!!!
I die-cut the circle die from the wood veneer paper and also from the card front. The flower was stamped on water colour CS and heat embossed in Rose Gold. I coloured it using the Kuretake Gansai Tambi paints and a water brush. To give it a bit more sparkle (which I couldn't pick up in the photo) I coloured over the centre of the flower with Kuretake Gansai Tambi 'Starry Colours' using White Gold.
After fussy cutting the floral image out, I used a larger brush to colour another piece of water colour CS with some blue paint from the same set. I then die-cut the circle from it to create the middle panel. I adhered a panel of white CS to the inside of the card front and inlaid the wood circle and the blue middle piece. The sentiment was stamped in black and the flower glued in place, along with some co-ordinating sequins. I hope Shelly likes it!!!
The floral stamp is from Paper Smooches 'Best Buds'. The 'Flower Circles Inverted Die' is from Waffle Flower, along with the sentiment from 'Balloon Messages'. The sequins are from Pretty Pink Posh. The wood veneer paper is from Papervine.
I'm going to also link this to the AAA Card Challenge # 66 where their theme is:
And will also link to the Simon Says Stamp - Work It Wednesday May Challenge where their theme is 'Sunshine'.
And last but not least I will link to the Taylored Expressions 'Share Joy Challenge' # 40 where their theme is:
Right, I was going to post another card on my blog but its absolutely freezing and my electric blanket and laptop are calling me!! Also we went out for dinner tonight which is a very, VERY rare treat for us and we ate until we burst. So laying down feels like a very good idea right now. Was wonderful though and to have no dishes to do afterwards was heaven!!
Take care
Shona
I don't know what's come over me this week but today I made my third masculine card.....in a week!!! Considering I've probably only made another four over the last three years, this is huge and I hope it doesn't mean I won't pick up a pink ink or flower stamp ever again!!
Luckily over at CASology this week they have a 'Masculine' theme, so it just must be meant to be that I've made another one!!
I was given some narrow copper washi tape a few weeks ago by my friend Lowri of Papervine and with Phoebe home sick again today, I decided to pull it out and finally try out the idea that's been floating around in my head:
I wish I could have taken a better photo of this to show just how shiny the copper tape is. It looks magnificent in the sun but the sun wasn't playing nice with my camera today!!
Copper is so popular these days, especially with home design and decoration. I love going through my magazines, like Your Home and Garden, to make a wishlist for my house and also be inspired with card ideas. And when I saw this copper tape I knew I had to try out a modern, geometric design!!
As you can imagine, this couldn't have been simpler to put together. I didn't make any plan, just laid the tape down where I thought it looked good and if it didn't, I just pulled it up and put it elsewhere. Once I was happy with the pattern I used my thumbnail to make sure the tape was pressed down firmly, almost like burnishing it, to bring up the shine. And to finish off I stamped and heat embossed the sentiment (from Hero Arts 'Year Round Sentiments') in Rose Gold and popped it up on foam tape.
So very happy with this and it even gets my husbands stamp of approval, which is very rare indeed!!!
I'm also going to link this to the Share Joy Challenge # 40 with Taylored Expressions. This is my first time joining and unfortunately I don't own any of their fabulous products but I love their theme for the week:
I have two more cards to post about and then I'm off to bed to watch a horror movie on the laptop. Fabulous way to end a very busy week!!
Take care
Shona
Hi everyone, its the 17th of the month so you know what that means, its time for the Calling All Sistah's Blog Hop!! You should have come here from the CAS-ual Fridays Blog but if not you can pop back there to find the complete blog hop list.
Michele, the owner of CAS-ual Fridays Stamps organised this monthly blog hop to remind as many women as possible to do their breast examinations, as early detection can make such a difference!! I've attached a YouTube link here to show you how to do it if its something you haven't done before. So get touching ladies!!!!
For my card I decided to make something eye catching, interactive and fun. Nothing catches the eye more than a shaker card because you just have to shake it, you can't help yourself:
I started with a panel of white CS cut the same size as the card front. Using my mini-blending tool and Distress Ink 'Picked Raspberry' I created a soft, pink background. I then stamped the 'hope' in Hero Arts Shadow Ink 'Bubble Gum' for a tone-on-tone look. The ribbon was die-cut from the panel and a piece of vellum attached behind it.
I added lots and lots of foam tape behind it to pop up the panel and also enclose all the beads. Once the beads were in place I pressed the card front down on to it to trap those beads and create the shaker. The sentiment was stamped on a white CS banner and popped up on foam tape.
I used stamps and dies from the Calling All Sistahs Collection. The stamps are from the 'Hope Ribbon' stamp set and the die 'Ruffled Ribbon Fri Die'. The beads are from Papervine.
So grab a coffee and a biscuit or two and enjoy the rest of the blog hop. The next person to visit is the fabulous Lori McAree who I'm sure will have a gorgeous card and post to inspire you!!
Take care
Shona
