Saturday 28 October 2017

CAS-ual Fridays Stamps - Girl Friday Post # 2 - October

Hi everybody and welcome back to my second Girl Friday post on the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps Blog this month!!

October is Cancer Awareness Month and the Michele (the owner) has coloured the blog pink for the whole month. She has some products called the Calling All Sistah's Collection and they consist of stamps and dies with lots of of supportive and uplifting sentiments, and images to send to people in your life. She gives 50% of the proceeds of these products to Breast Cancer Research and for this month has increased this to 75%!!

For my card I was in a die-cutting mood and also wanted to use one of my favourite sentiments:


I definitely wanted to have a 'pink' theme with my card and wanted a pretty background for this tough message.

I started by stamping the Full On Floral background stamp in pink across the card front. Using the Ruffled Ribbon Fri-Die, I die-cut it from pink and grey paint chips. These were slightly over-lapped and adhered to the card front.

For the sentiment I die-cut the Friend Fri-Die from silver CS and also twice more from white CS. These were all glued together for dimension and then to the card front. The rest of the sentiment (which is my favourite and from the Calling All Sistah's stamp set) was heat embossed in silver on a strip of white CS and then popped on foam tape. And of course I had to add some sequins from the Sistahood Sparkle Sequin Mix for a bit of sparkle.






If you like any of the products I used today and are thinking about purchasing them, don't forget to use my Girl Friday code to save yourself 15%!!


Thanks so much for stopping by. My week has finished and I'm looking forward to another long weekend (Monday is a holiday, yippee!!). Fingers crossed I can fit in some card making during the weekend and I hope you can too when it finally rolls around in your part of the world!

Take care
Shona
 

Friday 27 October 2017

CAS-ual Fridays Stamps - Girl Friday post for October

Hi everyone and thanks for stopping by!! Hope your weeks been going well and I bet your looking forward to the weekend as much as I am!!! 
 



Its my turn to be on the blog today, sharing a birthday card with you all to celebrate CAS-ual Fridays Stamps 5th Birthday!!! I'm very fortunate to have been part of the CFS family since June 2015 when I joined 'The Clean and Simple' Challenge team. I was very fortunate to then be asked to become a 'Girl Friday' and I've loved seeing the company grow. You couldn't ask for a better boss than Michele, she is incredibly supportive and generous, and her product designs are spectacular. I couldn't be happier being a part of her CFS family!!

Since I started with the CAS challenge, I decided to create a CAS birthday card with lots of die-cutting and my favourite colour combo:


I've always loved bold, graphic cards and even though this is hard on the eyes to look at, I love the topsy-turvy design.

I started by die-cutting the largest shape from the Bubble Box Fri-Dies from some turquoise CS. From that shape I then die-cut the next shape down, putting it on an angle. I continued to do this, alternating the angle and CS colour until I got to the smallest die. 

To stick this all together I firstly adhered the large blue shape to the card front. I like that it overhangs the sides because you can us those bits to flip open the card. In the space in the middle of that die (where the smaller white one would go) I put lots of strips of double-sided tape. That way I could put each die-cut shape in place. Once all the shapes were in I die-cut another blue piece with the smallest die and heat embossed the sentiment from Franklyisms with silver embossing powder. This was put on foam tape over the inlaid piece and I glued on blue and clear sequins from Neat and Tangled.



I hope you liked my card and its given you a few ideas for your next CAS design. If your interested in purchasing any of the products I used today or any others from CAS-ual Fridays Stamps please use my special Girl Friday code to save yourself 15%. Both of the products I used are actually on special at the moment and my code will take another 15% off, so its a win-win!!



Enjoy the rest of your week and I'm going to ben here again tomorrow with another card on the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps blog but you'll just have to wait and see what it will be..... 

Take care
Shona


 

Tuesday 24 October 2017

AAA Card Challenge # 101 - 3rd Entry

I'm back!!!! Yes I'm back with yet another 'horror movie' inspired card for the current AAA Card Challenge where they want you to create a project inspired by a movie!!






I actually had the idea for this card last week but just needed a few minutes to sit down in one place and try it out. I got home from work today and since both kids are now sick with colds, they were tucked up in bed watching movies so I took a chance to give this a go:
 


I showed this to my husband to see if he could guess the movie but he had no idea. Showed both of the kids and they knew straight away - A Nightmare on Elm Street!!!

Back in 1984, this movie came out and I was 11yrs old. I'm not sure what age I was when I saw it but I didn't sleep properly for weeks. Not to go into too much gory detail but its basically about a man Freddy Krueger who did horrible things to children and was killed by an angry mob of parents. He then came back to teenagers in their dreams, with his blade fingers on one hand and his green/red striped jersey on, and killed them in their sleep. Hence the reason I couldn't sleep for a long time!!! Its a very iconic movie in the Horror genre and even though my kids have never seen the movie, they recognised it in my card straight away!!

I started by using a pen blade and cutting down 4 'rips' in some white CS and then colouring them red using a marker pen. I twisted the blade around so the rips weren't all smooth and straight. I definitely had to show the red/green of Freddy's jersey somewhere on the card, so I cut thin strips of dark green and red paint chips and used double-sided tape to adhere them across the middle of the card front. Before putting the ripped panel on foam tape, I stamped the sentiment from Simon Says Stamp 'Pillow Talk', which seemed perfect for this card. And that was it!!

I'm also going to link this to the Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge where their theme is:



I've got one more movie idea to try out but I'm not sure if my drawing skills are good enough, so you will have to wait and see. You'll all be glad when October is over and I go back to rainbow coloured, happy cards again!!

Take care
Shona
 

Monday 23 October 2017

AAA Card Challenge # 101 - Second Entry

We are having a lovely Monday off in New Zealand today (Labour Day) and have just been at the skatepark with Max for an hour, catching up on nearly a years worth of magazines I haven't gotten round to reading yet. Poor Phoebe is sick with a cold so her day off isn't very exciting but she's binge watching Teen Wolf so Netflix is keeping her happy!!





After my first entry for the current AAA Cards Challenge I just had to come back with another. Its so much fun turning stamp images into something else and I tell you, this particular stamp has been extra fabulous with her different personalities of late:

 
Doesn't the Plant Lady stamp from Ellen Hutson make the most amazing Pennywise the Clown???? It took a bit of fiddling with only stamping part of the image and then some drawing by me, which I'm not too good at but I think it turned out pretty good!!

I started by stamping the lady image on some white CS. I only inked up to where her hair met the bottom of the hat, which required a fit of wiping to remove the ink from those areas sometimes. I was then able to grab a fine point pen and draw in the rest of her head and all that fabulous red hair (which I coloured with a red marker). The original Pennywise has quite a few ruffles around his neck but I decided to do only one as my art skills are seriously lacking.

Looking at pictures of Pennywise I realised he was wearing a yellow suit with red pom poms (similar to Ronald McDonald) under a multi coloured jacket. So I decided to go with the simple option and coloured the outfit with a yellow pencil. With the fine pen I created a much larger mouth with sharp teeth, evil eyebrows and bigger, scarier eyes. For the pom poms down the front and his nose, I used Nuvo Crystal Drops in White and coloured them with a red marker when they were dry.

Using a mini-blending tool I created a grey background with Mama Elephant 'Smoke' ink. I wanted to show him popping out of a hole, so I used an oval die from Studio Katia with some black CS, cut a slit through the middle with a craft knife and then put on foam tape. I fussy cut him out and adhered him thru the slit, with foam tape under his body for support. The balloon (from Whimsy Stamps 'Happy Everything') was stamped twice with red ink and then fussy cut out, creating a string from the CS itself. This was put on foam tape as well behind his hand.  The sentiment is from Paper Smooches 'Chubby Chums' and I glued on a few half-beads in black for extra embellishment. 

Can't wait to hear your thoughts on this one???!!

I'm also going to link this to the Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge where their theme is:




I better go and check on Phoebe and make sure she's still ok. The joys of having a fever when its such a hot day!!! Look forward to all your comments, will have to see what other horror movies I can create cards for......eeekkk!!

Take care
Shona

 

Sunday 22 October 2017

CAS-ual Fridays Stamps - October New Release - Day 4

Woo hoo, its Day 4 of CAS-ual Fridays Stamps October New Release!! I really hope you've enjoyed all the stamp sets and projects you've seen so far and we have one more fabulous stamp set to share with you!

Introducing 'Chanukah': 





This is such a beautiful set with stunning details and design. I immediately imagined the first tag-like image in gold, so used that on my card:


I must have been having a very good 'steady hand' day when I created this one, as I just eye-balled stamping the background stamps. My hands can sometimes shake a lot so all my concentration must have put the shaking in its place!!

I started by gathering together a rainbow of ink pads from Hero Arts and Waffle Flower. I then started at the top and alternated the colours as I stamped the 'Happy Chanukah' under each other on the card front. On a piece of plain vellum I stamped and heat embossed the image in gold and then die-cut it using the co-ordinating size die from the 'Bubble Box Fri-Dies'. This was adhered to the card front using tiny pieces of double-sided tape, placed behind the words to hide them. To finish off I glued on a few gold and blue sequins from Neat and Tangled.


All of the four new stamp sets will be available to purchase on Saturday October 21st. And please use my Girl Friday code if your going to do any shopping, always happy to save you a few dollars as I know how much each dollar is hard to come by these days!!




I hope you liked today stamp set and project, and that you've also been to the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps Blog to see the other projects by the amazing Girl Fridays and found out how you can win some prizes for yourself. Looking forward to seeing what you make with these new sets and will be scanning Facebook, your blogs and Instagram to see your gorgeous cards!!

Take care
Shona
 

Saturday 21 October 2017

CAS-ual Fridays Stamps - October New Release - Day 3

Wow, we are already up to Day 3 of the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps October New Release. I hope you've liked what you've seen so far and enjoyed all the projects by the Girl Fridays!!

Today we introduce 'Joy':





I really love stamp sets that have large words, so I fell in love with this set straight away!! The font is gorgeous and I love the intricate snowflakes too. I desperately need to make more Christmas cards and decided to use my favourite colour combo for this design:


I so wish I could have captured the sparkle and shimmer on this card with my camera, it looks dazzling in person!!

To start off I cut a tag from watercolour CS using the largest die from the 'Tag Buddies Fri-Dies' set. I stamped and heat embossed the 'joy' in white, and then used my mini-blending tool and Distress Ink 'Salty Ocean' to colour the whole tag. To give it some interest I sprayed it closely with Imagine Crafts 'Sheer Shimmer Sparkle Spritz' (trying saying that 3x quickly...) so that I would get small pools of spritz on the tag. I touched the blobs gently with tissue to absorb the liquid and it left the tag with a watery pattern and lots of shimmer.

Next I cut a panel of white CS slightly smaller than the card front. I die-cut the tag from the middle of it and then stamped the snowflakes randomly using Waffle Flower ink in 'Daydreaming'. I put the panel up on foam tape and then pressed the tag into the space. For the sentiment I used one from 'Snowy Sayings' and put it on foam tape, along with some clear and blue sequins from Neat and Tangled.



The new stamp sets will be available to purchase this Saturday. If your doing some shopping please use my Girl Friday code to save yourself 15%!!!




Thank you for popping in again today. Don't forget to visit the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps blog to see what the rest of the Girl Fridays have made with the new stamp set and find out how you can win some prizes for yourself. See you back here tomorrow for the last day of the release!!

Take care
Shona
 

Friday 20 October 2017

AAA Cards Challenge #101

I hope you've been enjoying my Halloween cards this month. They have been so much fun to make and I've loved seeing all your comments and reactions to them on my blog, Instagram and Facebook. So glad you all have the same sense of humor as myself!! Hopefully you'll still feel the same after you see this one.......



The theme for this weeks CASology Challenge  is 'Sorry'. I was thinking about how I could turn that theme into a Halloween card when it hit me:




If you've seen the 'It' movie you will recognise 'Georgie' straight away (and hopefully you will laugh....) but if not I will explain. Georgie is the little brother of Bill who creates a paper boat for him to float down the gutters as its raining. Bill is sick so can't go outside with him and unfortunately Georgie falls victim to Pennywise the clown. So this is a card showing how sorry Bill feels for sending his brother outside to play on his own.

Firstly I stamped the boy image on white CS, coloured with my pencils and fussy cut out. I stamped a puddle and coloured with a red marker pen and popped 'Georgie' up on foam tape. To create his paper boat (Bill writes on it 'S.S. Georgie') I cut two small shapes from white CS, glued them together and then glued to his hand.

The balloon was stamped in the background and also coloured with the same red marker pen. So I could spell out his name, I purchased a cheap alphabet stamp set from a local store and stamped out the sentiment on a piece of white CS. I cut it out and used a blending tool and Distress Ink 'Barn Door' to go around the edges. It was put on foam tape too.

It looked a bit plain so to make it a bit more interesting (and scary) I mixed Distress Ink 'Barn Door' with a little water and flicked a small brush across the card front, adding a few extra blobs of 'blood' here and there. I hope I haven't completely freaked you all out???!!

The boy image is from Mama Elephant 'Chance of Rain', the puddle image from Studio Katia 'Hello Alice' and the balloon from MFT Stamps 'Birthday Bears'.

Since this card is based on a movie, I'll also link to the AAA Cards Challenge # 101 where their theme is 'Inspired by a Movie'.


I can't wait to crawl into bed tonight. Its been a very busy week in the garden and I've spent the last two days trimming hedges non-stop. The gardens are all looking gorgeous though with everything starting to bloom. I think out of all the jobs I've ever had over my lifetime, gardening would have to be the most enjoyable!!

Take care
Shona
 

CAS-ual Fridays Stamps - October New Release - Day 2

Welcome back to Day 2 of the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps October New Release!! I hope you enjoyed seeing all the projects using the 'WTF2' stamp set and we have an equally fabulous stamp set for you today. 

Introducing the 'Bomb Diggity' stamp set:
 


Isn't this font gorgeous??!!! I'm so in love with it and the fact that the stamps are so large, the sentiments can be the star of a card! That is what I had in mind when I created this design:


You know I love a good rainbow and those colours behind these lush, gold words is heavenly to me. This was super simple to make but packs a punch!!

Firstly I cut a panel of black CS slightly smaller than the card front and adhered in place. I then die-cut a piece of watercolour CS using the 2nd largest die from the Bubble Box Fri-Dies set. Using Distress Inks 'Salty Ocean', 'Picked Raspberry', 'Mustard Seed', 'Spiced Pumpkin', 'Mowed Lawn' and 'Worn Lipstick' and a water brush I created this background, drying it and adding more colour as I went to make the colours more vivid. 

Once it was dry I stamped and heat embossed the sentiments in gold and popped the panel up on foam tape, also adding some gold sequins from Neat and Tangled.


This stamp set, along with three others will be available to purchase this Saturday and don't forget to use my Girl Friday code to save yourself some money!!





Also please head over to the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps blog to see what the other Girl Friday's created with this set and find out how you can win yourself some prizes!! See you all here again tomorrow for Day 3 and another new stamp set.

Take care
Shona
 

Thursday 19 October 2017

Reminder: TIME OUT Challenge # 94

Hi everybody, hope your having an outstanding week and everything is going to plan. My day has been absolutely flat out and I really just want to lie down but still so many things to do and I would be so bored if my life wasn't chaos anyway!!






This is the inspiration photo for our current 'Home Sweet Home Photo Challenge' at TIME OUT.  You can be inspired by anything in this photo, the colours, the objects or maybe the theme, its totally up to you!!

Our Sponsor for this challenge is Stamplorations and they have a $10 gift voucher for the winner!!


My eyes were drawn straight away to the orange pumpkins and I knew I had to create a card with a Halloween theme:


So many glorious pumpkins and one cute little frog, all courtesy of My Favourite Things 'Witch way is the Candy?'


I started by stamping all the pumpkins on a piece of white CS and coloured them all with my pencils, altering their colours slightly so they weren't all the same. Once I was happy with them I fussy cut them out and tried out different arrangements with them on the card front.

To give them some grounding I used a grey pencil to create a line and shading, just something very subtle. I adhered the bigger pumpkins to the card front and popped the smaller ones up on foam tape. The frog was also coloured with pencils and fussy cut, and put in place on foam tape as well.

I wanted to keep the sentiment simple, so stamped it in black ink of a piece of white CS, adhered it to a piece of orange paint chip and then cut around it to create an orange border. This was put on foam tape, along with some black half-beads in black.

I've got four challenges I would like to enter:

Addicted to CAS Challenge # 122 



Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge 



Uniko Challenge # 43 



Stamplorations CAS Challenge - October 



You still have until Wednesday October 25th to link your projects to the TIME OUT  challenge. And if your running out of ideas, pop over to the blog to see what the rest of the Design Team and our Guest Designer the fabulous Janet from Swanlady Impressions have created for you. Can't wait to see  your creations in the Gallery!!

Take care
Shona

CAS-ual Fridays Stamps - October New Release - Day 1

Such an exciting day!! Welcome to Day 1 of the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps  October New Release!! 

We have four new stamp sets to share with you over the next four days. All of the sets will be available to purchase on Saturday and if you pop over to the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps Blog you can see what all of the 'Girl Fridays' have created using the new sets and find out how you can win some prizes too...woo hoo!!

The first set we have for you is 'WTF 2': 






I absolutely love the font of this set, makes me think of cartoons. And there is so much you can do with the large WTF stamp. I was immediately drawn to that one and decided to decorate it a smidge:


I started off by using a grey ink pad and stamping the flowers from 'Flower Power' and 'Peace Out' randomly over the card front. 

For the large WTF letters, I stamped it on a piece of white CS and then stamped the 'Full on Floral' background stamp over top. I coloured the flowers with my pencils and then fussy cut around the letters. Some foam tape was added to the back and it was put on the card front. The rest of the sentiment was stamped in black on a strip of white CS and put on foam tape, along with some sequins from the 'Sistahood Sparkle' Sequin Mix.





Isn't this new set fantastic?? And you gotta love that 'tongue-in-cheekiness' about it too. If you've got your eye on any of the products I used today or your waiting to shop on Saturday, don't forget to use my 'Girl Friday' code to save yourself 15%!!




And don't forget to go to the CFS Blog to see all the other projects and find out the details for winning those prizes. Thanks for stopping by and I'll see you back here tomorrow for set no. 2!!

Take care
Shona