Hi there everybody!! Hope your week is treating you well and your having wonderful weather wherever you are in the world!! Its been mega hot here and I'm back at work, so lots of sweating going on. Really good though to be back gardening and have started some huge clearing jobs this week.
Our challenge theme at TIME OUT is 'Loving'. I do tend to make a lot of cards around the word 'Love' so very happy about this one!!
Our Sponsor for this challenge is Birch Press Designs and they are giving the winner a $20 gift voucher to their store. How fabulous is that!!
For my card I definitely wanted to include the word 'Love' but I also wanted to use some colours that I wouldn't normally associate with a 'love theme':
A couple of nights ago it was still 32 degress Celcius at 8pm. I realised that it was cooler on our front deck (in the shade) than inside, so I grabbed my Tim Holtz Glass Mat, Distress Oxide inks and paintbrush and sat outside to paint this design. I was out there until it was dark and the sandflies were starting to drain me of blood.....
First off I heat embossed the Simon Says Stamp 'Centre Cut Kaleidoscope' background stamp in white on some dark grey CS. I then used my Distress Oxide inks in 'Spun Sugar', 'Blueprint Sketch', 'Cracked Pistachio' and 'Tumbled Glass' to water colour the pattern. The stamp pattern is much better than this but I stopped when I had this 'flower-like' area painted.
Once it was dry I fussy cut it out and popped up on some white foam. For the sentiment I die-cut the SSS 'Love' die from a dark pink paint chip, and also twice more from white CS. I glued them all together and then to the card. The rest of the sentiment (from SSS 'Love') was stamped on a strip of white CS using Mama Elephant 'Lollipop' to match the pink die-cut. This was glued to the card along with some sequins from Neat and Tangled.
You have until Wednesday 16th January to link your projects to the TIME OUT Challenge. And if your needing any help with ideas, pop over to the blog to see what the rest of the Design Team and our amazing Guest Designer Jane of Purplejet Loves Crafts have created to inspire you. Looking forward to seeing all your 'LOVE' in the Gallery!!
Take care
Shona
Well hello there!! Hope 2019 is finding you well and you've had a chance to relax over the holidays and do some crafting. Its still mega-hot here so lots of swimming and reading going on. Has been nice to make a card or two but my crafting corner gets very hot during the day, so I have to wait till night-time to get stamping!!
So happy to be up on the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps Blog today, my first CFS post of the year. Our Design Team has changed a little over the last few months and we have some new people which is exciting, so lots of new inspiration coming your way!!
For my card today I wanted to use some older products and make them new again, give them a fresh start for the year. And what better way to do that, than with some rainbow colours:
I love these dies. They are trees but also look like seaweed when they are green. And can look like colourful firework explosions in rainbow colours. There are a lot of birthdays coming up soon, so good to start building up my stash now.
I started by die-cutting the Casual Trees Fri-dies from Strathmore Bristol Smooth CS. I then grabbed my Gansai Tambi 36 watercolour paint palette and a large round brush. I wet the die-cuts with water and them covered them with the paint. Since its so hot they dried very quickly. To give them some interest I coloured just the branches again with the same colour but didn't use as much water to make the colour more intense. I then gave them a thick covering of Wink of Stella for a bit of shimmer!!
When the branches were dry, I used Gina K Connect Glue to adhere them to the corners of the card front, putting the middle one down first and then the ones on either side.
For the sentiment I die-cut a circle of white CS using the smallest die from the Ornament Tag Fri-dies and heat embossed the sentiment from the Bold Wishes Stamp Set using WOW Metallic Gold Sparkle Embossing Glitter. This was popped up on foam tape, along with some sequins from Neat and Tangled.
I wanted to let you know that the Retiring Sets are now 60% off and if you use my special code you can get an additional 15% off on top.....that's a saving of 75%!!!!!!
Thanks so much for stopping by and I'll see you back on the CFS Blog again later this month with some more cards.
Take care
Shona
Well hello there everybody and welcome to my very first blog post for 2019!! So far its been a very fun and extremely hot start to the year, so I'm very happy with how its going so far!! And after being so busy for the month of December, I'm over the moon to have the time to make cards again.
Our first challenge theme for the year at The Flower Challenge is 'Pink and Grey'. I'm so in love with grey, I want grey clothes, grey walls, grey sheets, you name it, so I'm very excited about this one.
I also have a huge amount of stamps and dies that I haven't used from the last few months of 2018 and I'm determined to use them all, so you will be seeing all sorts of new products on my cards. For this card I finally used a floral stamp set that has been staring at me for months, begging me to cover her in ink:
I think any colour with grey looks amazing but pink is one of my favourites. So looking forward to seeing how you all use this colour combo too!!
Firstly I cut a piece of dark grey CS and adhered to the card front. I then cut a panel of Reeves 360gsm Acrylic paper (which also said it could be used for Watercolour). I heat embossed the floral image from Gina K Designs 'You Make me Smile' to the left of the panel in white, and then did it again below that, getting the flowers as close together as possible.
I then used my Christmas present, a Tim Holtz/Tonic Studios Glass Media Mat to mix some Distress Ink 'Picked Raspberry' with water, and painted the flowers, going back and adding more colour once it had dried. The glass mat is fanastic and its so handy to be able to mix on it as well. I then used a Zig Clean Color Real Brush pen in grey (along with a waterbrush) to colour the leaves. Once it was dry I cut the panel down slightly and popped it up on a piece of white foam.
The sentiment (from the same stamp set) was heat embossed in silver (from Ranger) on a strip of the same watercolour CS and put on foam tape, along with some Neat and Tangled sequins glued down with Gina K Designs Connect Glue.
I'm going to link this to the Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge as their theme is 'Something New', which is this stamp set that has finally been touched by ink!!
You have until Friday 25th January to link your projects to The Flower Challenge and we will be back on the 15th with some more ideas for you. You can also pop over to the blog to see what the rest of the Design Team have created for you. Can't wait to see what you come up with in the Gallery!!
Take care
Shona
