Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge

Its been a very hot day today. It was 30 degrees celcius by 10.30am which is very unusual and now its around 27 degrees. Usually it reaches the peak temperature around 5pm (its 6pm now) but its quite nice, so just started watering my poor, wilted garden. We've got 6 more days of 30 degrees to go, so everyone's watering systems will be going 24/7!!

I love Instagram, in fact I'll say I'm addicted to it! I look at it everyday to see what cards everyone's creating, what new products are coming out and all sorts of other things i.e. gardening, films, books, make-up etc. Its the first thing I reach for when I wake up in the morning and the last thing I look at before I go to sleep. It's quick and easy which is brilliant for my schedule!!

Last weekend I saw everyone's Stories on IG who went to Creativation in Arizona and it was wonderful to see them meeting up with other social media friends and people who they admire. It was also very cool to see the stamp companies and what they have install for us in coming months. One of my favourite ones is The Stamp Market. They have such fresh, modern stamps and dies. I only own three of their older stamps and one die but hope to buy more soon. Their instagram feed has been full of amazing cards with lots of rainbow colours and with it being to hot to garden this afternoon, they inspired me to whip up this card:

Its time's like this I'm so glad to have a MISTI, certainly makes stamping across a card much easier and the ability to stamp several times to get good coverage is fantastic!!

I grabbed nearly all of my Waffle Flower ink pads and a flower image from The Stamp Market 'Bloom with Hope' set.  I stamped each flower 2-3 times with a variety of colours across the card front. Nice and easy but so colourful!!

I then die-cut The Stamp Market 'Love' die 3x from white CS, glued them together and then to the card front. I don't have a sentiment from The Stamp Market that goes well with the die, so I used one of my new Simon Says Stamp 'Stained Glass Love' sentiments and stamped it in black on the card front. 

After gluing on some Neat and Tangled sequins I really wanted to add some Glossy Accents to the die-cut but I was so happy with the stamping, I didn't want to risk ruining it with runaway gloss (which happens to me often....). And it keeps the design crisp and white!!

I'm linking this to the Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge where their theme is 'Have a Heart'. I think this is my 4th entry, they must get sick of me bombarding them with my cards....

I better move the sprinkler before I flood the neighbours property. We haven't had rain for a long time and have a complete fire ban across our region, so I think we will probably have water restrictions soon. It has been a brilliant Summer though and I hope it continues like this, much to my husbands disgust who would rather it be freezing. Maybe I should send him to Alaska each Summer?????

Take care
Shona
 

Simon Says Stamp - Flickr Challenge #115 - Entry no. 2

I'm back! Yes, after weeks of hardly making any cards I've made two in as many days. And I have Simon Says Stamp products and Jennifer McGuire videos to thank for inspiring me!!

Yesterday I shared with you all a card using a new SSS die that I received recently for the current Simon Says Stamp Flickr Challenge. Well, after watching this video by Jennifer HERE, it gave me an idea for another way to colour the SSS 'Outline Floral Frame' die and have some messy fun while doing it:

For this technique my new Tim Holtz Glass Media Mat really came in handy, would have had to have used a dinner plate otherwise and I've already ruined a few with ink staining.....

To start off I die-cut the frame die and SSS 'Love' die from white CS. I grabbed Distress Inks 'Picked Raspberry', 'Mustard Seed', 'Abandoned Coral' and 'Spun Sugar' and a water spray bottle. This is where things got messy.....

I simply pressed the Distress Inks on to the glass mat near each other, gave them a spray with water and then smooshed the floral frame and word die cuts into the ink. I would check every now and again to see what colour was where and move the die around. And I wiped it all away a few times from the glass and dried the die-cuts with a heat gun before doing it all over again. My fingers were stained but it was a lot of fun!!

Once I was happy with the coverage and they had dried, I decided that the vibrant 'tropical' colours would look even better with a shiny coating. So I pressed my Versamark Ink pad over the die-cuts and heat embossed with clear powder 2x. They are so shiny, especially in real life:

 

I die-cut the frame and word twice more from white CS, glued them all together and then to a card front. To finish off I stamped the sentiment (from SSS 'Love') with Mama Elephant 'Lollipop' ink and glued on some Neat and Tangled sequins. My mojo is slowly returning, yippee!!!

I'm also going to link this to the Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge where their theme is 'Have a Heart'.

 

We spent the day in Nelson today which as always was a lot of fun. Nice to visit a small city that has a fantastic beach too. And of course we went to the trampoline park and Kmart where I got some more storage goodies for my craft area. Better take Bella for a walk now that its a bit cooler and before I really sit down, as I may never get back up.....

Take care
Shona 

 

Simon Says Stamp - Flickr Challenge #115

Hello there!! Its been so much cooler the past two days but starting tomorrow we have 7 days of at least 30 degrees celcius every day. I'm okay with it but my family (especially Dave) will be melting. Will send them all to sleep on the trampoline at night I think with lots of bug spray!! We are going to Nelson tomorrow for the day, there is a gorgeous beach over there and its supposed to be around 29dg celcius, so will be nice to swim in the sea instead of the pool for a change.

As I've mentioned my mojo is rather lack-lustre at the moment. Its really hard when I'm working all day and the kids pounce on me when I get home to do stuff with them too, which I'm more than happy too. However at the end of the day I'm too tired to do anything else, so its into bed with Netflix. The kids are back to school this week (Max on Wednesday and Phoebe Friday) so will be back in the swing of things shortly.

In the meantime I recently received my biggest happy mail yet from Simon Says Stamp. Its a belated Christmas present from my family and contained a huge amount of dies. One of them (the 'Outline Floral Frame' die) is one I've wanted ever since its release and I pounced on it straight away. And luckily the SSS Flickr Challenge theme is 'Love' so I could use my favourite word die:

Over the last few weeks I thought a good way to get my creative juices flowing would be to catch up on my Jennifer McGuire videos. I came across this one here where she shows off the latest Pinkfresh Studio release and also gives some tips on ways to use die-cuts. One of them was to use Copics to colour a background die. I thought this was a really cool idea!!

I die-cut the frame from white CS, grabbed my Altenew Artist Markers and set myself up in front of the tv to watch reruns of 'House of Lies' (one of my most favourite shows ever!). I didn't get too carried away with blending etc but added shading here and there and just enjoyed myself. When I was finished I die-cut another two from white CS and glued them all together. As I had gotten a few colours on the white border I decided to colour it all with a grey marker to cover it up. This was glued on to a card base.

For the sentiment I die-cut the SSS 'Love' die from turquoise CS and twice more from white CS. I glued them all together, covered it with lashings of Wink of Stella and glued to the card. I then gave it a good covering of Glossy Accents. The rest of the sentiment is from SSS 'Love', white heat embossed on black CS and glued in place, along with some black half-beads. Love this die so much!!!!

Will also link this to the Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge where their theme is 'Have a Heart'.

 


I've got another card in the works using this same die, so maybe my mojo is making a return. So thank you to Jennifer McGuire for her inspiring videos and SSS for creating such cool products, you've got me inspired again!!

Take care
Shona