Thursday 30 April 2015

CAS Colours & Sketches - #122

As there's a fifth Thursday this month it's a double challenge at CAS Colours & Sketches this week.


http://cascoloursandsketches.blogspot.com/2015/04/challenge-122-double.html

Now this sketch had me thinking hard and every time I had an idea it seemed the colours weren't suitable. So I reversed my thinking and started with the colours, trawled through my stamps and card and came up with this:


I'm really loving this lawn fawn border die at the moment and keep trying to add it to all my cards. I thought it was curvy enough to use for the wavy line on the sketch. And the card really is a good match to Island Indigo in real life, just couldn't get the photo to reflect this. I handcut the monkey in Calypso Coral card and looped his tail over the sentiment to look as if he was swinging from it.


Finally to include the wisteria wonder colour I added a trio of flowers and a finishing sentiment.

Supplies:
Stamps: Clearly Besotted, Wild Thing & In Stitched Easter - flower & matching die
Ink: SU, wisteria wonder
Dies: Lawn Fawn, large stitched square stackable & Happy Birthday border

Have fun with this double challenge! I look forward to seeing how you all interpret it.

And keep crafting!

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Wednesday 29 April 2015

The Male Room #09

So today I'm sharing my second card as a member of the DT at The Male Room. Thrilled to be typing that!

http://themaleroomchallengeblog.blogspot.com/2015/04/challenge-09-birds.html

This fortnight the theme is birds and as always whatever you create has to be suitable for the men in your life. So I went over to my favourite digi stamp shop and found a gorgeous owl all suited up for his graduation. Perfect!


I decided to keep the main colours in shades of grey with just a pop of a suitably dignified sort of colour. If I was making this card for a particular person I think I would have used their university's colours, but as this was just to go into my own stash I chose blackberry bliss.


I tied a piece of twine round the top of the card stack as I thought it echoed the tassle on the mortarboard.

Supplies:
Stamps: Digi Stamp Boutique, Graduation Winston; Clearly Besotted, Basic Banners
Ink: Memento, tuxedo black
Paper: SU, Moonlight paper stack
Colours: Promarkers, cool grey 1-5, tea green, vanilla; Flexmarker, linen; SU, stampin'write blackberry bliss
Embellishments: twine from my stash

Thanks so much for dropping by my blog today. Looking forward to visiting your blogs to leave some love about your interpretation of this theme.

And keep crafting!

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Tuesday 28 April 2015

Tuesday Talk

A quick and simple mini card to share today, and let's be honest that's what we all need sometimes. It's made with Less is More's recipe - use a tag - in mind.

  We'd love you to display our banner
                                  

I cut a tag shape from card and stamped a flower head in three colours three times in the bottom left corner. The tag was mounted onto foam pads before adhering to bright pink card.


I punched three butterflies to match the background card and added a sparkly gem to each. A lot of threes for such a simple card!

Supplies:
Stamps: Clearly Besotted, Take Good Care
Inks: Memento, dandelion, rose bud, bahama blue, tuxedo black
Punch: Martha Stewart
Embellishments: Papermania adhesive gems; twine from my stash

Thanks for visiting today. And keep crafting!                                                     



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Sunday 26 April 2015

AAA Cards Game #38

This fortnight at AAA Cards we want to see a hole in your card - sounds like fun to me!

http://www.aaacards.blogspot.co.uk/

I started my card by die cutting a speech bubble in a piece of white cardstock. This set up my spacing for the rest of the card.


I'm loving this cute little giraffe and coloured him in using flexmarkers. The balloon is actually an egg die cut and I used sewing thread to tie it to the giraffe's tail.

Here's a closer look at my hole:


I lightly drew round my speech bubble hole before stamping the sentiment on the kraft base card.
A matching strip of gold down the right hand side and my card was done.

Supplies:
Stamps: Clearly Besotted, Wild Thing
Ink: Memento, tuxedo black
Dies: Clearly Besotted, In Stitches Easter, You Said It
Flexmarkers: putty, nutmeg, satin 

So have I got you thinking about how you're going to interpret this challenge? Hop on over to AAA Cards for more fantastic DT inspiration. Oh and make a date to join us on May 10th for our first birthday blog hop - fantastic giveaways!!

Thanks for visiting my blog today, it's much appreciated. And keep crafting! 


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Friday 24 April 2015

Friday Focus

Another chance to use one of my newly acquired ombre ink pads was suggested to me by Sarah - Sazzle Dazzle - she'd spottted the new challenge at CASology when I posted here.

http://casology.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/week-143-ombre.html 

So it's to be a new balloon card sort of CASEd from the original, but larger and a different colourway.


I finished off the balloon strings by stamping a bow and then placing a button with sewing thread tied into another bow.


Supplies:
Stamps: Uniko Studio, Balloon Bash; Clearly Besotted, Say It In Style
Inks: Hero Arts Ombre, pool to navy; Memento, tuxedo black; SU, whisper white
Embellishments: button & thread from my stash

 Thanks for dropping by today. And keep crafting!

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Thursday 23 April 2015

CAS Colours & Sketches #121

A very striking sketch to challenge you this week at CAS Colours & Sketches. Will it be the triangles or the cross that jump out at you?

http://cascoloursandsketches.blogspot.co.uk/ 
Such bold shapes had me heading for strong colours and an oversized sentiment. And it was the triangles that took my eye so that's where I started. After cutting them out from patterned paper I stamped an arrow on each one to showcase the sentiment I was going to use.


Then I couldn't resist adding all that crushed curry splatter in between.


I popped the sentiment up onto pads to give it even more prominance and rounded all the corners as a contrast to all those straight lines.

Supplies:
Paper: SU, Moonlight designer series stack
Stamps: SU, Point & Click, Gorgeous Grunge; Uniko Studio, Big & Bold Wish
Inks: SU, crushed curry, rich razzleberry
Punch: Xcut, corner rounder

Then I got to thinking maybe this wasn't really a CAS card - not enough white space. So I started over and couldn't have come up with a more different card.


These hearts are punched from a very sparkly piece of card, (showing up a little better in the photo below), and finished off with a teardrop shaped gem.


Supplies:
Stamp: Clearly Besotted, Bridal Bouquet
Ink: Memento, tuxedo black
Punch: Martha Stewart
Die: Lil'inker, stitched mats recatangles
Embellishments: Peersonal Impressions, essential jewels

So how are you going to interpret this sketch. Looking forward to seeing your creations. And as always if you need a bit more of a kickstart there's more DT inspiration to be seen here.

Thanks for your time today, I'm so pleased you visited my blog.  And keep crafting!

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Tuesday 21 April 2015

Tuesday Talk

As I have a bit of a pash on balloon cards at the moment this week's challenge at Less is More is very timely - their theme is 'Up, up and away!'

We'd love you to display our banner

And guess what I actually managed to get an order in for a couple of Hero Arts ombre inkpads before the SOLD OUT noticed appeared. Just had to be used then, straight away, no gathering dust!


I kept my card very simple but made use of some vibrant pink card to add pizzazz - I hope you agree!


Supplies:
Stamps: Uniko Studio, Balloon Bash & A Gift For You
Inks: Hero Arts ombre, pink to red; Memento, tuxedo black; SU, whisper white
Die: Clearly Besotted, Tag Along

So pleased to see you visit my blog today, thanks so much.

And keep crafting! 

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Monday 20 April 2015

The Memory Nest - Make It Monday 38

Time for the second April Make It Monday challenge over at The Memory Nest. I'm loving this two photos, different sizes combo - great way to crop off some not so good bits of a photo.

http://thememorynest.blogspot.co.uk/

I went back into my older photos, sadly kept in a shoebox, for this challenge. I love the vivid blue of the pool's tiles making the water look so inviting. I chose the chevron paper to pick up on the colour and also because it reminded me of the ripples in the water.


I'd forgotten how much fun my boys had in the pool - albeit very loudly and noisily! It was so good to remember and the fact that my mum is in the photos an added bonus.


I stamped a line of arrows under the title and some random splatters in white to draw the eye down the page.


Supplies:
Ppaers: Bazzil Basic cardstock; Little Yellow Bicycle, Splash; Scraps from my stash
Alpha: ep, All About A Boy
Punch: ek success, scallopped edge
Stamps: SU, Oh Hello & Point & Click
Sticker: Simple Stories, I {Heart} Summer
Embellishments: Doodlebug sprinkles, blue jean asst.
Ink: Memento, tuxedo black

I wonder how you will interpret the sketch - looking forward to seeing your pages! Why not hop over to The Memory Nest to see what the rest of the DT have created to inspire you?

Thanks for looking today, hope you enjoyed your time here. And keep crafting!

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Sunday 19 April 2015

Sunday Slot

I've been busy catching up on some of the challenges I like to enter - three yesterday and two more today. Make the Day Special have a tic-tac-toe board and Happy Little Stampers want stencilling.

http://makethedayspecialcards.blogspot.co.uk/p/challenges.html                         http://www.happylittlestampers.blogspot.com.au/2015/04/hls-april-cas-challenge-reminder-2.html 

My card uses the bottom line of the board, stripes, diecuts and feminine and as it uses a stencil I'm hoping it's considered CAS, although I'm aware there's not that much white space.

I started by using a stencil to get my ombre stripes and then die cut the hearts once from the background and four more times from plain card. The plain hearts were then glued together with the stripy one on the top and replaced into the background - a technique I learnt from the online class Stretch your Dies, here.


I added a die cut 'hugs' and stamped the 'sending' to finish off my card.

Supplies:
Dies: Lawn Fawn, Hugs & Hearts
Stencil: Memory Box, wave
Stamps: Clearly Besotted, Say It In Style
Inks: SU, daffodil delight, calypso coral, melon mambo; Memento, tuxedo black

Thanks for dropping by today, hope your weekend is progressing peacefully and you've found time to:
Keep Crafting! 

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Saturday 18 April 2015

Saturday Slot

Do you ever have an idea rolling around in your head, but struggle to tie yourself down to create it? Well the sketch from Happy Little Stampers has been drifting on the back burner for a while so when I saw that it would be possible to combine it with a couple of other challenges the time to sit down and get on with it had come.

These are the challenges I'm entering my card into:
Happy Little Stampers sketch, Uniko Studio Things with Wings and Time Out inspired by words - 'You can't make a Rainbow without a little Rain'.

http://www.happylittlestampers.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/hls-april-sketch-challenge.html Grab button for Uniko Studio Challenge    Grab Our Badge!

I started by stamping a panel of rainbow coloured flowers and matting it onto plain white card.


The butterfly was stamped onto vellum, heat embossed in white and hand cut before adding three colours to the reverse side. Love how the colours shine through the vellum.


The sentiment was die cut and stamped onto a banner and popped under the butterfly which is mounted onto foam pads. Finally a trio of different coloured pearls was added and I was done.

Supplies:
Stamps: Uniko Studio, English Country Garden Butterflies & Background Builders Flower Power; LOTV, April Showers
Inks: SU, real red, tangerine tango, daffodil delight, wild wasabi, marina mist, rich razzleberry, wisteria wonder; Memento, tuxedo black; Versamark
Colours: Promarkers, violet, purple; Flexmarker, shocking pink
Embossing: Stampendous, opaque white
Die: Clearly Besotted, Tag Along
Embellishments: Doodlebug mini pearls, Spring asst.

A great peace has now descended on my mind - well at least until the next time!

Thanks for looking today. Hope your weekend is going well, I'm dog sitting the gorgeous Murray tomorrow - looking forward to that.

And keep crafting! 

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Thursday 16 April 2015

CAS Colours & Sketches #120

Time for a new challenge and some really gorgeous colours this week from CAS Colours & Sketches

http://cascoloursandsketches.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/challenge-120-colours.html

And here's my card. Such a pleasure to work with these colours, so me!


I stamped a grid background and then added some contrasting splatters all over. Then I stamped and hand cut the beautiful flower and popped it up on pads before attaching it to a white stitched die cut circle.


A trio of mixed coloured pearls, just to frame the flower, and I was done.

Supplies:
Stamps: Uniko Studio, Beautiful Blooms II; SU, Gorgeous Grunge; Clearly Besotted, Say It In Style; Memory Box, mesh
Inks: SU, rose red, pool party, Memento sweet plum
Dies: LawnFawn, stitched party banners; Lil'inker, stitched mats rectangles
Embellishments: Doodlebug mini pearls, Spring asst.

And now it's your turn to get creative with these beautiful colours, looking forward to visiting your blogs and seeing how you use them.

So pleased you dropped by today, thanks for your time. And keep crafting!


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