Using up the scraps!

My first stop when I'm making cards is my card stock scrap box so it's no trouble to me to follow this week's Less is More challenge where Chrissie and Mandi are inviting us to use scraps on our cards. Here's the card I made this morning:

The background strip is made by layering two pieces of designer paper together, popping them into the Square Lattice embossing folder and running them through my Big Shot. I had been demonstrating this technique to one of my customers who is a keen patchworker, as I thought she'd be fascinated by the quilted effect, and I'm pleased to give the resulting piece a proper home today!

This little cluster is made with items from my embellishment scraps box. This is where I toss all the things I make to decorate cards before realising they don't quite work! You can see the box on the left in the photo below with all sorts of interesting things in it:

The little jar on the right is full of die-cut letters and numbers which I use to spell out words, checking for size and position. When I have what I'm looking for, I look for the right colour in my card stock scraps box and cut the letters out - occasionally I'm even lucky enough to find the right colour in the jar! You can see I changed my mind about the orientation of this card - I am ALWAYS changing my mind about things!

Here's my card stock scraps box - looking remarkably similar to Chrissie's! The box is transparent so that I can see what's going on in there (!) and I keep the colours in rough order as Chrissie does, so that it's quick and easy to find the colour I'm after. It works really well.


I thought I'd show you another scraps card I made today using the left-overs from a retired Simply Scrappin' kit. As well as being great for scrapbooking pages, these kits are brilliant for incredibly quick cards - the hanging baubles on my card are stickers and so is the sentiment/border strip. Come and see:

All I did to complete the card was add piercing using my mat pack template, doodle in some bows with a marker and finish off with pearls. I'm entering this Christmas card into Sandra's Rudolph Day challenge and the 52 {Christmas} Card Throwdown Challenge where Jacqueline wants to see Christmas cards using stickers and/or rub-ons. Thanks for those challenges ladies - it certainly is good to feel that I'm gradually making a nice little stash of festive cards for 2012!

Supplies needed for the top card:

Stamps: Notably Ornate

Ink: Not Quite Navy

Card stock: Naturals Ivory, Very Vanilla, Pear Pizzazz, Basic Grey, Marina Mist, Bravo Burgundy

Other: Paisley Petals designer paper, Large Oval, Boho Blossoms, and 2-step Bird punches, Timeless Type junior alphabet dies, Square Lattice embossing folder, Circle Ice rhinestone brad

I'd be delighted to order any of these supplies for you and can have them delivered to your address in the UK. I am committed to providing excellent customer service and am always happy to help and advise. Just send me an email or give me a call on 01280 820593.

Click here to see all the free Sale-a-bration sets and don't forget to let me know which free Sale-a-bration set or sets you'd like - remember, one item for EVERY £45 spent!

My husband's just come in with a Gervase Phinn book he bought on the market this morning. He told me that he'd heard Phinn, a school inspector, talking on the radio and had been much amused by a snippet from one of his books: "Hello young lady," he said, greeting a little girl at one of the schools. "What's your name?" When she answered him, he exclaimed: "What a pretty name! Were you named after Portia from the Shakespeare play?" The child shook her head. "No," she replied. "It's Porsche after the car!"

Thanks for visiting me today. I'll be back on Monday with a masculine birthday card so do pop back then if you have a minute. Enjoy the rest of your weekend,