Envelope embellishments

Hello, crafting friends!

 

This morning, I was opening mail (just bills and promotional material I'm afraid!) when my eye was caught by the inside of one of the envelopes... and my craft switch was triggered! I immediately flew off to my designer paper drawer and rummaged around for some more snippets to go with the envelope.

 

Here's what I did with them: The green dotty piece was glued to a card base and the excess trimmed away. I cut the envelope into circles with punches and reached into the white snippets folder and cut matching circles to mount the flimsy paper onto. The flowery paper was a favourite back in the day and has been hoarded forever! I had cut some of the roses out of it for another project but today I was interested in the blue flowers.

 

After fussy cutting the flowers, I glued them on my envelope paper circles, ready to use as a border. I found a white piece of card that I trimmed to two thirds of my card base width and arranged the circles down the edge, adhering them down when I was happy with the design. This is when I realised I should have stamped the sentiment first!!

 

I masked the circle off where I wanted the sentiment to go but I'm afraid I did get a tiny bit of ink onto it. Someone once said to me "If you don't have any mistakes on your cards, how are people going to know they're handmade?" I didn't like to tell her that there wasn't any way on this earth that people wouldn't know, so I let it pass! I used a shiny blue pencil to colour the 'happy' part of the sentiment, popped the panel up on dimensional pads and finished the card with some yellow enamel dots.

CHALLENGES

I'm scampering off to the Snippets Playground with my homework - see you there! I'm also linking up at The Flower Challenge where the challenge is to include spots or stripes (or both) in our floral cards. I've got some dotty paper and the envelope paper has a chevron stripe pattern on it :)

 

AND IN OTHER NEWS

It was the resourceful Sarn from the Playground who inspired me to rifle through the recycling basket as I've been impressed with all the wonderful creations she has made with discarded packaging :) Of course, I have a fluffy pal here who is more than happy to help me look for likely items.

 

How about this Mum? Er, no thank you Eva! I cannot feel that your grotty tissue will enhance a card!!

Sending hugs,

Birthday bits and bobs

Hello, crafting friends!

 

I got right back in to the crafting saddle today, and had a nice canter round the Craft Square Metre! Hmm. It needs a bit of clearing out if I'm honest, but I'm much more interested in crafting than a clear out (anyone else?!) so I had a look in my snippets box and pretended that using up 3 items was a full-on Marie Kondo!!

Here are the snippets I found - all had been cut but not used. I made myself a nice cup of coffee and had a little think about them:

 

And here is the result of that thought process:

 

The die cut is supposed to be a musical stave from The Greetery's Noted die set, but I like the little bit of movement and texture it gives behind the arch aperture. The floral sprig is from WPlus9's Hello and Thanks stamp set and has been hanging around in my snippets box for two years! It seems to have held up quite well but I added a little bit more colour to it and snipped away any untidiness on the edges.

 

I decided to stencil a hopeful sunburst on the card base using an arch stencil as a mask and my well-used Sunny Day stencil from Clearly Besotted. The sentiment is from Altenew's Birthday Greetings set, coloured to match the leaves on the sprig with a coloured pencil.

 

I glued the elements together on my stenciled and stamped card base, popping up the arch on dimensional pads and pulled the colours together with some pink enamel dots.

CHALLENGES

I'm rather late but, since I was already in the saddle, I galloped through the Snippets Playground gates just as they were closing on their Anything BUT Christmas challenge!!  I'm also celebrating Double D's Birthday where they theme is Anything Birthday Related - Happy 7th birthday ladies and congratulations!

AND IN OTHER NEWS

January is doing its usual grey and murky thing but with extra rain this year. The river has burst its banks but I can tell you that the Golden Girls don't mind at all!

 

We cross a little footbridge to get to the river walk and when they realised that the footpath was now a paddling pool they both looked at me with the fondness and appreciation usually reserved for chicken in my pocket. I honestly think they believe that I laid it all on for their enjoyment!

Sending hugs,

Bringing flowers as a guest

Hello, crafting friends!

 

I am delighted to be guesting with Retro Rubber Challenge today after winning challenge 183 with THIS card. This time the challenge is a sketch - and of course the requirement is to use some of your older stamps - choose ones that are over a year old and do let us know when they were released! Here's the sketch:

Isn't it inspiring?! I have an old Stampin' Up stamp set (Painted Petals, released in 2015 I think) that I love and still use quite often; I thought it would be perfect for this sketch!

 

Taking a white card panel, I stenciled pale yellow ink into a trellis stencil to create the rectangle shape. There are dots and stripes images in the stamp set which were perfect for recreating the two horizzzontals.

 

The trellis is quite subtle but you can see it more clearly on the photo above. The cluster of the flowers and leaves was stamped on scrap card and fussy cut. I added detail with coloured pencils before attaching the flowers to the background. 

 

To finish the card, I chose a pretty flowing script from another older set, Altenew's Birthday Greetings (released 2015) and stamped it between two of the stripes. I attached the card panel to a card base using dimensional strips and added a sprinkling of coordinating sequins too for that feminine touch!

Okay so now it's your turn! Do hop over to the Retro Rubber challenge site where the design team has some beautiful samples to inspire you. When you're ready to share your own creation, you can use the Linky Tool which you'll find at the bottom of the post. Don't forget to use stamps older than a year - and have fun!!

CHALLENGES

I'm linking this card up at We Love Stamping where the theme is Anything Stamped with the option of Hot Sunny Colours; I'm also joining in with Laurie's Green Thumb challenge at The Paper Players; and Allsorts where Ellie has chosen the theme of Flora and/or Fauna.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

I love the summer days for walking. When Eva has friends we tend to walk out in the countryside but when she and I are on our own, we tend to walk in the local parks because it is her great joy to greet people and other dogs. One of our parks has created great areas of wildflower meadow to attract bees and butterflies and other pollinators and they always make me marvel.

 

Here's Mrs Floof, poised to have a romp through the poppies!

Sending hugs,

Slimline sweet peas

Hello, crafting friends!

 

The benefit of having a dodgy knee is that it has to be rested a bit and what better way to rest it than to do a spot of crafting?!

 

 

The Sweetest Peas stamp set by Altenew has been a recent addition to my flower stamp collection, and I've been dying to have a go at water colouring some of the flowers. This card is the result!

The flowers were stamped along the side of a thick slimline card base in a pale green ink. I coloured them with water and inks in blue, pink and purple. When it had dried, I added detail to the stems and sepals (is that the word?!) with a dark green coloured pencil.

 

The card was finished with a navy blue sentiment from Altenew's Birthday Greetings.

CHALLENGES

I followed the sketch at CAS Colours and Sketches so I'll link up there; I'm also joining in with the new Watercolour challenge at Happy Little Stampers.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

Today, I saved a bee from the clutches of a spider. It was like that scene from the Lord of the Rings film where Shelob comes out of her lair and attacks Frodo (I had to watch through my fingers!) I don't think that anything else I do today will be as worthwhile as rescuing the bee so I shall just take it easy for the rest of the day!

PS. I was going to add a video clip of Shelob wrapping Frodo up in sticky web but I don't want to traumatise anyone!!

Sending hugs,

A twofer for a diamond fella!

Hello, crafting friends!

After a tricky few days of nothing going right in the Craft Square Metre, I finally produced a card that didn't get thrown in the bin!

CARD ONE

It's a masculine card which nods both to the season, with its pastel colours, and to the game of golf, with its Pringle sweater-esque motif. You won't believe how long this took to make... 

... BUT, I'm pleased to say that  I rescued quite a lot of the duds so this is a very 'use up the leftovers' kind of card :) The panel was cut from a ruined card base that I'd been trying to stencil diamonds on with pencils. The pencil didn't show through so I was able to trim it out with a stitched rectangle die from Heffy Doodle and stamp and heat emboss the plain side with a sentiment from Altenew's Birthday Greetings.

I had tried to make a pattern of diamonds with my Funky Fossil Trellis Background stencil but I couldn't get my pattern to work at all so there was quite a lot of waste! In the end, I used scissors to cut out some of the pencilled, stencilled diamonds and glued three of them beneath the sentiment. Then I used a diamond die from the Spellbinder Optical Illusion Geo dies and cut some more diamonds from snippets of designer paper which I positioned over the top of the larger plain diamonds.

CARD TWO

I had just managed to make the Less is More deadline when I realised it was one layer week. Anyone else ever done that I wonder... lol! Well, inspiration suddenly hit again so I made another card which took a lot less time.

I remembered an ancient SU builder wheel with an argyle pattern on it, which I'd unmounted. I used neutral ink to stamp that directly onto a card base, off the edge, and coloured the little diamonds with coloured pencils.

The sentiment is from Clearly Besotted's Simply Said. I stamped it partially over the top using Stazon ink, keeping all the stamping within a one inch strip. There! Job done!

CHALLENGES

I'm linking Card One up with The Snippets Playground, after rescuing all those snippets; and Dawn's Occasions challenge at Watercooler Wednesday. I'm linking Card yTwo up with Less is More's One Layer Diamonds challenge and AAA Cards' One Inch Strip challenge - that strip was carefully measured!

AND IN OTHER NEWS

My crafting is done in my living room and I have made the biggest mess I have ever made, with trimmers, die cutting machines, stamps, colouring materials and off cuts of paper strewn about everywhere. If there's any relaxing going to be happening in there this evening I had better get it cleared up rather than hanging about here chatting!

Sending hugs,

Looking for flowers

Hello, crafting friends!

The sun was out today and my spirits soared as I watched Eva romping about on our walk and spotted all sorts of flowers and plants getting ready for spring. It inspired me to get a favourite floral stamp out and make a quick card this afternoon.

The stamp is a large one from Floral Focus by MFT and I find it is surprisingly versatile. Today I stamped it off the top of my card panel and again at the bottom, turning it at an angle for the second stamping so that it doesn't look like the same stamp. I coloured it with Spectrum Noir alcohol markers and added a heat embossed sentiment from Altenew's Birthday Greetings in the channel between the flowers. The panel was cut out with a stitched rectangle die from Heffy Doodle, matted onto coordinating card stock and attached to a card base.

EDITED TO ADD AN AWARD

I was so pleased that this card won a Librarian's Choice award at The Library Challenge!

CHALLENGES

The beautiful book cover at The Library Challenge was the starting point for this card so I'm linking up there; I'm also joining in with Stamping Sensations with one of my favourite floral stamps; and with Watercooler Wednesday, where Michelle is hosting the always popular Occasions challenge.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

There are snowdrops out everywhere on our woodland walks but this tiny clump was hiding behind a fence not far from where I live. The daffodils at the bottom of our road are looking hopeful too and I had to include the photo of those courageous little daisies! They made me chuckle.

There are always flowers for those who want to see them - Henri Matisse.

Sending hugs,

Manatee-rific under the sea

Hello crafting friends!

Just as I thought there'd be no card today, I suddenly had an idea! I'd been rummaging around in the stamp box and found the cutest set by Lawn Fawn called Manatee-rific. I was lucky enough to win it at Di's Snippet Playground last year but hadn't yet used it because I wasn't sure that any of my family knew what a manatee was! So I did a little research today and, would you believe, EVERYONE knows what a manatee is except me!!

I started off with a slightly coated card base and blended some purples and blues to create an underwater scene with a yellow strip at the bottom to represent sand. By drawing the ink into the centre from the top and sides I was able to leave a white area which I thought would look as if a shaft of light were shining into the scene.

I found that my Thistle stencil from Funky Fossil made effective seaweedy stuff! I used a nice bright green to ink into that. I had to leave everything to dry for a while because the semi-coated card stock keeps the ink wet for a little longer than an uncoated one would.

I added my sentiment next using Stazon black ink and a stamping platform to position everything. The 'happy birthday' bit comes from Birthday Greetings by Altenew while, unsurprisingly, the punning 'have a manatee-rific day' is from the Manatee-rific set.

Finally, I stamped the cute little manatees and coloured them with Spectrum Noir alcohol markers before cutting them out with the matching dies and popping them up on dimensionals. The card was finished with a sprinkling of sequins (I added these to my last SU order and I am in love with them - they come in a pot full of a variety of colours and sizes and are perfect!)

CHALLENGES
I was inspired by Stamping Sensations to use bright colours for this card and I'm also linking up with Allsorts, where this week's theme is Cute, and The Sisterhood of Crafters, where they want to see Stenciling. The Male Room's theme is Die Cuts so I'm joining in there too. I'm also going to share this card at the NBUS (Never Before Used Schtuff) Challenge (third time this month - and to think I truly believed I didn't actually HAVE much NBUS!!)

AND IN OTHER NEWS
Let's have a big round of applause for my floofy girl today!

Here she is, doing a very tense sit-stay because she's about to get a morsel of liver paté. Why? Because she returned from a long walk this morning CLEAN AND DRY!!! While she was licking her paté up, I explained at great length that humans LOVE a clean and wholesome dog and often give them delicious treats. She ignored me and sniffed about to see if there was any more of that nice liver stuff - this is the canine equivalent of saying "Yeah, yeah, whatevs!)

Hope your week has started off as well as ours.

Hugs,

Soft flowers

Hello crafting pals!

I have now restored order to the chaos after my weekend away - except there are some card challenges that I'd really like to join in with before the deadline! So I've spent a little time tying up loose ends ;)

The card panel of this card was decorated by masking off the edges and sponging Smoky Slate ink through Funky Fossil's Distressed Diamonds stencil with a damp sponge. While it was drying...

... I stamped two of these beautiful flower stems from Fresh Flowers by Clearly Besotted using black Stazon ink. I thought they'd be perfect for some soft colours and have watercoloured them in Petal Pink, with Sea Foam for the leaves and stems, before fussy cutting them and arranging them on the stencilled card panel.

I found that this feminine birthday sentiment from Altenew's Birthday Greetings was a nice fit for the space :)

The final touch was to colour the stamens with a black fineliner to give the femininity of the card a little bit of 'edge' and mount the panel onto a card base using dimensionals.

Edited to add: I was delighted that this card won an Honourable Mention from Just Add Ink :)

CHALLENGES
The team at Just Add Ink has the most beautiful colour palette this week. I'm also linking up with AAA Birthday where the theme is Flowers.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

I'm not wittering today as I have 8 minutes to join in the JAI challenge! Aaargh!

Hugs,

Pattern for a male birthday

Hello crafting friends!

I went away to Norfolk for the weekend and came back to find a little packet of stamps waiting for me! I looked at the suitcase that needing unpacking, the laundry that needed washing, the housework that needed catching up with... and naturally I opened the package and just ever so quickly made a card! Come and see:

There's been a new release at Uniko and I was particularly excited about a new background block stamp called Arts Décoratifs. Here, I've stamped it at an angle off the bottom of a card panel in black, heat embossed it and coloured inside the lines with alcohol markers.

I chose a simple birthday sentiment from Altenew's Birthday Greetings, stamping it along one edge and heat embossing. Black embossing powder and I don't get along very well, so I used my stamping platform to stamp with Memento black ink, cleaned the stamp while in situ, inked it up with versamark and stamped over the black, then embossing with clear embossing powder.

What do you think? It reminds me of a stained glass panel with leading separating the coloured glass but I think it works well for a male card.

CHALLENGES
Embossing is the theme of two current challenges - The Male Room, who want masculine cards using any kind of embossing, and The Paper Players, who want to see heat embossing on our projects. I'm also linking my card up with Perfectly CAS where the theme is shapes using no more than a third of a card front; and Inspired By, where I became very excited by the colours on the inspiration photo!

AND IN OTHER NEWS
I very rarely go away as Eva is unable to travel any distance without distress, but oh what a welcome home! She brought me a sock as a present and tried very hard not to jump although I could see she wanted to. I got down to her level and she gave me little kisses, making adorable little hen noises at the same time, and paddling excitedly with her front paws!

Do you have a pet that gives you a first class welcome home?

Hugs,