Playing with poppies

Hello, crafting friends!

Tuesday has cheekily popped up again and it's time for another fun CAS Colours and Sketches challenge! Here are the colours our host Bhavya has chosen this week:

I immediately thought of poppies! The poppies that grow wild in the fields here in middle England are an intense red, but I was also thinking of a pal who lives in California where you get lovely yyellow ones, so the challenge colours were perfect for a mix of both!

To provide a background for my poppies, I used the Pool Party ink and Clearly Besotted's Tear Awayy stencil to create a sort of misty background directly onto a card base.

The poppies are beauties from Clearly Besotted's Pure Poppies. I stamped the stems and leaves in a neutral grey and flower heads in the red and yellow of the challenge colour palette, filling in extra colour with coloured pencils. To keep my card nice and clean and simple, I kept the stamping to the bottom of the card front only, leaving plenty of nice clear space above it. 

The sentiment is from Hero Arts' Cheeky Birthday - very handy when you are ludicrously late for a birthday. I'm afraid I've brought it out several times already this year :/

Are you ready to get inky? You'll find lots of inspiration from my teamies over at the CAS Colours and Sketches site so do have a look! The Linky Tool is there too, at the bottom of the post, ready for you to link up your creation. Don't forget to keep your card clean and simple will you, with lots of lovely clear space!

CHALLENGES

I'm linking this card up with AAA Cards where they want you to use only two quarters of the card with the option of using our favourite colours; I'm also joining in at Happy Little Stampers Stencil challenge where Anything Goes.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

We have a lovely cockerpoo staying with us, a great friend of Eva's. Unfortunately, after a paw injury, he arrived with a bandaged leg and a soft cone to prevent him from worrying at it. It hasn't dampened his spirits at all and although Eva was initially a little worried about the cone, she soon found that it didn't stop her pal from playing with her. During their initial playtime, we discovered that the cone was pretty loose as it came off over the top of our visitor's head! The two dogs looked at each other for a moment and then this happened...

I swear Eva thought this was a new concept in coming to visit: bring a toy, but wear it!

Sending hugs,

Say it with gummy bears!

Hello crafting pals!

How are you adapting to your new social distancing/isolation lives? I have been spending so much more time on the phone that it's been hard to fit in any crafting! But here is a little something I rustled up earlier:

Sometimes when making birthday cards for young teenage boys, only sweets will do and everyone loves a gummy bear - am I right?! These are from Retro Sweeties by Skull and Cross Buns - a place you should shop just for the name alone!!! I stamped the gummies in bright colours and watercoloured them, adding a tiny heart on the yellow one when it was dry. The next step was to fussy cut them before smooshing them into a Versamark pad and embossing them with clear embossing powder to make them all shiny and delicious like real gummy bears!

The sentiment needed to be tiny to fit nicely under the yellow bear and his chum. I used just part of one from Cheeky Birthday by Hero Arts, inking up with a marker and using my stamping platform for position. I glued all the gummies to the card base, except the one holding the heart - he was popped up on dimensionals.

Some of you may remember my special floofy mail delivery service bringing me a box the other day (click on the link and scroll down for total cuteness!) Well, when I opened it, I was delighted to find this stamp set, with congratulations from Emily at Skull and Cross Buns - a sponsor prize for being the January winner at the Less is More challenge.

EDITED TO ADD AN AWARD
I'm proud to say that this card made the top three at CAS on Friday - thank you ladies!

CHALLENGES
I'm going to link today's card up with CAS(E) This Sketch where there's a fab retro sketch this week; also CAS on Friday, where the challenge is to Make a Birthday Card; and The Male Room where the theme is something you'd find Grandfather's House. I didn't know either of my grandfathers but we did visit my stepmother's father once or twice. I remember there was a dog we weren't allowed to play with in case he snapped, but there were also sweets - not gummy bears but boiled sweets!

AND IN OTHER NEWS
If you are in the UK and were celebrating Mother's Day yesterday, you will have had a strange one - but I hope you felt the love. I texted a friend: 'My son came back from uni with a two-pack of loo roll. Best Mother's Day ever!' She replied: 'My daughter says she can't top that! I got breakfast in bed!'

Sending love. Be safe and well,