Watercolour Butterfly

 Hello lovely crafters. 

I made this card for a friend who has had horrible surgery, and though I have posted it off today, I confess I really wanted to keep it!

I stamped the butterfly and embossed in clear. The after spritzing the paper (very) loosely dabbed orange at the bottom and yellow at the top with a brush. 

When it was dry, I ironed off the embossing. (Hot iron, with card placed between sheets of clean paper). An then added a tiny amount more stamping - a couple of swirls and some crackle. 

A Paper Smooches sentiment it's off in the post. 

I'm linking this to CAS Mix-Up challenge which is:

Check out the beautiful work by the DT. 

Thank you for visiting, enjoy your day. x

Shopping our Stash #461 - Something beginning with the letter S

Hello lovely crafters

Happy New Year and I hope you all had a lovely Christmas. That's all that over for another year. 

I'm pleased and excited to say that I have joined the DT at Shopping our Stash. There are different challenges every two weeks with the focus on using what you already have in your stash - old favourites or things you had forgotten you had. Which is perfect as we consider the state of our planet and how we should consume less. 

The first challenge of 2022 is: Something Beginning with S - hence the Snowdrops!

Other stamps I found but didn't use this time- skates, scissors, stitching, sunflowers... We look forward to seeing what everyone chooses. Hop over to the blog to find plenty of inspiration. 

I was sure I wanted to use this Snowdrop stamp to make a card for my Mum's January birthday.  They are such determined little flowers and hopefully will be pushing their way through soon. 

I tried a few inky ideas which didn't really work as I wanted the Snowdrop flowers to be properly white, not splashed with other colours. In the end I just stamped and painted them with watery inks. 

I chose this sentiment as you can be sure she will have something flowering in her garden every day of the year. Then finally I added 3 tiny birds around it. 

Snowdrops, greeting and the tiny bird from an old Creative Stamping set plus a bird from another set. 

The frame is a snippet of cream paper . You don't need every colour of paper. (No you don't).  I just coloured round the edge with a Pro marker. 

I'm also adding this to the January NBUS challenge as I have never used this sentiment before in spite of having had the set for several years! Shocking.

Thank you for visiting, enjoy your day. x

Give masking a go.

Welcome to another challenge at 52CCT. 

The weeks are flying by and we are here to help you get a head start on your Christmas cards before panic sets in in December. 
Our challenge this week is a fun one:

In case you have not tried this before here is how I made my card. You can get some great looking results and extend the range of your stamps. 
I chose a Poinsettia stamp and wanted to use it all around the edge of the card. Masking allows you to overlap your stamps without the lines crossing each other. It doesn't have to be this complicated. It can be as simple as a panel across your card. 
You just need to remember that whatever you stamp first will be at the front and the next things behind. 

I stamped the flower on a sticky note pad and cut out masks. I forgot to stamp near to the sticky edge but I had enough sticky to make it work. 

I cut out several together and then keep them with the stamp set as they can be used again. 

Stamp your first image and then cover with the mask and stamp again. 

You can see that the lines overlap onto the mask and not your stamped image.  I went all around the card stamping and masking. Then I filled in with Brilliant Red and Emerald Green Brushos. 
I love the effect and the vibrancy of this card.
The Poinsettia is Penny Black and the sentiment is Inkylicious. 

I hope you have time to join in. 
x
I'm joining in with October Rudolf Days at Scrappy Mo's a  monthly Christmas card challenge. 
Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge

52CCT Watercolour

Hello lovely crafters...

Welcome to another week at 52 Christmas Card Throwdown. I was pleased I managed to make a flowery spring card this week but now it's back to Christmas. I'm short on birthdays at this time of year.  
For our final February challenge Myrna has chosen Watercolours. A lovely theme with so much scope. 

This background is made using a more successful attempt at the Cling film technique (than my last card here). This time I used smooth, coated cardstock so the colour sits on the surface rather than soaking in. 
I used purple Brushos, a touch of yellow and possibly black. There are plenty of videos on You Tube for anyone who hasn't tried it. It is one of those ideas which looks a real mess when wet and then you never know what wonders might appear as it dries. Sometimes it is still a mess.
I used a Die-namics frame die I won in the Playground a little while ago and an unknown snowflake die. After it was finished I wished I'd stamped the sentiment but resisted pulling it off and ruining what I'd one. 

We hope you will join in with this fun challenge.

Thanks for visiting and Enjoy your Day. x

I'm hopping over to Pixie's Snippets Playground as I've used snippets and my playground prize. Thanks Di. 

Playing with ink, water and NBUS.

I've been to a local craft show. I went with a list but, no, of course I didn't stick to it. I did just about stick to the budget I'd given myself though so that's all good. 😊

This first card features a bonus set but look how pretty it is. This is a Woodware set called Dotty Flowers. 

My photographs looked very washed out but I think this is a pretty good idea of the colours if not the sharpness. Taken quickly with my phone as I was wasting too much time fiddling about with photographs. I'm sorry you can't see how pretty it really is. 

What I've done is ink over the whole piece of watercolour paper in shades of pink, purple and blue, then spritz with water. I then inked a little more which gives the water droplet marks a bit of colour which looks pretty cool in real life. 
I stamped the images with Versafine and then went in with a water brush and painted out the ink. This gives a very pretty effect which I don't use often enough.

This picture is really washed out but you can see the water marks and the Wink of Stella added here and there. Having made it I didn't want to cover any of it up with sentiments. 

I'm linking this to Mrs A's Butterfly Challenge. The current challenge is #87 V for vertical and/or Damson. 

I quite understand if you don't think the colour is right, feel free to delete. x

This second card is made using a Hobby Art set called Falling Leaves. Everyone needs a good leaf set and this is everything I wanted it to be and was on my list!

I used the same technique here, inking the panel and spritzing. Then I used the water brush to take away the ink from around the leaves rather than inside them. I love the shades of colour. 
I wish I'd made the sentiment smaller but it's stuck on now!
I'm linking this to CAS Watercolour challenge. Having made the leafy panel I didn't want to cut it down so it's not as CAS as it could be. 

And Happy Birthday - they are celebrating their 1st year. 🎂

I can just get into both of these challenges before they close. 

I'm also hopping over to Pixie's Snippets Playground where the challenge is always to use scraps and snippets. I've used a few here. 

One good thing about a craft show is that having seen all the gorgeous samples you come back inspired. I just need more time to play. 
Thanks for listening to my waffling. Enjoy Your Day. x