There's Gnome one like you

 Hello lovely crafters, 

Here is another card for our Shopping your Stash challenge. 

There's Gnome one like you - a card featuring at least one Gnome.

The only Gnome stamps I have are Christmas stamps so Christmas card it is. This is a PolkaDoodles stamp and to my shame, I have never used it before. I'm more of an inky effects card maker. 

This is nothing like what I planned when I chose kraft card but heyho! I think I'd imagined pale snowy colours but instead I give you red and green. 

The lamp is a separate stamp so I cut out a partial mask to stamp it behind the carol singers. 

After I'd mounted it on a piece of very old card stock, so old I don't even know where it came from, I went in with a white pen and added a leafy border. Thus proving why I use stamps and don't draw my own cards. 😁

Thanks for visiting, enjoy your day. x

Bright baubles then holly

 Hello lovely crafters. 

Today's card is for our latest challenge at Shopping our Stash. Where we encourage you to use your stash, dig out those stamps, papers and dies (and everything else) which we know you are hoarding and put them to use. 

Make mine a Tall one - a slimline card or mini slimline. Here we also call them DL.

For some reason slimline makes me think of Christmas cards and still on a mission to catch up with those here is what I made:

For this I chose a bauble stamp which was on of the first stamps I ever bought and still love. I stamped and embossed in gold and then painted in using Brushos. I've also had my Brushos for a while but not used them very recently. 

I went in with a gold gel pen to give a little more detail and then added the gold greeting. 

Finally I used a piece of purple card for the base which I may have had for 10 years!

Then I decided I didn't like that one too much and made another. 

I used my Honey Doo holly stamps, embossed in gold and then painted in with distress inks. I wanted to add splatters but wasn't brave enough/ran out of time. 

I finished with this lovely Penny Black greeting. Placed where the embossing wasn't quite perfect. 

The world needs more Joy, Peace, Love. 

From my stash, everything really, but especially a piece of gold sticky which I saved from the bin when I worked in an office (at least 5 years ago) and the green card which is a few years old. 

Thanks for visiting, enjoy your day x

Pastel shades

 Hello lovely crafters. 

Here are my cards for the new Shopping our Stash challenge and I have not one, but two cards. 

Despite my best intentions, I have not kept up with making regular Christmas cards. So I decided that to make one for this challenge. 

The theme is The Power of Pastels - use the pastel colour pallette. 

Why not for a Christmas card?

However, while rummaging through my stack of paper and inky projects I found this:

The background is made by putting watercolour paper in an inked embossing folder. Spritz with water before running though a die cutting machine and all kinds of fun happens. I know I made lots when I tried this. Each one was different. I thought this pale blue was perfect for a pastel challenge. 

I didn't want to do too much to it or cover the pretty inking so just added some die cut leaves around the sentiment. 

I stuck down the blue panel and then trimmed top and bottom whereupon I found the card was in two pieces. I'd forgotten I'd made a top fold card so I'd just trimmed the join! No matter, I just put the front on a new card. Almost as good as when I cut right through the back of a card when cutting a front aperture. 

I still wanted to make a Christmas card and here it is. 

It's a mini slimline - bang on trend right now!

The tree is aqua and the backing paper is soft blue. 

I'm also skipping over to the Snippet's Playground as I hear there is a May Pole and I've always wanted to have a go. I'm sure everyone is in a right muddle and tied up in knots. 

I've used snippets for the sentiment and leaves on the 1st card and papers, tree and sentiment on the second card. 

In other news I posted a card which I must have made about 5 years ago. It always escaped when I had a clear out and finally it was just right. It was a snippets card too!

I'm also linking to Christmas Kickstart Challenge where the challenge is Mini Slimline. Coincidentally using a sentiment stamp I won in a previous challenge here!

Thanks for visiting, enjoy your day. x

Inky stencilled leaves

 Hello lovely crafters! I hope you are all enjoying getting inky and sticky. 

I notices a tap tapping as I walked yesterday and found a gemstone stuck to my shoe. I hadn't even been using gems!

This one's for Sarn. She mentioned on Sunday how hard cards for our male friends are. I agree. 

I saw this idea demonstrated by Gina K on The You Tube and realised I could adapt it for my son's birthday card. She calls it the reverse stencil technique. (Don't blame me if you fall down a rabbit hole).

In real life the colours are rich and velvety. 

You ink your card, I used different shades of green. Then place the stencil and tape it in place and ink over the whole thing in black. Fun and dramatic.

When you lift the stencil you have the original inking showing. Which is perfect here as the leaves are green.

 A simple die cut and stamped greeting. 

No fuss or frills as members of this household have been known to smirk about butterflies and gems. I carry on regardless!

Et voila a quick and easy card, looks fab (I think), didn't take long but still has a satisfying amount of creativity in the creation. 

Edit: here a couple of photos for anyone who didn't quite understand. The stencil - Palm Frond Honey Bee Stamps. 

And the stencil laid over the finished card, showing only the black inking. 

So I'm popping this over to the Snippet's Playground. I used one large snippet and several smaller pieces for the greeting. 'Happy' is layered 3 times.

There are always great ideas on show over there. Take a look. 

Thanks for visiting, enjoy your day. x

Smile

Hello lovely crafters! How is everyone doing?

I have been flat out in my flower plot (where I grow cut flowers) and really need to get some perspective and organise my time better. 

Here is my card for our latest challenge at

What a Difference you've made in my Life

A card for your Mum, Grandma or other special person in your Life. 

My reason for choosing this greeting is that caring people often forget to look after themselves. We all need a little bit of special time. 

I started with an inked background from my stash. I can't quite remember how I made it but probably inking a stencil and spritzing. (I'm aware that's not very helpful to you if you want to recreate). It's created a pretty soft look. You can just see the outline of the flowers and leaves of the stencil. 

It's fun playing with stencils, ink and water and seeing what happens. 

I added an inky butterfly with a sparkly finish, a few die cut leaves and flowers and some punched hearts with Glossy Accents. If you don't quite have the right embellishment you can create your own!

Do join in with us this time. You have two weeks for the challenge. 

Thanks for visiting, enjoy  your day. x

 

Sunny birthday

Hello lovely crafters

Here is my card for our latest challenge at Shopping our Stash

This time it's a sketch. 

Sometimes I struggle with sketches but I remind myself that the elements don't all have to be layers. Sometimes they can be white space. 

I realised too late that I haven't really followed the sketch properly. It should be offset. Hopefully you'll do better!

I made this for a friends birthday using. Card-io stamps. I can't resist a wreath and this is a bright sunny one for a change. The butterfly is punched and is one more thing from my box of left overs! 

See what you can dig out to join in our challenge. 

Thanks for visiting, enjoy your day. x

 

Hello Sunshine

Hello lovely crafters

We have has some beautiful sunshine here and warm temperatures but I think that may be about to change. We remind ourselves that it is only March and carry on. 

Here is my card for our latest challenge at Shopping our Stash:

Challenge 467 - March 29 Under The Weather - weather related or Get Well cards

Everything on here is from my little box of abandoned stuff. It was the background which started it and then I fished around and found the flowers to match. Then it was too matchy so I added the yellow, which of course goes with the idea of sunshine.

The background is made by embossing a stencil. I'm not exactly sure how I made it, or when, but it did have Versamark embossing ink on it and is sprinkled with embossing powder. 

Have a search through your stash and see what you have to join in our challenge which runs for the next two weeks. 

Thanks for visiting, enjoy your day. x