Mooey wishes

Beccy of Beccy's Place has started a new challenge. April's prompt was to use any one of her images (either one of the many freebies or an image from her new shop) and combine it with chocolate-coloured papers, embellishments and so on.

For my card I used the pre-coloured version of the quilted cow. This offered a good opportunity to play around with my new digital kit by Nitwit Collections (Affection - FQB & Solids) and it tied in nicely with the various animal-themed challenges that are going on right now (maybe Spring is in the air?). The layout is based on this week's sketch over at Papertake Weekly.

Other materials used:

Scalloped square die - Lifestyle Crafts

Swirl - Silhouette

Combined lace/ribbon - Ladybug Crafts Ink.

Cardstock - Core'dinations

Sentiment - computer-generated

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Beccy's Place - Use one of Beccy's designs + chocolate-coloured papers and so on

Papertake Weekly - #64 Sketch

Bunny Zoe - #23 Ribbon or twine

Crafter's Companion - #22 Four-legged friends

Aud Sentiments - #53 Anything goes

Fussy and Fancy - #61 Punches and dies

Simon Says Stamp - Anything goes

Cute Card Thursday - #214 Animal magic

Totally Gorjuss - #129 Congratulations

Secret Crafter Saturday Challenge - #183 Cute n fluffy

A present for you...

Just a quick post to show you yet another Christmas card.

For the layout I used the following Sketch Saturday sketch:

Materials used:

Image and sentiment - Humprey's corner by Crafter's Companion

Colouring - Spectrum Noirs

Papers - Unknown brand (square) and Marianne Design (triangle and "ribbon")
Square scalloped die - Lifestyle Crafts

Snowflakes - Silhouette (large) and MD (small)

Gems - Papermania

Glitter glue - from stash
Faux stitching - Sakura souffle pen

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Sketch Saturday - Sketch 204

OLLCB - #103 Bold & bright

Crafter's Companion - #23 Four-legged friends

CCAYR - Photo inspiration

Penny Black & more - Oh so cute

Tuesday Throwndown - #95 Sparkle

Simon Says Stamp - Anything goes

Totally Papercrafts - #114 Saturated colours

Crafty Catz - #130 Anything goes

Aud Sentiments - #53 Anything goes

Fussy and Fancy - #61 Punches and dies

Crafty Ann's - #64 Stitching, real or faux
One Stitch at a Time - #110 Anything goes
Cute Card Thursday - #214 Animal magic

Peace on EARTH(DAY)

The Jingle Belles are challenging us to "create a holiday card which re-uses, re-purposes, re-cycles, up-cycles, or in some way "rescues" a bit of... well, SOMETHING... which you'd've either thrown away, or perhaps just overlooked in terms of card-making?"
This fortnight's prompt at Simply Create Too is also to create a project in honour of Earth Day.

Since I'm one of those people who find it hard to throw away anything, this theme was right up my alley. I had been saving a few old Christmas cards that my husband had salvaged from the waste paper bin at work back in 2005! You're wondering how I remembered the year? Well, the card said 2005 and I used the number 0 on my card below. I'm still thinking about how to reuse the other numbers. I love those little Santas and red and cream are just so perfect for Christmas, don't you think?

Anyway, here's my card:

The panel behind the image came from the packaging of the large star sticker I used some weeks ago and the red mat is from a scrap. I inked the panel with Antique linen distress ink (Ranger). I was having some trouble finding the right ribbon, since they were either too small, too wide or the wrong colour. But when I opened a drawer to take out the extension cable for my daylight lamp, my eye fell on this ribbon, which had previously been used for displaying our Christmas cards (using paperclips). A perfect match!
The embossing on the card was done using a Crafts-Too embossing folder and lightly rubbing the embossed image with Antique linen distress ink. The sentiment stamp is from a Woodware set and was stamped with Frayed burlap distress ink.

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Jingle Belles - Peace on EARTH(DAY)

Simply Create Too - #11 Earth day

Sparkles Christmas Challenge - #15 Colour me happy: favourite colour combination

MAWTT - Merry Christmas from MAWTT

Bling It On - Monochrome

Tomboyish or girlie?

For this card I used one of the new digital images of The Teenagers range from Ladybug Crafts Ink. I was the lucky person to win a gift certificate to the shop at the time of the release and the first item I put into my cart was Tomboy Jess. I thought it was the perfect image for the daughter of a friend who turned 14 today.

My camera could not really capture the fresh green of the Core'dinations CS and the dress, but at least they're a bit more true to life in the detail photograph below.

The layout is based on the following sketch from the Fussy and Fancy challenge blog:

I rotated the background triangle to make the sketch work for me.

Materials used:

Papers and flower stickers - BasicGrey Marjolaine collection pack

Brads - BasicGrey

CS - Core'dinations

Image - Ladybug Crafts Ink (Tomboy Jess)

Colouring - Spectrum Noir pens

Ink - Stazon black

Border - Silhouette design, cut from white CS and coloured with SN

Sentiment stamp - Paula Pacual stamp set (All year round)

Oval die-cut - Crafts-Too

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Top Tip Tuesday - #74 Spotty, dotty

LCI - Shapes

Aud Sentiments - #52 Spring/summer colours

Fussy and Fancy - # 60 Sketch

BasicGrey - #60 Spring colours

Sweet Stampin' - Girlie but no pink

Paper Sundaes - #116 Anything goes

(Almost) digital card

The basis for this card is all digital. I printed the snowman again, fussy cut it and affixed it on my card with foam pads to add some dimension. The same goes for the button. For some added interest I stamped the bird, glazed it with Sakura pens and then added some extra colour with Spectrum Noirs. I also added some faux stitching.

The card is based on the following sketch, created by Amy Tsuruta for Jingle Belles.

Materials used:

Nitwit Collections digi kit Polar Pals

(just couldn't resist buying it when I visited the website earlier this week)

Woodware stamp (bird)

Sakura Souffle pens

(white, clear and aqua - for glazing the bird,

the button and to create the faux stitching)

Spectrum Noirs to colour the bird.

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Winter Wonderland - Robin Redbreast

Jingle Belles - 'Twas the sketch before Christmas

CCAYR - Inspiration photo

Sparkles Christmas Challenge - Favourite colour combo

CHNC - #67 White Christmas

CCC - #19 Flower soft/flocking (theme always optional)

Anything Goes - #64 Anything goes

Delightful Challenges - Delightful stitches (real or faux)

Catch the Bug - Anything goes

Birthday blossoms

I've been admiring the DT creations over at Mojo Monday for a long time, but it's not a style of card making that comes natural to me (yet). That's why I'm so happy that I managed to create not one but two cards using this week's sketch AND loving how they turned out.

For this card I used the same cardstock and PPs as for my previous card. The sentiment is from Create with TLC. The flower die and lace are Marianne Design and the big and small brads are BasicGrey.

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Mojo Monday - Sketch #235

Papertake Weekly - Anything goes

Tuesday Throwdown - #92 Pastels

Simon Says Stamp - Use favourite tool (Cuttlebug)

Totally Papercrafts - 111 Bingo, top row (flowers, lace, pink)

Allsorts - #149 Colour bingo, top row (green, lace, pink)

Anything goes - # 64 Anything goes
The Crafty Pad - #165 Die-Delicious
Paper Sundaes - #115 Sundae bar (2/4: lace, die cuts)

Celebrate life

I hope you are all enjoying a wonderful Easter weekend. Over here, most people will be celebrating Easter next week, since the Greek Orthodox Easter is not until next weekend.

For this card I have used a brand new digital image from Paulette's blog at Create with TLC and it seems very appropriate for Easter. I printed it, fussy-cut it and added foam tape so I could use it as a sticker. I paired it up with pink and flowery papers from the Henbury Lane collection by Kaisercraft. I created the Celebrate sentiment in Word, which was inspired by a Hero Arts Happy Birthday stamp that I saw being used on a card in a magazine. I printed the sentiment in dark green on some pale pink Papicolor cardstock and then cut out a circle with my new Lifestyle Crafts (formerly Quickutz) circle die. The borders are simply strips of PP that were cut using my manual paper cutter. To finish the card off, I doodled a white line with a Sakura gel roller.

I think the trick to doodling is to just do it. This was actually the 1st time I doodled on a card and it scared me to bits to do it on the finished creation. I tried a small corner on a piece of left-over PP and then just took a deep breath and did it ... and then sighed with relief LOL.

The layout is based on this Mojo Monday sketch:

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Mojo Monday - Sketch #235

Ooh La La - #102 Vintage

Papertake Weekly - Anything goes

Tuesday Throwdown - #92

Simon Says Stamp - Use favourite tool (Cuttlebug)

Charisma Cardz - #13 Chipboard/sticker

Sweet Stampin' - Dies and doodles (hope my entry qualifies on the 'stamping' part)

Anything Goes - #64 Anything goes

Happy Hybrid Holiday 2012

This fortnight, the Jingle Belles have challenged us to use digital elements on our Christmas cards. After seeing their gorgeous paper piecing examples, I decided to follow their example and make a super hybrid card, involving digital papers, a digital image (kindly "donated" for this challenge by Robyn's Fetish, who are sponsoring the challenge this fortnight), 3D layering (did not want thick layers, so I did not use dimensionals), paper-piecing, colouring with Spectrum Noirs, both on the base layer and for adding extra dimension on the paper-pieced elements. To finish it off, I added some tiny pearls with a Viva pearl pen. I also used a few more of my tiny stickers for the sentiment and corner embellishment.

I first printed the digital image on white colouring paper and coloured the holly leaves, berries and bell with Spectrum Noirs. I then printed the image again on on digital freebie paper from Create with TLC and then fussy cut the green stuff. The ribbon and the three background layers are from a digital paper set that I selected at My Grafico after winning a challenge that they were sponsoring. I cropped the digital background layers in Word, added the green and red outlines and printed this in one go. I really like this background, so it's a good thing I saved it to be used again for other cards.

Below is a close-up of the image:

This week, I actually managed to stick to the (optional) theme over at Christmas Card Challenge, which was the following sketch:

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Jingle Belles - Happy Hybrid Holiday 2012

Christmas Stampin' All Year Long - Feelin' sketchy (use sketch provided or any other sketch)

CHNC - #66 Get sentimental (my sentiment may be tiny, but it's there!)

52 {Christmas} Card Throwdown - Anything goes

Christmas Card Challenge - #18 Sketch (theme always optional)

Papertake Weekly - Anything goes

Tulips and butterflies

Today I created another monochromatic card with some Papermania papers, my new Lifestyle Crafts (formerly QuicKutz) dies and three stamps from a Viva Decor stamp set, coloured with Spectrum Noirs. The sentiment stamp is from a stamp set of an unknown brand, bougth from the retail chain Action in the Netherlands. The ribbon is from Rayher.

The layout is based on Tuesday Morning Sketches #139.

I would also like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Sir Stampelot - Happy Birthday

Bling It On - Monochrome

Elke kaart een feestje - #108 Colour challenge

Simon Says Stamp - Anything goes

Craft Your Passion - #103 Monochromatic