Monday 30 January 2017

Joyeux Noël

I have another card to share, featuring alcohol inks, a glittery snowflake sticker, and more NBUS supplies.


I had been wondering if I could use alcohol inks on vellum, and a search on Google confirmed this should not be a problem, so I gave it a go, and I loved the results. For the card above, I sandwiched a circle of inked vellum between two layers of cardstock from which I had die cut a circle using a NBUS die (Essentials: Carly Cutaways by Winnie & Walter), and added a large snowflake sticker in the middle. A sentiment from a NBUS Winnie & Walter stamp set (Season's Tweetings with Evelin T Designs) stamped in black Archival ink and my card was done.

Challenges:

Darnell's NBUS #9 - Anything NBUS goes


CASology - 223 Glisten


AAA Cards - #82 Winter chill




Jingle Belles - Sticky and sweet (use stickers)


Hidden Hugs

This week's optional twist for Darnell's NBUS challenge is a hidden or camouflaged sentiment, and I had just the right marbled shaving cream panel for the occasion, as well a NBUS word die (Hugs cutaway) by Winnie & Walter.


When I was creating several marbled panels using Distress reinkers and shaving cream. I thought it would be fun to try and create some rose shapes in the shaving foam, resulting in this fun and bright panel. I stacked my die cut sentiment with three layers in black and laid it back into the aperture, but not after I had stamped 'sweet' from the Big, the Bold and Friends (W&W) in black Archival ink.

My panel was die cut using a stitched rectangle die (Simon Says Stamp) and I used another SSS stitched die (Bundle of stitched shapes) to die cut a black mat. To finish off, I created a few dew drops using glossy accents, but these don't show up well in the photo.

Challenges:

Darnell's NBUS #9 - Anything NBUS goes
(optional twist: hidden sentiment)




The Card Concept - CC#65 Fresh and bold
(for my CAS & layered card I was inspired by the 
colours and the swirly orange pillow case)


SSS Wednesday - Anything goes




Wednesday 25 January 2017

Watercolour and stickers

What?! Yes, watercolour and stickers, and a stamped sentiment!


I was dertermined to play along in the first Muse: ChristmasVsions challenge of the year and thought I had plently of time, since they switched to a monthly format, but time was running out. Time was also running out for the CAS Watercolour challenge, but then the Jingle Belles prompt came to the rescue: stickers. Last December I had bought several of these white glittery snow flake and silvery snowman & snowflake sheets at the local supermarket and this seemed like the perfect time to use my NBUS, along with a sentiment from my NBUS stamp set (Sentimental: Winter) by Winnie & Walter. It was also high time to give my Zig markers a proper work-out. I scribbled three colours onto a panel of watercolour cardstock (Crafter's Companion) and spritzed a good amount of water using a mister. Love how soft the colours look. I pencilled in a mountain curve onto some Neenah cardstock and cut my panel out by hand and foam-mounted it onto my watercolour panel.

Challenges:
MCV76 - See below for Kimberly Wiener's card that inspired mine.


CAS Watercolour  - Snowflake


Darnell's NBUS #9 challenge - Anything NBUS goes
(optional: hidden sentiment and/or CASEing)


Jingle Belles - Sticky and sweet

and since I've CASEd Kimberly's card, I'm also linking up my card at Ksenija's fun challenge Chasing Mojo with Sweet Kobylkin. The idea is to CASE one of the cards in the gallery or another card of your own choosing.






Tuesday 24 January 2017

Noel revisited

As promised, here are two more cards that I made using the marbled pink panels that I had created earlier. Please see this post for my first card, in case you missed it.


For the above card, I took the die cut sentiment that I was left with from my first card, stacked it with a black die cut and adhered this onto another pink alcohol ink panel together with a gold thread nest. My pink panel was matted with black cardstock and adhered to a white card base that I cut to be slightly shorter than an A2 card to adapt it to the size of my pink panel. I finished the card off with a few sequins that accompanied my last order from Winnie & Walter.


For this card, I simply adhered a strip of one of my extra panels behind the aperture in my black panel (that I had used to die cut the sentiment for the card of my earlier post), glued the internal bits of the O and E into place and then adhered the panel onto a rustic white card base (Papertrey Ink).

I'm entering my cards into the following challenges:

CAS Mix Up - stamping, liquid colours + choice (heat embossing, die cutting)




I'm also entering my second card into the following challenges:

ABC Christmas - A for Anything goes & B for Berries & Black

SOS #287 All that glitters is gold








Sunday 22 January 2017

HI - Marbling with shaving cream

This afternoon, I've been experimenting some more with marbling. This time I used shaving cream and distress ink reinkers to do my marbling, which is a new to me technique. After creating several panels, I was left with some left-over inked shaving cream. The colours in my plastic tub looked so soft and pretty that I did not want to let it go to waste, so I used it to ink up a few more small panels of cardstock.


One of these smaller panels ended up on my card above. I didn't want to cover up too much of my pretty panel, so I simply added a sentiment (Bigger Bang Confetti, Winnie & Walter), just below the big white cat that's keeping a watchful eye from his magic forest. Don't you love it when you get such fun surprise gifts? But maybe you prefer dogs lol? I adhered my panel behind a die cut frame (I die cut the outer frame using Custom Panels by Avery Elle and the inner frame using Concentric Circle Dies (NBUS 1) by Neat & Tangled - part of an earlier SOA collection) and mounted it all onto my A2 card base. To finish off, I added a few gold sparkly gems (NBUS 2) that ended up in my cart last month when I was spending a gift certificate (from my challenge win at AAA Cards) at Kylie's Happy Little Stamper's shop.

This card is a purrfect fit for the following challenges:
Darnell's NBUS #8 - Anything NBUS goes + optional theme: new technique


AAA Cards - CAS game #81 Hello


CAS Mix Up - Stamping, liquid colours + choice (die cutting)






SOS - #286 Fantastic beasts






Saturday 21 January 2017

Winter birthday

My crafty goals for this year involve doing more colouring, sending out more cards and using my NBUS (never before used stuff, or rather, schtuff, according to Darnell lol). So when I needed a birthday card this week, I grabbed one of my new stamp sets (Winter Flowers, Simon Says Stamp).


I heat embossed the berry cluster in 2 corners of my watercolour cardstock panel using silver pearl embossing powder (Ranger). I coloured in the images using distress inks, something I had been meaning to do for a long time. I used the following colours: Wilted violet & Seedless preserves for the berries, Twisted citron & Mowed lawn for the leaves, and Tumbled glass for the background. The sentiment (Brushed, Avery Elle) was heat embossed in liquid platinum ep. I used a stitched rectangle die (SSS) to die cut my panel and mounted it onto an A2 card base from Fog cardstock (SSS). To finish off, I added a few clear sequins.

And guess what? I stamped and coloured 2 panels, creating 2 cards, one to give to the birthday girl and one for my stash.

Places I'm playing:
In case you hadn't heard, the sweet and talented Darnell is in a celebratory mood and has launched her NBUS #8 challenge. The main purpose is to get us all to use our NBUS, and for the first week of her challenge, the optional theme is colouring on kraft or trying a new technique.


Daring Cardmakers - Stitch it

HLS January Watercolour challenge - Anything goes (optional: stencil)


STAMPlorations CAS card challenge - Anything CAS goes (optional: silver or grey)


I'm also linking up my card at SSS Work it Wednesday, where this month's theme is Making something new with a new product.










Sunday 15 January 2017

Noel

Hello there. Guess who's been playing in her craftroom today? I started by creating several pink marbled panels using alcohol inks and Yupo. And then I had some fun turning some of these panels into cards.


For the card above, I took the lightest panel and heat embossed my new stamp by Winnie & Walter (Mini Scenery: Merry Berry) in gold and I repeated this using a black panel that I had cut to the same size. With my MISTI, it was easy to stamp in the exact same position. Next, I die cut my sentiment from both panels using the Noel cutaway (Winnie & Walter). I adhered my Yupo panel to a panel of black cardstock, adhered the die cut sentiment from my black stamped panel into the aperture in the pink panel and then mounted everything onto my white card base.

Challenges:
Merry Monday - 230 Noel


CAS Mix Up - Stamping, liquid colours + choice (heat embossing, die cutting)


Taheerah's Gossip Column (Winnie & Walter) - 6 Marble


HLS - January Anything goes with dies






Monday 9 January 2017

Alcohol ink flowers on Yupo

Today's card was inspired by a couple of challenges and a card that Kristina Werner created for the OCC Creative Chemistry 103 class last summer.


I started each flower with a few drops of alcohol ink on my Yupo panel and then used blending solution and a paint brush to move the colour around to create my petal shapes. I painted the petals by picking up dried alcohol ink with my damp (alcohol) paintbrush from the palette I had created during the CC103 class. I die cut my new Hugs sentiment (My Favorite Things) once from black cardstock and twice from white cardstock and stacked them to create dimension and stamped the 'sending' part of my sentiment (Winnie & Walter) above this using black Archival ink. I trimmed off a small strip on either side of my yupo panel and foam mounted it onto my card base to wich I had adhered two strips of Shape 'N Tape washi adhesive sheets (Lifestyle Crafts) that I had finally managed to find back in my stash.

Challenges:
CAS Mix Up - Stamping, liquid colours + choice (die cutting, washi)


Color Throwdown - CTD424: black, hot pink, green


HLS - Anything goes with dies


SSS Wednesday - New something

Tuesday 3 January 2017

Sparkle

Hello there! I bet you weren't expecting me today, were you? Three cards in three days...I'm trying to get in as much crafty time as I can before I start working again on Thursday. Besides, I wanted to create a card for the current Pin-sights challenge over on the Ellen Hutson blog. How could one not be inspired by the red and white deliciousness of the inspiration moodboard? For my card, I focussed on the striped cup and saucer.


Materials used:
Burst image and sentiment (I masked off the 'shine' part) -
Merry and Bright by Julie, Essentials by Ellen
Star image - Brushstrok Christmas by Julie, Essentials by Ellen
Sparkle die by Julie, Essentials by Ellen
(brand new; it came as a free gift with my Black Friday order
and arrived just before Christmas)
Inks - Archival jet black and Versamark
Clear embossing powder by Hero Arts
Ranger watercolour card
White sparkling Snow paper by Marianne Design
Off white pearlescent cardstock
Watercolour paint - Winsor & Newton

Challenges:
Essentials by Ellen December Pin-Sights challenge (see inspiration graphic below)


A Blog Named Hero - New to me (Sparkle die)


HLS January Watercolour challenge - Anything goes (optional twist: stencil)


Allsorts - 396 Something new

Penny Black and More - January Anything goes


In the meadow we can build a snowman...

Hello there! I'm back today with my first Christmas card of the year. I have several unfinished projects lying around, so I'm trying to finish them to get a headstart on this year's Christmas cards.


I had coloured in this sweet image by From the Heart Stamps over a year ago using Promarkers. See my earlier make with another image from the same digital stamp set here. I cut my panel to size using a stiched rectangle die (Simon Says Stamp) and adhered it to a larger panel that I had embossed using a few Spellbinders snowflakes. I die cut one of the smaller snowflakes and popped it up on my coloured panel using foam tape. I also used foam tape to pop up my larger panel onto my A2 card base. To add some festive sparkle, I applied clear Wink of Stella on the trees and snowmen, added snow/stars to the sky using my new Uni-ball Signo silver glitter pen. I also decided to add a little silver glitter to the popped up snowflake. I could not resist buying a large (pourable) bottle at the local DIY shop just before Christmas. It's super fine, and now I'm thinking that maybe I should have bought the other available colours when I had the chance. Maybe next time...

Challenges:
Passion for Promarkers - 375 Use punches and/or dies
CHNC - 314 Anything Christmas goes
CHNC Extra - Always Anything Christmas goes
The Cutie Pie - 106 A day in the snow
Sparkles Christmas Challenges - 72 Lots of glitter
CCAYR January - Add snowflakes

Sunday 1 January 2017

Happy New Year and Happy Birthday

Wishing you all a happy, healthy and creative 2017!

My first post for the new year does not feature a Christmas card but a birthday card, although I did use a Christmas stamp set to create it!


I used the wreath stamp from Winnie & Walter's In Bloom: Hollie's Festive Florals to create a border towards the bottom of my panel, at a slight angle, and then stamped a few smaller images from the same set to fill in the gaps between the wreaths. I did all of my stamping using my new Altenew inks: the Warm Gray mini cube set. Love love love these colours. For my sentiment strip, I used the direct-to-paper technique with the darkest of the greys, swiping my ink pad over a scrap of white cardstock. Don't you just love this warm taupe grey? Swoon! When the ink was dry, I heat embossed the sentiment (Winter Woodland, Winnie & Walter) in white embossing powder (Simon Says Stamp), cut the strip to the desired height, adhered it to my stamped panel using double sided tape, and then trimmed off the excess. I then mounted my panel onto my A2 card base using foam tape.

Challenges:
Winnie & Walter Rerun No. 17 - In Bloom: Hollie's Festive Florals


Less Is More - 309 Dimension

CAS-ual Fridays - CFC164 Celebrations


SSS Wednesday - Anything goes

Penny Black and More - January - Anything goes