CAS2 - Bonus day - Warm thoughts

I was so inspired by the ideas and projects from Saturday's bonus day class that I instantly had an idea forming in my head. The class was all about making a clean and simple card using die cuts. So I skipped the assignments for days 2-5 for now and immediatlely started to work out the ideas I had in my head.
JJ Bolton created this gorgeous arrow consisting of a row of chevrons by using a number of nested square dies to cut a small and long strip of chevrons in one go (using the dies at a diagonal angle) and then repeating this with different colours. Apparently, JJ mentioned off-hand that this technique could also be applied with circle dies. I totally missed that remark, but when one of the students repeated that remark in the comments section, wondering what it was about, something clicked inside my head and I was thinking RAINBOWS!

Perhaps I'd better show you my first card to make things a bit more clear:

Just like JJ did with her square dies, I taped down my nested circle dies (Lifestyle Crafts) using paper tape to distribute them evenly and keep them together so that I could die cut all rays of my rainbow (not complete circles) in one go. I repeated the process for every colour of the rainbow, which means that I first cut a rectangle piece of red colorcore cardstock giving me 7 red rays in 7 sizes, followed by 7 rays in orange and so on. For my current card I used the biggest ray in red, the second biggest ray in orange, the third biggest ray in yellow and so on. In fact I decided to cut not 7 but 11 rays (= 11 circle dies) so that I could create at least 5 rainbows in decreasing sizes (1+2+...+7 & 2+3+...+8 and so on). If you're not looking to create rainbows in the 'official' colour sequence, you could of course mix and match to you heart's content.

I created a horizon by scoring a line on my score board and then adhered my rainbow with strips of foam tape. The die cut clouds (C.C. Design) were glued together and then also adhered using foam tape. The sentiment is by Paper Smooches (Sentiment sampler) and was stamped in Memento Tuxedo black ink. I finished the card off with a few Kaiserkraft pearls.

Cannot wait to finish my next card...
This online class is so much fun. What I like most about it is that I'm now playing with ideas and trying out new techniques without having to produce a card every time. I know that the cards will be created in the end when I don't rush it, so I'm enjoying the journey as much as the destination (for now LOL).

BTW The size of my card is 13.5 x 13.5 cm (white Papicolor cardstock)

I'm also entering this card into the following challenges:
Simon Says Stamp - Anything goes
MAWTT - Punch it out

CAS2 online class - Day #1

Last week I enrolled in my first online card making class focusing on Clean and Simple cards. I have had a week filled with wonderful inspiration, but little time to play. I hope I can catch up with the assignments this week. The class is loads of fun but creating CAS cards is hard work and not simple at all LOL. But hey, that's why I'm taking the class in the first place, so that I can try and create my own CAS cards and become better at it.

So here are 2 cards that I made for Day #1. I used one of the 3 available sketches and used the spraying technique that Kristina Werner was showing in her video.

For the second card I used the exact same ingredients, except for the cardstock (kraft instead of Neenah solar white):

And here's an image of the two cards side by side:

Kristina used a mask for her card. Since I did not have a mask, I used what I did have, namely the grid that came in my tub of feta. Since I'm living in Greece, I always have some feta in the fridge. I had already salvaged this particular grid a while ago, though, thinking I could use it as a mask or stencil or something. How right I was LOL.

Since it was a last-minute decision to join this class, I do not have most of the supplies the teachers are using, which means I have to improvise all the way. Since I love making Christmas cards, my supply of Christmas stamps is growing, so I'll probably turn to these stamps a lot for this class.

Similarly, I only had two (shimmer) mists in my stash (Slate & Spring Rain by Tattered Angels), so I based my colours on the dark slate colour. Despite the colour, I think the mist gives a lovely impression of a snow storm. After I was done, I added some Spring Rain, which gives a lovely pearlescent sparkle in real life.

I stamped the snowflake (Verve Stamps)  in VersaColor Smoke blue and heat-embossed it with Clear frosted embossing powder (Ranger's). The sentiment (from the same Verve Stamps set (Christmas in the Air) was stamped in clear embossing ink (Ranger's) on some dark blue cardstock and heat-embossed with white embossing powder (Artemio). I adhered the top panel and the sentiment strip on foam adhesive for added dimension. I finished the snowflake with a silver pearl (with a stale blue sheen)  from my stash.

I'm also entering this card into the following challenges:

Jingle Belles - Ho Ho H2O!

CHNC - Use sth. starting with a P (there's only 1 pearl on each card, but who's counting?)

CHNC Extra - Always Anything Christmas goes

Sparkles Christmas Challenge - 25 Anything goes
Simon Says Stamp - Anything goes
Winter Wonderland - Monochrome/monochromatic
MAWTT - Punch it out
Christmas at Sweet Stampin - 2 Cold and frosty
Beccy's Place - Birthday Bash #1: sth. starting with B
(blues - blue ink, blue mist, blue cardstock)

Cupcakes anyone?

As soon as I saw last week's sketch over at Tuesday Morning Sketches, I knew I wanted to use the cupcakes stamp from my Verve Birthday Bash set. It also gave me a good reason to try out my new Stamp-a-ma-jig. This is a really nifty tool for aligning your stamp so that you get the stamped impression exactly where you want it. Perfect for wood-mounted stamps but also very handy for aligning clear stamps. I used it to add two more cupcakes to the right of the three cupcakes of the original stamp.

Here's a close-up of the glitter:

And here's the sketch:

I stamped the images onto Neenah solar white cardstock and coloured them using Promarkers. The cupcakes look purple in the picture but they are pink in real life (blossom, rose pink, maroon & ivory, satin, gold). When I wanted to put the card together, the white looked terribly white, so I coloured the background with my ivory marker and added a little shading under the cupcakes with my satin marker. For a festive touch I added some glitter glue for frosting and Glossy accents for the candle flames.

Materials used:

Cardstock - from stash & Neenah solar white

Papers - My Mind's Eye (So Sophie 6x6 pad)

Sentiment stamp - Paper Smooches (Sentiment sampler)

Image stamp - Verve Stamps (Birthday Bash set)

Doily - came as a surprise goodie with my order from Verve Stamps

Distress ink on all edges - Ranger's (spun sugar)

Ribbons - from stash

Fibre - from very old Avec fibre collection

Stamping ink - Mememto (Rich cocao)

Colouring medium - Promarkers

Glitter glue - Avec

Glossy accents - Ranger's

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

Bunny Zoe - Anything goes

Papertake Weekly - 81 Tie up your loose ends (bows)

Bearly Mine - (Tic tac toe: bottom row - glitter, twine, pink, doily)

Passion for Promarkers - 182 Favourite colour combo

I love Promarkers - 152 Anything goes

Alphabet Challenge - Y for Yummie

CAS-ual Fridays - 87 Make your mark (use markers)
The Ribbon Girl - Colour inspiration (pink and ivory)
Polkadoodles - Week 4 Monochrome/monochromatic