Little Ones

It's a five week month over at Less is More which you all know is my favourite challenge site so I was thrilled to be asked to be the guest designer this week and join in the fun.   The theme is little ones which had me head scratching for a bit before I hit on the idea of using some "little ones" to make a "big one"!

I used 5 shades of distress to colour a piece of card from deep red, through pink into orange and then used the super cute tiny hearts die set from Paper Smooches to die cut lots of little hearts.  I lightly drew a big heart on my base card and then arranged my little ones inside the line using the dark at the bottom and light at the top.  To get the effect right you need to make sure that the hearts touch the edge of your pencil line all the way around and then your eyes fill in the gaps between to create the shape once your rub out the line.

I finished with an appropriate sentiment heat embossed onto a strip of vellum so you can still see the hearts underneath.  This one comes from one of my favourite sentiment sets - Avery Elle's So Happy which is so very useful!

You Got This!

It's sketch week at LIM and it's a lovely easy one to interpret so I played along for my card at Make the Day Special Stamp Store this week.

This is a new set from Mama Elephant which I just had to get my hands on as I live with a huge comic book fan so super heroes are right up his street!

For this card I used the new lots of stars die 4 times to create the banner shape on the sketch from a card panel and then used distress inks on the base card to get a blended background behind the star shaped holes.

I coloured the super hero copics and cut her out and added her on top.    The sentiment is from the same set and I stamped it in blue to pull the colours together.

Stretching Cats

 No it's not some kind of weird torture technique - I am a cat lover as you know!  It's just what I did with the new stamp from WaffleFlower I couldn't wait to play with.

I made a gate fold card and using masking and selective inking stretched the cat stamp over the front and right through the middle of the card to make a super-looooonnnnng cat!   I grounded her simply by using a pencil to create a rug for her to stand on.

The sentiments in the set didn't quite say everything I wanted, but again with some selective inking I managed to change day into say and then stamped the sentiment inside with added space to emphasise why everything is stretched.

I took my colour inspiration from the photo of the latest WaffleFlower challenge - the chairs are grey and I used the red lamp as my highlight colour.  http://waffleflower.com/2015/01/waffle-flower-challenge-january-12-25-2015/

On My Mark

Recyling Challenge

Our challenge at my store this month is to recycle something or use household items in your crafting.  I opted to make a pot to hold my new copic ink refills and all you need is a pringles tube, a craft knife, some paper and stamps!  http://makethedayspecialcards.blogspot.com/2015/01/january-challenge-week-1.html

Trim your pringles tube to your desired height with your craft knife (draw a line measured from the base and follow it - use bluetac to hold the tub still to reduce the risk of injury when using a blade to cut something that can roll.....)

Measure your paper to be a couple of centimetres higher than your tube and the right width to go all the way around (I used a sheet of polka dots in my favourite colour from Lawn Fawn)  Use double-sided tape at the top and bottom of the outside of the tube and where the edges meet to secure the paper to the outside.

You then need to make cuts at the top at every centimetre around the tube - this allows you to easily bend the excess over and get a smooth top.  The inside of a pringles tube is resistant to double-sided tape so even though you can see that on the picture above, what actually held the paper on the inside in the end was some pva!  Just spread it around and then fold each tab over in turn and rub more pva over the top when finished to ensure the tabs stay stuck!  (You could tidy the inside up with some washi tape if it's not too neat)

You can stop there, or if you like, you can decorate more with stamps and dies.  I went for a simple rainbow border of pens and pencils using Smarty Pants from Paper Smooches.   I stamped it and cut it out as a border and stuck it on.  For the sentiment (from Headliners) I wanted to go direct to the tube which is a little trickier but it is doable - select your stamp - stick it to your desk and ink it.  Then carefully roll your tube over the stamp in one smooth and even motion.

You could make a whole range of these in different sizes and make your own desk tidy - would be a fun project to make with your kids too.  Once you start looking for containers to upcycle you'll be amazed at what you'll find!

Simply love

A new year and a new challenge at my favourite challenge site.  If you come here often then you know that LIM is the challenge I play along with the most, particularly now crafting time is limited.  I'm such a fan in fact, that I am back as a sponsor this month with my Store so do play along this month as you get some vouchers to go on a little shopping spree if the LIM ladies pick you as their winner!  http://simplylessismoore.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/week-205-colour-challenge.html

This week's challenge is a colour one mo - to use black and metallics with a colour of your choice.  I went for red and a theme of love.  Classically simple.

I used the new scripty love die from Lawn Fawn which is great as it cuts as a whole word not fiddly individually letters and added it over the top of a red glittery heart cut with a Wplus 9 die.   The black background is unusual for a love themed card but it adds strength and drama and I really like it!