Showing posts with label CASusal Friday. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CASusal Friday. Show all posts

Saturday, 2 February 2013

Happy Birthday Less is More!

Today is the second birthday of my favourite challenge - Less is More  - can't quite believe that I've been playing along pretty much every Saturday for 2 years now - but I have and I love it - so here's to many more birthdays ladies :-)  I have to say thanks so much for your great challenges and your unfailing commitment to commenting on every entry - not every challenge blog does that and I so appreciate the time you take to do it.

For my first card, I used my new Stampin Up set - just loved the humour in this one and I thought the dog was perfect for this weeks colour challenge of Kraft and Kreme.  Simply stamped on cream card with crumb cake ink and a tiny bit of water to blend the colour on the dog.  Finished with some natural ribbon with paw prints and fixed to a kraft base card.


For my second card I used my favourite flower stamp - the gorgeous water lily from Clearly Besotted and this time I decided to do a little more water colouring so I stamped it onto a cream water colour paper using the crumb cake ink again.  I then stamped the inkpad onto my acrylic block and used my water brush to pick up the colour - it gives the image a sepia photo effect.  I die cut it with an oval nestie and added a matt from lined kraft DP, mounted onto a kraft base card and finished with a sentiment from the same Clearly Besotted stamp set using crumb cake ink.


The final card is another entry for the Kraft and Kreme challenge at Less is More, but also for the Love Letters challenge at CASual Fridays and also another challenge off my list of the 75 I'm trying to complete from the Paper Crafts Magazine - this time Challenge No 39 - Spell a Word with Twine.


For this one I just gently pencilled the word hello onto a strip of kraft card and drew over the pencil with glossy accents.  I then pressed kraft bakers twine onto the glue using tweezers - the twine was more white than kreme though so once dry, I went over it with a beige copic marker to dull the white.  I edged the kraft strip with two thin strips of watercolour paper once mounted onto the kraft base.

Friday, 25 January 2013

CASual Markers

The challenge at CASual Fridays this week is right up my street - they just want us to use markers on our project  http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/cfc87.html

Well if you know me, even just a little bit, then you know how attached I am to my pens - especially my copics - so joining in on this one was a no brainer and I may well be back later this week with more, but for today I'm sharing a card I made for our Receptionist at work to give to her niece who's birthday is today.


The image is one of my favourites from Kraftin Kimme - reminds me of Saturday Night Fever!  I coloured the disco diva using copics mostly but finished her boots, belt and earrings with a gold promarker adding yellow stickles over the top for the extra touch of golden shimmer.  I used a square kraft card as my base and cut a piece of of extra kraft card which I embossed with a hexagon spellbinders embossing folder to cover half of it, with a piece of green dotted DP for the bottom onto which I stamped a sentiment from PTI.  I fussy cut the diva leaving a small white border and simple stuck her over the two halves of paper which were themselves popped up on foam for a little dimension.

I'm also going to enter this into the new Keep It Simple challenge which is dry embossing http://kis-challenge.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/kis-6-dry-embossing.html

Stamps:   Disco Donna, Movers and Shakers Sentiments

Thursday, 24 January 2013

The long and short of it

This week's challenge which is about to expire at CASual Friday's was to use a long/tall card and I wasn't really inspired to begin with - hence being late to join in.  http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/cfc86.html  But suddenly I had an idea based around making word 'long' the focus of the long card....


The long is my first attempt at creating my own handwriting file on my Silhouette Cameo using my Wacom tablet - it's a little wonky but not bad for a first attempt, simply cut from white card, coloured with copics and stuck on my long card base..  The pen and tablet are going to take a little practice!  I then added the rest of the phrase with a stamp from Crafts Meow Vintage Clocks and stamped a pair of glasses from Woodware going off the edge of the card.  A little corner rounding to finish and we have a very CAS monochrome card with a hint of humour - just my style.


Monday, 12 November 2012

Tearing through my Christmas cards.....


I've made a quick card tonight to add to my Christmas card stash combining the sketch above with this weeks challenge at CASual Fridays which is to use tearing:

http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/cfc78.html

http://casethissketch.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/case-this-sketch-challenge-5.html


I tore a piece of silver paper (which is actually a leftover party hat from last year's Christmas crackers which I I kept as I love the texture) and then tore a piece of patterned vellum to lay over it.  (the image below shows the texture and detail better).  I stamped a sentiment from Hero Arts Very Merry Christmas onto the vellum and embossed it with red EP.   The flowers is from the Waltzingmouse Pointsettia set stamped and embossed in white onto colouring cardstock and then speed water colour painted with 3 shades of red luminarte paints (my current favourite technique which is very handy when you need to colour lots of images quickly - like for Christmas cards).  It has lots of great shimmer IRL but I can't get it to show in the photos.  I simply finished it with 3 tiny maroon pearls.

Sunday, 12 August 2012

Woof, woof, woof.......

It's another one of those fortuitous occasions where lots of the challenges I like to play along with can be combined together which given my limited crafting time recently really helps.   I therefore have a square card (CASual Fridays) featuring a whole host of dogs (LIM and DYSU)  :-D


The additional element for Less is More this week is that it has to be a one-layer card, so I simply stamped this super group of doggies into the centre of my square card and embossed a frame around them with a couple of nestabilities.  I coloured the dogs with pencils as I find copics show through too much on one layer cards and used a little smooch ink for the collars and ID tags.  The sentiment is from Waltzingmouse (well it nearly always is with my cards isn't it!)   These challenges were very well timed as I needed to make a dog themed card for a birthday coming up next week too - don't you just love it when a plan comes together ;-)

Challenges entered:

http://doyoustackup.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/dysu-84-four-legged-friends.html

http://simplylessismoore.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/week-80-one-layer.html

http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/cfc65.html

Thursday, 9 August 2012

A couple of last minute challenge entries

It's been one of those weeks again this week with lots of hospital and Dr visits for the parents for me and my hubby so whilst I started a couple of cards for challenges earlier in the week, I've just realised that today is the deadline for them and I haven't blogged my entries!

So, here's the first - for this week's CASual Friday's challenge which was "something in the sky" http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/cfc64.html  One of my most favourite things in the sky is fireworks!  I think its because bonfire night always heralded the start of my birthday (which falls a few days later) so fireworks have always felt like they were "just for me" since I was a kid and I've never grown out of that giddy feeling they give me.  When I picked up my issue of Craft Stamper on Saturday and saw the brilliant freebie stamp on it designed by our very own Lady of LIM Chrissie I immediately saw its firework potential.


I stamped the image 4 times in an "explosion shape" and embossed with white onto black card.  I die cut some stars from white glitter card in various sizes (the tiny bits are from a MS punch border actually) and coloured them with copics (they work really well on glitter so you can get it in any colour you need).  I added random dots of stickles in matching colours to the circles on the edge of the stamped image.  I cut a line just within the edges of the stamped image and cut round the bits that fell outside it to emphasise the explosion.   The sentiment was cut on my silhouette.

Next I wanted to make a card with this lovely sketch over at retro sketches. http://retrosketches.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/good-morning-wow-wow-wow-did-you-see.html


I had some cute PTI stamps that I thought would work well so went down the Christmas route with the sketch and decided to use the blue and green palette which is the current Less is More challenge to go with it.  http://simplylessismoore.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/week-79-colour.html


 The ribbon I used looks black in the photo but is actually a pine green with gold flecks.  I stamped 4 of the signs from the PTI Sign Language set in 4 shades of blue and green momento ink and cut them out.  I embossed an ice blue snowflake brad with clear pearl wow ep to give it a shimmer and make it stand out and arranged it over the snowflake sign so the flakes on the stamp were in between those on the brad.  I added some blue gems for sparkle and stamped a sentiment in ice blue but it didn't stand out enough so I wrote over the top with a blue glitter pen.


Friday, 20 July 2012

Black Cheddar

I know lots of people don't like working with black base cards but I do it quite a lot as I really like the effect it gives so unlike some people I was quite pleased to see the challenge at CASual Fridays this week - http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/cfc62.html


I stamped and embossed one of the camera images and a roll of film from the There She Goes "Oh Snap" stamp set directly onto my square black base card.  I embossed one of the sentiments onto red and cut out an embossed map pin from the same set to make it look like it was pinning it to the card.   I like the little hint of red against the black and white.

Great challenge ladies - thanks so much.

Friday, 11 May 2012

CASual Birds

As I'm on holiday today - I get to play along with CASual Friday's a full 12 hours earlier than normal :-)  Today's challenge is to feature birds.  http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/cfc52.html

I had my cricut out last night mass producing cards for our local Cats Protection League from whom we got our lovely Lottie a few years ago so I like to do what I can to support their totally volunteer run rescue services.  I made them packs of cards with this image from the Cindy Loo cartridge.


As it was still out, I thought I'd use it to make my CASual Friday card for a change too (I really should use it more than I do, especially as I'm now after a Cameo too!) 


This time I used the From the Nest cartridge and just used two colours and two images - the phrase goes with a different bird not the caged one - but I thought it would be a good card for someone leaving home for the first time.  The only non-cricut bit is the chain I've hung the cage from which is actually a row of tiny silver spacer beads from my jewellery making stash.

It is actually not raining here today for the first time this week so we might go out for the day.

Catch you later


Friday, 24 February 2012

Another pun

When I had my first go at this week's CASual Friday Challenge I didn't read it quite right.  http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.com/2012/02/cfc41.html   They had specifically defined a pun as "a humerous play on words" so whilst my first card made me laugh, I don't think it was strictly a pun.  So, quick sticks, here's another go....


This one is from a papersmooches set just stamped and masked and stamped again - well who could resist a smiling tomato??? 

Then it seems once you've hit on what a pun, you find you actually have a tonne of pun stamps in your stash, so I couldn't resist a 3rd attempt!


I just adore this set of fabulous mustaches from the Crafts Meow - I rarely buy stamps that aren't available in the UK as I hate getting stung for import tax, but I just couldn't resist these and they have the perfect set of puns to go with them.

I think that's my punning over now......


CASual Pun

This week's CASual Friday Challenge is to use a pun or funny sentiment.  http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.com/2012/02/cfc41.html

As it's getting close to Easter, I decided to ink up an as yet uninked egg stamp - it makes me smile so hope you all find it funny too!


The stamps are from the LOL Taglines set from There She Goes, they appeal to the comedy fan in me.  I used my new sunflower yellow brilliance ink which is perfect runny yolk colour :-)

Can't wait to see what other funnies everyone comes up with this week.


Friday, 17 February 2012

CASual Ribbon

If you've come looking for my Waltzingmouse Blog Party post, please scroll down....

The challenge this week at CASual Friday's is to use ribbon in readyness for Mardi Gras.
http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.com/2012/02/cfc40.html  Well we don't really do Mardi Gras in the UK so I'm not sure if this is along the right vibe, but lets give it a go and see what our US friends have to say.



I decided to "rescue" one of my cards from last weeks LIM challenge, that was a bit of a disaster,  but as the embossing bit worked well I just opted to cover up the disaster with a strip of pink card card onto which I stamped a Hero Arts sentiment.  I then made a ribbon rose from a delicious strip of pink and black velet ribbon.  I tied a knot in one end and then wound it round and twisted it to make a rose.  Finished with a black flourish die cut and 3 black gems for balance.

It also fits the super easy challenge this week at Aud Sentiments which is to create any card as long as the sentiment includes the word HAPPY http://audsentimentschallengeblog.blogspot.com/2012/02/happy.html

Catch you later.

Friday, 10 February 2012

CASual paperpiecing

The challenge this week at CASual Friday is simply to paperpiece your image.  I had to play along as soon as I got home as paperpiecing is probably my favourite technique.  This is my second card, my first was a more complex image which didn't work as well as I thought it would.  This is really simple but works better.


Recipe:
Kraft base card
Papersmooches Sunny Side Up
Picket fench distress stain
Snippets of paper from stash

If you want to use up some snippets - play along here, http://cas-ualfridays.blogspot.com/2012/02/cfc39.html and also join in with the weekly challenge to use up your snippets by joining Di in the snippets playground.  http://pixiescraftyworkshop.blogspot.com/2012/02/pixies-crafty-snippets-challenge-number.html  I must admit it's my first visit since Di took over from Jules - sorry Di - will try harder!

Monday, 19 September 2011

Mini CAS

Just a quick post with another entry for both this week's "mini" card challenge over at CASual Fridays, plus a 3rd entry for this weeks LIM as they go in search for a 1000 entries - I'm going to try to post one every day this week to help them get there.


This is a tiny 2 x 3 inch card - I like these really tiny thank you cards as they are just the right size for a simple gift like a small box of choccies.  I masked off a strip with post its and stamped a grungy background in a soft green.  I added some red ric-rac ribbon and a flower I made with a pair of tonic punches (there are 6 and all can be interlocked together to make different flowers).  Finished with a simple sentiment from Elzybels and black gem in the flower centre.

Catch you later
x

Friday, 16 September 2011

St Luke's Mid Month Inspiration

It's time for a little more inspiration for our month long challenge over at St Luke's Charity Cards Challenge which this month is a buffet.  You can make any card you like but you have to include 4 things from a list of 10 - check out the blog to see the whole list.  We have a great set of Waltzingmouse stamps as a prize this month so do join the fun!


This is a mini card - just 3 x 3 inches, which is the requirement for this weeks' CASual Friday challenge, so I am also entering this card into their challenge.  The four items I choose from our buffet were pattern papers, embossing, punches (die cut) and gems.

The patterned paper is from an old DCVW Christmas Stack and then I used a snowflake embossing folder on some blue mirri card and used these to create my background.  I stamped one of the christmas baubles from the Waltzingmouse Vintage Ornaments set onto silver mirri using stazon ink and cut it out with the corresponding nestie.  I popped this up on foam pads and finished with 3 blue gems.

Don't forget to check out the challenge for a chance to win - you still have a couple of weeks to play and remember our blog is a little different - we play for charity, so if you can spare the card you enter (or any other handmade card) then just post it to us at the address on the sidebar of the challenge site and we'll sell it for the charity at a local fayre.

Thanks for visiting :-)

Craftilicious x

Friday, 9 September 2011

Falling to pieces

It's been all quiet on the blogging front for me this week as I had a little procedure in hospital on Wednesday that didn't go well and left me feeling rather sore, so when I saw todays' CASual Fridays challenge - Falling to Pieces - it seemed quite apt, as I have been falling to pieces somewhat for the last couple of days!

However I did get a very nice pick me up, as when I felt well enough to sit up and have a look at the laptop this afternoon, I discovered that was the August prize winner over on Less is More

Here's hoping that this is the start of a good weekend and that things start to get back to normal around here.

As the CASual Friday challenge seemed apt, but not too complex while I'm still feeling a bit icky, I decided to have a go at making a card for it and this is it.


I stamped the leaf  from waltzingmouse 3 times onto some my minds eye paper using brown ink.  I cut them out and layered them onto a piece of the same my minds eye paper but this time from a 12x12 pad so the leaves were bigger and brighter, with brown card behind to tie it together.   I added 3 orange gems from Anabelle stamps (they were actually the prize I won on their challenge a few weeks back) and finished with a sentiment in brown, also from waltzingmouse stamps.

Right, am off for another lie down now.

Craftilicious x

Friday, 26 August 2011

Old and sticky....

I do like challenges which ask you to delve into all your old stuff and show it some love rather than leaving it to fester in a dark forgotton corner, but as I have, like all of us I'm sure, far too much stuff, when it's a open "something old" I often find it hard to make a decision what to use.  This was the case with this weeks' challenge at Just Add Ink, so I had a delve and found my mojo lost in the enormity of my old stash pile.... 

However, today, the new challenge at CAS-ual Friday's is out and as they want us to use stickers on our card, this helped me narrow my search somewhat!  I have tonnes of stickers, but haven't used any in an age, so a perfect combo of both challenges.

 
I used three old peel off stickers, the flower was a black and I stuck that to white card and coloured with polychromos pencils - the circle border and the sentiment were also peel offs but one was gold, the other was silver, but I coloured them both with a black copic to match the flower.  I used some yellow and red patterned DP to match the colour of the flower.


Peels off have fallen out of fashion somewhat, but I do think they are still a great product when used selectively.

Night all, Craftilicious x

Wednesday, 24 August 2011

CASual Embossing

This week's challenge at CASual Friday's is to use embossing, either dry or heat.  I made one card with purely dry embossing on Friday evening, but really wanted to play with my heat gun on Saturday and had planned a little series of mini cards to go to the craft sale for St Luke's this coming weekend.  However, one of my jobs on Saturday was to book tickets for our favourite comedian who is doing a few extra gigs at the National Theatre for a show we missed out on getting tickets for a few weeks ago - tickets went on sale at 9.30 am and I FINALLY secured mine at 4.17 pm precisely, after numerous screen refreshers on the laptop and frustrated redails on the phone.  Needless to say, this somewhat curtailed my crafting plans.....

I did manage one mini card, and will all the prep for the craft sale still left to do, it looks like he will be on his loansome so I thought I'd share him now and stop pretending I'll find time to make him any friends this week.


The plant and sentiment are both from an Elzybels set (sadly no longer trading) which were stamped with versamark and embossed with extra fine copper ep.  I then dry embossed a strip of kraft card using a border embossing folder and it isn't showing up too well on the photo but I added a copper rub-on cream to the raised areas to match the embossing powder.  I may make a set of these at a later date as I think they could make very useful little cards with a variety of sentiments.

Catch you later, Craftilicious x

Friday, 12 August 2011

Clean & Simple CAS-ual Friday

For this week's CAS-ual Friday challenge, the girls have joined forces with Clean & Simple and used one of their sketches for the basis of the challenge.


After last weeks horrendous glue dot torture, this simple sketch is a pleasant and welcome return to something a bit less taxing for the start of the weekend!

It's been more like blumming October here today than August - I even had to put my office light on at work this afternoon it was so dark and grey - so my first thought on seeing the sketch was to make a Christmas card as I was feeling a little chilly.  I used the tiny trees set from Waltzingmouse Stamps to create a simple two shaded tree, and then added "snowflake" embossing powder for the decorative lights.  The greeting is from the same set.  I added three rows of twine and a little dp border.  Very quick and simple so I may well make a set of these in different shades to add to my christmas card stock while I'm in the mood.


I wanted to get back into summer though, so decided to use the same set but without the snowy feel, so this is my second card.  I stamped a couple of trees this time side-by-side onto kraft paper and used the friends always sentiment as it seemed to me that they trees were friends.  I finished it with a strip of lime green card with some golden gems.


I think it ended up slightly autumnal so I may go and look out another set to see if I can't make an altogether more summery card to remind me that summer is still hiding behind the clouds somewhere...

Thanks for visiting - see you later.
Craftilicious x

Sunday, 7 August 2011

CAS-ual glitter glue

Well, this week's CAS-ual Friday challenge, which is to use glitter on glue dots, almost had me beat!  The problem is, that we don't get that brand of glue dot in the UK (well I've never seen them).  The brand we have here isn't such a pretty shaped dot - the ones I have are not at all round, and have odd pointy bits, so when you apply glitter they REALLY don't look so good!!!!


I refused to be beaten and miss a week however, so I used two strips of double-sided tape and glittered those once applied to a kraft base card and stamped a doily border.  I then added a sentiment and "made" my own glue dots by using my crop-a-dile on the centre of my messy glue dots to get a properly round dot.  It turned out to be VERY tricky and made a real mess of my crop-a-dile so I don't recommend it - and the swirl I intended to make became a shorter line of just 3 dots - but I'm hoping for brownie points for determination and ingenuity ;-)

Can we have an easier challenge back next week please????

Thanks for stopping by.
Craftilicious x

Friday, 29 July 2011

Featuring Buttons.....

The Daring Cardmakers this week want us to make cards with buttons - but rather than just bunging one in a corner, we have to make them part of the feature image.  The DT have some great samples with really quirky ideas for incorporating buttons, and as I've just got a new stamp set full of button images, I wanted to play along.


I was inspired by the phrase - "one in a million",  and created a sentiment I could apply to my DH who does put up with a lot from me and this crafting lark!  I created the sentiments in word art using cena font, applying a wave and a shadow to mimic the shape of my stamped buttons.  Now I know there aren't actually a million buttons on my card, but I hope my idea gets the message across by featuring just one real button on my card.  As it's a DL card, then I am also entering it into this week's CAS-ual Friday's  'the long and short of it' challenge which is to create a DL sized card but maintaining a lot of white space.

Back tomorrow for LIM and some more entries for the Crissy Armstrong DT call which closes this weekend.

Craftilicious x
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