Simple Christmas for St Luke's

It's the first of the month again (already - just what happened to September????) which means a new challenge over at St Luke's Charity Cards Challenge and this month we are looking for CAS Christmas cards - well it is time to get cracking on those soon to be needed cards and simple is defo the way to go (for me anyhow) for Christmas cards so I can whack out a few in each design.

This is my case in point - it's been a hectic weekend so my card HAD to be CAS and very quick.  The bauble, complete with the word joy, was a design I found in the silhoutte online store and I simply cut it from white card stock and then coloured with a copic marker.  I added a simple circle of white glitter card behind the outline to give the bauble some weight and then added stickles to the word joy.  I cut a nestie shape to mount it on and drew around the outline of the die to cut a thin red border (the next size up die would have been too large for my 4 inch card base).  I finished by handing the bauble on some red and white twine with a matching bow.  I can definately knock out a few more of this design in different colours to make up a stack of cards ready for Christmas.......

I do hope you'll join in our challenge this month and get making your Christmas cards too - and if you're short on Christmas supplies you can even with a fabulous set of Waltzingmouse stamps as a prize if you're our winner so check out the challenge blog  http://stlukescharitycardschallenge.blogspot.com/

Spring into Spring for St Luke's Charity Cards Challenge

It's the first of the month so time for our new challenge over at St Luke's Charity Cards Challenge and this month we're looking for you to get in the mood for spring with flowers, animals, colours or anything that makes you think of spring!

We have a brilliant prize package this month - a gorgeous set of floral stamps donated by Waltzingmouse stamps and the latest issue of PaperCrafts magazine.

For my card I opted for flowers in spring greens and yellows using my favourite new medium of the moment - felt!  I love making felt flowers both with floral dies or just using old fashioned quilling techniques with a pair of sharp scissors which is what I've done here for my tiny yellow pom-poms flowers.

I started with a white base card, added a strip of white with some embossed line detail and I added a pansy border in yellow swiss dots on either side.  For the feature panel I came over all Morticia from the Adams Family and cut the flower heads of my stamp and die set (Sizzix/Hero Arts combo) and just used the stalks stamped in 3 shades of green ink and coloured with copics.  I arranged them top to tail to add interest and make them fill the panel and then added my felt flowers to the ones that were the right way up.  The flowers are simply made from a 3 cm strip of felt, folded in half lengthways and stuck with strong thin tape.  You then simply cut from the untaped end to where the line of tape starts at regular intervals to create your petals and then simply roll using a quilling tool (or toothpick) and seal the edge with more tape.  The sentiment is from Waltzingmouse's Frame It set.

You've got a whole month to play along with the challenge so do pop over to the blog to check out the challenge even if you only want to play for fun, there is NO obligation to donate your cards if you don't want to.

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

Cute Card Thursday - Signs of Spring
Aud Sentiments - Happy Birthday

Let it Snow!

This month over at St Luke's we're being inspired by all things cold and frosty and are looking for cards featuring snow, snowflakes, polar bears, penguins or anything chilly really.

For my card I decided to use one of my new Kraftin Kimmie images  - don't you just love that hair do???  I stamped her onto smooth white card, coloured her with copics, mostly in blues for the extra frosty feel and then cut her out.  I stamped the sentiment which comes with her onto white card stock, and then embossed it with a snowflake folder.  I added a strip of co-ordinating snowflake paper with an orange mat for her to lean on and finished with some die cut snowflakes with frosty gem centres for added sparkle.

Do pop over to the challenge blog and have a look at the rest of the DT inspiration cards and you have until the end of December to play along for a chance to win this gorgeous set of Waltzingmouse stamps.

I am also entering my card into the following challenges:

http://crazy4challenges.blogspot.com/2011/11/crazy-4-challenges-c4c115.html  where the challenge is also Let it Snow.

punches and dies are the order of the day over at  http://sweetstampinchallengeblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/punches-dies.html and I have lots of snowflake die cuts on my card

E is for embossing at http://abc-challenge.blogspot.com/2011/12/abc-challenge-e-for.html  and I have lots of embossed snowflakes too

Anything goes is on for the month at http://cookingitupwithkatie.blogspot.com/2011/11/cooking-it-up-86-anything-goes.html 

Thanks for visiting

Surf's Up!

 I said I'd be back, and this evening it's with another card for the current challenge we have this month at St Luke's Charity Cards Challenge which is "beside the seaside" so can be anything holiday related.  For my second card for the challenge I've gone for the cute little surfer dude from The Greeting Farm, teamed with a Stampedous sentiment and some snippets of blue card cut with  various width scalloped edge scissors. 

I am also going to enter this into a variety of other challenges as there are lots around like ours at present:

Firstly - cards for men, want clean and simple cards this week - http://cardsformen.blogspot.com/2011/08/challenge-16-clean-simple.html

Cooking it up with Katie would like something old - which is surfer stamp, something new which is the stampendous stamp, and your favourite thing/technique which for me has to be colouring with copics.  http://cookingitupwithkatie.blogspot.com/2011/08/cooking-it-up-69-show-me-your-new.html

Over at Critter Challenge - the challenge is summer fun - http://critterchallengeblog.blogspot.com/2011/08/challenge-76summer-fun.html  and the same challenge at Stamp Challenges http://stampchallenges.blogspot.com/2011/07/summer-fun-something-challenge.html  and at Die Cut Dreams it's holiday fun - http://diecutdreams.blogspot.com/2011/08/die-cut-dreams-95-holiday-fun.html

At TSG Clear Stamps the challenge is to celebrate summer http://tsgclearstamps.blogspot.com/2011/08/tsg118-celebrate-summer.html and Creative Inspirations is Summertime - http://creativeinspirationschallenge.blogspot.com/2011/07/challenge-65and-winnersof-challenge64.html 

At Try it on Tuesday's the challenge is from the beach - http://tuesdaytaggers.blogspot.com/2011/08/card-week-from-beach.html   and Craft Room Challenge is Summer Holidays - http://craft-roomchallenge.blogspot.com/2011/07/summer-holidays.html 

Finally this weeks challenge at Cute Card Thursdays is to create a card without any designer papers - http://cutecardthursday.blogspot.com/2011/08/challenge-176-no-designer-paper.html 


That's all for this evening.
Take care
Craftilicious x

Beach Bum

Well, it's the first of the month again, so time to launch a new challenge over on St Luke's Charity Cards Challenge and this month our challenge is "I do like to be beside the seaside".  There's a gift voucher for Quixotic Paperie as a prize this month so do pop over to the site and play along.

I created a beach scene as a collage of torn papers and printed my beach bum sentiment and stamped  the clouds over and cut them out.  I added one of the 3 beach huts from the Molly Blooms beach hut stamp which I coloured with pencils in ice-cream colours.  The "bum" image is a free digi from Leighs Paper Creation and I just love the humour in it!  I matted onto a black mat, and stuck the images on so they deliberately overhung the mat but stayed within the card edge.

Have a sunny day :-)

Craftilicious x

St Luke's Mid Month Reminder

This is my second post today - if you're looking for my Waltz post then please scroll down.

As we're half way through July now, its time for a little reminder of our current challenge over at St Luke's Charity Cards Challenge blog which this month is to make a card just using Black and White plus one accent colour.  For my first post, I went to my favourite colour of teal, so for this second card, I've gone out of my comfort zone with pink!

I started with the frame-it set from Waltzingmouse and stamped it onto a white square just larger than the frame stamp, and added the Happy Birthday sentiment in the gap in pink.  I added the bird chandelier that was free with craft stamper a few months back and just added a little pink glitter to its crystal droplets.  I added a very narrow black matt then mounted it onto a wide pink matt and added a decorative stamped corner with the same pink ink I stamped the sentiment with.  Another black matt to bring it all together - et voila - a quick and easy black and white card with a touch of an accent colour.

Don't forget we have a great stampin up stamp set as our prize this month for our best card - we're currently running at just 21 entries so the odds are in your favour - so come on, get your craft on and get inky with us :-D

Craftilicious x

St Luke's Colour Challenge

Over at St Luke's Charity Cards Challenge this month our challenge is a colour one - black and white plus one - that's the only stipulation - just three colours, otherwise ANYTHING goes.  We have a great prize up for grabs this month, donated by a blogging friend of mine, Zoë who is a Stampin Up demonstrator so she has donated a great set of their stamps.  Check out the challenge for all the details.

For my card, I guess it will come as no surprise to those that know me, that my chosen 3rd colour was teal....  I know, I should break out of my colour comfort zone but I couldn't help myself. 

In honour of Zoë's donation, I decided to use some Stampin Up products myself and opted for the gorgeous Manhattan rose embossing folder which I totally adore.  I carefully inked the raised up side of the folder with a brayer and momento black ink.  I then ran it through my machine and used the debossed side with the black lines on my card.  I added a simple sentiment from There She Goes and matted onto black and teal and finished with a teal bow and pearl.  Check out the challenge to see what the rest of the DT have for you to gaze at.  Do play along - we're aiming for 50 cards this month, and you could even win a great stamp set.

Thanks for visiting.

Craftilicious x

St Luke's Mid Month Inspiration

As our challenge is only a monthly one, we've had a few comments from people saying they wanted to take part but it slipped their minds, so I've decided to do a mid-month inspiration post from my blog and the St Luke's Charity Card Challenge blog to remind you about our challenge before you run out of time to take part.

As I made a very girly card for this challenge earlier in the month, I thought I'd make something a bit more masculine this time.  I used this decoupage panel with a big yellow helicopter which I've had for ages so don't know where it's from (sorry).  It's a "non cut" decoupage sheet - my favourite as I'm not brilliant at cutting!  I decided I wanted it bigger on the card, so I made a brayered background with some clouds created with the resist technique cut out from post-its.  I matted it onto a yellow background to make it pop, stuck it onto a blue base card and then added a simple birthday sentiment.

So, I hope this has inspired you to "come and fly with us" - you've got until noon on 30th June and could win a brilliant bundle of ribbons and buttons if you're picked as our favourite card this month.  The challenge will have a prize every month from now on so do make sure you follow us to find out what you could win........

http://stlukescharitycardschallenge.blogspot.com

Thanks
Craftilicious x

Come Fly With Me!

It's the first of the month again which means another new challenge over at St Luke's Charity Card Challenge and this month we'd like you to fly with us!  You can make any style of card you like, you just have to include something that flies on it - a bird, a plane, a fairy or in my case and angel....

This is a lovely image from Elzybels (no longer available to buy sadly) and its a cute little angel sprinkling wishes, peace and dreams as stardust from her cloud.  I coloured her in a soft muted palette and added lots of glamour dust and glitter and matted onto silver mirri.  I added a sentiment to the bottom, matted onto more mirri with a top and bottom border of stars using a Martha Stewart punch.  Simple, but hopefully effective.

So dig out your butterflies, birds, planes, balloons or anything else that flies and make a card for this months challenge - our favourite card will win a fabulous bundle of ribbons and buttons donated by Ciara - and there's a bit of blog-bling in the form of our winners badge for the runners up.  So pop on over to the blog to check out the challenge http://stlukescharitycardschallenge.blogspot.com/

We've had over 300 cards donated to the hospice for sale already so your support of this challenge really is making a difference - thanks so much for joining us for our challenge with charity at its heart.

Craftilicious x

Pattern on Pattern

I thought I'd make another card for my charity card challenge  in aid of St Luke's Hospice in Sheffield which this month is all about pattern.  The challenge is open until the end of May so you've got plenty of time to play along - I hope you do, even if you can't post your card to the charity - play along online and help me spread the word about the challenge to as many bloggers as possible.  I'd like to get more players each month if possible so our little challenge grows from strength to strength.  Thank you ;-)

I also added some twine and a button, as I really wasn't happy with my entry to  CAS-usal Friday Challenge yesterday, so I thought if I used the twine to edge and separate the patterns in the central strip, and one central black button added a little interest and balance to the simple sentiment at the bottom.  I used a kraft card embossed with polka dots as the base for my card so I have dots, spots, stripes, gingham and diamonds - so plenty of pattern, but still in a clean and simple way.

Do remember to pop over to the St Luke's Charity Cards Challenge and take a copy of our blinkie for your sidebar to help spread the word about this simple fundraising idea.  Thanks again...

Have a good evening - Craftilicious x

St Luke's 2nd Charity Challenge - Pattern!

THANK YOU SO MUCH to everyone who took part in our first challenge - 33 entries is not bad for first attempt.  Lets hope it just grows and grows.

For the second challenge this month, one of the DT, Ciara suggested we played with pattern.  I hit upon an idea straight away - I wanted to cut out the letters of BIRTHDAY on my cricut and then stamp half of them and half of the background so it looks like the letters have been "peeled" out of the cardstock...

This was actually my THIRD attempt at this card - first I used a pale green ink and I couldn't see it clearly enough through the stamp to get the repeats correct across the card.  I switched to this eggplant ink, but my second attempt I didn't get it right either.  There is still a section on this third attempt where I pressed a bit hard, repeat patterns take a bit of practice!  I do like the effect I originally set out to achieve though.  The stamp I used is one from a Martha Stewart set all of which are patterns so a very useful set to practice with (watch this space for more pattern!!!)  The HAPPY is stamped with individual letters from one of the first stamp sets I bought many years ago - its a very handy little set by Hero Arts

Do pop on over to the other DT blogs to see what inspiration they have and then go and get your pattern mojo working and let's see what you can come up with over on the challenge site - you've got until the end of May to play.

                                           Craftilicious x

St Luke's Hospice Summer Fair Saturday 12th June

I will be volunteering on the jewellery stall at St Luke's Summer Fair this coming Saturday.  The fair starts at 12 noon and as parking is an issue at the hospice there is a free park and ride scheme operating from Tesco's on Abbeydale Road.

I have donated a lot of my handmade jewellery to St Luke's and will be selling that on the stall along with donations from other St Luke's supporters.  I know from personal experience when I lost my Dad three years ago to the big 'C' what a wonderful job all the staff do for the patients and their families at a time when they desperately need support, so am trying to do a little bit to pay them back.  I do hope you will come and support them - they get so little government funding and have to raise millions each year just to stay open.

Keep your fingers crossed that the rain stops by Friday as predicted too please......