Cosy Cuddles

So I don't blog in ages and then I'm here twice in a day - just like a bus you wait for ages then two come at once!

I'm back as I need to squeeze this one in under the deadline - it's a card for my friend's birthday this weekend and I wanted an unusual layout to mount my image and this week's retro sketch really fit the bill http://retrosketches.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/retrosketches-89.html

The focal image is from Lili of the Valley and is stamped onto watercolour card and coloured with distress markers - my newest addition to the craft room thanks to my lovely hubby and I adore using them!  The sentiments are from two different Hero Arts sentiment sets.  I added striped paper and spotty washi tape and 3 brad heads.

Right - time for bed - night all.

Homemade stamps and hexagons

I finally managed to do the homework for Day One - I never was good at handing in homework on time!

It's also my entry to Cath's Moxi Fab challenge to make a card with a homemade stamp - I made the 3 different sized triangles from a couple of layers of foam http://www.moxiefabworld.com/2013/01/75-creative-card-challenges-week_10.html  I used a protractor to get the 20 degree angles to space my triangles out evenly and stamped in pear tart, teal zeal and navy ink.  I used a Hero Arts Greeting in pear tart and finished with a glitter pen to make the dotted lines.    This is also No 18 on my list of 75 creative card challenges completed.

I also completed No 5 on that list this week - Make a Card Inspired by a Quilt - I used that to make a card for my Aunts birthday.

I used the hexagon die from MFT using 6 different papers from a MME pad.  I added a couple of Clearly Besotted butterflies and sentiments from Waltzingmouse.

New Apartment

I am only just going to get this online in time for the month long Hero Arts challenge - I really am rubbish this month!  http://heroarts.com/blogs/club/august-2012-contest-details/

 I used one of the sketches this month, and made a card for a friend who is about to move into a new apartment.

The tower block is cut from kraft on the silhouette (a Hero Arts cut file) and I then stamped chevrons over it with a Hero Arts stamp using peanut butter momento ink.  I added some black card behind the cut out windows.  The bird is from a Hero Arts stamp and die set.  The sentiment is embossed on black from another HA set using a lengthened HA lable die.   The stars are from an old punch.  I quite like the masculine feel.

I'm going to enter it into the CAS challenge at ATS too 
http://addictedtostamps-challenge.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/addicted-to-stamps-cas-challenge-2.html

Krafty Christmas Tree

I was doing really well on my plan to make Christmas cards all year by joining in with the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown challenge earlier this year but I fell off the Christmas card wagon in May and totally missed all the June and July challenges.  I've still been following the girls and there have been some great challenges but I just haven't had the time.  I am however back for the final July challenge - which is to use brads http://52cct.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/july-embellishment-challenge.html and I'm combining it with the Crafters Cafe challenge of making a Christmas card with non-traditional colours  http://crafterscafeblogchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/challenge-6-christmas-in-july-wnon_25.html

I used one of my lovely new tree stamps from Card-io stamped in peanut brittle on kraft and I stamped a Hero Arts sentiment in chocolate brown over the stump.  The stamp has lots of circles in 3 sizes and I used craft candy dots in the largest, glitter in the medium ones and tiny brads in cream and brown in the smallest.  I drew some faux stitches in brown around the card after rounding the corners, mounting onto DP with some faux white stitches.

Dragonflies and ferns

I've played along in a couple of Hero Arts Challenges this week and managed to combine two into one card.  I've used the sketch from the April contest challenge http://heroarts.com/blogs/club/april-2012-contest-details/

and combined it with the challenge from A Blog Named Hero which is to create a window in your card
http://ablognamedhero.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/challenge-2-cards-with-view.html

I wanted to go for an earthy feel to the colours as I wanted to play with my new stamp and die set and wanted to use the fern as my focal image with a few dragonfly accents.  I used a cream base card, added 4 strips of cardstock to a kraft sheet and die cut a window from it.  I cut a frame for the window in black to add contrast and then stamped a simple hello in the window.  I stamped the fern in green and brown die cut it and offset it over the window and had the dragonflies fluttering up the card - kind of looks like they're escaping the swamp!

LIM Take 3 Challenges

This week's Less is More challenge is to pick 3 of their past challenges and combine them.  I decided to start with Challenge 1 as my basis as I didn't find the blog until week 2 so missed the first one!

My chosen weeks were:

Week 1 Pink Black and White
Week 12  Off centre
Week 14 Embossing (although this was one layer week and I haven't made a one layer card so it may not count)
Week 16 Butterflies
Week 43 Bit of Bling

This is the result:

I cut 4 butterflies with my embosslit die but I "un-embossed" the top layer so I could emboss it more on both wings.  I stitched the 4 layers together and added some pink gems to the middle.  I inked a Hero Arts swirly grass in black and added the butterfly to it grass.  I cut two of the tiny butterflies and inked the embossed areas in pink, added a couple of clear gems and finished with a sentiment from the same Hero Arts set in pink.

Thanks for all your comments last week - I seem to be over the worst of the effects from the  tablets and am no longer a dizzy-dummy :-)

One Layer Stripes

This week's challenge at Less is More is stripes, and as it's the second week of the month it's one layer week - so stripes but no layers - dang - I have lots of striped paper but no striped stamps! http://simplylessismoore.blogspot.com/2012/02/week-54-one-layer.html

A lot of head scratching and sorting through all  my drawers and I managed to find a couple of stripey things and have actually made 3 cards in the end.  These challenges are good like that, otherwise I just use the same stuff or new stuff all the time - this made me dig deeper and older!!!

This one is a bit outside the box, but I think the train track counts as stripes!  Stampin up wheel and TPC trains, planes and automobiles stamps.  I think this was in part a reaction to my blogging buddy Deborah's news - wish you lots of luck for your move to the States.  Wish we were coming too to share in all that US crafting goodness :-)

For this one I was inspired by Mandi's stamping stripes into nesties but I twised it up an stamped my stripes as a border strip after inking and embossing my nestie shape.  The flower is Hero Arts, clear embossed and glittered.  DI's blended and pearled to make the frame.  The stripes is actually a layer from my papermania cake stand stamp - told you I had to look at things hard this morning!  The sentiment is from an Elzybells set which has just been re-released by Penny Black (yeah!!!)

I'm not so thrilled with this one - very simple embossing folder with a sentiment stamped in the gap that is on the folder.  Just don't think the sentiment works, and I can see this being recycled with the sentiment covered for an non one-layer card.

That's it for a while as I have a very bad headache today - a phonecall at 4.30 am about the alarm at work is probably to blame....   Time for lunch and a quick nap I think!

Catch you later

LIM Week 18

Week 18 on Less is More and we're in week one of the "cycle" so it's a colour challenge and this time it's monochromatic which shouldn't be too much of a challenge, particularly after the last time round was "white on white" which I came to love after initially being terrified by it.  But today it just hasn't been happening for me.  I've felt a bit off all day so spent most of the morning just laying on the bed thinking of what to do and coming up with a big fat zero on the ideas front.  Not getting an entry up until mid-afternoon is very late for me....

After lunch I went back to the craft room and dug out a hero arts set of clear stamps which is full of flowers, butterflies and flourishes.  I selected 3 elements from it that I thought would work - a floral circle to colour, a dotty circle with a flourish, and a final flourish for a background.  Then I had to pick a colour.  I got a lovely prima pad from the show I went to last weekend which is all shades of pinks so I began with a flesh pink mottled sheet and stamped the dotty flourish with a richer pink ink - I like how inks change colour when stamped on coloured paper not white.  I picked a matching dotty paper from the pad with the same flesh coloured dots on a richer maroon background, cut a strip half the width of my card and stamped the flourish background in the same rich pink ink.  I stamped the final image a flower circle on white using a combo of the pink ink and black, then softly shaded the background with prisma pencils and blended to a soft pale finish.  The flowers were coloured with flesh tone pencils and a maroon for the leaves.  A little pink flesh stickles adds a bit a sparkle.  I decided to layer the circles off-centre for added interest. I then spent about 20 minutes deciding where to put the sentiment, which is from the same stamp set - I tried bottom right which looked OK, but not after I rounded the corners (I've started to put my sentiments on scrap so I can move them around the finished card as I've ruined so many putting them in the wrong place!) and centrally didn't work either under the image or on the bottom, so I plumped for the small space top right - what do you reckon?  Right decision?  I may not have left enough white space for a strictly CAS card (I'm sure Lady and Diva LIM will let me know!) but despite the complexity and difficulty in the thought process I think it's still quite clean and I'm really pleased with the finish results, particularly as I normally tend towards teals and greens as my preferred colour palette.

I've got to make a housewarming card, a 5 year old birthday and a sister birthday card today - hope the mojo comes back as I don't have time to spend 5 hours thinking about all of them!!!

See you later
Craftilicious