Masking Flower Thanks...

Hey,

I am trying to use the lockdown period to post cards that have been sitting in my 'to be blogged' folder for a LONG time.

This card is 18months old!!

I love Helen Dardik and I was so excited when she released a stamp collection with Waffle Flower. I think I have most of it now..but I am always on the hunt for the missing pieces :)

This card was one of a series I made, using the Helen Dardik stamps and a mix of Simon Says Stamp and MFT flower stamps.

First I created a circle mask and stamped the main girl image (Enveloper Birthday), then I masked off the girl and stamped the sentiment. Cue much more masking so I could stamp all the flowers.

I coloured everything and them die-cut it as a circle.

It looks so pretty on the square card blank.

This is a time consuming but a fun technique that I use a lot to stretch my stamps.

Cx

Did Somebody say Cake?..

Hey,

Happy Monday.

I hope you had a good weekend? I spent mine having a Zoom call with the craftgang, doing more of the Spring Card Camp over at Online Card Classes and doing a ton of digital scrapping. Busy! I also managed to watch a few films with Hubby and Clint.

I made today's cheery card a few weeks ago, partly because I wanted to play with the great 'Swell' background stamp by Avery Elle that I got from a AE grab bag last year.

I thought it would pair well with the shark from their 'Sea-prise' set.

I stamped the background and cut a circle out of the centre, so I could house the shark. I went backwards and forwards on what background should go in the centre. ugh. Eventually I settled on the scrap of Lawn Fawn spotty paper.

Because my whole life is about cake during this lockdown, I thought my shark would be popping up looking for a piece of cake!

It all came together really well and I believe the recipient loved it!

You're Pawsome..

Hey,

Hope you are all well?

One of the things about being home permanently is that can do more crafting.. it is starting to look a bit like Hallmark in my house though!

It also means that I have been putting the NBUS and shiny stuff aside for the most part and digging through my stash using older things.

My bestie Lemon, loves dogs and tolerates my cats LOL. So I thought this great 'Best Friends' set by Studio Katia would be perfect to send her a thank you for some stuff.

I love the heap of dogs and cats and it's a lot of fun to colour, for this version I watercoloured using distress inks.

As it's obviously quite busy, I kept it simple with a die-cut thanks with an additional sentiment from the set.

She loved it and I got to play with something that had been a bit neglected.

Retro Rubber Challenge #133... Anything Goes..

Hey,

Welcome to another fun Retro Rubber challenge.

Hope you are all staying safe and well at home!

This time we have my fave -

Always great to be able to play with some forgotten about goodies in any way you like!

I decided to use a great set by Simon Says Stamp 'Sea You Soon' I think it came as part of a cardkit?! I've had it since 2017 and it has barely been used.

I created a background using the x2 bikini stamps that came in the set and coloured them with Copics. Then I heat embossed the sentiment onto some vellum and adhered that to the pale blue panel. I love this sentiment. It sums me up perfectly..I have waaay too many bikinis.

Super simple make from me!

What are you going to dig out of the archives and make? Don't forget to pop over to Retro Rubber and get inspired by the things the DT have made.

Challenge ends May 1st.

Don't forget to tell us the age of your stamp, that is part of the fun of our challenge and please only enter 10 challenges including Retro Rubber.

Cx

CASology: Just Be Claws..

Hey,

Happy Monday.

Hope you are all staying home, safe and well.

I loved my friend Jen's take on the current CASology challenge and it inspired me to play along.

I actually have a lot of friends and family (including Hubby) that are Cancerians AND because I love Crabs it felt like a natural fit to go down that road.

ALSO my beloved Big Shot gave up last Monday and so I am still waiting for a large format die-cutter, so everything I make that needs die-cutting has to be able to go through my smaller We R Memory keepers mini die-cutter.

The crab is from the Mama Elephant 'Cosmic Stars' set and I added the fun sentiment from the Pink & Main 'Oh Crab!' set.

I think the bright pink card blank helps make Mr Crab stand out and I couldn't resist adding teeny tiny googly eyes, because we all love googly eye right?

Cx

WOW!!

Hey Happy Friday,

What a week!

No posts from me, it's been a touch busy!

But today I am pretty happy to be sharing this awesome card that is a CASE of this wonderful card by the amazing Julie Ebersole.

Amazing card right?!

I used spotty Clearscraps stencil with Peacock Feathers Distress Oxide. The WOW was cut from the super large alpha dies I bought with my Christmas money from my in-laws.

Weirdly I do not have an Elephant in my stash, so I pulled out the Pink Fresh Studio 'Party Animal' set and decided that a Giraffe would be perfect here.

Whenever I hand stamp the Mama Elephant sentiment banners, I wish that I had used a misti - never gonna learn right..

Anyway, it still came out really well and I LOVE it. I need to make more of them.

Have a great weekend. Stay Home.

Cx

Happy Mail, Happy Easter...

Hey,

Happy Easter / Good Friday to all of you!

It's gonna be a weird one this year right? How will 'remote' church work?!

I love making Easter cards and last year I acquired the awesome 'All The Bunnies' set by Neat & Tangled (now retired). It's just so cute! I love the idea of the Bear dressing as a Bunny, which reminds me of a Liz Climo cartoon.

So I dug it out again along with a few other things and cracked out a ton of Easter cards that are already dropping on doorsteps.

Here is a version that I paired with the Neat & Tangled 'Eggciting' set - also retired. I added a strip of grass using my fave Lawn Fawn grass die.

This final shot is of some variants I did of a challenge entry, using the great Hema bunny stickers.

I did actually make a few other kinds of Easter cards, but foolishly forgot to photograph them (eye roll).

The main thing is that they are arriving and making people smile. That's what happy mail is about..

Cx

Wake Up Hug Dog...

Hey,

When I was back in London in February, I managed to get my hand on my fave cardmaking mag.

Making Cards Magazine. I always love their freebies and they do a great set of free digital stamps all year.

I actually managed to get both February and March magazines. You have already seen the March cards.

The Feb set was awesome, all dogs and great sentiments -

When this whole virus thing started, it kind of became apparent quite quickly that this wasn't coming to an end soon. So I wanted to make some cards for my people.

I made a whole batch of the one that you see today. I love that Poodle stamp and colouring it in randomly and in non-dog colours really worked well. And who could resist that sentiment 'Wake Up, Hug Dog, have a Good Day' I NEED A DOG.

I like to heat emboss sentiments onto vellum, when I have a big interesting background - I mean why cover it up if you don't have to!

Cx

Retro Rubber Challenge #132.. Be Squared..

Hey,

Welcome to another fun Retro Rubber challenge, a couple of weeks ago the RR DT did a google meet-up and omg it was so nice to see everyone for the first time ever. CV-19 is creating a mess in the world, but some good things are coming out of it too.

We have a fun theme for you this time -

I like squares, they suit my linear brain!

I used all Concord & 9th products here, the background blocks set that I bought in 2017, but couldn't really afford the letter/number dies that you can use with the set. BUT I got lucky in their blowout sale earlier this year and got them for a steal.

I stamped the blocks in x4 colours of Altenew inks (Pinkalicious, Maple Yellow, Sea Breeze and Sweet Leaf) onto a white base. I LOVE Altenew inks and I am slowly building my collection of them.

Then I stamped the same blocks onto white card and die-cut the letters/doubles. These are special double cut dies, so you get a solid and the outline - here is a close-up example of how they look -

I mixed and matched my placement of them and you get such a fun effect. I can't wait to do more things with them.

Show us your square makes and pop over to Retro Rubber and get inspired by the things the DT have made.

Challenge ends April 17th.

Don't forget to tell us the age of your stamp, that is part of the fun of our challenge and please only enter 10 challenges including Retro Rubber.

Cx

Squares and Cupcakes..

Hey,

Happy Monday!

Hope you had a nice weekend and are continuing to social distance.

I bought a great set by Mama Elephant during the Black Friday sale 'Cupcake Wishes' - I love that all the bits of the cupcake come individually, so you can build the cupcakes any way you like.

I was also super excited that it came with number candles - how awesome is that!

I made x3 cards - using the amazing Taylored Expressions masking template. I bought the square one and it comes with x2 templates - one with x4 squares and one with x3 squares. They make masking and blending super easy. I love the ombre blending I was able to do on x2 of the cards.

One of the cards was for my friend's daughter who turned 2. Here is a close-up - 

How cute is this! And look at all that sparkle! The background sparkle is from a shimmer spray and the sparkle on the cupcake is from the Sakura Starburst gel pens.

Cx

Fiddle Dee Dee: Layout Challenge Winner..

Hey,

Happy Sunday to you!

I have been on a roll this week.

I am so pleased that some of my first attempts at digital scrapbooking have been a win!

I won over at Fiddle Dee Dee too.

Here's the layout template that I had to use -

It was WAAY out of my comfort zone, but I really wanted to give it a go, so glad that I did. It actually took me x2 days to build the page!

Cx

Shopping Our Stash: Under the Sun, Moon and Stars..

Hey,

So, my Retro Rubber teammate, Maria is DT over at Shopping Our Stash and I saw her card, so I went to check out the challenge.

They have a theme of Sun, Moon, and Stars.

I knew exactly which stamp set I was going to use and I am 100% embarrassed to say that this beautiful set 'Late Nights' by Pink Fresh Studio (retired) has been owned by me since 2017 and had not seen ink until Thursday night..

I really didn't have to do much, the stamps are so beautiful, they just pop off the card and don't need to be over-embellished. I love all of the details in the stamp and the smiling moon is lovely.

I made x2 cards because the set was out and I have ALWAYS wanted to play with it, but just kept neglecting it.

I used Altenew Starlight ink - love Altenew inks.

I die-cut navy cardstock as a mat, so the white stamped panel would pop even more.

Can't lie, I am feeling super pleased with myself at how gorgeous these are. I hope the stamp set will forgive me for the terrible neglect.

Lockdown can be a wonderful thing..

Cx

CAS Colors & Sketches: Floral border..

Hey,

Happy Friday!

So I had a fun 8 days playing along with challenges.

I got a couple of honorable mentions (CASology and CAS(E) this sketch), so that was pretty cool.

I love the current CAS Colors & Sketches challenge -

I love the Botanical Borders set by The Ink Blot Shop. I thought one of the borders would work really well here if I rotated the sketch. I used Copics to match the colours and I think it came out pretty well.

Have a great weekend. I will be playing at my desk.

Cx

The Digital Press: Another win!

Hey,

Hard on the heels of my announcement yesterday, I won ANOTHER scrapbook layout challenge..

So happy and can't believe I won x2 challenges, given that I am a 100% newbie.

This time I won Rachel Etrog's layout challenge, it was an open theme just had to use Rachel's products and the template.

I got to choose a kit of my choice from Rachel's store on The Digital Press.

Loving all this happy news right now, it is much needed.

Cx

The Digital Press: First Scrapbook Layout Win..

Hey,

Welcome to April!

So big news for me, I won my first ever scrapbook layout challenge!

I can't believe it, but I am so chuffed and it's just the kind of good news I can do with right now!

I have been experimenting with digital crafting and memory planning and have been using the Everyday Selfie Love monthly challenge to create a travelers notebook sized memory planner.

All of this has been done digitally and along the way thanks to Traci Reed who has been running ESL, I have discovered a bunch of digital scrapbooking / asset stores.

I decided that I was really loving this and wanted to broaden my horizons a bit. I have always stayed away from traditional scrapbooking - too much space and time needed I felt. But doing it digitally means that I get to put layouts together pretty quickly and cheaply too!

I wanted to test my newly dusted off photoshop skills and decided to enter a challenge or two over at The Digital Press.

I love Gone Digital Designs and had bought few of their kits / elements / papers, so I was able to join in with their template challenge (see the main photo).

I still can't believe I won! So happy I won with this layout that honors my parents.

Cx