Perfectly CAS - Make Pina Coladas...

Hey,

Well, I have been so busy being on teams and digitally scrapping that I haven't really been playing along much.

But I came across this awesome challenge over at Perfectly CAS - Tropical

I mean YAASSSS!! I just moved to Tampa in August, so I am all about feeling tropical.

I used x2 stamps - Sassy Crafting 'Feeling Fruity' and a wood Pineapple stamp by American Crafts.

I inked up the stamp with Distress Oxides - a bit of green bled into the Pineapple, but I kinda like it. I tried the sentiment a bunch of ways, until I finally settled on chopping it up and arranging it in a funky way!

I love it! SO not a Christmas card.

Cx

CASology #397 Type - I Like Your Face

 

Hey,

Happy Monday!

I hope you had a lovely weekend? Hubby and I had our first houseguest here in Tampa last week, which was a lot of fun.

I haven't played along with CASology in forever, but I saw so many cute typewriter cards that fit Fusion Card challenge AND my friend Jen's card made me laugh so hard I had to play along!

I mixed a bunch of sets to make this fun simple card.

The pink swoosh is a stamp from the Clearly Besotted 'Brush it Off' set and I used Kitsch Flamingo Distress Oxide. Heidi Swapp turned me on to stamping with Oxides and I am HOOKED.

The cute little typewriter and small sentiment below it, are from Lawn Fawn's 'Just My Type'  set. To add the fun sentiment, I masked off an ancient fave by Stampin' Up, so that I could have it stacked, it's actually in one straight line -

I loved this card so much I ended up making a bunch of them as a gift for a friend.

Hope you all have a lovely Thanksgiving Week. We are lucky enough to be going to spend ours with a friend.

Cx

CASology: Fart Glitter...

Hey,

Happy Friday!!

So WHOOP! I got an honorable mention in the last CASology challenge.

I thought I would play along with the current challenge -

However, my wonderful friend and CASology DT member Jen has already used my first choice of stamp!

So I had to go on a rummage. I remembered a stamp I bought a while ago by Rubbernecker Stamps and obviously I can't find it anywhere, so I looked it up and recreated the text - blurgh..

I love the Unity Stamp Co 'Damn Girl' set and I thought the lady in it, looked like she might say this to her friend ;)

I created the border and the text in PSE and printed it out and stamped the lady. I was going to colour her, but I think she looks so much better in black and white, I added a teeny tiny bit of glitter gel pen to her hat for impact.

Have a great weekend.

Cx

4from1: Craft Smart time to party...

Hey,

Hope you had a nice long weekend? 

Today Hubby and I go back to work after a week off - ugh!

I finally got around to inking up this stamp (by Craft Smart from Michaels) during the first weekend of our vacay.

I bought it mainly for this giant sentiment, that I thought would make fun CAS cards and I think I was right!

To add interest I inked the stamp using minimum of 3 colours, sometimes to create a vignette and others just for the solid colour. I used Memento Dew Drop inks for this, as I wanted to use a mix of colours, smaller pads are better for this technique.

Simple and easy. All they needed was some coordinating enamel dots and bling and they were done. Very very easy makes.

Cx

CASology: Plant..

Hey,

Well I think the team at CASology have a camera on my desk :)

I went to check the prompt for the current challenge and it just happened to be -

Both sets I used on my card were already on my desk! WEIRD!

I decided to add a bit of interest to my CAS card, by die-cutting the largest of the Lawn Fawn scalloped, stitched, rectangle window dies. I love these dies, they always add a bit of interest/drama to a card.

Before I added the frame to my card, I added a small amount of Twisted Citron distress ink to the x4 edges of my card. Then I stamped the awesome plant by Flora & Fauna from their 'mini plant lady' set and added the sentiment from the Waffle Flower 'Pretty Foliage' set.

Add the frame, a teeny bit of Sakura glitter gel pen and voila! easy peasy completed card.

I love the little glow you get from the addition of the distress ink, for me it really makes the card.

Cx

Perfectly CAS: Happy Birthday Bridge..

Hey,

Today I am playing along with a new challenge Perfectly CAS.

The idea of the challenge is to use one-third of your card, alongside the theme.

I love a CAS card and the idea of using just a third of the space on my card appeals to me.

I used this as an opportunity to pull out an older stamp set that I haven't used in a while 'Wherever You Go' by Stampin' Up - sadly no longer for sale.

I started by putting my stamp onto my white cardstock and marking where I wanted the blue panel to go.

The Wendy Vecchi 'Make Art Stay-tion' came into it's own when I was doing this, as I could hold my panel and the masks down firmly (I use post-it's for masking).

I blended x3 distress ink colours from left to right - Tumbled Glass, Broken China and Faded Jeans. The paler Tumbled Glass, kind of got absorbed by the Broken China..

I am so happy with how this came out, the blend is pretty much the ombre I had envisioned - how rare is that!

I stamped the bridge from the set over the blended panel and then added a simple Happy Birthday sentiment at a slight angle.

Then I just had to die-cut it using a stitched rectangle die and affix to my card blank.

Perfectly CAS = me perfectly happy.

More playing along with this challenge.

Cx

CASology 353: Feathers...

Hey,

Happy Saturday to you!

Hubby and I got approved for our Green Cards yesterday!! Can't believe it, after all this time and paperwork, needless to say I feel slightly jaded today..

Today I wanted to play along with the current CASology challenge -

I have a few feather stamps, but I thought I'd add a little twist and use the fabulous 'Mardi Gras' set by Avery Elle (sadly, no longer in stock).

I started by die-cutting the black panel using a stitched rectangle die.

Then I stamped the mask from the set (using Versamark embossing ink), slightly off of the edge of the panel and then heat embossed it using my all-time fave embossing powder Liquid Platinum by Ranger.

I stamped the feathers from the set onto a piece of red card and again heat embossed them using the same powder and then die-cut them out.

After much rearranging of the position, I FINALLY settled on a place for the sentiment and used the same methods as above to heat emboss it.

I affixed the entire panel to a black card blank. Then I arranged the 3 feathers and added them to the corner of the mask.

It felt like it was missing something, so I added a super shimmery Neat & Tangled gold enamel dot.

CAS can be 'black' space too ;)

Cx

p.s Happy World Cardmaking Day!!!

CAS on Friday: Butterflies..

Hey,

With all the traveling and working! I haven't been playing along with too many challenges.

So this weekend has I had some time, I thought I would play along with one of my fave challenges - CAS on Friday.

The theme is Butterflies.

I think my card feels pretty CAS..but we'll see what the DT think ;)

I smooshed half of my paper in distress oxide's and water and dried it before using a large rectangle stitched die to die-cut it to size.

I used my new Lil Inker stitched butterfly dies and embossed the large butterfly and a trail into my panel. I die-cut a smaller butterfly from the same set using a coordinating scrap of paper and popped that up on my card.

I finished it off with a simple sentiment.

I am really happy with how it came out, I really like the embossed butterfly that overlaps the coloured and plain parts of my background.

Cx

CASology: Peas on Earth...

Hey,

Happy Sunday to you.

Today I am playing along with the current CASology challenge.

I had toyed with a couple of options, but decided to go with a punny card.

I love the 'Peas on Earth' set by Ink Blot Shop. I got after Christmas last year, so I'll be making some Christmas cards with it this year.

But for this challenge, I thought it made a nice simple CAS card for a friend. I fussy cut the peas for a bit of dimension.

It made me smile a lot today..Hubby not so much, more eye rolling from him.

Cx

Twofer Challenge time...

Hey,

Happy Friday..

This week has been crazy!!! Being very unwell last week left me with a backlog of work and personal things.. AND JT was here for a few days, so I really wanted to spend a decent amount of time with her.

I did manage to make a twofer card this week :)

I really wanted to play along with both of the current Less is More and Addicted to CAS challenges and I felt that they combined really well.

I love bird stamps and the most recent set I purchased Mod Birds by MFT is fast becoming a fave. I stamped all of the birds from the set in navy and yellow ink, fitting the LIM theme. I wasn't sure which of the birds I wanted to use and tried them all until I settled on the one you see.

I like masking off shapes so I can ink blend into them and so now I have a ton of ready to go masks - fun tip, I use the card inserts that come in stamp sets to create masks out of :).

I used Fossilised Amber Distress Oxide ink for my circle and added some stars by Studio Calico in navy around the edge of my circle.

The sentiment stamp is a magazine freebie and fit the overall theme perfectly I thought.

I'm pretty pleased with the ONE card I have managed to make this week.

I'm looking forward to some serious desk time this weekend.

Cx

CASology: Smile..

Hey,

I had some free desk time last night, so I decided in honour of my first HM of the year over at CASology I would play along with this week's cue card.

I have this great stamp by Waffle Flower 'Picture Perfect' that I thought would be great to make a semi-one layer card.

I stamped and coloured the image and then trimmed it out, so I could mount it onto my white card blank..

And that is pretty much it LOL. I mean it can't really get any more CAS than that - can it?

I love the cheeky monkey and her little friends, I have a friend in mind who I think will love this card.

Cx

CAS(E) This Sketch 285: Have a Monster Birthday...

Hey,

Happy Sunday.

Because of my epic night out on Friday yesterday was a bit of a nothing day!

Today I am back at my desk, but still a teeny bit slow.

I needed inspiration and went looking for a challenge and I liked the sketch over at CAS(E) this sketch this week -

Nice and straightforward for my slow brain today.

I decided to break out a set of stitched rounded rectangle dies for the shapes - I don't use these as much as I used to, as I lost the most useful size of the die between my desk and the expedit and trust me that is WAY too much work to recover that..

I stamped the Monster from the Neat & Tangled 'Little Monster' set onto white card and die-cut it out. I decided I didn't want to hide him completely and so used vellum for the central panel.

I heat embossed half of the sentiment onto the vellum panel (by Snarky Stamps).

I love the giant 'monster' word stamp and die from the set - I totally overuse it..

I am super pleased at how my card came out and I LOL when I showed it to my Hubby he said 'obviously the first thing you make is a Monster card..'

My love of Monsters is renowned..

Cx

CAS-ual Fridays: Heat Embossing..

Hey,

I wanted to play along with the current challenge over at CAS-ual Fridays, because I have been heat embossing quite a bit lately and I'm feeling it!

I thought that one of the stamps from the awesome CAS-ual Friday's 'Flower Power' set would work really well heat embossed.

I heat embossed 'Rock' from the set in white and used picked raspberry and wilted violet distress oxide inks to watercolour over them - love this resist technique.

I added some splatter of the two colours and then added a Tim Holtz sticker for the rest of the sentiment.

Super simple and pretty CAS too..

Cx

CAS On Friday: Talk Nerdy...

Hey,

Happy Friday!!

It seems only fitting that I post my entry for CAS on Friday today :)

I love their current theme of Watercolour...

I started with a piece of Tim Holtz watercolour paper. I die-cut it using a stitched rectangle die and I sprayed it with some water and gradually added three colours of distress ink (chipped sapphire, peacock feathers and mermaid blue), I dried it and added splashes of each colour.

I wasn't sure what to do with it next and after a rummage through my stamps I came across the Technique Tuesday Favorite Human set, which I am embarrassed to say I have had for over a year and never used!

I decided that I didn't want to detract from my pretty watercoloured patch, so I just stamped and fussy cut one of the robots and added a little bit of blue spectrum noir sparkle pen.

The sentiment made me laugh, as Hubby and I are both a bit nerdy, so I might just give this to him for no good reason!

I added some hearts from the set to compliment the sentiment.

I love how this came out and I'm a sure I'll never create a watercolour as pretty as this one again, so I decided to enter it into this week's Addicted to Stamps challenge as well.

Have a great weekend, mine is going to be spent watching the World Cup, crafting and working out.

Cx

CAS on a Friday..On a Monday...

Hey,

Hope you had a good weekend, I had a fun time.

It's an exciting week for me, Hubby returns home and then two days later my Momma arrives. SWEET!!

I saw the latest challenge 'Make a card with embossing' over at CAS on Friday and I wanted to play along.

It was the perfect excuse to use new Monsters from Create a Smile (Monster Party), that I coloured yesterday morning for The Daily Marker 30 day Colouring.

I used a fave Sizzix big spots embossing folder, I have had it years!! I chose a bright yellow piece of paper, I thought my monster would pop against it.

I then die-cut the embossed piece using dies from The Works in the UK, I bought them last year, but I have only used them once!

I added a sentiment from the Monster set and boom! finished card and of course a googly eye!

It was so easy and fun I made another one ;)

Cx

CASology: Just be-claws....

Hey,

Hope you are having a good weekend so far.

I am spending QT at my desk, now my MOJO seems to have returned..

This week's CASology cue card fits my love of the sea perfectly..

I have lots of Marine focused stamps, but I decided it would be fun to use 'Oh Crab' by Pink & Main..mainly be-claws..I lost it and then had to purchase it again,as living without it wasn't an option!

I used 'Falling Circles' by Neat & Tangled with a Blue Breeze Kaleidacolor ink pad to create the background.

The sentiment is from the Pink & Main set.

I'm pretty happy with the finished card, has a nice CAS feel to it and uses two thirds of the card, which is my fave CAS formula!

Cx

CAS(E) This Sketch: Miss that face...

Hey,

It's going to be a challenge fueled week for me!!

As I was away over the weekend, I made up for lost time on Sunday and got my challenge ON!!!

Today I am playing along with CAS(E) This Sketch -

I really like the simplicity of the sketch.. so many possibilities.

I pulled out a couple of super old sets to use - the stitching is by Bo Bunny and the loopy border is by American Crafts. Both are from 2013. I decided to break up the 3 lines with the cute kitty from the Impression Obsession 'Planner Pals' set.

I wanted to send this card to a friend and that is how I ended up choosing my sentiment, this is a firm fave by Hero Arts.

Question is do I have 4 lines and not 3, as per the sketch?..maybe...

Cx

Playing with Dots...

Hey,

Happy Sunday to you. I am off to the Gym this morning - good way to earn the right of sitting on my butt for 12hrs watching NFL!

My Black Friday Haul was amazing, especially from Studio Calico which had the best sale ever and so I was able to acquire a lot of things that I have been lusting after for a while.

This stamp set (Large Sentiments by Hello Forever) caught my eye a while back, as I figured it would be mad fun to colour and stamp all the fun little dots / stripes.

As you can see from my photo, I went with Happy Birthday for my first road test of the set.

I watercoloured the words and then used contrasting inks to stamp the dots. I love it, it is so fun and clever.

I am going to try anniversary cards next and I was thinking about stamping onto a coloured paper and then adding dots..so many possibilities.

Cx

Less is More..Monsters..

Hey,

So whilst I was nosying through some blogs last weekend I came across a new to me challenge - Less is More.

Imagine my delight when I saw their cue card this week -

A MONSTER theme!!! Now we all know how much I love Monster stamps..

I decided to use my newest monsters by Reverse Confetti (Monsterous) and continue my masking theme.

The challenge is all about being CAS, but white space doesn't have to be white - right?

I die-cut a black panel of card and masked off my circle (using white ink). I stamped the sentiment into the masked off circle and coloured / die-cut my Monster and added him just above the sentiment.

This was a bit of an experiment, using black as the clean space and I really like the end result, as the brightly coloured Monster really pops here.

I will totally be playing along with this challenge again!

Cx

The Flower Challenge.. Tic-Tac-Toe...

Hey,

I was over at Cara's blog this week and I saw her card for The Flower Challenge and I was inspired to join in.

I love a Tic-Tac-Toe challenge.

I decided to use the middle horizontal row - gems, watercolour and CAS.

I thought it was the perfect opportunity to use the Newton's Nook Vertical Vases, that I have had for ages and have only inked up once!

I went with a bit of messy watercolouring for the flowers using Distress Inks.

The sentiment is from the same set.

Super simple card, made with a recipient in mind.

I think as the challenge runs for the whole month, I might need to play again!

Cx