16/11 - Happy Anniversary..

Hey,

If you have been visiting my blog for a while you know a) my wedding anniversary is Halloween and b) I always celebrate the anniversary of our first date - 30th October.

This year it's 16 years together and 11 years married!! 

The photo is from our anniversary early morning boat ride through the water park/conservation area last year in Cancun.

Being a cardmaker, I use these x2 anniversaries as an excuse to make Hubby elaborate cards. 

First up the 16 year card.

I love the 'Bacon' set by AALL & Create - a brand that I discovered earlier this year, whilst I was at home in London and they have been such a great find. I blended Worn Lipstick and Picked Raspberry distress oxides to create my background and then stamped the awesome bacon stamp from 'Bacon Break' by Sweet Stamp Shop. I added a few hearts for fun.

I mean how can he not love a card with a bacon background?! AND not a pun in sight (he very much dislikes a pun card, and I give them to him to wind him up - hee hee).

And here is the 11th Wedding Anniversary card! It's not strictly a pun, but it is kind of because it's Halloween...

I love all the amazing cloud blending I am seeing and I need MUCH more practice at it. But I am SO happy with how this came out and now I need a black blender brush..

I used an MFT Cloud stencil, Crate Paper 'After Dark' stamps and Papertrey Ink 'Keep It Simple: Anniversary' stamps. The inks are distress oxides in Black Soot, Carved Pumpkin and Wilted Violet.

We would normally be in Mexico right now celebrating, but you know global pandemic.. So we are going to our fave restaurant in NYC instead (hoping we don't freeze to death outside). 

I would just like to say that even though the last 7 months have been very strange, there isn't anyone else I could have been trapped in a small apartment with. Hubby and I have had so much fun at home, watching random crap, eating our body weight in cake, perfecting our fave recipes, and hanging with Clint Catwood. 

If you choose your life partner carefully, all storms can be weathered with humor.

I love you Mr G, you are my man, love, thing for life and beyond.

Cx

Fusion Card Challenge - Autumn...

Hey,

Welcome to another fab Fusion Card Challenge.

This time we have an 'Autumn' themed challenge. As always both the sketch and the inspiration image are fantastic.

Which will you try or will you fuse them?

Again, I loved both, so I fused them!

I was inspired by the wood floor and the mug. I created a little wood effect panel, using a Prima 'Salvaged Wood' background stamp and Altenew Mocha ink. 

I wanted to add a mug, so had a dig through my stamps and I actually found x2 fun ones. BUT as I am a HUGE fan of Monster stamps, it naturally had to be the Your Next Stamp 'Silly Monsters Chillout' one (YNS Monsters are my faves). I kept the mug white but added little grey dots at the top to emulate the one from the inspiration photo.

The little sparkly oval helped anchor my little mug Monster and matched the sketch.

This card is going to be going in a box of goodies for a friend, I think its a perfect use for it!

Make sure you check out all the rest of the inspiration by the DT over at the Fusion challenge blog, and play along with your own creation! 

When playing along you may use the sketch OR the photo to inspire your makes. OR, if you are feeling adventurous, you can fuse them together (see what I did there!).

Can't wait to see your makes. 

Challenge ends on November 10th.

Cx

Be Happy...

Hey!

One of the downsides to being on design teams is that when you go to comment on cards, you discover all the goodies you didn't know you needed!

Or is that just me?!

During my first Fusion Card Challenge I saw a card with the amazing Zebra planter and I was like - gotta have it!

The stamps are Be Happy by Penny Black, such an awesome set. 

I stamped and coloured x4 of the images from the set and used a mix of sentiments from the set and others from my stash. I kept the cards pretty simple, as the images are so gorgeous when coloured, they really need nothing else adding.

I don't need an excuse to be enabled when it comes to stamps...

Cx

 

Fancy Cocktail Cards...

 

Hey, 

Happy Monday.

Hope you had a great weekend?

Mine was exercise/sport fuelled - my new spin bike arrived last week, so I could use it all weekend and I did and it was great. Also, standard NFL Sunday in my house (10hrs of solid football) and it was a Grand Prix weekend, so Clint Catwood and I were up early to watch Lewis Hamilton make history.

I love Tim Holtz blueprint stamps and quite a while ago, we used the great Cocktail blueprints in a class with Cheiron. I am notoriously mean when it comes to buying things brand new and full price.. So I have never owned these, until a few weeks ago when I found them on super-bargain sale - whoop!

The fact is, I have SO many crafty goodies that I made a pact with myself to curb my spending there can only be sale goodies coming in UNLESS the thing is a limited edition (like the Tim Holtz SSS Stamptember cats!).

Anyway, I decided to put the new stamps to good use and make a set of cards for a friend as a gift. I thought they would look amazing heat embossed over fun backgrounds. And as I always have backgrounds on hand, I pulled out x4 that I thought suited the stamps. 

From top left and clockwise here are the techniques used for the backgrounds - distress oxide smooshing, stencil lift (I used the stencil with distress ink for another background, when done, spray the side of the stencil that is facing you, with water and then lay down on a piece of paper), gloss spray through a stencil, distress oxide smooshing.

Fun right! My friend loved them and I have made another set since. I can see a default, easy gift coming on here.

Cx 

Halloween exhibits..

 

Hey,

So I made a bunch of Halloween cards this year, but foolishly I did not take photos of them before they went out in the mail (ugh).

BUT fortunately, I had to make an additional one and I remembered to take a photo of that one!

I had made most of my cards by the time I got this fun stamp set from Michaels, I think it is Tim Holtz for Michaels. I love all the funny little 'exhibits' and had this idea that they would make a fun 'horror wall' style card.

The background is Taylored Expressions 'Shiplap Background' stamp and I stamped all the little exhibit stamps over it and coloured them in.

I stamped the sentiment in orange ink for a bit of standout and to add a bit more spook.

I am very happy with the outcome and I think my friend will like it too.

Cx