Blue Christmas Skates

Over at StampTV they hosted a challenge last week (yeah, I got my card posted in time but the challenge itself is closed) for "Blue Christmas" and this is what I came up with.  On top of participating in the challenge I also used GinaK's tutorial for versamark resist.  Now I realize you will have squint, hold your computer at arms' length and possibly stand on your head to see it but there is a versamark resist snowflake background on this card.  The most prominent one is probably right under the main image.  They show up better in person.  Honestly!

What I think I learnt is that maybe the stamp was too delicate to pick up enough versamark for a good resist and maybe the blue I chose was too dark.  The ink itself should have been ok as it was Memento which is the same GinaK used in her tutorial just the next shade dark blue.  Failing that maybe it was a cardstock/moisture issue.  

Maybe I should find some candy have a find the snowflakes competition and the first one that finds all of them wins... like I would be that organized!

Oh and BTW this is One Layer card, I masked the skates and the circle. 

Ingredients-
Card size - 4.25 in x 5.5 in
Cardstock - Neenah Classic Crest Smooth
Stamps - GinaK "School, Sports, Spirit", Inkadinkado "Warm Holiday Wishes"
Ink - Memento Danube Blue, Tuxedo Black
Copics - B000, B000, B00, C1, C3, C5, C7
Accessories - White Grosgrain ribbon, Sakura metallic silver.

Such a sweet birthday

Such a sweet treat to wish someone a happy birthday don't you think?  Well, of course sometimes you need more and more an more to share all the delicious goodness and the good thing about these sweet treats is that they are ZERO calories!

This sweet card concoction is for my Sister in Law.  It was all pretty straight forward once I decided I wanted to use these stickers that I picked up earlier in the year at Michaels, on sale nonetheless!  Oh yeah!  You can't really tell but I added some stardust glitter pen to the cupcake and the candle flame.  I thought a card full of sweet confection was the perfect foil for my homemade baker's twine.  I'm a bit iffy on how it turned out but I know the recipient isn't someone that would fret about whether it was fake or not.

Ingredients

Card Size - 8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Neenah Classic Crest

Ink - Memento

Stamp - Stampendous (image); Kitchen Sink Stamps (greeting)

Color - Copics, Sakura stardust gel pens

Paper - The Paper Studio

Accessories - Homemade Baker's twine; Recollection cupcake stickers. Rhinestone.



A little help for a Happy Birthday

Thanks Joan at Paperlicious for the inspiration to create this card.  Joan has been such an overall inspiration to me about exploring life as a daughter, mother and crafter so please visit her blog generally - she has decided to be an occasional blogger and that works for me!  Yeah.  I bet you hadn't guessed that.  Anyway the link is directly to the card that inspired my creation and I hope you enjoy my interpretation.

I was absolutely at wits end on what sort of card to send to my nephew's girlfriend and I hope she liked this.  I thought it was "young" and maybe even "modern" but what do I know! LOL! 

Recipe

Card size - 8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Neenah, Recollections, K&Co paper

Stamps - Stampendous, Just Rite Stamps

Ink - Memento

Color - Copics, Sakura (glitter, metallic, souffle - yep all of them!), American Craft white pen.

Accessories - Circle nestabilities, rhinestones, punch (unknown ATM) 

A planted wagon of Birthday Cheer.

I'm still trying to decide what I think of this card.  It just seems to lack something but everything I tried to add went wrong so I went with the less is more approach.

So what do you think?  Over cooked it? Under cooked it? or just right?

I started by selecting the image for this card and then the cardstock I wanted to use for the background.  After that I chose Copics that matched the background cardstock.  I then colored some white brads with the copics to match the image and help with the bling factor.  I added glitter pen to the middle of the flowers to help pep up the image.

I wanted it to be bright and cheerful as I was creating this for our lovely Auntie in England who is in her 80s.  I know she has some sight issues so I hope the card was bold enough for her to enjoy it.

Recipe -

Card Size - 8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Neenah, DCWV 

Stamps - Clear Dollar Stamps

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black

Color - Copics

Accessories - White & black brads, Martha Stewart punch, Sakura glitter pen

What a pane!

I'm not feeling this card - it turned out exactly how I thought it would and its part of my experimentation with CAS but I don't know, its just not speaking to me. Any ideas?
This card is my standard 8.5 x 5.5 in and maybe that's where I went wrong - maybe the proportion of the stamp can't support the size of the card.

I really wanted to use this set and let the pink girlie icing on the cake pop out from the dark shadows of the inside of the home. The trim actually mimics the trim of my mother's house as this was a card for her. I colored the ribbon with the copics to get a match. I decided to anchor the image with black mounted background to give the image some weight on the card. If you look closely you can see that I scored the card either side of the ribbon just to give a little more simple texture to the card.

Ingredients:
Card size - 8.5in x 5.5in
Cardstock - Neenah, The Paper Source
Stamps - Clear Dollar Stamps
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black
Color - Copics - hopefully I will sort out my list soon - I wrote them down somewhere!
Accessories - Sakura clear glaze pen, white grosgrain ribbon.

Belated birthday "sweet" friend

I just love these images from High Hopes stamps and was determined to use them for a dear friend's very belated birthday card. I hated it being late but knew just that I was thinking of her would brighten her day whenever it arrived!

I colored in the little girl with the melon first and decided that the three main colors should be the pinky reds, greens and yellows of the melon. That made me decide the little girl would have brown hair and the sky would be a nice blue - I carried all these colors through the project but the main ones moreso.

I also wanted to use stitching on my card but I didn't want to ruin it so I went with faux stitching to keep the card fresh and clean.

I created the background paper with a nod to a checked picnic blanket but by using the main colors of the image the pinks and green and the chisel ends of my copics. For the sentiment image I just quickly colored in the rind and inside of the watermelon - and used one of my newly aquired punchesI thought this punch really picked up on the lace of the dress of the image. What do you think? and truthfully the cut around was a "save". I had stamped the two watermelon images for the inside and outside of the card on the same 1/4 sheet of cardstock and with the edging I had to either cut through the image or around it. I like the way my mistake turned out.

Now the nitty gritty -

Ingredients
Card size - 8.5 x 5.5 inches
Cardstock - Neenah, Bazzill
Ink - Memento tuxedo black
Stamps - High Hopes Stamps
Copics - 0, B000, B00, E00, E02, E31,E33, E35, G000, G14, G17, R20, R22, R32, R35, R37, Y11, Y15, Y17, C5, C7
Accessories - EK success punch, Nestabilities, Sakura gel pen

Muted butterflies...

This card is a CASE of these beautiful cards so please go give them some much deserved love -

http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/gallery/photo/1226299

and

http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/gallery/photo/1311815

and

http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/gallery/photo/1273358

I loved the rainbow of the first, the vibrancy of the second and the flow of the butterflies of the third.
When I set out to do this card I knew that I had to use Neenah for the base to give that crisp white flair. I then decided to have the duller colors of my paper choices at the bottom to give a lift to the flow of the butterflies. I used the single butterfly punch and the triple butterfly punch from Martha Steward on the K&Co paper. Instead of giving the butterflies black bodies I wanted to keep it light and airy so when with clear stardust glitter pen.

I hope you like my interpretation of a theme that has already been done brilliant by some really talented ladies.

Ingredients
Card Size - 8.5in x 5.5in
Cardstock - Neenah
Stamps - Kitchen Sink Stamps
Ink - Palette noir
Designer Paper - K & Co
Punches - Martha Stewart
Pens - Sakura Stardust clear

Bugging a Tomboy birthday!

I think this has to be my favorite card I have made recently.
There were several things I wanted to accomplish when I made this card. I wanted the image to be of a not so girlie girl and for you to get the impression that although there is a bow in her hair and a flower in her pocket that the bow is there because her mother put it in and she is far too engrossed in tomboyish pursuits and discovery to worry about it.

Secondly I wanted to use a quirky color combo that was actually inspired by some early Halloween cards that I had seen (take that hot pink and make it purple and I think you will see what I'm talking about).

I chose my colors of cardstock first before I started to color my image, so that my color choices would compliment the image. After I colored in the little girl in Copics I decided that my glass jar would look a bit green around the edges I had already decided the bugs would have a glow about them when I colored her face in so I just went for the yellow glow. Of course because the girl isn't too girly the bugs and flower had to be sparkly so they got clear Sakura stardust on them and then what you really can't see in the pictures is that the glass jar was cover in glossy accents.

The patch on her knee reminded me of my heart Nestabilities and I looked at them and decided I wanted the sentiment to be subtle so I embossed the heart with my cuttlebug folder before cutting it. You can just see in the main photo how the ribbon goes through the heart and I debated ages about adding the brad and finally decided to do it. What do you think?

For the inside of the card I decided to use the negative of the scalloped heart as a mask to pounce the inside with color and stamp the sentiment over.

Ingredients
Card size - 5.5in x 8.5in
Cardstock - Neenah, DCWV, Michaels
Stamps - High Hopes, Kitchen Sink Stamps
Ink - Palette noir, Memento Rose bud, Memento Tangelo
Copics - E00, E02, E93, G000, 05, Y00, YR00, YR02,YR04, YR07, V15, V17, RV02, RV04, E33, E35, E37, C1, C3, C5, C7, B000, B00.
Accessories - grosgrain ribbon, brad, Nestabilities, Cuttlebug embossing folder, cropadile, Sakura stardust clear.

Fairy belated... Edited to add list of copics used

Well you know I told you about my trip to Nomojoland, which is a very scary place to be indeed. Well this was another friend who suffered not being remembered on her special day because of the scary monsters in Nomojoland.

Well this cardie friend loves rather funky fairies so when I saw the new(ish) Fairy stamps from Inkadinkado I knew that I had to buy them and do a card for her with them.

I colored the fairy first with my Copics. Then with my Sakura clear stardust pen over her wings. I don't know what it is with fairies but I nearly always tend toward purples, blues, greens and pinks for them - so I think I might need to do this image again a few times and ban myself from those colors! (can you just see the subtle sparkle on the wings? --------->>>>)

I decided that as she is flying I would just "pop" her away from the background with a little shading and I wanted the added contrast of the white around all that color in the image so she really stood out on the card.

The circles were inspired from the K&Co paper that I have had for about five years. The butterfly is from the same stamp set and the greeting is from a Brenda Walton Inkadinkado set.

I did use a new tool on this card which is the Martha Stewart Circle Cutter - I like it because of the variety of circle sizes you can get with one tool and cutter. There is a bit of a learning curve with it however, what I did in the end to keep the paper from slipping was just tack it down to the cutting mat in a few places with temporary glue stick - worked like a charm!

Ingredients

• Card size - 8.5in x 5.5in
• Stamps - Inkadinkado
• Ink - Palette
• Cardstock - Georgia Pacific, K&Co, Bazzill
• Color - Copics, Sakura clear stardust pen
• Tools - Martha Stewart circle cutter

Copics Used

• 0
• Skin - E00, E02
• Hair - E31, E33, E35, E37, E47
• Dress, shoes, wings - V000, V04, V06, B00, B23, B24
• Flower and dots on wings - RV02, RV04, RV06
• Wand - Y00, Y02, Y06, Y08
• Shadowing - C1, C3

3-step Hydrangea for our Auntie!

This is a card made for another auntie whose birthday was at the beginning of the month - another Kitchen Sink Stamps creation, this time combined with some new JustRite Stamps. I like this card although because I didn't put the stems/trunk between each level of the hydrangea I think it lacks a bit of grounding in color at that level. Truth be known I had done the urn in lovely greys and it was quite pretty but the whole image was a bit lost without the stronger colour at the base.

I used the monogram stamper and the memento inks to match the image on the sentiment. I then highlighted each flower center with a dot of glitter gel pen. I matted the sentiment to match the card and then highlighted the scallopes with white souffle pen.

Ingredients-
Cardstock - Georgia Pacific, Bazzill
Ink - Memento
Stamps - Kitchen Sink Stamps, JustRite Stamps
Pens - Sakura clear glitter and white souffle
Accessories - Nestabilities

It looked better in my head! Honestly it did!

Well, according to my promise to show the good, the bad and the ugly. This one ranks up there with the it looked better in my head.

I started with the red background... it was going to be a blended red background with the bird stamped on the front. The red blended background quickly became a sunset.

To be honest with you - I really don't like this card at all but I do like some of the stuff I did on it.

I like the black sillouette. I like the bird with the white highlights - thank you Michelle Zindorf! what an inspiration she is and now if you go look at her blog you will just realize how badly I FAILED! Still as you can tell this was a card for the dear Hubby and he liked it - just not as much as the other two I made. Glad I married a smart man who knows better than to criticise! ROFL

Ingredients:

Stamps - Inkadinkado, Kitchen Sink Stamps

Ink - Palette

Markers - Copic

White Sakura Gel Pen

Cardstock - Bazill, Georgia Pacific.

A bright Changito Birthday!

This is a card I made for a dear friend in Scotland who not only takes care of her family but decided to take Open University and is doing great! I really don't know how she does it all she is fab!

I took my cue from her cardmaking style - she almost always has bright cheerful cards with clean lines (now watch her go and change on me!) and detail. I was going to do cupcakes - everyone loves cupcakes AND she had sent me a card for my birthday with cupcakes... but it just didn't feel right. I wanted to celebrate her strength and her getting her courses sorted. So I found my Changito, Stampendous stamps and they just made sense for this card.

This is a BIG card 8.5in x 5.5in front or A9 whatever works in your brain!!! I love Big cards for special occasions.

The card base and colorful solids are out of the DCWV brights pad. I scored it pretty successfully with my Score-Pal. I then pulled out some my patterned cardstock from DCWV Nana's Kids (I love the vibrancy but just find it difficult to use any patterned cardstock/paper!) I also needed to use ribbon on this card - lots and lots of ribbon - so I cut a band of white and covered it with the ribbon and adheared that to the card base. Changito and his books were colored to match the cardstock choices with Prismacolor pencils on GP cardstock and cut with my rectangular nestabilities.

The envelope and insert where stamped with lined paper background from Cornish Heritage Farms and Stampendous school and Changito stamps sets. I used Brilliance ink on my brand new to me Kitchen Sink Stamps greeting. *insert happy dance!*

Ingredients
Cardstock - DCWV, Georgia Pacific
Stamps - Stampendous, Cornish Heritage Farms, Kitchen Sink Stamps
Embellishments - Michael's ribbon
Color - Prismacolor pencils, white gel pen Sakura
Ink - Brilliance

A Justrite gift!

I picked up the Just-rite monogram stamper last Wednesday and was so excited to get it out of the box then I thought I was going to have to stand on my head to get the border on - I found out on SCS that I had a defective one so I contacted Just-rite directly and told them my problem. They emailed me right away and we sorted it out and I received my replacement stamper in the mail on Monday! Can you believe it what great customer service that is? So a Big Shout out to the Just Rite time and just in time so I could make this gift to send to my neice.

I took a leaf out of Lauren Meader's blog entry and did the first name and then last initial. My color choices were dictated by the ribbon. I cut my circles with my Quickutz cookie cutter dies - my nestabilities circles are making there way to me at the moment but alas too late to get this done and in the post. I inked up my monogram stamper with some Versacraft cherry pink. The small dots in the border are highlighted with Sakura clear glitter pen. The green cardstock is from a selection I picked up at Wally's world and has a slight sheen too it - I just had to run it through my cuttlebug paisley folder!

The folio idea I picked up while surfing on Splitcoaststampers. I made by playing around with numbers and my scorpal - there are still a few tweaks to make it better and I am certain there is probably a brilliant tutorial out there that I just couldn't find when I needed to get this done... in the end because of the thickness of the note cards I went back and scored in gussets where I could to accomodate this. I decorated the front of the folio using the same cardstock through the cuttlebug with the cuttlebug paisley die that I just had to have and then hadn't used.

I also sent my neice a birthday card with this set. I will post that next time!

Oh and I have added a link to the side where you can get FREE TEMPLATES to use on your own or with your cricut and I think sillouette so have a look!

Recipe

Ink - Versacraft cherry pink; Sakura clear glitter pen

Dies - Cuttlebug

Embossing - Cuttlebug

Embellishments - Michael's ribbon

Paper - Georgia Pacific and ? Colorbok

Cardsize - notelet (4.25in x 5.5in)

Ladybug? Ladybird? Graduation Card.

I never know what to call an "LB" anymore - Ladybug is American, Ladybird is British so I think the darling little bug will just be LB from now on! LOL.

This card is for my Auntie in Alaska who just graduated college for nursing! WOOHOO! She absolutely lurves ladybugs so I took my inspiration from there. I decided to use the swiss dots cuttle bug folder to emphasize the dots on the LB and again I chose the ribbon to tie in. The circle was cut from the front layer first and is a Quickutz cookie cutter die. I put the solid circle aside and put the cardstock through my cuttlebug with the swiss dots folder x 2. I then used my Fiskars trimmer to score two lines and then stamped my greeting from Hampton Arts. I then measured my greeting so I would know where to score the bottom two lines and flipped the cardstock over and scored. After that I sent it through with my swirls folder. I then went over the top of the Congratulations with a graduation cap stamp and my versamark and clear embossing powder. I placed the organzaa ribbon to highlight this and be a color tie to the main image. I then mounted this on the black card base.

The lady bug image was stamped with Brilliance Graphite Ink and colored in with Sakura glitter pens. I then went around the circle making dots my black marvy pen. Then I just had to tackle the "nekkid" envelope too! This time I colored in the LB's with permanent red ink. This was added to the "hole" I had made earlier using 3-D Zots for dimension. After I took the picture I added an insert with a LB on the corner too! I really hope she likes it!

Sorry for the blurry close up! just trying to show the elements together and the clear embossing!LOL

Ingredients
Ink - Brilliance Graphite Black
Stamps - Unknown, Hampton Arts
Embossing - swiss dots, devine swirl, Fiskars trimmer
Pen- Marvy, Sakura

Cuttlebug anniversary

Well I really can't take any credit whatsoever for the design of this card - I was inspired by the creations Heartprints Cuttlebug Gallery you have to admit they are just scrummy and so effective.

The receipients of this card are my Brother-in-law and Sister-in-law in England - their anniversary is Sunday AND I know it won't get there in time but still sending them lots of love as they celebrate their anniversary - the world can always do with more love.

Big note to self - I need a stamp for the "Happy Anniversary" - I nearly made myself cross-eyed lining up all those letters! You really can't tell by the photograph (which was taken about three seconds before I popped it in the envelope and sent it on its way) but there are embossed lines to separate the sections.

Ingredients:

Embossing - cuttlebug stylized flowers and devine swirl, Fiskars trimmer

Stamps - My Sentiments Exactly

Ink - Versamagic Dew Drop chalk ink in Pixie Dust, Spring Pansy and Aloe Vera; Sakura gelly roll stardust clear.

Slight variations of the kickstand theme - Easter

Now, say that title three times fast while standing on your head drinking water from a glass .... or don't it's your choice LOL!

They also fit in with the DCM challenge this week! WooHoo!

As I know 4/6 of these cards have gotten to their destination and the other two probably don't frequent my blog - I'm sharing the rest of my Easter Cards with you.

The single card is one I made for my neice - the previous one I shared was for my nephew (hope he doesn't notice the flower on the bunny - however he is getting to the age where he probably would have preferred a different type of female bunny - but then I wouldn't be a very good Auntie now would I?!?!?!?!)


I combined the embossing and the kickstand card template for these. For the one for my neice I went over the embossing with a Tsukineko Dew Drop Spring Pansy ink. The lettering is stamped with the same ink with Hero Arts alphabet stamps and colored over with a Sakura Souffle pink. The bunny is flocked with Stampendous Fun Flock in white after being colored with Prismacolor pencils. The cardstock is DCWV and Georgial Pacific white. The embossing is Cuttlebug embossing folder Bloom dots. The stamped bunny is bun-bun from Penny Black stamped with Archival Ink black and cut and matted with Quickutz Cookie cutter flowers.

The set I did are pretty much the same except with out the stamped message, and the inking of the embossing and with an assortment of ribbon I got from Michaels. Hope you like!

I love your style!

Firstly, sorry to keep everyone waiting for the reveal - we have had some quite strange weather here, and its made international news. Everything seemed to skip over us though it was confirmed today that the distant train sound I heard was most probably an EF2 tornado that touched down a few miles from here. The loss of life in "The South" is really too dreadful to contemplate with many still missing. We have a weather radio that seemed to never stop signalling on Tuesday to take cover and we just about heard the towns sirens going off, (though I know many people that slept through it - Yikes!) When I heard the sirens I got the family out of bed and went down to the basement to take cover for about 45 minutes. I'm thankful we are all safe and sound.


Well as promised here is the reveal and I am quite happy with it - sorry if anyone is disappointed LOL.

The BG and Dress stamps are from I Brake for Stamps. The BG is white brilliance stamped on black linen effect cardstock from Michael's. The purple dress is pearlescent cardstock I picked up at Michael's, the hanger is coated with Sakura white pen, the dress is highlighted with Sakura glitter gel pen in purple and I used a cut down christmas ornament hanger for the wire. The other dress was stamped on K&Company paper (Brenda Walton line). The stamps for the verse are Clear stamps stamped with Archival Black and the heart was filled in with Sakura pink Souffle pen. The embossed dots were made with my Crop-a-dile after I found the technique on Splitcoast Stampers in the gallery - though my hand really ached after completing the set!


Hope you like and can I just say that Della from I Brake for Stamps is lovely to deal with. These stamps were from my first order and I am planning on many more in the future!

Birthday Girl!

Yes another birthday card - what can I say but birthdays in my family and friends seem to all come in clusters.

This is a card I made for my youngest cousin (yes the card says 6 - not 16 or 60!) - she is a very girlie girl and loves pink, fairies, sparkle etc... which therein lies the problem - I don't possess a lot of pink or fairies in any way shape or form - though I DO have sparkle. I think I went through all my stash to make this card. Hope you like what I came up with, especially as I am making a huge effort to use what I already have to make my cards rather than buying things I won't use.

The stickers are from PaperMania, the cardstock is DCWV - Nana's kids, Glitter stack and Brights stack, the Holographic stickers I altered with a pink overhead pen and the birthday greeting I wrote out with Sakura pink Souffle pen and then went over the top with a clear stardust pen. The little flower brads I got so long ago I don't know who made them but I did see them in Michael's recently.

I have to say the card is very much more SPARKLY than the picture shows - so I am hoping I have a happy little cousin on my hands after I give her the card and her present - a pink flamingo cuddly toy - shhhh don't spoil it! as her birthday isn't until tomorrow;-D.

Fairy Happy Birthday

Well my friend t'over pond got her card yesterday so I can safely blog it now. I liked it when I made it but now I will probably go all weird and not like it IYKNWIM. Still I like to share the triumphs and the dodgy if everything was spectacularly gorgeous that leaves no room for improvement and just where would be the fun in that!


So here is the card. My friend likes fairies but more the funky fairies well here is her fab shop - Believe in Fairies - and you can see for yourself what I mean.

I found the image as part of free decoupage but I knew that for my friend decoupage isn't quite her "thing" so instead of printing the decoupage on paper I printed it off on acetate and chose a DCWV cardstock from the neutrals that highlighted the mottled background paper that I had gotten out of the DCWV Rockstar pad and the blue from the neutrals highlighted the blue in her skirt. The teal blue is from the DCWV brights - I think it does go together - I have to say IRL it doesn't contrast as much. The "Happy Birthday" is stamped - colored over with Sakura souffle black pen and then stamped again with Archival Ink - jet black. The effect is that the "Happy Birthday" is shadowed and the shadow is glossy and raised IRL so when the light reflects in a certain way... well you will just have to trust me or try it out yourself! LOL

New Year's Day 2008

Where did that last year go! ROFL - oh I must be old if I am losing years in the blink of an eye - just nod in agreement to amuse me because you know I can see you - lol.


Well, I thought for the new year I would post up a baby card I made recently. As I really haven't had a moment to craft over the Christmas break - which may have more to do with going to all the sales and I won't even tell you how much got stuffed in my car from the New Year's 75% off sale...in my defense there were three of us shopping for three different households.

I made this card for my cousin and his wife on the arrival of their son. I thought the blue and white was quite crisp and fresh, oh and of course there was the "boy" theme. The ribbon is a satin roll I picked up somewhere and the pram was made with a Marvy circle punch, scallop scissors, organza ribbon, Adirondack denim and eggplant with irisdescent glitter over the top. The congratulations greeting is from a See D's set which I went over again with white sakura pen. I don't have a small circle punch so I just drew around a thread spool and cut. - isn't it funny with all the gadgets there are when we end up just using a scissors, paper and glue. lol.