Poppies

In a year of remembrance and commemoration it's obvious why this stamp by Chocolate Baroque from their Flora and Fauna themeplate has been on my mind. So in memory of those who paid with their lives while fighting for their country I have made this card.

The image was stamped in black Stazon, coloured with Prismacolor pencils and a little black glitter used in the middle of the flower on the stamens.   The background was made using the same stamp and Satlin Red Versafine ink which I stamped off onto scrap before stamping the second generation image on my card. There was going to be a bow, or some gems or something, but no matter how I tried fiddling around with possible embellishments nothing seemed to really add anything to the card.

Teddy Birthday Card

This card was made for a Birthday card swap. The person who's birthday it was loves teddies and most things cute so I dug out my one and only cute teddy stamp and came up with this. Cute is not really my forte - other people do it better than me but I enjoyed making the card.

The teddy stamp is from Visible Image and was stamped onto some card cut with a die from a set of circle shape Nestabilities then layerd onto a co-ordinating scalloped circle. The image was coloured with Prismacolor pencils which I blended with paper stumps and low odour mineral spirits.

The background paper is from the a Joanna Sheen CD - the Pamela West Collection. I stamped and heat embossed the floral corner flourish which comes from a set of stamps designed by Sheena Douglas then painted all the little leaves and flowers with with Twinkling H2Os. The flower embellishment is from Prima and was given some extra glitz with a coat of Shimmerz paint.

Getting on with Christmas Card Making

It was easy to get motivated for Christmas card making yesterday after the postman deivered my new stamps from Joanna Sheen. She has a very cute new range of stamps called "Messy Rabbit". I used the a stamp from the plate called "Baggy Jumper" which I stamped in Black Stazon then coloured with Prismacolour Pencils and belended with artist's low odour white spirit.

The finished image was mounted onto papers from a Crafter's Companion CD and some blue Mirri card and a little bow was added for a finishing touch. The sentiment comes from a little set of clear text message stamps which hubby bought for me from a local craft shop - not sure what make they are but the tiny text is often quite useful.

This makes a total of 4 cards made for this months "nutter's challenge" on Fab's big Christmas Challenge - 3 more to go before the 25th, I guess I had better get a move on!

Pop-Up Card

This card was made for a challenge swap, the challenge was to make a pop-up card. As soon as I signed up to join the swap I knew I wanted to use my set of cute doggy stamps from The Angel Company and make a 3D scene with them.

First I stamped the dog, his kennel and the little grass stamp with black Stazon. I coloured the images with Prismacolor Pencils, using low odour white spirit and paper stumps to blend the colours and then cut this out. With my pop-up element made the next job was to cut a liner for the inside of my card. This would become both the mechanism for my pop-up and also the background scene.

Next I measured the height and width of my cut out images and made the corresponding cuts and scores in my liner to enable me to fold the mechanism and then coloured my background by masking off areas and sponging on some Adirondack Dye inks for the hills and sky. The sun was also masked and then colour sponged on using Distress Ink and some light orange from a Kaleidacolour ink pad over the yellow Distress Ink to give it a little more "heat". Finally I took some Tree stamps from another The Angel Company set and stamped in my trees using more Distress Ink.

The front of the outer card has been decorated with papers from the Artylicious Butterfly Bliss CD and stamped with a text stamp from the same set of stamps I used for the pop-up images. However, while the little dog on the outside is also from The Angel Company, he is not part of the set I had been using for the inside of the card. I also use one of the inserts from the Butterfly Bliss CD to line the facing side of my liner (the bit where you would write your message to the receipient of the card).

With this all done the last step was to adhere the inner pop-up part of the card to the outer card and then mount my pop-up element onto the mechanism. There was quite a lot of work in this card, but I think the end result is worth the effort.

Brrrrrr......Freezing

I am still working on the "nutters" challenge for Fab's Big Christmas Challenge this month. As June is the sixth month Fab's "nutter's" challenge for June is to make not just one Christmas card as is required for the regular challenge, but six! Not sure if I will manage all six, but every card I do make just now means less pressure for me at the end of the year. Last year I found that the pressure to make enough Christmas cards was actually taking away a lot of the pleasure in making, so I am not too worried if I don't manage all 6 this month so long as I am enjoying making the ones I do make. I will be that much closer to having all the cards I need for Christmas 2008 ready in plenty of time. If you haven't started making your Christmas cards yet, why not join in with Fab's challenge, you don't have to go for the "nutter's" one, for the regular challenge all you need to do is make a single Christmas card - and you never know you might find yourself in festive mood and make more - not a bad thing to have some cards made nice and early if you always need a lot of hand made cards for family and freinds at Christmas.

Fortunately I found some more inspiration in another challenge this week. Daring Card Makers Challenge is entitled "Brrrrrr.......Freezing" and the brief is to make a card that is inspired by images, colours, embellishments - anything that makes you think of feeling cold and reminds you of winter. Anyhow here is my "chilly" card!

The Snowman stamp is from Visible Image and has been stamped in Black Archival Ink then coloured with Prismacolor pencils. The shimmery snowflake background was made by sponging blue dye based ink onto white card stock the spritzing with Gimmmer Mists. After it dried I stamped the snowflake image in Adirondack Dye ink (Denim) then spritzed some more with the Glimmer Mists. The photo really does not do justice to the gorgeous icy shimmer from those Glimmer Mists. Finally I edged the both the Snowman image and the background with a silver Sakura Pentouch pen.

The card itself is some pearlescent card stock that I picked up at the SECC in March and I have used some of the offcuts of my background to punch out small snowflakes and to make the text message. The Let It Snow text was also stamped with the Adirondack Denim ink.

Just Because ...

I don't really have a title for this post because this card was not made for any particular occasion or challenge, so I guess it's a "just because I can make it" sort of card.

The little dog stamp is from a set by The Angel Company. He was stamped with black Archival Ink then coloured using Prismacolor pencils which I blended with low odour white spirit and paper stumps. The papers and the greeting text stamp are from an Hot Off The Press kit and the flowers are from Prima.

Well Done Card

Earlier this year a lady who posts on a craft forum I read told us she had won a competion to design some stamps for a local craft store. Infact she has designed a whole range of stamps which have been launched under the name Kadoodle Stamps. Sandra, the designer was to take part in a launch event on the weekend of the 7th and 8th of June and would be demonstrating cards designed with her stamps! I made this card to send to Sandra to congratulate her on winning the stamp design competition and to wish her luck for the launch event.

The image was stamped with a stamp from the Stamp-It range and coloured with Prismacolour Pencils, using paper stumps and artist's low odour white spirit to blend the colours. The wording "well done" was added with a small clear stamp from a set I have but cannot recall the maker of the set.

Fab's Christmas Challenge - May

Well yesterday was the 25th of May, so time once again for Fab's Big Christmas Challenge! This time I chose a Penny Black stamp called "Snowball Fun". I love the Penny Black stamps, they are good quality stamps which makes them so easy to use as they give a lovely clear impression every time. Oh, and maybe the fact I am a sucker for cute designs has something to do with this too.

I stamped my image with black Stazon ink then coloured the image with Prismacolour Pencils, blending the colour with artist's low odor white spirit. This is such an easy technique to do and very relaxing. Once I had my finished image I chose some blue cardstock and printed some lovely snowy paper from the Artylicious "Season's Greetings" CD. The image was mounted onto some silver foiled card and stuck to the card with foam pads. Finally for that bit of Christmas sparkle I added tiny dots of Stickles Glitter Glue (Star Dust).

Cute Birthday Card

I made this card for a Birthday swap. The very cute teddy, or at least in my opinion very cute teddy, is from Visible Image. I bought this stamp quite a long time ago not just because I liked it, but also because it seems such a versatile design that is suitable for so many occasions.

Ted is stamped in black Stazon, then coloured with Prismacolor pencils. I mounted the coloured image on to some fushia mirri card. My main card is from the Papermill's new colour range and the papers and brad are from an Hot Off The Press kit that was sold by QVC last year. The celebrate was a stamp from the same kit, stamped using a magenta coloured ink and then embossed using Cosmic Shimmer powders (Iced Blush Luster) which is a very translucent pink, made more vibrant by the colour of the ink underneath. Finally some blue fibers were added to tie in with the blue paper.