CCM 105 Clean and Simple

Our challenge at Crafty Cardmakers for the next two weeks is clean and simple or CAS. I struggle with this sort of card, as I always feel as if there is something missing when I go down this route, but I have seen some stunning examples with next to nothing on them. I’m beginning to feel quite inadequate. I cannot do that overly shabby chic style with everything but the kitchen sink on it, cos it really does look as if I threw all the embellishments up in the air and randomly caught them on the card, and I struggle with the cleaner style too!

We are sponsored by Di’s Digistamps with a fabulous $10 gift voucher, and also by The Stampman with a £10 gift voucher.

Anyhow, for my CAS card I used a House Mouse stamp which I love called Knitariffic.

I had the devil’s own job getting it roughly centred! Normally I wouldn’t have to worry because I would be able to cut it out and mat and layer it, but I was going for a One Layer Card version of CAS, so had to try and be reasonably accurate. I can tell you I have a few card blanks, or rather no so blank, now awaiting covering with patterned paper!

Anyhow after I had got it down and coloured, copics and promarkers, then I thought what on earth can I do to finish it off. I remembered I had this large set of Xcut (20 I think) dies all about haberdashery. Well bearing in mind the ‘minimal elements’ requirement of CAS I didn’t want to die cut balls of wool, knitting needles etc. but there were a couple of stitch dies amongst them and I thought they might make an interesting border. That was okay, but the dies were too long to be able to match them up! So I did something very naughty! I broke the end two stitches off the die……. do you think I will go to Die Hell for this?

Anyhow the die now fit perfectly. The stitches are, of course, going in slightly different directions, but there was no way round that. Also with the holes now in it, it needed a different coloured card underneath to show them off, which had the added bonus of covering up the ink that had bled right through the card.

I am entering this into the following:-

Addicted to CAS – #28 Pet

Amusing Challenges – Anything Goes

Cards Galore – November Animals

CAS on Sunday – #22 Winter Theme (the mice are knitting winter woolies - if this is too cheeky please yell out)

Catered Crop – Animal House

Crafty Ribbons – #71 Stitching Real or Faux

Digistamps4Joy – #80 Stitching Real or Faux

House Mouse Challenge – #158 My Favourite Things (I love to knit)

Sparkles Monthly Challenge – #50 Animals

The Outlawz Sunday’s CAS – With a Mouse

Lexi 104 Christmas

We have a nice simple challenge for you today at Lexi’s Creations, Christmas!

We are sponsored by Fairy Dust Crafts with 5 digis for the winner.

I have gone for a Lili of the Valley image for my card, which I have coloured with copics, and added some glitter and gel pen accents. I also used white puff embossing powder on Santa’s fur trimmings on his hat and coat. The papers were from a free kit with a craft magazine, and I am trying really hard to use these up so they won’t be in my stash next year, and the year after and the year after that! Can’t bear to throw things out! The poinsettia is a Marianne die.

The image below is a little darker, but shows off the glitter better.

I am entering this into the following:-

Charisma Cardz – #46 Christmas

Copic Marker Europe – #23 Everything Christmas

Crafty Hazelnut’s Christmas – #152 For a Child

Glitter N Sparkle – #60 Show us Some Snow

Little Claire Monthly Challenge – #39 Christmas

Rhedd & Rosie’s Challenge – #20 Christmas is Coming (Reindeer and Gift)

The Paper Shelter – #138 Christmas Is Coming

Time 4 Scrap – #25 All I want for Christmas

Totally Gorjuss – #211 Child’s Christmas

Winter Wonderland – Photo Inspiration Challenge

ABC Z for Zebra

Our challenge at ABC this time is Z for Zebra, so stripes or a black and white theme. As Christmas is fast approaching and I am way behind with cards I elected to go down the stripes route and make another Christmas card.

We are sponsored by Bugaboo with 7 of their fabulous digis and by Lili of the Valley with a £10 voucher.

I have used a Lili of the Valley stamp and coloured her with copics.

The tree is a Doohickey die with some fairy lights and tinsel wrapped around. It’s meant to look like she is putting stars on the tree! The paper is from Joycrafts and the snowflake dies are also from Joycrafts. Border was a silver peel off coloured to match and sentiment was a freebie in a magazine.

All of the diecuts, apart from the tree, were sprayed with glitter glue and I used a Zig glue pen and glamour dust to glitter her wings.

I am entering this into the following:-

A Creative Romance – Winter Blues

ABC Christmas Challenge – W for Winter Wishes

Christmas Stampin’ All Year Long – #42 Stripes

Crafts4Eternity – #150 Tic, Tac, Toe Top Horizontal Line Stripes, Sentiment, Glitter

Creative Corner Challenges – Let It Snow

Creative Knockouts – Make It Sparkle

Deep Ocean Challenge – #64 Winter

Happy Campers – #24 Glitter It

Holly Jolly Christmas – O’ Christmas Tree

The Cheerful Stamp Pad – #73 Angel Wings

CCM 104 Paper Piecing

Our challenge today at Crafty Cardmakers is Paper Piecing. We are sponsored by both Saturated Canary with two of their gorgeous digi images and also by Woodware Craft Collection with a £12 voucher to be spent at one of their retailers, either online or in store.

I had a lot of fun with this one. Some friends and I have been having a bit of a hard time and so we decided to make something sparkly for each other to cheer ourselves up. I do hope that the person mine has gone to has achieved that, because it certainly cheered me up making it.

I forgot to take photos all the way through, but the door hanger started off plain wood and I painted one side in a pale pink so that it would tone in with the paper I chose for the front side.

The paper is from the Craftwork Cards Vintage Boho Pad. After I had stuck it in place I started to get really cross with myself because I had forgotten how difficult pink is to match, there are red pinks, and orange pinks and blue pinks, and no other pink seemed to match or rather tone in, and I didn’t want to paper piece my prima doll with the same pad as I didn’t think it would stand out enough. In the end I went for some WRMK paper from their Tiffany Pad, which I had left over in my scraps box, I knew there was a reason I didn’t throw it away! I had to stamp it in white though so that the dress folds would show up against the black paper.

I coloured her body parts first with copics, and then trimmed her out and restamped her again onto the tiffany paper. The shoes, bolero and hairband, and also the hem of her dress were also stamped onto some green paper scraps from the same pad and trimmed out.

I have these teeny tiny flowers and I had the idea to put them onto her hairband, and then I just got carried away and decided to make her a bolero with gems stitched onto it, although in this case of course, they are stuck on, they also ended up as buckles for her shoes. The crystal swirls came from Poundland, in their make up section as body art, and I coloured them to tone in with the greens in the doll clothes and the green in the background paper and the frame around the door hanger circle.

The gems around the top are some coloured gem flowers with small crystals in the centre in pink, and the green ones, were plain flat back pearlised flowers which I coloured with the same green as the crystals and stuck tiny crystals into the centre so they would sort of match the pink flower gems.

I tied some various ribbon scraps around the hole and made up a prima flower with my own metallic floral centre.

The circle in the middle drove me nuts. I cut it from double sided paper and first off I laid it down with a darker side showing, but as I started decorating the hanger I realised it was jarring and so recut it and this time stuck it down the other side facing up, which I think tones in much better.

I also made a little box for it, lined with pink tissue paper.

And some Hunky Dory paper covering the lid

I have a few of these doll stamps, and I really enjoyed working with this one. Hopefully I will find time to dress a few of the others, and I have masses of small scraps that are ideal for this sort of thing! This reminded me of when I was a small child and my Mum and I would sit with the sofa pulled up closer to the fire in the Winter to get cosy and she would help me cut out pictures from old catalogues and we would then cut out the various fashions and dress the dolls! Later, of course, she bought me some proper paper dolls to dress, but nothing quite matched the joy of those early images cut from the catalogue. We used to cut out beds and living room furniture and make whole houses for the paper dolls….. happy days. These days of course, if it doesn’t have bells and whistles and ring, with a camera attached kids don’t want to know. I doubt they will have the same fabulous memories when they are my age that I have!

I am entering this into the following:-

4 Crafty Chicks – #167 Anything But a Card

Brown Sugar – #67 Anything Goes

Bunny Zoe – November Shabby Chic/Vintage

Craft My Life – All Crafts Challenge October/November

Crafts4Eternity – #149 Anything But a Card

Di’s Digi Designs – Girly Creations

Eclectic Ellapu – Anything But a Card

Hiding in My Craft Room – #123 Super Scraps Saturday

Hobby Cutz – #24 Glitter and Sparkle

Inky Impressions – #133 Dies and Punches

Lacy Sunshine – #21 It’s A Bling Thing

Pan Pastel – #45 Altered Media

The Paper Girls Challenge – #43 Cut It Out

Lexi 103 Thanks/Thanksgiving

Today is Armistice Day in the UK and our challenge at Lexi’s Creations is a Thanks/Thanksgiving theme.

We are sponsored by My Heart Pieces.

I have to be honest I don’t get much call for Thank You cards, but it’s always useful to have one ready in your stash, so I went for a cheerful theme for mine.

I used a brand new die from Tonic Studios from their Soiree Indulgence range. It cuts out into the paper rather than cutting out a diecut, although there is also a plain circle die so you could cut it out as a circle diecut was well. It’s designed to go with their indulgence inners but I fancied it to surround my dufex decoupage of a cute little kitty instead.

It does actually have a thank you in the corner, as you can see below, but due to the nature of dufex if the image was in the right light then the thank you, a silver rub on, wasn’t.

I’m entering this into the following:-

Addicted to Stamps – #69 Punches and Dies

Card Makin Mamas – #76 Thankful Tidings

Catered Crop – Thank You

Charisma Cardz – #44 Anything Goes

Corrosive Challenge – #187 Fur and Feathers

Daring Cardmakers – The Other Occasions and Reasons – Thank You

Paper Nest Dolls – #17 Give Thanks

Shelley’s Images – November Give Thanks

Simply Create Too – #50 Give Thanks

There She Goes – #233 Thanks/Thanksgiving

Dream Valley 69 Humour

Our challenge this time at Dream Valley is Humour and we are sponsored by Bugaboo Stamps with $21 to spend in their store.

I have used one of their digis called ‘Not Every Princess’ and the sentiment comes with the image.

I coloured her with copics and promarkers. With little glitter accents on her dress and her tiara. My papers are from Prima as is the flower, and the diecut is from Joycrafts.

I frantaged around the edge of my image.

I am entering this into the following:-

613 Avenue Create – #44 Anything Goes

Bearly Mine – #111 Anything Goes

Card Mania – #33 Anything Goes

Doodle Pantry – #40 Any Digi Goes

Paper Nest Dolls – #16 Anything Goes

Papertake Weekly – Anything Goes

Seema Crafts – November Bright and Colourful

Sunshine Mail – Anything Goes

The Corrosive Challenge – #186 Tic, Tac, Toe Centre Horizontal Line

Through The Purple Haze – Anything Goes

ABC Y for Yellow

Have to say yellow is not one of my favourite colours as I feel it can be too ‘in your face’, so when I saw that our challenge this time at ABC was Yellow, I thought I wouldn’t enjoy making the card, but actually I really like the way this one ended up. So it goes to show how good it is to challenge yourself occasionally!

We are sponsored by Tilda's Town with a voucher for their store. Please ensure that yellow is the focal or main colour if you enter!

I coloured in my maggie with promarkers, and highlighted the flowers she was colouring with glamour dust. I also added glamour dust to the outside edge of the petals in my floral arrangement.

The yellow card is Bazzill and I used a spellbinders die to cut out the filigree pattern, which creates a gorgeous frame for the image, and a cheery lynn die for one corner and a memory box one for the other.

I’m entering this into:-

Cute Card Thursday – #293 Sparkles

Die Cuttin’ Divas – #139 Anything Goes

I Love Promarkers – #192 Anything Goes

Lady Anne’s Challenge – #12 Stamp Anything Goes Challenge

Magnolia-licious – Anything Goes

Moving Along With the Times – No Designer or Digital Papers

Paper Pretties – PWC282 The Brighter the Better

Stampin’ Royalty – #200 Anything Goes

Sweet Stamps – #141 Frames

Twisted Tuesday – 2TC62 Free for All, Anything Goes