CCM #210 Birthdays

Our challenge at Crafty Cardmakers today, hosted by me, is Birthdays. I chose the theme because today is my Sister’s Birthday. I won’t divulge her age, but she’s older than me….. in your face Sis!!! LOL - All the while we were growing up she used to say ‘when your as old as me’ as a way to prevent me doing something I wanted to do…. and naturally bragging about her seniority, well then you get over a certain age and you would kill to be the younger one. I created my own card blank with the Tonic dies, Bowscale. The matting and layering levels were various purple cardstock in my stash, but the background layer is from Heartfelt Creations’ Sugar Hollow collection paper pad.

The focal point is one of the stamps and dies, which I cut and coloured with copics. The sentiment comes from Craftwork Cards preprinted and die cut sentiments, and the flowers are also from Heartfelt Creations, Ariana Blooms. The corner die, again from Heartfelt is Fleur Borders and Pockets dies. I added glitter accents to all the flowers, including the blossom in the tree.

The little owls in this set are so cute, and the stamps match the dies so well.

I am entering this into:-

Always Happy Birthday - April
Aud Sentiments - #201 Happy Birthday
CCC Digi Creations - #91 Include An Animal
Craft Rocket - #47 Flowers
Crafting With Dragonflies - #102 Cards Using Dies and/or Punches
Crafty Friends - #82 Flowers
Di’s Digi Challenge - Include an Animals
Fashionable Stamping - #134 Animals
Fussy and Fancy - #210 Add a Die Cut
Sieze The Birthday - Vibrant Colours (opted to just go birthday)
Simon Says Stamp Weds Chall - Sparkle and Shine
Simply Create Too - #137 Use Die Cuts
The Paper Shelter - #335 A Birthday Card
Try It On Tuesday - Nature’s Beauty

DV #177 2 Or More Buttons

Our challenge at Dream Valley this week is to use 2 or more buttons in your project. We are sponsored by All Dressed Up and I have used one of their older designs ‘Love to Shop Girl 1’, which I coloured with copics.

I made my tag background by covering a manilla number 8 tag in patterned paper, you can just see it through the next layer. The next layer was made from some tissue type paper that came as a protective layer with some clothes. I do have rice paper, but thought I would try an experiment to see if stuff I would normally discard would work as well! This was the mopping up from another project that consisted of blues and pinks, which I put to one side to possibly use later. This paper seems considerably more fragile and prone to tearing than rice paper does, but once dried it did ‘firm up’ I applied it over my patterned paper layer with pva glue.

After it dried I stencilled the word Perfect and the stars and distressed harlequins with three shades of Pentart glitter pastes. I inked around the edges of my tag with Broken China oxide. The buttons, and ribbon bits that I stapled on, came from my stash, as did the dazzler flower and the thread I used in my buttons.

I fussy cut the image and popped her on with some foam tape.

This is the packing tissue before, and what was left after I took out the piece I used on the tag. As you can see, it’s not as strong and does tear easily, so maybe mop up in layers and let it dry out a little in between.

  

I am entering this into:-

A Inky Mess - #19 Anything Mixed Media Goes
All Dressed Up - #80 Anything Goes
Altered Eclectics - April: Anything Mixed Media Goes
Artistic Inspirations - #198 Anything Goes
Crafting By Designs - Elegant Ladies
Create and Inspire - #73 Anything Goes, Option use stencils
Creative Artiste - #37 Anything Mixed Media Goes
My Creative Scoop Color Inspiration Monthly - Anything Hand Coloured Goes
Naughty or Nice - #50 Use a Past Theme I chose #19 Ribbon
Simon Says Wednesday - Add Some Texture
Stamping Sensations - April: One for the Girls
We Love 2 Create - #7 Anything Creative/Mixed Media Goes

CCM #209 Water

Our challenge today at Crafty Cardmakers is Water. Do please pop by the blog as there are a lovely wide variety of interpretations of the theme by the DT.

I went for an underwater theme for my card. I started with the background to the scene by stamping Whimsical Waves from My Favorite Things in versamark and embossing with White detail powder onto a watercolour card. Then I just liberally applied various colours of Zig Clean Color Brush Pens and a couple of the blues from the Ecoline Watercolour Brush pens and then spritzed with water. I did add some extra colour directly to certain areas after it was dry in order to give some more depth and shade. I then went over the whole background with the clear overlay sparkle pen.

The three main embellishments are all Katy Sue Designs moulds filled with Paper clay and then coloured with Spectrum Sparkle pens. The jellyfish and most of the seaweed are dies from Magnolia and the other dies are from Marianne. The little shells at the bottom, the paper surrounding the scene and sentiments are from Heartfelt Creations’ Under the Sea collection.

A close up of the scene taken with the flash to show all the sparkle that sadly the camera doesn’t pick up properly with no flash:

The scene was intended to look like a Porthole and I even had a large acetate covering for it that came from a pack of giant crumpets!! Waste not, want not. Sadly in the event it was really too deep and would have made it too front heavy for a card. It might have worked on a canvas but I still think it was too deep, so good idea, but practically not suitable. If the crumpet packaging had been used it would have obscured the waist end of the mermaid’s tail, but because I had already stuck the embellishments down before I realised the packaging wouldn’t work now there is a dip showing in the tai.l. It was meant to look like a mermaid swimming past the porthole and all you can see is her tail. I am bemused as to why it’s shaped like it is anyhow I would have thought a flat finished waist area would have been more practical, and if I had realised sooner I would have trimmed it up to fit against the black frame.

You can see what I mean in this pic@

I am entering this into:-

2 Crafty Critters - #13 Anything Goes with a Critter
A Inky Mess - #19 Anything Mixed Media Goes
CCC Digi Creations - #91 Include An Animal
Craftaholics R Us - #14 Birthday Cards
Crafter’s Castle - #4 Anything Goes, Option Dimensional
Creative Artiste - #37 Anything Mixed Media Goes
Fussy and Fancy - #209 Add a Sentiment
Love To Craft - #21 April: Anything Goes
Love to Create - #7 Anything Creative/Mixed Media Goes
Naughty or Nice - #50 So Long and Thanks for All the Fish (with a title like that and my project, how could I resist!) July 2014 Mixed Media
Papercraft Business Challenge - #5 Anything Goes, Option Birthday
Sheepski Designs - #13 Animal Magic
Simon Says Wednesday - Birthday
Simply Create Too - #137 Use Diecuts
That’s Crafty - Going Round In Circles
The House That Stamps Built - DCC44 All Creatures Great and Small

 

Delicious Doodles April Guest Spot

I was thrilled to be offered a guest spot on Delicious Doodles for April. Stupidly I didn’t read my email properly and created something that did not have a Delicious Doodles image on it! Annoying, as Teri is a very talented designer and I actually have lots of her images. Anyhow, the challenge is Anything But Square.

My non square card was made for my beautiful Niece Madi’s birthday. I wanted it to be bright and colourful as she had a hard year last year after being diagnosed with breast cancer. Several rounds of chemo, surgery and radio therapy followed, and she was so positive throughout. Anyhow I am waffling now, sorry.

My card base and mats and layers were made with Sue Wilson’s Octagon dies, the layer with the circular holes is from the Classic Adorned Octagons and the base and top layer, and indeed the birthday sentiment layer are all from the Double Stitched Octagons.

The Sunflower diecuts are from Spellbinders Stephanie Low’s Cool Vibes Sunflower collection which are stamps and matching die sets. I was drawn to this set because of the beauty of the flower but also it has a sentiment ‘Radiate Positive Vibes’ because of Madi’s condition. She radiated positive vibes throughout. However, this was for her birthday so I didn’t want to ‘remind’ her of her recent past and stuck with the traditional Happy Birthday sentiment instead.

The feathers are a Spellbinder die from way back, sorry I don’t recall the name.

I coloured the flowers with a combination of Zig Clean Color brush pens and Ecoline watercolour brush pens. I also splashed the background with the pens. The feathers were cut from the Ink Away clean up cloth I used to mop up the spills from the various watercolours and then left to dry on the radiator before cutting out. It gives them a lovely ethereal feel. The final addition is a bunch of Card Candi.

I am entering this into:-

A Gem of a Challenge - #216 Female Birthday with a Sentiment
Always Fun - #52 Happy Birthday
Always Happy Birthday - Birthday
C.R.A.F.T. - #461 Shaped Card, not Rectangular or Square
Di’s Digi Challenge - Spring Flowers
DL. Art Thankful Thursday - #225 Flowers
Seize the Birthday - Birds (Birthday with option of Birds, do feathers count, as without birds there would be no feathers!)
Star Stampz Challenge - Throw on the Flowers
The Sisterhood of Crafters - Spring Flowers
Whoopsi Daisy - Anything Goes with Option of Flowers

DV #176 Dry Embossing

Our challenge at Dream Valley today is Dry Embossing. We are sponsored by Cute As A Button and I have used one of their images to create my card, Ballerina.

I coloured her in with copics, and printed the skirt part of her tutu onto patterned paper from Nitwits and then paper pieced it onto the image. The die cut is from Spellbinders.

The embossed background I have had since forever!!! It’s one of those craft supplies I just had to have, before embossing folders were so prevalent and die cutting machines, and came in a pad from Craftwork Cards. This particular sheet was a full 8” sheet, but the pad also contained embossed card that was precut in various lovely shapes.

I inked over it with Broken China and Shaded Lilac Distress Oxides. The two ribbons came from my stash, as did the gems and glitter enamel dots.

A slightly darker version of the picture. I really need a new camera, or better eyes, because I am struggling to get decent pics at the moment.

I am entering this into:-

Artistic Inspirations - #197 Anything Goes
Craftaholics R Us - #13 Enamel Dots
Crafting With An Attitude - #37 Anything Goes
Crafty Catz - #410 Anything Goes, Twist Use Old Stash
Dare 2B Artzy - April: Pastel Colours
Daring Cardmakers - Do Something Digi
Dies R Us - #94 Anything Goes with Dies
Get Creative - #68 No Patterned Paper
Southern Girls Challenge - Die Cuts
The Paper Shelter - #332 Digital Image

CCM #208 Bunnies, Chicks or Eggs

Our challenge today at Crafty Cardmakers is basically an Easter challenge entitled, Bunnies, Chicks or Eggs.

I have used an image from Delicious Doodles called Away with the Bunnies. It struck me funny because my family accuse me all the time of being away with the Fairies! So I loved this play on that saying.

I printed it onto watercolour cardstock and coloured the image with Zig Clean Color Brush Pens and a little dabble of Neocolor ii’s for the background.

The image, matting layer and card base were all made with a Crealies double dots XXL die.

The scrolly bits are a Joycraft die, and the Happy Easter comes from Crafter’s Companion Die’sire range. Flowers from my stash, some small diecut butterflies and a bit of glitter on her wings finished it off.

I’m entering this into

Always Fun - #51 Easter
Creative With Stamps - #24 Bunny
Delicious Doodles - March: Hare/Rabbit
Die Cuttin’ Divas - #361 Flowers
Di’s Digi Challenge - Spring Flowers
Fussy and Fancy - #208 Spring Flowers
Make My Monday - #67 Easter Fun
Scrapbook Stamp Society - #137 Easter
Scribbles Design - #63 Bunny Hop
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge  - Floral Frenzy
Whoopsi Daisy - Mar: Anything But a Square

DV #175 Spring colours

Today at Dream Valley we are sponsored by Paper Nest Dolls for our Spring Colours challenge.

I used ‘Will work for Carrots’ as my image, which I coloured with copics.

For the card itself I started with a sheet of Clarity paper from their Brighton Rock pad, which I chose because of the lovely Spring colours, particularly the peachy orange and yellow of the daffodil.

It looked like this:

I chopped it down to 7.5” square, and then cut it into 5 strips of 1.5” wide, and then chopped them down to 1.5” squares, so I had 25 squares, which I laid out like this:

I stuck them down onto a sheet of white paper and trimmed it up and then popped it through the Bigshot with an Embossalicious folder from Crafters companion so it looked like this:

Then I used several different shades of  Pentart Colored Metallic wax paste, picking out the embossed flowers, until it looked like this:

As kyou can see I caught it more heavily than I wanted in some areas but most of those were covered up with the image and sentiment.

This is a slightly darker version of the final card so you can see the dragonflies a little better.

The mats were cut from white card using a spellbinders die, the sentiment comes from Die’sire, the dragonflies are by John Next Door and the flowers were all from my stash.  Unfortunately you cannot see properly in the pic but the dragonflies have all been dusted with glamour dust so they are sparkly!.

I am entering this into:-

A Gem of a Challenge - #215 Easter Time
Animal Friends Challenge - #60 Easter
Bastel Traum - #63 Easter/Spring
Brown Sugar Challenge - #276 Spring or Easter
Crafting With Dragonflies - #100 Easter Cards
Creative Knockouts - #237 Spring Is On The Way
Eclectic Ellapu - March: Spring Is Coming
Fabrika Fantasy - #18 Spring
Hanna & Friends - #292 Easter/Spring
Let’s Craft and Create - #135 Anything Goes Option Easter
Mari Ko Creations - Bunny Hop/Easter
Moving Along With the Times - #67 Easter
My Time to Craft - #366 Easter/spring
Noor Designs - March: Spring
Papercraft Business Challenge #4 March: Anything Goes Option Easter
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge - Easter Inspired
Sparkles Monthly - #102 Spring Is In The Air
Stempel Magic - #149 Easter
Sweet Stampers - #18 Spring or Easter

CCM #207 Go Green

As it’s St. Patrick’s Day this coming weekend we thought we would celebrate with the traditional St. Pat’s Day colour of green, so our challenge today at Crafty Cardmakers is Go Green.

My card is on an 8” scalloped card base, using just two papers/card. One is a green paper with embossed offwhite dots and the other plain white card. I managed to get all of it out of a 12” sheet of the green paper by gutting the middle of the bottom square layer….. well there isn’t much point in hiding what you can use in the front now is there!

The bottom white layer has been embossed with a Sue Wilson die, Pinpoint Cross Stitch.

The rest of it was cut using a combination of Sue Wilson’s Lavish Accented Octagon and Classic Adorned Octagon dies, which you can cut into the card/paper or cut out with the accompanying plain octagon dies in the sets. I do also have the Double Stitched Octagon dies, but I didn’t want to make an octagon shaped card so just went with the pretty pattern ones instead.  I layered these up with a layer of the white card and then a final layer of the green paper.

The flowers are Heartfelt Creations Striped Sun Kissed Fleur, which I also diecut in the plain white card and inked through with Evergreen Bough Distress Oxide ink, the same ink I used to stamp the striped flowers with before | embossed them with clear powder.

I’ve added a couple of swirls from Crafters Companion, and from Marianne Designs, pearls to the centres of the flowers, and a sentiment from Creative Expressions’ Showered with Love stamp set.

I am entering this into:-

Cards In Envy - Green Things
Careful Heart - #12 Anything Goes, Twist Add Green
Die Cut Divas - Mar: Monochrome
Di’s Digi Challenge - Lot’s Of Green
Die Cuttin’ Divas - #359 Use Green
Dragonfly Journeys - #113 Going Green
Pearly Sparkles - #26 Flowers
Scribbles Design - #62 Go For Green
SheepSki Designs - #12 Flowers
Simply Create Too - #136 Use Green
Star Stampz - Lots of Green

DV #174 Vintage

Our challenge today at Dream Valley is Vintage. It’s not normally one of my favourite genres, but I found some lovely vintage photos with just a hint of colour to them and was inspired by one of them.

We are sponsored by Di’s Digi Designs.

As I said above I found these lovely vintage images online, and this one inspired me. She is just so beautiful. I used a sheet of Sara’s Shabby Chic paper from Crafters Companion, which is also beautiful. I wish I had bought more than one pad as I hate using it, in case it will be all gone! I am sure you all know that feeling. I trimmed this down to 8”, and used some of the offcuts later to make some diecut swirls. which are behind the flowers. I know they are difficult to see, but in real life they are quite noticeable. I think the subtle differences in colour to the background the camera found hard to pick up. There is a photo below in close up so you can see them.

I printed the image and then trimmed it out with another Sara signature product from the Glamorous dies, the background mat is from the same set. but I embossed that with a swirly embossing folder after I had diecut it. The lovely lace and pearl string were in my stash, and again they are something I hate parting with!

Flowers, diecut leaves and stamens all from my stash. I hadn’t used flowers for a while as I am often late and have to hurry to finish, but this one really cried out for some floral accents.

I am entering this into:-

A Vintage Journey - Treasure (my treasure is the paper, lace and pearl bead string)
City Crafter Challenge - #401 Die Cuts
Cut It Up - #142 Anything Goes
Di’s Digi Challenge - Die Cuts
Die Cuttin’ Divas - #358 Tic, Tac, Toe (Bottom Line - Flowers, Embossing, Ribbon)
Dies R Us - #92 Use Pastel Colours
Everybody Art - #420 Pearls and Lace
International Heart and Soul - #28 Emboss and Use a Die
Pearly Sparkle - #26 Flowers
Sheepski Designs - #12 Flowers
The Corrosive Challenge - #3 Anything Goes
Try It On Tuesday - Vintage

DV #173 Things With Wings

Our challenge at Dream Valley this time is Things With Wings. We are sponsored by Fabrika Fantasy and I have used their ‘Earth Fairy’ for my card.

I swear my photography is getting worse, so apologies for the quality of the image in the photo above. I promise she doesn’t look that blurred in reality!

Anyhow I printed her onto Daler Rowney media paper and coloured her with my relatively new Zig Clean Color Brush Pens. I then cut round her with another new acquisition (thank goodness for second hand sites on Facebook!) Devine Eloquence. She is matted onto deep purple mirri. The papers are all from Nitwits’ Promised collection and I trimmed them up with a combination of Crafters Companion edge dies (by the way the Gemini hates these and cuts them where it’s only meant to emboss them. In the end I went back to Old Faithful Big Shot to cut them! The other dies are from Spellbinders and Sue Wilson for the flowers and leaves.

You can’t see in the pic, but the flowers and leaves I went over the top with Spectrum Sparkle clear overlay pen and also her wings are glittered with glamour dust!

The sentiment is from a set by Stamp-It.

I am entering this into:-

A Gem of A Challenge - #213 Spring Flowers
Challenge Up Your Life - #85 Spring Flowers
Crafty Calendar - Feb: 2 or More Layers
Cuttlebug Mania - Colour Challenge (I chose the mauves)
Dragonfly Dreams - Flowers
Fashionable Stamping - #132 One For the Girls
Southern Girls - Three or More Patterned Papers
Sweet Stampers - #17 Things With Wings
The House That Stamps Built - Tic, Tac, Toe (Diagonal Bottom Left-Top Right, Die Cut, Patterned Papers, Pastel Colours)

CCM #205 Love

Our challenge at Crafty Cardmakers today is Love and Romance.

My ‘card’ is for my Daughter to give to her Hubby. I had a different idea in my head when I started but if it could go wrong and not work out it did!

So I started with a sheet of construction acetate as I wanted to make a card with a completely transparent centre and just the roses design around the outside. After much faffing about and finding a different die to cut the acetate (the roses design caused too much pressure and kept splitting the acetate putting great cracks across the middle of it) I settled on a Crafters Companion new easel die to cut the acetate. Sadly this has a scalloped edge and I wanted it to be plain and not be able to be seen. The largest and outside die is the one from the Today is the Day from Tonic’s Floral Affections range. The next level in is from the Hello Posey in the same range and the middle is back to the Thank You range. As you can see all the dies mix and match which is fabulous.

I cut them all from red satin cardstock which I had first adhered to Dawn Bibby’s huge roll of double side film as I figured it would be much easier, and cleaner to stick onto acetate with card this way rather than fiddly little areas of glue.

I only put the middle two layers in (and you can see from the photo that they were actually cut from the waste that I would have had from the middle of the largest die), because when I stood them up against the Ornate Easel stand (also from Tonic) it looked awful behind. Even though it’s beautifully decorated it didn’t look right seeing it so obviously through the acetate layer. The easel stand has an outside layer of acetate and an inside layer of the red satin card.

Before I turned it into this single layered card I did try to make an easel card from it using the easel set from Crafters, mentioned above, but nothing was strong enough to support the acetate layer and still make an easel. Either I folded a piece of acetate in half as you would normally to make an easel, but then it looked like there was a dirty big crack across the centre of the heart, or I tried to cut a sort of strap, but that didn’t have the strength in it and in any event, even had I been happy with the half fold the acetate disliked all that folding and simply cracked clean in half!

The valentine sentiment was cut from silver mirri with a Simon Says Stamp die that if used in full says ‘Be My Valentine’ but because the word Valentine is so long I couldn’t fit it all in the centre of the heart and still be able to read it due to the intricacies of the decorated red satin card area!

I am sure there must be a way to create what I wanted to create, but at this moment in time my brain hurts and I am content with what I ended up with. Just hope that Son-in-Law likes it too!

I am entering this into:-

Bastel-Traum - #61 Valentine/Love
Card Mania Challenge - #101 Red and Hearts
Cards In Envy - Love You So Much
Country View Challenges - Feb: Anything But Cute
Creative Craft Cottage - #104 Love Is All Around
Daisy Chain Challenges - #16 Add a Heart
Dare2BArtzy - Feb: Love
Delicious Doodles - Feb: Valentine/Love
Die Cut Divas - Feb: Love Is In The Air
Dies R Us - #90 For The One I Love
Dragonfly Journeys - #111 Love
Naughty Or Nice - #48 All Loved Up
Noor UK- Feb: Celebrations
Paru’s Card Making Challenge - Feb: Love
Pearly Sparkles - #25 Love, Love, Love
Sheep Ski Designs - #11 Red/Hearts/Romance/Love
Use Your Stuff - #299 Love Is All Around

DV #172 3 Patterned Papers

Our challenge today at Dream Valley is to use 3 patterned papers. We are sponsored by All Dressed Up and I have used one of their fabulous digital images ‘I Love My Puppy’ to create my card.

I printed the image onto Daler Rowney Mixed Media paper which I also used on the bottom layer of the card as it’s an offwhite colour so the image looked odd against a white card. I coloured her with my brand spanking new Zig Clean Color watercolour pens which I have been lusting after for ages and Amazon had a good price and they kinda fell off the warehouse shelf into my basket!!! Anyhow, I haven’t quite got to grips with them yet as this was their first outing, especially skin tones, first it was too brown then too pink, then too dark and then too pale, lol, but I am sure with practice and maybe a bit of Youtube surfing I can find a good colour combo for skin.

I added a few Papermania shimmer dots to her hair ribbon and her dress.

My three patterned papers are all from Nitwits from their Bonnets and Bowties collection. I edged all of them with stickles star dust and actually sprinkled over the top before it dried with some of those pee wee glitters in a soft of soft lilac colour. Two of the papers were just straight rectangles and the third was a corner die that came with my Gemini.

Sentiment comes from John Lockwood’s everyday sentiments set and cut out with his mini tags set.

The mat behind the image is a spellbinders die, I think it’s the fancy labels 8 version which matches the labels 8 that I diecut the image out with.

I am entering this into:-

Addicted to Stamps - #277 Make Your Mark
C.R.A.F.T. - #453 3 of a Kind (patt papers)
Crafty Calendar - Feb: 2 Or More Layers
Crafty Hazelnut’s Patterned Paper - Feb
Cuttlebug Mania - Birthday
Everybody Art - #418 Circle or Square
My Creative Scoop - Color Inspiration Monthly Feb: #31
Noor Design - Feb: Celebrations
Oddball Art - Feb: Cute or Die
Papercraft Challenges - #4 Pastel Colours
Scribbles Designs - 5th Birthday Party Blowout, Birthdays
The Paper Shelter - #324 Birthday Card

CCM #204 Get Inky/Messy

Our challenge today at Crafty Cardmakers is to get inky and/or messy.

I started with a sheet of plain white card which I inked up with Tim’s Distress Oxides, and then spritzed with water to give that watercolour effect. I love these, and with any luck set 3 should be winging it’s way to me this week! Wish he would hurry up and release them all. I would not have bought the original DI’s if these had been available at the same time, or at least not the full set. Storage is a nightmare for so many inkpads and the originals aren’t much use for actually stamping, although these are, and these just seem to blend so much easier than the originals. These also give that lovely ‘chalky look’. Can you tell I love them?

I diecut out the centre of a 6” scalloped card with Spellbinders Adorning Squares. I have had this die for years and never used it!!!! I am sure that’s like 99% of us and not at all unusual. Anyhow this is one of those dies that you can cut in lots of different ways, and according to the packaging you can mix and match to create 20+ designs. I nearly gave this away last week, lol, so glad I didn’t because Now I have actually bothered to use it, I can see it popping up again soon.

I then created a square thin frame from my inked background and put another slice of it behind the apeture I had die cut into my card. Popping the diecut back in, having die cut the centre from that too. I’m really annoyed with myself, I swear it was dead centre when I popped it back in, but because there are so many ‘little areas’ that could stick back up I placed it under a heavy weight and left it to set…. and at that stage I think it might have shifted slightly so that it’s now slightly too far over to the right. Because the intricacy of the design is part of the overall design I didn’t feel I could cover up my mistake with something. I did try a few combinations of things but it detracted from the inky centre which was to have the butterfly on it.

I added the frame I had previously cut on foam pads, and having lift the butterflies wings stuck it down and added a row of gems for it’s body.

I like the way you can just catch hints of all the different colours through the diecut areas and the larger square area revealed in the centre.

I am entering this into:-

2 Crafty Critter Crazies - #10 Anything Goes with a Critter
4 Crafty Chicks - #387 Watercolour Backgrounds
Allsorts - #452 Old Favourites (Distress Oxides)
Country View Challenge - Jan: Anything Goes
Crafts Galore Encore - Jan: Anything Goes
Everybody Art - #417 Butterfly or Heart
The Paper Girls Challenge - #144 Watercolours
Happy Little Stampers - Jan: Watercolour Challenge
House of Cards - Jan: Mixed Media
Paperminutes - #522 Multicolour
The Corrosive Challenge - #1 Jan: Anything Goes

DV #171 Love

Our challenge today at Dream Valley is Love. The year goes so fast and Valentine’s Day is only just around the corner less than a month away already. Anyhow, we had some images from Paper Nest Dolls to play with and I chose Ellie with Heart Balloons.

I started with a blank 6” scalloped card and die cut into the centre of it a Tonic Verso Die from the Affections range called First Crush, which struck me as rather appropriate for the image. I printed Ellie onto watercolour card and coloured her with Albrecht Durer pencils. The glitter hearts are the ‘waste’ from a Memory Box heart shaped die full of tiny hearts. I stuck the same coloured glitter card to the back of the diecut areas. The small patterned mat is from Stamping Unicorn’s Butterfly Dreams paper pad. The sentiment die is from Alexandra Renke. I coloured it with spectrum sparkle pens to tone in with the glitter accents as I couldn’t think how to cut it from two different coloured glitter papers without it looking obvious. A|so it’s a very fine and delicate diecut and I wasn’t sure it would cope with rough glitter paper.

I am starting to worry that in my old age I have turned all girly. I don’t ususally use pinks, and this is my third card that has had this or a very similar shade of pink in it…. I must try harder to avoid pink next time around, lol

I am entering this into:-

Always Fun Challenges - #42 Wedding or Anniversary
Art Impressions - #224 Feel The Love
C.R.A.F.T. - #451 Love/Valentines
Cuttlebug Mania - Valentine’s Day
Everybody Art - #417 Butterfly Or Heart
Inspire. Create Challenges - #09 Love
Scrapbook & Cardmaking - #61 Valentine/Love
Tic, Tac, Toe - #31 Top to Bottom Right hand (light blue, heart, square

CCM #203 Bling’s The Thing

Our first challenge for 2018 over at Crafty Cardmakers is ‘Bling’s The Thing’. We would love to see any project you fancy provided it has lots of lovely bling, so that could be glitter, as I have done, gems, pearls, or any manner of sparkly thing you can think of.

I must apologise for the slight blur on my photo. It’s a nightmare trying to get a photograph of glitter/mirri card, and I, of course, combined them both!!!

My die cut is brand new and from Tonic and is called Live the Life You Imagined, which is what I want to do this year with my crafting! In reality of course I’d like Michael Buble to come and whisk me off my feet, but that ain’t gonna happen so I will stick with making sure I craft regularly instead!!! Anyhow enough waffling, I die cut it from turquoise mirri card and stuck it down over silver glitter card. I inlaid/paper pieced seome embossed hot pink mirri card into the flowers, the butterfly’s wing and also picked out the word ‘you’ in the sentiment to make it pop out more.

The whole thing is matted onto more turquoise mirri and a 7” scalloped card.

I need to get the vacuum out now as my carpet is a combination of slivers of pink and turquoise mirri. Very pretty, but don’t want to tread it all around my bungalow.

I am entering this into:-

Alphabet Challenge - U for Use 3 of Something (3 colours)
Allsorts Challenge - #450 No Patterned Papers
Cut It Up - #139 New Year’s Resolutions (As per my sentiment)
Cute Card Thursday - #512 Something Nee (the die)
Daisy Chain Challenges - #15 Something New (the die)
Happy Little Stampers - Jan: Anything Goes With Dies
My Time to Craft - #362 Something New (the die)
Shopping Our Stash - #336 Out With the Old and In With the New (new die, old hot pink mirri card were scraps in a scrap file, about 10 years old!)
The Crafter’s Cafe - #188 Lots of Bling
Stampavie and More - #297 Something New (the die)

DV #170 Anything Goes

Well that’s 4 months I wouldn’t want to repeat in a hurry. Around about August last year I had a fit and decided I needed to remodel my bedroom/craftroom as the mess in there was driving me nuts. Here I am 4 months later with a lovely new craft space and my bed moved into the lounge.

I will hopefully make a post later with before and after pics, but for now to the matter in hand. My first post in ages and of 2018 is on behalf of Dream Valley and our ‘Anything Goes’ challenge.

We were all given a few lovely Fabrika images to choose from and I picked Winter Fairy. I did actually remove a bird that she had on her shoulder as I preferred it without, and that, of course, is the beauty of digital images, you can manipulate them to remove bits, flip them, enlarge them etc.

I coloured her in with copics and promarkers. I made an ombre combination of the colours in the fairy to the scrolls and swirls surrounding her. Some of them I added glamour dust to, and some I left alone. I also added some white dots in her hair with a sharpie marker.

I matted her onto some blue glitter card, and then onto the white linen card I had printed her onto, and again onto more blue glitter and more white linen. The lovely detailed pink glitter frame surrounding the image was cut with an Intricut die I got from Hobbycraft, their own make. I had to cut one of the patterns out of each side along the length to make it fit the image without gaps, but one half of that I have hidden under the sentiment, and the other half, I hope your eye is not drawn to. The birthday sentiment was from Crafters Companion’s birthday exclusive bundle and is a transfer, which I foiled onto with foil that matched the glitter card.

It feels really good to be back crafting, instead of living in a war zone of boxes, more of that later, and I am looking forward to 2018 being a much more creatively productive year than 2017 was.

In the time I have been away from blogging I have lost over 2 and 1/2 stone with a combination of my own start and Weight Watchers and my hip has gotten progressively worse. I sincerely hope when I see the Physio this week that she will tell me I am well on course with my weight loss for hip replacement surgery. Cancel that, due to the crisis in the NHS that’s exactly what they did,, cancelled my appointment.

I should like to enter this into:-

Brown Sugar - #274 Birthday
Color Inspiration Monthly Link Up - #30 Anything You have Coloured Yourself
Crafty Friends - #74 For a Girl or Lady
Creative Knockouts - #227 Celebrations
Die Cut Divas - Jan: Do or Use Something New (the image and the dies are new)
Double D Challenge - Anything Birthday/Anniversary Goes
Everybody Art - #416 Latest Purchase
Pause, Dream, Enjoy - #1 Die Cuts
Stamping Sensations - Jan: Cold And Frosty Colours
Stamps & Fun - #315 Use Stamps (Hope a digistamp is okay)
The Paper Girls - #143 Glitter

Happy New Year everyone x