CCM #247 Christmas

It’s our final challenge for 2019 over on the Crafty Cardmakers blog and unsurprisingly we have chosen a seasonal theme of Christmas.

I made my cards with the lovely reindeer stamp from Studiolight. I created a background with distress oxides onto a glass mad, added water and smooshed it onto the card.

I then stamped the reindeer in black archival ink, and added a sentiment from Claritystamp. I created the snow by scattering loosely some shabby white embossing powder from Stampendous.

The second picture is the same idea but obviously the colours are slightly different on this one as you cannot predict where the ink will go!

These were a part of my theme this year, and once I created the backgrounds I just lined up the stamp in my stamp press so that it would appear in the same place on each background and stamped away, likewise with the sentiment.

Rather than wasting black card to mat and layer, after trimming out the stamped background, I simply went round with a black copic pen to create a border.

I am entering this into:-

2 Crafty Critter Crazies – Dec: Anything Goes with a Critter
A Vintage Journey – Holly Jolly Christmas
Addicted to Stamps – #180 Cold and Frosty (sadly their last challenge)
Alphabet Challenge – S is for Snow
Corrosive Challenge – #12 Anything Goes
Creatalicious – #176 Anything Goes with Optional Winter
Just Add Ink – #485 Just Add One Layer
Lost Cost Portal – #89 In The Deep Midwinter
Merry Little Christmas – #17 Anything Christmas Goes
Sparkles Christmas Challenge – #107 Winter Wonderland
Sparkles Monthly – #122 It’s Begining to Look A Lot Like Christmas
Sweet Stampin’ – Christmas
The Artistic Stamper – Dec: Christmas is Coming
The Crafting Challenge – Dec: Christmas
Winter Wonderland – Anything Christmas Goes
Your Next Stamp – #128 Winter Warmup

DV #215 Christmas

Our challenge today at Dream Valley and through to January 6th is Christmas. We have three fabulous sponsors this time around, All Dressed Up 2 Digi Stamps, Di’s Digi Stamps with a $12 gift certificate, Dies to Die For £15 voucher, Fabrika Fantasy 3 Digi Stamps and Polkadoodles 3 Digi Stamps.

My Christmas card uses a Sue Wilson Christmas Angel Die from 2017. This is a 2 die set that cuts a star background and a separate die for the angel herself. I die cut her from pearlescent paper. the background was made with white card which I added Pixie Dust powders to and spritzed with water and then I die cut the background die from it and overlayed the whole thing over some holographic silver card. The sentiment is a stamp from my stash and embossed in silver embossing powder.

I made several of the same design, but of course the backgrounds are all slightly different as you cannot make the pixie powders go where you want them! The picture above is just 4 of them in a line.

I am entering this into:-

Bastel-Traum – #83 Winter/Christmas
Cardz 4 Gals – #110 Get Ready for Christmas
Crafty Hazelnut’s Christmas Challenge – #466 Christmas
Fab ‘N’ Funky – #459 Christmas
Kleuren Met Potloden – Nov: Christmas
Merry Little Christmas – #17 Dec: Anything Christmas Goes
Sparkles Monthly – #122 It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas
The 12 Months of Christmas – #60 Anything Christmas
The Holly and The Ivy – #61 Anything Christmas Goes
Try It On Tuesday – Inspired By A Song Or Christmas Carol (Hark The Herald Angels)

CCM #246 No Patterned Paper

One of my favourite challenges today at Crafty Cardmakers, No Patterned Paper.

I have made a page in my gorgeous Marlene Mini Journal starting with Distress Oxides in Ripe Persimmon, Dried Marigold and Squeezed Lemonade. Which I smooshed onto the page. The background stamps are from Indigo Blu and from AAll & Create’s Janet Klein ‘Lil Magic stamp set. The main image is also Janet Klein, Bird Lover, and the cat comes from her range of stamps, Cat Lover. I coloured the image with copics for the skin and I used my polychromos pencils to colour the rest of her.

I coloured the centre of the stars with Squeezed Lemonade DI and the sentiment I printed on my pc. I used a couple of strips of washi for her to stand on. I have so much washi and forget to use it normally.

I am entering this into:-

A Bit More Time to Craft – #104 Anything Goes
Addicted To Stamps – #179 Anything Goes
Arty Divas – #9 Anything Goes
Colour Crazy Challenge – #46 Anything Goes
Crafting By Designs – Nov: Anything Goes
Crafts Galore Encore – #69 Anything Goes
Crafty Animals – #32 Anything Goes
Crafty Calendar - Nov: Cute and Girly
Createful Heart – #14 Anything Goes
Cutie Pie Challenge – #141 Add An Animal
Do-Al(l) Kreatives – #35 Anything Goes
Krafty Chicks – #482 Anything But a Card
Lavinia World – #14 Anything Goes
Not Just Cards – Nov: Anything Goes
Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – #1947 Anything Goes
Pattie’s Creations – #164 Anything Goes
Through the Craftroom Door – Wk Nov 19 Anything Goes

DV #214 Favourite Colour Combination

Out challenge today at Dream Valley is to show us your favourite colour combination. We are sponsored by the wonderful Polkadoodles with 3 of their gorgeous digis for the winner. I have used Winnie with Big Balloon for my card.

I chose blue and green for my colour combination. I don’’t know that I have an actual favourite combination but blue and green definitely appeals to me, although as a Child I can remember a saying ‘Blue and Green should never be seen’. But I love it!

I coloured Winnie with copics. The lovely diecut frame is from Spellbinders, S6-004 Card Creator Detailed Scallops, and I also used two of their Borderabilities Curved Borders Set one to create the wavy mat underneath the main focal point.

The little butterflies are from Sara’s Signature Butterfly Collection from Crafters Companion. You can use this die to cut into your card and leave little butterfly apertures but I wanted all the various sized ones instead to use on my card. I used the same paper from the background, also from Polkadoodles from their Posy Collection, to make the butterflies, and I inked through the die before removing it to give a contrast colour. The flowers are from my stash.

I am entering this into:-

Addicted to Stamps – #179 Anything Goes
Addicted to Stamps and More – #367 Make Your Mark
Arty Divas – #8 Anything Goes
CD Sunday Plus – #23 Anything Goes
Crafting With An Attitude – #57 Anything Goes
Imagine That Creative Playground – #11 Anything Goes
Lil Patch Of Crafty Friends – #118 Anything Goes
Love To Craft – #40 Anything Goes
Not Just Cards – Nov: Anything Goes
Polkadoodles – #46 Anything Goes
QKR Stampede – #372 Anything Goes
Southern Girls – Anything Goes With Team Lou
The Crafting Challenge Blog – Nov: Anything Goes
The Creative Crafters – #22 Anything Goes
World Wide Open Design Team Challenge – #11 Anything Goes

CCM #245 Thankful

As today’s is Armistice Day in the UK, our challenge for the next couple of weeks is thankful.

I made my card for my Daughter. She has a lot to put up with my health issues and she always listens patiently to when I need to moan. I would be lost without her.

The butterfly on my card is from Tim Holtz Geo Dies. I die cut the whole thing out of a clarity mask sheet so I would have it for use again, and then using the apeture left behind as a stencil I inked through the butterfly shape with Distress Oxides. I cut the butterfly again in silver sparkly self adhesive film and adhered this to the inked butterfly, and then fussy cut the whole thing out.

The sentiment is from Your Next Stamp. The shaped die matting layers are from a Go Kreate die set, and the glittery enamel dots came from Ali Express! Ebay on crack!!!!

A closer look at the butterfly.

I am entering this into:-

A Bit More Time To Craft – #103 Anything Goes
Brown Sugar – #295 Anything Goes
Crafting With An Attitude – #57 Anything Goes
Creative Moments – #180 Anything Goes
Dare 2B Artzy – Nov: Thankful
Die Cut Divas – Nov: Thanksgiving or Thank You
DL Art Thankful Thursday – #249 Thankful
Gem of a Challenge – #22 Anything Goes
Happy Little Stampers – Nov Anything Goes With Dies
Let’s Craft And Create – #153 Anything Goes Option Thank You
Lil Patch of Crafty Friends – #117 Anything Goes
The Corrosive Challenge – #11 Anything Goes

DV #213 All That Glitters

Today at Dream Valley we are sponsored by Dies to Die with a £15 voucher for our ‘All That Glitters’ challenge.

I have used a lovely set of pre-printed pages from Polkadoodles, Posydoodles, which are perfect for that card in a hurry. I diecut them out with dies also from Polkadoodles and added glitter accents to several of the images.

I also fussy cut out some extra elements from other sheets in the set to create 3D elements for my card. Using a scalloped die I created a base and top for an easel card, and used one of the 3D elements as a stopper.

I am entering this into:-

2 Crafty Critter Crazies – Nov: Anything Goes
Crafter’s Castle – #23 Nov: Anything Goes
Crafty Animals – #32 Anything Goes
Crafty Friends – #122 Anything Goes
Gem of a Challenge – #21 Anything Goes
My Time To Craft – #409 No Rectangle or Square Cards
Not Just Cards – Oct: Anything Goes
Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – #1944 Anything Goes
The Crafter’s Cafe – #230 Travel or Insects/Butterflies
The Crafting Challenge Blog – #21 Anything Goes
The Creative Crafters – #21 Anything Goes

DV #212 Add A Sentiment

Our challenge today at Dream Valley is to Add a Sentiment, and we are sponsored by Fabrika Fantasy.

I’ve made a really nice and easy card and something you can do in a hurry! Using our Sponsors fabulous pre-coloured (I can only dream to colour this well) image called Mighty Wizard. I printed the image onto decent quality printer paper and fussy cut round it…… it has been stuck onto a 7” card blank.

I drew a frame round it with a microfine pen in purple, and then stamped the greeting using Clarity Word Chain small stamps….. the Wishes stamp I had to make up myself as they didn’t have one….. so I chopped up (sacrilege) the Kisses and Wishing stamps and cobbled the beginning of one with the end of the other to create the missing word!

Apologies again for the quality of the image….. it’s way too dark, but no matter what I did with it I couldn’t get it to properly reflect the brightness level!

I am entering this into:-

Challenge Up Your Life – #116 Frame
Crafty Creations – #400 Anything Goes
Dream Factory – #73 The Little Witch
Lil Patch of Crafty Friends – #116 Anything Goes
QKR Stampede – #368 Anything Goes
Simply Create Too – #154 Anything Goes
The Corrosive Challenge – #10 Anything Goes
The Fairy and The Unicorn – Oct: Anything Fantasy Goes
Through the Craftroom Door – Anything Goes wk beginning 15.10
Try It On Tuesday – Witches, Wizards, Halloween

CCM #243 Sparkle

I can’t believe how fast this year has flown by, here we are in the throws of Autumn in the UK, cold and drizzly and quite depressing. Hopefully our challenge today will cheer you up…….. Sparkle.

I started with a page from my Studio Light square journal. It has lovely paper/card in it, one side smooth and the other has a texture. I chose the smooth side, and using three colours of Distress Oxides, Cracked Pistachio, Wilted Violet and Broken China I made a watercolour background.

As close to the middle as I could get I stamped the gorgeous Thalia from Pink Ink.

I coloured her in with my Jane Davenport Magic Wands. I got these in a bargain collection of her stuff on ebay….. some of which I already had which I shall flog on and some of which I didn’t yet have, these pencils being amongst them. Now I love my polychromos, the closest idea to these, but these went on like a dream on the watercolour card and blended beautifully. With a little Gamsol and a blending tip from the parchment craft range at Crafters Companion., I did go over the whites of her eyes with a Sakura gelly roll in white as they were very blue looking from the background colouring!

The butterfly is from the Thalia stamp set and I stamped it onto acetate and glittered it from behind. It actually doesn’t look as messy to the nake eye as the camera has made it look, or at least to my named eye it doesn’t and as it’s for my journal that’s all I am worried about, lol

The sentiment, also from Crafters Companion, is one of their rub on sticky transfers that they make for foil, but I used mine with glitter. I also glittered her upper lid under the brow line crease.

I added a frame around the image with three very fine line pens, and to finish it off popped a couple of large faceted self adhesive gems from Craft Buddy.

I am entering this into:-

A Vintage Journey – Inky Wings
Addicted To Stamps – #362 Make Your Mark
Arty Divas – #6 Anything Goes
Challenge Up Your Life – #116 Frame
Colour Crazy – #40 Anything Goes
Creative Artiste – #54 Anything Mixed Media Goes
Elliebelle’s Crafty Wednesday – Oct: Stamp It
Gem of a Challenge – #20 Anything Goes
Imagine That Creative Playground – #10 Anything Goes
Just Us Girls – #509 Trend Week, Frame It
Lavinia World – #11 Anything Goes using Stamps
Little Red Wagon – #518 Cut It Out
Polkadoodles – #41 Anything Goes
Scrapper’s Delight – Oct: Anything Goes
The Corrosive Challenge – #10 Anything Goes
Through the Craftroom Door – Anything Goes

DV #211 CAS (Clean and Simple)

Today’s challenge over at Dream Valley is Clean and Simple and we are sponsored by LeAnn's World 101.

I made my background by stamping  with versamark and embossing in white so I would get a resist look, using Studio Calico Lattice Background.

I spritzed heavily with water and then dripped various colours from Dr. PH Martin’s Bombay Inks on, and rolled over it with a roll of kitchen roll to soak up the excess paint and take away the heaviness of the colour. I let it dry naturally as I had heat embossed earlier and didn’t want to alter that.

When it was dry I diecut it with MFT’s Snowdrift Coverup MFT775. I placed the frame down on my card and held it slightly in place long enough to re-position the diecut wavy strips so they would be neat and tidy. I didn’t notice until I photographed it that I had the last one to the right slightly off.

I diecut the Sheena Birthday sentiment die from a copper coloured mirror card and popped on using thin foam tape strips.

I am entering this into:-

Addicted to Stamps – #361 Anything Goes
Angie’s Digital Stamps – #36 Anything Goes, Optional Twist Autumn Colours
Brown Sugar – #294 Anything Goes
Classic Design Team Open Challenge – #10 Anything Goes
Crafting By Design – Oct: Anything Goes
Crafting With An Attitude – #56 Anything Goes
Crafty Gals Corner – #199 Fall Colours
Crazy 4 Challenges – #505 Focus On The Sentiment
Creative Fingers – #172 Anything Goes
Cute Card Thursday – #602 Anything Goes
Fab ‘n’ Funky – #451 Autumn Colours
Lil Patch of Crafty Friends – #115 Anything Goes
Polkadoodles – #40 Anything Goes
QKR Stampede – #366 Anything Goes

CCM #242 Add A Critter

Today at Crafty Cardmakers we would love to see your creations with an added Critter……. as our hostess, Judy said, 2 legged, 4 legged, 6 legged, or even multi legged, we want to see them.

I used a couple of my brand new Art by Marlene stamps, the animals, and the bin is from Katzelkraft, to make my journal page. As soon as I saw the rabbit with the octopus/squid on it’s head that ‘should have gone to specsavers audio advert’ sprung to mind. He looks pretty miffer to have a squid on his head, and the other rabbit just looks a bit smug! I created the sentiment on my pc and edged it with black pen.

Anyhow I inky my background with Distress Oxides, and then stamped the bubbles from a That’s Crafty floral stamp set, which I either bleached out, bleached and coloured, or just stuck some diecuts from one of Marlene’s Diecut blocks over. The border is also a Katzelkraft stamp, and I coloured in the little circles in it to match one of the colours in the diecuts.

This is NOTHING like the true colour. To get the colour reasonably accurate in the rabbits I have ended up with the background looking more washed out than it is. I really need a new camera! Any recommendations anyone?

I am entering this into:-

A Place To Start – Sept: Anything Goes
Arty Divas – #5 Anything Goes
Aud Sentiments – #236 Anything Goes + A Sentiment
C.R.A.F.T. – #529 Animals
Crafting By Design – Sept: Anything Goes
Creative Fingers – #171 Anything Goes
Creative Knockouts – #317 Anything Goes
Cute Card Thursday – #601 Sentimental
Imagine That – Anything Goes + A Sentiment
QKR Stampede – #365 Anything Goes
Scrapper’s Delight – Sept: Anything Goes
Stampotique Designers Challenge – #333 Pets
Through The Craftroom Door – Anything Goes
Through The Purple Haze – #159  Fur-tastic
Tuesday Throwdown – #441 Anything Goes
We Love2Create – #10 Anything Mixed Media Goes

DV #210 Things With Wings

Our challenge today at Dream Valley is Things With Wings.

I have created a journal page for my Winged thing.

I started with a sheet of rice paper that I had coloured with various watercolour brush pens, adding lots of water so the colours mixed and mingled. I glued that to my journal page and then stamped with Indigo Blu’s Open Your Heart stamp randomly across the background, with Watering Can Archival Ink.

I picked out some of the circles from within the stamped image with Zig Clean Colour pens. I also stamped a larger stamp into three places on the background, but decided I hated it so gessoed those areas out! I edged the page with Broken Glass Distress Oxide.

My Angel is from Carabelle Studios called An Angel to Love. I stamped her onto stamping card and coloured her with the Zig pens, giving her a sparkly layer for her dress with Crafter’s Companion clear sparkle pen. Her wings, which come separately, I stamped and heat infused into Angelina Film, Aurora colour. I did originally stamp them into Angelina Fibres, but I didn’t like the end result. I have lifted the wings and popped the tips of them down with a silicone glue dot so that they look like they are fluttering, and raised my angel up with foam tape.

The sentiment was created on my pc and printed.

I am entering this into:-

2 Sisters On The Blog – #31 Anything With S (Sentiment, Sparkle, Stamps)
A Bit More Time to Craft – #100 Anything Goes
A Perfect Time to Craft – #9 Anything Goes
Angie’s Digital Stamps – #35 Anything Goes
Brown Sugar – #293 Anything Goes
Corrosive Challenge – #9 Anything Goes
Crafts Galore Encore – #67 Anything Goes
Creative Fingers – #171 Anything Goes
International Art & Soul – #67 Things With Wings
LeAnn’s World 101 = #18 Anything Goes
Love To Craft – #38 Anything Goes
Not Just Cards – Sept: Anything Goes
Pattie’s Creations – #162 Things That Fly
Polkadoodles – #38 Anything Goes
Sweet Stampers – #36 Use A Sentiment
The Fairy and The Unicorn – Sept: Anything Fantasy
We Love2Create – #9 Anything Mixed Media Goes

CCM #241 Autumn Colours

As the weather starts to rapidly cool off here in the UK and Autumn is well on the way we would love to see your Autumnal colours for our next challenge.

For my Autumn Colours I started with some lovely papers from Bo Bunny from their Autumn Song collection. I used the outside edge from the paper that I gutted to make the flowers for my challenge last week for Dream Valley….. I so hate to waste pretty papers.

The die cut kraft card leaf is from Craftwork Cards and I coloured it with Distress Inks and then went over it lightly with some lovely red metallic paste from Pentart, which I also used to edge the die cut mat and the back coloured layer.

The little corners were actually the waste from a corner die as I just wanted something to take the ‘white’ off, and didn’t want the full corner. I cut this from some lovely rusty red metallic paper from my stash.  The sentiment is years old from a peel off range of Dawn Bibby’s which I coloured with the currant copic pen.

I am entering this into:-

Aud Sentiments – #235 Fall/Autumn and a Sentiment
Bastel-Traum – #81 Fall
Cardz for Galz – #105 Welcome Autumn/Fall
Ching-Chou Kuik – Sept: Fall Colours
Crafty Friends – #118 Autumn Colours
Crafty Gals Corner – #199 Fall Colours
Cute Card Thursday – #599 Autumn
Daisy Chain Challenges – #44 Autumn Is Coming
Fabrika Fantasy – #34 Autumn
The Male Room – #119 Autumn
Unicorn Challenge – #47 Autumn

DV #209 Autumn Colours

Our challenge at Dream Valley for the next two weeks, sponsored by the fabulous Sheepski Designs, is Autumn Colours.

I have used a Sheepski image called Butterfly Girl to create a journal page.

I printed her out on some stamping card and coloured her in with a combination of copics and polychromos pencils. She is a little lighter skinned that I intended but one of my copics ran completely dry mid colour so I was stuck with the paler shade.

The background was created with Distress Oxiders in Aged Mahogany, Dried Marigold and Ripe Persimmon, To frame where she was going to sit I went around the edge with just one stamp from La Blanche, one of my favourite scroll stamps. I stamped and embossed it alternately with white embossing powder, and copper embossing powder.

I had to put a circlet of flower in her hair because I accidentally cut the image up too small and made the top of her head square, which looked really odd, so I made the die cut flowers to give shape back to the top of her head! The others I added just for some balance.

The sentiment is from Tim Holtz Big Chat Snarky stickers and seemed perfect for her shushing finger!

The sparkle comes from a Tonic midas touch pen.

I am entering this into:-

A2Z Scrapbooking – Sept: Anything Goes
Allsorts Challenge – #536 Anything Goes
Brown Sugar – Sept: #293 Anything Goes
Ching-Chou Kuik – Sept: Fall Colours
Colour Crazy Challenge – #35 Anything Goes
Craft-Dee Bowz – Sept: Anything Goes
Crafts Galore Encore – Sept: Anything Goes
Crafty Friends – #118 Autumn Colours
Creatalicious Challenges – #170 Anything Goes
Creative Artiste – #53 Anything Mixed Media Goes
Creative Sketchy Girls – #39 Anything Goes
Daisy Chain Challenges – #44 Autumn Is Coming
Fabrika Fantasy – #34 Autumn
Get Creative – #84 Anything Goes
Happy Little Stampers – Sept: Anything Goes with Dies
Morgan’s ArtWorld Open Challenge – #09 Anything Goes
Sheepski Designs – #30 Die Cuts and/or Punches

CCM #240 Pearls and/or Gems

Our challenge this time at Crafty Cardmakers is to add your pearls and/or gems. I have literally hundreds of gems, big ones, small ones, coloured ones, clear ones, patterned ones….. you name it I have an excess of them, so this was ideal for me to use up a few!

I've created an easel from a 42 cm long x 15 cm wide blank piece of card for my base. The top part of the card was created with a combination of one of Leonie Pujol’s circus stamps, Some Marianne dies and some zig clean color brush pens.

I stamped the image onto some matching cardstock and then partially coloured it with the clean color pens. I die cut it and then cut a matching mat which I coloured around the edge with the three colours I used on the stamped image. This was all matted onto the front of the easel card.

For the stopper I used a Craftwork Cards pre printed sentiment, and made a mat to match the coloured edge of the one on the main part of the card. The gems across the bottom were mainly clear with small bits of blue, so I coloured the rest in with yellow and green copics to complement the existing colour palette. The little butterflies must be 15 years old, and I found them lurking in a box with some gems! As was the large blue gem in the centre of the main image.

I am entering this into:-

A Bit More Time to Craft – #99 Anything Goes
Bastel-Traum – #80 Sentiment
Classic DT Open Challenge – #9 Sept: Anything Goes
Corrosive Challenge – #8 Anything Goes
Craft-Dee Bowz – Sept: Anything Goes
Crafts Galore Encore – #67 Sept: Anything Goes
Creative Sketchy Girls – #39 Butterflies
DL Art – Sept: Anything Goes
Dragonfly Dreams – Sept: Happy Birthday
QKR Stampede – #361 Anything Goes
Scribbles Designs – #80 Include a Sentiment
Sheepski Designs – #30 Die Cuts and/or Punches
Sweet Stampers – #35 Dies and/or Punches

DV #208 Buttons and/0r a Bow

Today at Dream Valley we are sponsored by the fabulous Oddball Art, and our challenge is Buttons and/or a Bow.

I have used one of the Oddball Art images which I printed onto Daler Rowney media paper and then painted with various watercolours. I have added some definition to the image with super fineliner pens.

The background was created with Simon Hurley Dye Inkpads in Slippery When Wet, Clear Skies and Overzealous. I blended them onto a Studiolight giant tag, but was not happy with the blend. I guess the tag was too chalky and grabbed the ink too much so I spritzed and then flipped it over onto my glass mat and smooshed it about a bit and that gave me a much better blend.

The various stamps in the background are from HobbyArt, stamped with the same inkpads and the stencilling was with a set of Ranger stencils that came free with a Magazine.

I fussy cut the image and also painted in some of my stamps. My buttons are from the Heartfelt Creations Buttons and Blooms collection of stamps and matching die. Stamped in white and embossed in white and then I just painted some waterdown ink from the same inkpads to give them some colour. I also coloured her little satin bow with the same ink. A few splodges of Liquitex Acrylic Ink in white to break up the citrus background a bit.

I am entering this into:-

Brown Sugar – Aug: #292 Anything Goes
Colour Crazy – #33 Anything Goes
Colourific Challenge – #3 Anything Goes
Craft Rocket Chall – #62 Anything Goes
Crafting By Design – Aug: Anything Goes
Crafty Calendar – Aug: Anything Goes
Crafty Creations – #396 Anything Goes
Creative Knockouts – #312 Tic, Tac, Toe, Diagonal TopL to Bott R
Creative Moments – #175 Anything Goes
Creative Playground – #8 Anything Goes
Dare 2B Artzy – Aug: Anything Goes
Di’s Digi Challenge – Ribbon and/or Bows
Oddball Art – Aug: Anything Goes
QKR Stampede – #360 Anything Goes
Your Next Stamp Fun Friday – #121 Anything But A Card

I just wanted to share this with you before I go, yesterday in 30+ degrees C my Daughter completed a 35 km walk, for the care home she works for, who have been caring for the elderly for 35 years. They are raising money for a special chair that costs about £1500 and Emily raised well over £350.

CCM #239 It’s A Bugs Life

We’ve had a nice break at Crafty Cardmakers for the Summer, which looks as if it’s disappeared into the sunset in the UK! We are back today with a new challenge ‘It’s A Bug’s Life’.

My bug is a mechanical grasshopper. I have had this stamp for ages and not gotten around to stamping it yet! Mind you that’s not unusual!! The stamp is by Carmen Medlin.

I made my art journal background with Decoart fluid acrylics. and then stamped a few stamps from Art by Marlene over the background. A few of them I whited out the centres with Jane Davenport’s paint over pen in white. The sentiment, stamped and embossed in gold is also from the stamp set. I coloured my bug with Faber Castell Watercolours.

I fussy cut him out and stuck him down. He does stand out better than my photograph shows, but I think he might have looked better raised up from the background a little.

I am entering this into:-

2 Crafty Critter Crazies – #29 Anything Goes
A Inky Mess – #33 Anything Goes
Art Journal Journey – Anything With Eyes
Cardz for Galz – #103 Wings
Creative Artiste – #52 Anything Mixed Media Goes
Dragonfly Dreams – No Patterned Paper
Pearly Sparkles – Something Beginning with ‘B’ (Bug)
Scribbles Designs – #80 Include a Sentiment
Stampin’ Sensations – Aug: Things With Wings

DV #206 Christmas In July

Welcome to our Christmas in July challenge at Dream Valley.

It seems so ironic to be posting a picture of snowy hills and snowflakes when we are melting here in the UK.

Anyhow my card was made with a Stamps by Chloe stamp which I stamped and embossed in silver. I also stamped the tree portion again and then painted and fussy cut them out to decoupage on top of the original stamped image. I added crystal glitter to the hills for snow, and then stamped several different snowflakes on heat embossable acetate and embossed them with white embossing powder. I added some reg glitter to the stars atop the trees and matted the whole thing onto a lovely green metallic card, before adding to an 8” scalloped base.

I am entering this into:-

12 Months of Christmas Link Up – #55
A2Z Scrapbooking – July: Sparkle and Shine
CCC Digi Creations – #105 Christmas In July
Crafting By Design – Get Ready For Christmas
Crafty Hazelnut’s Christmas Challenge – #448 Anything Christmas
Cute n’ Crafty Christmas – #16 Christmas
Lost Coast Designs – #80 Christmas In July
My Time To Craft – #402 Christmas In July
Shopping Our Stash – #400 Christmas in July
Sweet Stampin’ Christmas – July: Anything Goes
Tales From the Craft Room – #6 Christmas In July

CCM # Here Comes Summer

Our challenge today at Crafty Cardmakers is Here Comes Summer. The team will be taking a well earned Summer break after this challenge and we won’t be back until 19th August. I have chosen this camper van for my 'Summer' card because as soon as I saw it I was reminded of the Cliff Richard song of my youth, 'Summer Holiday'. That song, more than any other I think, captures the feeling of my youth and the long school holidays and our family trips to Cornwall. Mind you, more often than not it rained on our holidays! My Dad’s workmates used to tease, ‘find out what week Ray is booking off and then choose the week before or the week after’!

So my image is from Pink Ink Designs, and I coloured it with my copics. I added glossy accents to the windshields, the headlights and the three hearts at the bottom on the bumper. The extra stamps were made with the flowers that come with the camper van stamp and three sentiments from Kay Carley via Paper Artsy, and stamped with Tonic Nuvo Inkpads.

The dies are from Sue Wilson.

I am entering this into:-

A Bit More Time to Craft – #96 Anything Goes
Crafts Galore Encore – #65 Anything Goes
Creative Craft Cottage – #120 Summer
Creative Knockouts – #306 Summer Fun
Die Cuttin’ Divas – #428 Summer or Tropical
DL Art Thankful Thursday – #245 Summer
Love to Craft – #36 July: Anything Goes
Love To Scrap – #123 Anything Goes
Moo-Mania and More – #195 Summer Holidays
Not Just Cards – July: Anything Goes
Scribbles Designs – #79 A Slice of Summer
Sognando Scrap – #69 Summer
Sweet Stampers – #34 Summer

CCM #237 Dies or Punches

Thank you for joining us at Crafty Cardmakers in our last challenge. Today we have a nice easy challenge of Dies or Punches. I am sure you, like me, have an obscene amount of dies to choose from. In fact a challenge like this makes you look at them again and dig out the ones you had forgotten all about.I had a great deal of fun with this one. The picture above is a little dark, the one below is better for the actual colours, but the above one does seem to pick out the diecuts so much better and after all the challenge is about dies.

My background is a lovely design from Wild Rose Studio’s Blackberry Lane Collection. The circle in the centre formed from the floral corners was perfect to layer my first die into. I used Heartfelt Creations Frame A Card Leafy Borders die. There is a lovely doily corner in the set and I made two semi circles with it by flipping it round and in effect cutting it four time. I wasn’t confident enough to try and get the circle by lining it up four times, so did it in two halves.

I used another sheet of the Blackberry Lane paper to create the paler pink central circle and the diecut above that is from Jeanine’s Art and is called Doily. The flowers and the birthday sentiment are hot foil stamps. One is from Couture Creations, Arizona Poppy and the sentiment is a Spellbinders Glimmer die from the Elegant Occasions Sentiments and comes with the die that cuts out the sentiment after it has been foiled. The centres of the flowers were decorated with pink Prills.

I created the very back pink layer by scanning in the central pink paper and picking out the pink colour with the graphic program’s colour picker and then I just printed a plain layer to pop behind the decorated layer.

I am entering this into:-

A Place to Start – July: Anything goes
Artistic Inspirations – #216 Anything Goes
Aud Sentiments – #230 Anything Goes With a Sentiment
Corrosive Challenge – #6 June: Anything Goes
Creative Fingers Challenge – #167 Anything Goes
Creative Moments – #171 Anything Goes
Cute Card Thursday – #588 Birthdays
Die Cuttin’ Divas – #426 Happy Birthday to You
Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – #1926 Anything Goes
QKR Stampede – #354 Anything Goes
Through the Craftroom Door – Anything Goes