White Christmas

Hello everyone!  Today I am sharing a card I made using white on white.  I have seen some beautiful white on white cards over the last couple of weeks and felt inspired to try it (although I don't think mine is as good as some of the cards I've seen).

The bottom layer of my card is dry embossed using an embossing folder.  I then created the square in the centre by stamping the snowflakes in Versamark an embossing with a sparkly clear embossing powder (unfortunately this effect does not show up very well on the photo).  I then layered some die cut snowflakes, glittered the top layer with Stickles and added a gem in the centre.  I added some more die cut snowflakes in the corners and around the edges of the card, which I also glittered.

I would like to enter this card in the following challenges:

Inkspirational Challenges - word prompt: chill
Craft Rocket Challenges - white on white
Crafting with Dragonflies - white on white
A Snowflake's Promise - anything goes
Unicorn Challenge Blog - snow/snowflakes

Christmas Pud

Hello everyone!  Today I am sharing a card I made using a very cute Bebunny stamp by Crafter's Companion.

I coloured the stamped image with Polychromos pencils and carefully cut it out.  I then die cut a circle and rubbed some gold gilding wax around the edges.  I layered my stamped image onto the circle and then created some background layering using patterned papers and a paper doily.  The papers are from the Jingle all the Way pade by First Edition.

The holly in the corners is also stamped and coloured with Polychromos pencils. I stamped the sentiment onto a die cut circle and added the gingham bow.  The ribbon is a really good match for the papers, which surprised me, as I never seem to have one that's just right!  As a finishing touch, I added some Glossy Accents to the holly berries, both on my main image and on the holly in the corners.

White and Bright

I have been making a lot of Christmas Cards lately so yesterday I felt like having a bit of a change.  Since it rained all day here and was dull and miserable, I decided to create something bright and cheerful. 

I created the background using an embossing folder and layered a die cut trellis over the top.  The trellis die is one of the new Intricut dies by Hobbycraft, and as you can see it cuts really fine.  I think I will have to get some more of these!

To create the panel, I stamped my image with Versamark and heat embossed the stamped image using white embossing powder.  (This is a stamp by Crafty Individuals).  Then I used Cosmo Cricket Swatch Sticks over the top so that the embossed image created a resist effect.  I layered the panel over a ribbon and added a large ribbon bow. 

I die cut the flowers and tinted them a bit using Polychromos Pencils which I blended using a Promarker blender pen, and added some stick on pearls to the centres.

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Crafty Cats - Anything goes
Crafty Ribbons challenge - Flowers and pearls
Perfectly Created Chaos - Heat Embossing.

Cardz 4 Galz: Contemporary Christmas

The card I am sharing today is my DT card for this week's challenge at Cardz 4 Galz.  This week's theme is Contemporary Christmas.  Normally I make Christmas cards that are kind of contemporary but with a touch of traditional, but I wanted to make sure there was nothing traditional about this one.  I also wanted to make sure it was very feminine, since it is for Cardz 4 Galz, so I opted for soft pastel colours.

I started off with a white background which I embossed using a snowflake embossing folder and layered onto lilac card.  I then die cut the baubles from printed papers (these are Crafter's Companion papers that came with a recent edition of Crafts Beautiful magazine).  The die is by Spellbinders.

I layered the baubles onto turquoise card and attached ribbons to 'hang' them from.  I then attached the baubles to the background using foam pads and looped to ribbons over the top of the lilac card, fastening them on the back.  I stamped the 'Deck the Halls' sentiment using Brilliance ink, layered it onto lilac card and attached it at the corner, and finally I finished my card off with some turquoise chiffon ribbon and a handmade bow.

I look forward to seeing everyone's creations for this week's challenge!

Sian. xx

Make My Monday: Get Well

This is my DT card for this week's challenge at Make My Monday.  The theme for this challenge is "Get Well".  I've chosen to make my card using this stamp by Kanban, because I think it's really cute.  I've coloured it with Polychromos pencils.

The background papers are from the Mulberry Kisses pad by First Edition, and I've added some paper flowers.  The flowers were created using a Crafter's Companion flower die then I shaped them using an embossing tool and inked the edges.  Finally I added some stick on pearls for the centres.

It's taken me a while, but...

Well, I haven't had much time for crafting this weekend, so I thought I'd share some photos of what I've been doing instead.  Some of you will know that over the last 6 years I have been doing a degree in psychology.  This is why my blog has a big gap with no (or very few) posts.  I studied whilst working full time and looking after my two boys, a huge task which left me with very little time for anything else!  I am pleased so say that I have now finished.  I officially graduated at the end of July with First Class Honours, but my ceremony was not until Friday.

These are some of the unofficial photos. Friday was a very special day.

To anyone who is considering studying later in life, I woud say do it - it's never too late, but don't go into it thinking it will be easy.  I have had some very tough times over the last few years.  My eldest son, now 14, said to me recently "I'm definitely going to university when I finish school because I don't want to have to do it the way you've done it.  It's too hard."  I hope he follows through on that because he's right, but at the same time, if he

decides he's not ready at that time I can totally understand, and he won't get any pressure from me!

The Open University has been brilliant throughout.  I can't fault them and it's been a brilliant experience.  Now I just need to decide what to do next!

Christmas Snow

Today I am sharing a Christmas card that I made using this lovely Barkley stamp by Crafter's Companion.  I am not a dog person, but I love these stamps.  I coloured the image using Polychromos Pencils.

The background papers are from the Blissful Blizzard pad by Fancy Pants Designs.  I did something a bit different here by using circles for my background layering, and I'm quite pleased with how it turned out. 

I embellished my card with various different die cut snowflakes and glittered the snowflakes and parts of the stamped image using Stickles glitter glue.

I would like to enter this card in the following challenges:

Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge
Crafty Catz
Crafting from the Heart
Craft Your Passion
Get Creative Challenges

Christmas Post

I know it's still only October, but since most of my cards take around 2 hours to make (especially where colouring is involved), it's important to start early if I want all of my cards to be handmade.

This card was made using a Barkley stamp by Crafter's Companion, which I stamped onto a die cut circle.  I coloured it with Polychromos pencils (I am liking the pencils a lot more than the markers at the moment).  I hand stitched around the edges of the circle and layered it onto different sized snowflakes so that they stick out around the edges (I did this by drawing around the circle initially and sticking the snowflakes so that they partially overlapped the edges of the circle.   I layered this onto red card and patterned papers and added snowflakes, sparkly gems and pearls at the corners to finish it off.

It doesn't show up well in the picture, but I glittered all of the snowflakes, the snow on top of the post box and the falling snow in the stamped image.  I used Stickles glitter glue for this.  I like it much better than loose glitter because it's a lot less messy.  Whenever I use loose glitter I end up finding bits of it everywhere for weeks, including in my hair and stuck to my arms, legs and face! 

Cardz 4 Galz: Fantasy

This is my Design Team card for the current challenge at Cardz 4 Galz, which is fairytale/fantasy.

I created this card using some fairy house stamps I have by Lavinia Stamps.  I created the background to the main picture with distress inks and various bits of masking (the houses, the sun and hills).  I then spritzed it with some mica sprays to add some sparkle (although this doesn't show up well on the photo), and coloured the houses using pearly watercolours.  I also aded some white highlighting and glitter.  For the background I used patterned paper and heat embossed the corners with gold embossing powder.  To embellish I added paper flowers with button centres and die cut dragonflies.  The sentiment 'don't forget to fly' is from the Tim Holtz Ideology "small Talk" pad.

Happy Halloween

Well, I am still busy with painting and decorating, so even though I have the week off work I have not had much time to make anything.  We are doing the hall and stairs, so it's a bit of a mammoth task.  Five days in and I am finally beginning to stop aching! 

Anyway, I did get a bit of free time this afternoon.  This little lady has been sitting around on a corner of my desk fully coloured and waiting to be made into something for a few weeks now, and I looked at her today and decided she needed to be made into a Halloween card. 

The image is a digi stamp from the Ickyinks collection by Polkadoodles, and her name is Oddella.  I coloured her with Polychromos pencils.  The papers are from the Gorjuss collection by Santoro.  I added some ants and a spider, which are plastic Halloween toys.  The sentiment is printed, and I dripped on some Fired Brick Distress ink, which I think is a really good blood red colour.

I don't tend to make many Halloween cards.  However, my eleven yeard old son is a bit halloween obsessed, so we do tend to do other things - Halloween cupcakes, bat cookies, decorations and costumes complete with face paint (I LOVE doing face paint.  I'm always amazed at how different you can make someone look) - so I will try and find time next week to share some of our creations on here.

A Quick Christmas Card

I have been very busy over the last few days, decorating and doing the wrong kind of painting.  I am feeling my age, as I am aching everywhere, and this did not happen when I did painting and decorating when I was younger!

As you can imagine, this has not left me much time for making things, but I did manage to make this Christmas card.  The image I've used here is a freebie that I downloaded some time ago.  I have it credited to Kasjan's Scrapblogg, but I have no idea whether or not it is still available.  I coloured it using Polychromos pencils.

The background papers I used on this card are from the Jingle All the Way pad by First Edition.  Hopefully I will have more time to create (and more things to share) soon.

Make My Monday: I Put a Spell on You

I am very excited to announce that as from today I am a member of the design team for the Make My Monday craft challenge blog.  The Theme for this week's challenge is 'I Put a Spell on You' (Halloween), and this is my first DT card.

For someone who has a love of all things macabre, I have a distinct lack of halloweeny things in my craft stash, so I had to get creative for this one.

The image is a stamp by Sweet Pea Stamps, and I coloured her using Polychromos Pencils I carefully cut her out and layered her onto a circle of green card which I stamped with spiderwebs and stitched around the edge in black thread.  The pumpkin paper layered behind is paper that I've had since my very early days of crafting (too many years ago to mention)  It started out as plan white paper with orange pumpkins, but I thought it was boring so I inked it with distress inks in shades of orange and sprayed it with a gold mica spray.  The purple paper behind is from a lovely pad that I was fortunate to be able to pickup at Poundland (I doubt  they were on the shelves for very long), and I have also sprayed that with gold mica spray.  The sentiment is printed, and I inked the background with distress inks and sprayed it with water.  To finish it off, I added a plastic spider and some black lace along the bottom.

Sian.

Traditional Christmas

I have been creating Christmas cards again (well, it is only just over 2 months to go now).  This time I thought I would try something a bit different, using the stamp and poinsettia scoring boards that came with this month's Papercraft Inspirations magazine.  This is not my usual style at all, but I do enjoy going out of my confort zone from time to time.  I think it's turned out quite classy.

I stamped the sentiment onto a white die cut oval and coloured it with Polychromos pencils, then layered it onto a die cut scalloped oval.  I created the poinsettias using the scoring board, rubberd soem gold gilding wax over them and along the edges and layered them up.  I added some micro beads to the centres.  I then layered everything onto patterned paper, added a large gold bow and added somm glitter glue to the sentiment, finisihing it off with two little gold pearls at the corners.

Time Flies

I haven't been very productive over the last week, as I've had a nasty cold.  I have however managed a couple of cards this weekend, including this one which I've made for the current Cardz 4 Guyz challenge, Time Flies.

The image is a digi stamp by Bloobell Stamps called Steam Punk, and I thought he would be great for this challenge.  I colured him using Polychromos pencils.  I layered the image onto patterned paper and a strip of card which I embossed using an embossing folder.  The cogs are X-cut dies.

Cardz 4 Galz Challenge: Use at Least one Die

This is my DT card for this week's challenge at Cardz 4 Galz, which is to use at least one die.  As you can see I have used lots of dies to make this card!

I stamped the sentiment onto a die cut circle and used lots of die cut flowers around the circle and in the corners of the card.  I cut away half of the front of the card and embossed the remaining half using an embossing folder.  I added some matting and layering underneath (inside the card), which has the added advantage of adding some stability.  this means that even though I have cut away part of the front, the card still stands up.  I fininshed off the flowers with pearl centres.
  
I think this is the first time I have used a sentiment as the main focus on one of my cards!

I look forward to seeing everyone's entries for the challenge!

Make My Monday: Photo Inspiration

This week's challenge on Make my Monday is to make something inspired by the photo on the right.  I think the photo is stunningly beautiful, so couldn't resist having a go at this!

The picture below is my creation.  I created the background using distress inks in shades of orange, red and black, with a die cut circle masking the moon.  I then lightly inked over part of the moon to give it a bit more depth.  The cat is a Craft Stamper freebie from a while back, and I can't remember where I got the owl.  I was initally planning to stamp the branches, but I couldn't find a stamp in my stash that was right for this, so I painted them freehand using acrylic.  I added some highlighting to the branches once they were dry using a Sakura Stardust pen, so that it looks like the moonlight is reflecting off them.

The image is the main focal point, so I decided to keep the rest of the card simple so as not to detract from it.  I layered the image onto black and then white card, and embossed some light red card using an embossing folder to use for the main card background, then layered it onto black card on a white card blank.

I thought that the image looked rather halloweeny, which isn't really what I was looking for with this, but it fits with the time of year, so I'm happy.  I ddin't want it to be a halloween card though, so I added the inspirational quote "life doesn't have to be perfect to be wonderful", which is from the Tim Holtz Idea-ology Small Talk pad.  I think it makes the perfect finishing touch!

I hope you like my creation.

Sian.

Blossoms

Today I am sharing a card I have made using a beautiful digi stamp by Connie Fong Art.  I have coloured her using Polychromos pencils.  The background papers were from The Works - they seem to have quite a lot of nice papers at the moment, at really good prices.  The blossom dies that I have used to embellish this card are by Spellbinders.  The photo doesn't show it well, but I have added some glitter glue to the centres of the die cut blossoms and the flowers on the main image and have used some Glossy Accents on her eyes and mouth.

I hope you like it!

Sian.

Black Magic

I have made this card for the current Fantasy Stampers challenge, the theme of which is Black Magic.  The aim is to use black as the focal point of your work.  I would also like to enter it into the current Make My Monday challenge, which is no patterned paper.

I created both the background and the butterfly by stamping in Versamark ink on black card and brushing over with mica powders  I then matted and layered it onto purple card.  I used foam pads behind the square and the butterfly to give it some dimension, but I don't think this comes through well in the photo.  I wanted to keep this quite simple so as not to detract from the background so I added a bit of glitter to the butterfly, some purple gems and a large purple bow.  The sentiment, 'use your wings' is from the Tim Holtz Ideaology 'Small Talk' sticker pad, which has some lovely inspirational quotes.  The flower stamp used for the background is one that I've had for a long time, which came free with Craft Stamper Magazine.  I can't remember what brand the butterfly stamp is, but I do remember that I got it at the first ever craft show I went to, so it's quite old!

I always have difficulty photographing black cards and this one is no exception.  It's also a lot more shimmery in real life because again this is hard to capture in a photograph