Come - waltz with me ....

... it's hard to believe that it's already 17th August and time for our monthly Blog Waltz with Waltzingmouse Stamps.  The theme this month is tea and coffee for full details about joining in with the fun click here.

One of my jobs, when I was girl, was to make my father his morning cup of tea.  It had to be very strong, very hot and sweet.  I used to think that the spoon would melt - it was so strong.  And I hated it.  As a consequence I started drinking coffee.  I try to keep to about 5 cups a day, and yes I know that it's probably too much, but it tastes soooo good!!   I've made two cards for the Waltz - one has a tea theme and the other has a coffee theme.  Seems appropriate!! :)

I'll start with my tea themed card for which I've used the sketch from this week's Waltzingmouse Sketch Challenge - WMSC60.

I've used a light cream slightly pearl card as the base.  I started off by added a little colour to the card base with my distress inks.  Then I randomly stamped outline teacups, tiny solid teacups and little teabags all over the card.  I used Spellbinders Labels 20 to make the trim at the top of the card, adding some colour with distress inks.  I stamped the little teapot and cups from the Afternoon Tea label image onto some scrap card and fussy cut them out, and attached to the trim.  I decided that the focal point of this card would be the lovely quote by Eleanor Roosevelt - which is so true.  I used Spellbinders Labels 4 to cut out the quote and make a sparkly mat.  I had a tiny bit of this lovely cream crochet lace in my stash so I added that to the card and then attached the label.  I'm really pleased how well this turned out!

Stamps: Waltzingmouse - Afternoon Tea, Afternoon Tea Sentiments
Inks: Distress - Dried Marigold, Spiced Marmalade, Wild Honey, Rusty Hinge, Tea Dye
Spellbinders: Labels 4 (S4-190) #4, Labels 4 Sm (S4-309) #5, Labels 20 (S5-026) #4
Accessories: Card, glitter card and lace from stash

My second card has a coffee theme. Sadly Claire hasn't made a coffee theme stamp set - yet!! Claire - what do you think? :) So I've mixed a coffee themed set that I got recently with Asian Gardens. I've gone for quite a clean and simple look. I stamped the border stamp along the side and bottom of the card making a frame. I stamped the coffee cup and sentiment onto some white card and heat embossed them with clear powder to give a nice shine to the images. I used my nesties to cut out the images and to make various layer. Finally, I stamped the little sakura blossoms in two sizes and cut them out, added them to the corner of the card. The colour theme might be a bit familiar - it's sort of based on Costa Coffee!

Stamps: Waltzingmouse - Asian Gardens; Impression Obsession - Smell the Coffee
Inks:  Stampin' Up! - Early Espresso, Cherry Cobbler; Versamark
Spellbinders: Long Rectangles Lg (S4-142) #3, Long Rectangles Sm (S4-144) #3, Standard Circles Lg (S4-114) #3, Standard Circles Sm (S4-116) #4, Pinking Circles Lg (S4-170) #3
Accessories:  Stampin' Up! card and card from stash

Before I go, I'd like to wish my friend Buffy a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY.  She's celebrating a special one today - you know, one of those that has a zero at the end!!  I made a special card for Buffy - here.

Now I'm off for a waltz - do join us - it's such fun!!