C24C - Red, Gold and Green ....

Morning!! Well, January went fast 😁 I'm here today with my card for our new challenge at Christmas 24 Challenge - C24C#27. We've gone for a very traditional feel for this challenge. Your Christmas creations must use RED/GREEN AND GOLD. Here's my card:

Stamps: MFT - Bitty Holiday Wishes; Elusive Stamps - Christmas Ornament (now discontinued)

Inks: Versafine - Onyx Black; Memento - New Sprout; Versafine Clair - Nocturne

Dies: MFT - Circle Stax Set 1 #8, Circle Stax Set 2 #0; Lil Inkers - Stitched Squares #6

Accessories: White Card; White Hammered Card; Gold Satin Mirri Card; Clear Embossing Powder; Copic Markers; Nuvo - Midas Aquashimmer Brush; Sakura Metallic Gold Pen

I'm submitting this card to the Holly & Ivy Christmas Challenge - H&ICC#86, where it's Anything Christmas Goes.

I've been going through my stamp stash and came across some lovely (but discontinued stamps) from Elusive Stamps. I used my MISTI to stamp the image onto white card. I removed it from the MISTI, coloured selected areas with red and green Copic markers, returned it to the MISTI and restamped with Versafine black ink. I heat embossed the image with clear powder and cut it out with a circle die. I used a metallic gold pen to colour the lines. I then cut a gold circle slightly bigger than the ornament and layered them together. I stamped the ornament hanger, embossed it, fussy cut and coloured with the gold metallic pen. I cut a panel of white hammered card with a square stitched die, adhered the bauble and added to the front of a 6" square card. I stamped a simple greeting along the bottom of the card. To finish the front, I added gold shimmer to the white areas of the ornament. Sadly, you can't really see it in the photo, but it's so pretty in real-life!!

On the inside of the card, I cut a mat layer of the white hammered card. On the plain white card I stamped a Christmas greeting and stamped a smaller version of the big ornament in pale green. I made another card using these colours and a fun flower Christmas tree stamp:

Stamps: Elusive Stamps - Christmas Tree (now discontinued)

Inks: Versafine - Onyx Black; Memento - New Sprout, Angel Pink, Bamboo Leaves; Versafine Clair - Nocturne

Accessories: White Card; Clear Embossing Powder; Copic Markers; Sakura Metallic Gold Pen

I'm submitting this card to Addicted to Stamps and More - ATSM#397 where the theme is Christmas.

Using the same technique as I did for the bauble I stamped the tree, coloured the image with Copic markers and a gold metallic pen, restamped and heat embossed it. I then carefully fussy cut it out. I stamped a simple sentiment on the card, added some very non-traditional snowflakes in pale green and soft pink and adhered the finished flower Christmas tree. On the inside, I simply stamped a Christmas greeting and added a tiny green tree.

I love the traditional Christmas colours with the clean and simple look of both these cards. Don't forget to visit our Christmas 24 Challenge blog to see more inspiration from the rest of the design team. That's all from me for now. See you again soon.

The holly and the ivy ....

... Chrissie and Mandi have come up with a fabulous challenge for this week's Less is More theme - LIM46.  They want us to use the theme of music - musical instruments, manuscripts or simply base your card on a song title.  I've done both!

In my stash I have some lovely stamps from Elusive Images that have only seen ink a few times, but they are perfect for this theme.  Some holly, some ivy - the carol is one of my favourites - The Holly and the Ivy.

I stamped the image onto plain paper and heat embossed with clear powder, this gives an image that's really easy to paint.  I used Label 8 to cut out the image and then painted the holly, ivy, berries and ribbon with Twinkling H2Os - they have a fabulous shimmer, which is actually visible in this picture!  To get the red mat I put the die I used to cut out the image onto some red mirri card, taped it in place and then used my scalpel to cut around the outside of the die - giving a mat that is just a bit bigger than the image.  I stamped the line of sheet music onto white card, embossed it and then layered it onto some more red mirri.  Finally, I added the sentiment - positioning it with my trusty stamp-a-ma-jig!

Stamps:  Elusive Images - The Holly and Ivy; Waltzingmouse - Musical Backgrounds
Inks:  Versafine - Onyx Black
Spellbinders:  Labels Eight (S5-019) #3
Accessories:  Twinkling H2Os; Clear embossing powder, Red mirri and card from stash

Jonathan's home!!!  Yippee!!!  Our journey to the airport was a bit hairy!  It was dry when we left the house, but it started to hail by the time we got to the M56 and visibility wasn't good.  I slowed down and kept my distance, but there were several accidents on the motorway.  At the airport I turned up at the wrong terminal - silly me.  To be fair, it was the right terminal when Kathryn and I arrived home two weeks ago, but KLM switched terminals last week - and I hadn't checked.  Our journey home wasn't much better - it was still hailing like mad and one of the accidents (on the other side) caused the motorway to be closed for several hours.  I don't know what caused the accident, but some people don't put on their headlights or slow down - and I don't understand that!

Jonathan's had a nap this afternoon, but he's got absolutely no idea what time of day it is :)  I know that feeling :)  Still, that's all for now - I'm off to watch the final of Strictly Come Dancing - I've got no idea who's going to win this year, but I'd sort of like Chelsea to win.  Kathryn wants Aliona (Matt) to win!!  See you all tomorrow.

Indian inspiration .....

.... I finally got into my craft room - somewhat later than planned, but I've had fun!  I've made my card for this week's Less is More challenge - White on White - but I'm going to post that tomorrow.  I need daylight to try and get a good photo.  So you'll have to wait and see :))

In the meantime I've made a card which has been inspired by my recent trip to Mumbai.  One of the things that we constantly saw while we walked around the city, were stalls selling flowers - marigolds to be precise.  These were made to be placed on shrines and as good luck symbols on shops and homes. 

One of the many stalls selling marigold garlands - so beautiful!!

 I decided to use the marigolds as the focus for my card.  I bought some stunning handmade paper while in Mumbai - bright turquoise covered with gold Hindi writing and I used a piece of it as the base layer of my card (I still have lots left to play with).  For the main image I stamped a pretty flower stamp that I got from Elusive Images ages ago.  I stamped in Versamark and heat embossed with gold detail powder.  I coloured the image with distress inks and an aqua painter.  And I finished off the card with a simple greeting as I'm sending this to one of my friends.

Stamps:  Elusive Image - Flower Stamp
Inks: Versamark; Distress - Mustard Seed, Spiced Marmalade, Dried Marigold, Scattered Straw
Accessories:  Card from stash; Handmade paper from Mumbai; Greeting from Craftwork Cards

These colours are almost exactly the colours for last week's Colour Q challenge - but sadly I've missed the deadline for that challenge.


Craft class today was lots of fun - I spent most of the morning chatting and catching up on all the gossip!!  Actually, I didn't to much crafting!!  But I did get to see what the rest of the girls have been up to - and they made some fantastic cards.  Barbara, brought all her birthday cards into the group to share them with us - we made some stunning cards!!   Betty has completed her cross-stitch picture of Menai Bridge which joins North Wales to Anglesey - it's absolutely superb.  And it reminds me that I started a cross-stitch picture of a dragon on a castle about four years ago, and it's in the bottom of my sewing basket.  I think I need to finish it!!

We had a lot more rain today and now that my garden is looking really green and lush, I'd like it to stop!!  I did managed to get some washing dry between down pours!!  I want the sun to come out again. 

That's all for today.  But do pop back tomorrow as I have my LIM card to share with you.  See you soon.

Bleached flowers ....

... just a very quick post to share another flower card with you - it's for our challenge at St Luke's Charity Card Challenge - where the theme is to "say it with flowers".

The flower panel was made quite a while ago and has been waiting for the right card - this is it!!  I stamped and embossed the flowers.  I then painted some of the flowers with bleach, which causes the pigment in the paper to fade out.  The amount of fading depends on how often you paint over the flower.  So I've made some flowers quite pale and some not so much!  I mounted the flowers on to some rainbow vellum.  Simple!

Stamp:  Elusive Images - Flowers
Accessories:  Rainbow vellum and card from stash; Martha Stewart punches

 Do join in with the challenge - it's for a good cause!

OLW38 - Spring tree ...

... the challenge set by Jennifer over at Styles Ink for this week's OLW is to use a sketch.  Now, normally I don't have a problem with a sketch, but I think it's that we still had to have just one layer!!  That was a real challenge for me.

Anyway, I spent some time in my craft room yesterday afternoon and came up with my Spring Tree card - actually I'm quite pleased with it.  I did flip the sketch - it worked better for me with the tree on the left!

I used my favourite bare tree stamp from Elusive Images, only this time I was able to add some leaves and flowers!!  To make the sun I made a stencil with my Spellbinders inverted scalloped circles - it gave the sun little points!  Finally, I added a very simple greeting.

Stamps:  Elusive Images - Trees;  Greeting - don't know the company who made this one (any idea?)
Inks:  Memento - Rich Cocoa, Cottage Ivy, Pear Tart, Bamboo Leaves, New Sprout, Lulu Lavender, Lilac Posies;  Distress - Mustard Seed, Dried Marigold
Pens:  Marvy le Plume - Black, Scarlet
Spellbinders:  Lg Classic Inverted Scalloped Circles (S4-194) die #2

That's all for now.  I'll be back later with a few more challenges to show you.

A different technique ...

... is what I used on my card for the challenge set by Brenda Dean at Clean & Simple Sunday Challenge.  Brenda's is a sketch challenge - and I like these as sometimes my brain just won't come up with ideas on its own!

My card is really quite simple.  I stamped my image in Versamark and then chalked it - the result if a soft and subtle rose.  I cut it out using my trusty Spellbinders dies, using the plain mega rectangles for the image and the scalloped mega rectangles for the mount.  The mount was actually white card, but I inked the edges with distress inks in a soft pink.  I added a lovely flower from my stash, to which I added a little ink.

Stamps: Elusive Images - Roses
Inks: Versamark; Memento - Rose Bud
Spellbinders: Mega Rectangles - Plain and scalloped
Accessories: Petaloo rose, peel off sticker and card from my stash

And that's it for tonight.  I've had great fun this evening playing in my craft room.  I think the girls have been enjoying their "sleep over" too!!  Jonathan has just removed various electronic games from their bedroom and told them to go to sleep!!  Yes, right!  Like that's going to happen soon.  Hopefully, though, they will get to sleep.

OLW 36 ...

... Jennifer of Styles Ink is hosting this week's OLW challenge.  It's a super challenge - Jennifer wants us to make a one layer card "using a bare tree, or bare vegetation of some kind – that means no leaves, no needles, no buds, no flowers.  You can use as many images/sentiments/colours as you like, but you must use one plant image that is “bare”.  As soon as I read the requirements I knew exactly what my card would look like.

I made a stencil using the largest die in the Spellbinders Labels 14 set and sponged  in the background sky and ground.  Then I found my wonderful, and much neglected, bare tree stamps designed by Glenda Waterworth.  Finally, I added the senitment.  Easy-peasy.  And I'm absolutely deligthed with the card.

Stamps:  Elusive Images - Bare Trees; Creative Expressions - Time
Inks: Distress - Shabby Shutters, Bundled Sage, Tumbled Glass, Stormy Sky, Pumice Stone; Versafine - Black Onyx
Spellbinders:  Labels 14 (S5-22) die # 6

OLW32 - ages, part 2 ...

... I've had another go at my niece's 10th birthday card.  I like the one I made earlier, but it is a bit small and subtle.  I think that when you go into double figures you need to be loud and proud about it.  So I had a bit of a think and came up with another age card for this week's OLW challenge of ages being hosted by Jennifer at Styles Ink.

Stamps:  Elusive Images - Big Flowers;  Hobby Art - Happy Birthday
Inks:  Memento - Rose Bud; Distress - Worn Lipstick, Spun Sugar
Pens:  Promarkers - various
Accessories:  Ribbon from stash

This time the card is anything but subtle!!!  It's A5 in size.  I found some number templates which I over stamped with these wonderful flowers, designed by Glenda Waterworth, and coloured the flowers with Promarkers.  I found these lovely ribbons in my ribbon box and they matched the colour of the flowers.  I added some interest to the card by inking the edges with Worn Lipstick and Spun Sugar.  Finally, using my stamp-a-ma-jig (Stampin' Up!) I positioned the birthday greeting.  Result - really pleased with this card.  I think it's suitably big and bright for a 10th birthday!

I know I went into my craft room to make Christmas cards, but this idea wouldn't budge - so I had to make it.  Christmas cards tomorrow!!!

It's snowing ...

.... really, it's snowing!!  Not very heavy, or very big flakes, but lots of pretty little flakes.  However, the net result is the ground has gone a lovely white colour.  This is not right - I don't like it snowing - but I'm sounding all happy about it!!  I'm nuts!!  Seriously, it looks very pretty, but I don't like it once it turns to slush - and that won't be long as the snow's not heavy enough to settle (yet).

I'd like to say Hi to Becky - a new follower - I only just realised that the number had gone up.  So glad you joined me.

The school fair yesterday evening was very busy - and I sold ALL the cakes!!  But not so many cards.  I think I'm going to have to diversify and do some more smaller gifts - would love to know what works for everyone else!

And here are a couple more of the cards I made yesterday - again I'm only posting the briefest of descriptions about supplies (sorry!).

Card 3" x 3" - Image from Microsoft, Greeting Stampin' Up

Card - A6, Image - Pink Petticoat, Stamp - Waltzingmouse

Stamps - swirls (Elusive Images), can't remember where I got the greeting

Both image and greeting are from sheets that I bought - but I can't remember which company.

That's all for now - the snow has stopped!!  Told you it wouldn't last long.  I'm now off to start the Christmas shopping with Jonathan.  Back later.

OLW26 - Black, white ...

... and red all over!!  Those are the instructions for this week's One Layer Wednesday challenge, set by Jennifer over at Styles Ink.  I seem to remember that as one of the few jokes I could ever remember - the answer being a newspaper!!!  However, I knew just what I was going to do for this challenge.  A nice simple Christmas bauble and some lovely red holly berries.

Stamps:  Creative Expression - Holly; Elusive Images - Kelmscott Baubles; Stampin' Up! - Contempo Christmas
Inks: Memento - Tuxedo Black; Distress - Barndoor

I'm not entirely happy with the result; the bauble is too high up because I stamped too much of the holly border, but it's okay and I know what to do to make it better.  I also think that next time I do this card, I'm going to use smooth card and possibly use black tinsel embossing powder to make the bauble sparkle.  After all it's a Christmas card - and there really should be bling!!!

That's all for now.  I'm off to collect Kathryn - she's been out at a Halloween Party in our local community centre.  It was hopping when I left and I'm sure the children will all be on a sugar rush - but I'll bet they had fun.

A dull start ...

... to the day.  I'm sure the weatherman on TV last night said that it'd be a nice day!!  Well, there's time yet.  This is going to be a quick post as I've got to get ready for our Scout adventure this evening.  We're taking them out to a local castle to do some cooking.  So I'm really, really hoping that the weatherman was right.  I don't fancy rain!!

For a change I'm showing you a card that I made just because I could.  This was the first time I tried out the bleaching technique.  The image is by Glenda Waterworth - Elusive Images - the set is called Texture Blocks.  It's a set of six stamps with some really lovely images. 

I stamped the image, using Versamark and silver embossing powder, onto some green card from my stash.  Next I dipped my paint brush into some bleach - boy did it smell - and applied carefully.  I was amazed as the bleach dried to watch the colour fade from the card.  As it was my first attempt - I kept the bleaching to a minimum, but was really pleased with the effect. 

I am pleased to say that the card was sold earlier this year in a fund raising event for our Scout Group. 

That's all for today - I think I'd better try and do some housework, otherwise we're going to end up living in a pit!!  :) 

Christmas preparations ....

... I think it's time I started mine.  I've seen some wonderful Christmas cards on Splitcoaststampers and Docrafts Gallery - there are so many talented people about.  And I'm only just starting to think about my cards. 

Our family and friends are spread about the UK, consequently, I have to make quite a lot of cards - normally in excess of 150!!  I usually end up helping the children too.  I also try to make some to sell at the school and/or Scout fete.  So I think I'd better get started.  To be fair, I do have some lovely Nutcracker stamps that will be perfect for a series of 10 cards.  And I know that I'm going to be using some Christmas tree and holly stamps.  I hope to get some new sets from Stampin' Up! after my party on Saturday - so I may be using some baubles too.  Below are some of the cards I made in 2008 featuring the Elusive Images Christmas Trees and Holly spray.

I did a series of eight black and white cards featuring various Christmas trees.   I did half of them with black trees on a white background and the other half with white trees on a black background.  I was very pleased with the way these turned out.  And they were popular at the school fair too - I sold most of them and had to make some more. 

For this series of eight cards, I did red,black and white.  I used the same stamps, with half the set stamped red trees on a white background and the other half red trees on a black background.  While the red trees on a black background looked great in reallife, they didn't photograph very well.  But below is one of the red trees on white - which worked really well and looked really luxurious.

I find that holly leaves tend to feature heavily on my Christmas cards - and in the Christmas trees set from Elusive Images was a beautiful holly spray which worked really well.

So these are cards from Christmas Past.  Now I need to concentrate on Christmas Future.  At craft class this morning I was playing with my Nutcracker stamps and working out different colour schemes - hopefully, I'll post some pictures later this week.  To be honest, I didn't get much done this morning as it was our first meeting since July and we all had so much catching up to do.  Swapping stories of summer holidays and showing off our new goodies :))

I'll say good night now, as I must get back to my astronomy course.  I find that making cards is a great way to avoid working on my assignment - but it's due in on 28th October so I really must get down to some serious work.  See you tomorrow.