Christmas snowflakes ....

..... Good morning everyone!  Can you believe that it's the last Saturday in September?  And that means it's time for our technique challenge at 52 {Christmas} Card Throwdown.  Ruth has picked a favourite technique of mine - emboss resist (if you've not played with technique before here's a link to Splitcoaststampers tutorial).   Here's my card:

Stamps: Stampin' Up! - Festive Flurry, Christmas Message, Sassy Salutations
Inks: Versamark; Brilliance - Lightening Black; SU - Pistachio Pudding
Dies: SU/Sizzix - Framelits Apothecary Accents
Accessories: My Mind's Eye DP - Snowed In; Gold Card; White Lustre Card; Clear Embossing Powder; SU - Paper Piercing Essentials

I started by picking a sheet of design paper that was light and had a subtle pattern and cutting it to size.  I rubbed an anti-static pad all over the paper.  I inked the snowflakes with Versamark and stamped onto the paper, added clear embossing powder and then heat embossed.  Next I rubbed pigment ink all over the paper, allowed it to dry and then took a soft tissue paper and rubbed the ink off the embossed images!  I just love the way the snowflakes pop up!  As you see from the photo above - the ink is not totally opaque and a subtle image shows through.  The colour I used has a really pretty gold shimmer to it, so I mounted the finished paper onto gold card.  The sentiment was stamped in the same pigment ink and heat embossed, die cut and then paper pierced.  I cut the same shape in gold, split it in half and backed the sentiment, which I attached with dimensional tape.  For the inside I cut another gold mat and a panel of white card onto which I stamped a snowflake and greeting.

Do check out the inspiration cards from the rest of the team - as always, they are just awesome!  That's all for now.  Have a good weekend.

Back in black .....

..... Good morning all - I hope you all had a super weekend.  It's been just glorious here in Northville - wall to wall blue skies, bright sunshine and hot!!  In my Saturday post I mentioned that I was attending a craft class at Stampeddler (my local shop).  The class was called "Molten Magic with Metallic FX" and it was taught by Lynell Harlow - owner and designer of Dreamweaver Stencils.

I have used Dreamweaver stencils with their embossing paste before, but I have to admit that I've not been entirely successful.  So having a class with the Lynell was an opportunity I couldn't miss.  Lynell demonstrated the application technique used with the embossing paste and then showed us how using a heat gun to speed up drying affected the powders and paste.  It was like magic and really did look like molten magic.

One of the pieces we made used black card as the base and this beautiful daisy pattern stencil.  This week's challenge at CAS-ual Fridays - CFC62 is to make a clean and simple design with a black card base.  I'm so pleased that I've been able to use some of the pieces made in my class - I actually made two cards, here's the first.

Stamps:  Hobby Art - Happy Birthday GR1853C
Inks: Versamark
Stencil: Dreamweaver - Daisy Background LX7014 (provided at the class)
Accessories:  Metallic FX mica powders (provided at the class); Gold card, Gold embossing powder and card from stash

The daisy stencil is very large and I cut it down and mounted it onto some gold card to make my card.  The finished image has a lovely texture and really pretty shimmer.  I decided to add a simple sentiment which I stamped in Versamark and then embossed with gold powder.  Clean, simple and, I think, elegant.

Below is a close up picture of the finished image - you can see the lovely bubbly texture that you get when you heat up the paste.  And here's a picture of Lynell demonstrating and finally, the graphic for this week's challenge.

That's all for now.  Kathryn starts her Summer Theatre Day Camp today at The Marquis Theatre in Northville.  The camp runs for two weeks and she has very full days starting at 8.30am and finishing at 3.00pm.  They do singing, dancing, acting, improvisation, games, stage movement, and get to put on a show for family at friends at the end of the two weeks.  Kathryn is really looking forward to it.  I'll be back later today with the other card that I made from the daisy stencil.  See you soon.

Red and white, V2 ....

.... hi all, it's been a busy day.  I took Jonathan to the airport this morning and he is now en route to Detroit.  His plane is scheduled to land in Detroit at 16.50 hrs (US time) that's 9.50pm our time.  Once Jonathan clears customs and immigration he has to pick up his hire car - to say that he wasn't keen on driving on the right-hand side would be an understatement.  Still, he's done it before, so it will come back to him.  I don't think we're going to get chance to talk until Wednesday - Jonathan has to get a new power lead for his PC!!!

And this afternoon I've been carving a pumpkin!  I should have done it yesterday, but was getting Jonathan's stuff ready for packing.  Kathryn picked a nice easy design and I've managed to get it carved out okay!  It's not brilliant, but it's not too bad.  At the moment, Kathryn and her friends are all in fancy dress and are out "Trick or Treating" - there's a group of seven of them!!  Fortunately I have a good supply of sweets on hand!

But I did manage to get a bit of time in my craft room after Kathryn left - and I've done another card for One Layer Wednesday - OLW70, which is being hosted by Susan at Simplicity.  Susan wants us to make a clean and simple card using only red and white or red and cream.  I made a white and red card for this challenge last Friday - here!!  And this weekend I realised that I wanted to make the negative - so this time I've gone for a red and white card - a red card base and white embossing - the layout and stamps are exactly the same.

Stamps: Waltzingmouse - Nordic Winter
Inks:  Versamark
Accessories: Detail white embossing powder and card from stash

I really like the card white on red - it's really bold and bright.  And best of all, the sentiment is straight!!

That's all for now.  I plan of playing in my craft room this evening, so I will have a card, or two, to share tomorrow!  See you then.

Come Waltz with me ...

.... it's the first one of 2011 and has such a lovely theme - Love/Valentine.  I've really been looking forward to seeing everyone's cards.

For this Waltz I've made my husband's Valentine card.  There are several things that Jonathan really enjoys - his family, his photography and his music.  So I decided to incorporate Jonathan's love of music into the Valentine card.  And I have just the right stamps to do that - the wonderful WMS Musical Backgrounds. 

I've combined several challenges in this card.  I used the layout - SFYTTJan, from I love 2 Stamp (see below) and I decided to go monochrome for the colour - which is this week's challenge at Just Add Ink - JAI51.  As one of my favourite colours is blue, that's the theme I chose for the JAI51 part of the challenge.

The sketch layout is for a square card, which is fortunate as this is a large 8" x 8" card.  I stamped two borders using the piano keys and mounted them to the blue base card.  Sort of like ribbon.  The card was originally white, but I used the direct to paper technique to add colour (summer sky).  I used some lovely Coredinations card for the layers - the mid-blue has a shimmer finish and the embossed layer has a whitewash finish - which I rubbed after it was embossed.  The long panel was stamped with the sheet music stamp.  The stamped heart is mounted onto some blue silk mirri - both cut using the Spellbinders heart dies.  The stamped heart image is also embossed with Stampendous Kaleidoscope embossing powder.  In real-life it has a lovely shimmer.  Finally, I added the little heart lock and key from the Little Box Labels set.  I've added a subtle shimmer (too subtle to see on the photo) all over the card using pearlescent chalks.

Stamps:  Waltzingmouse - Little Box Labels, Musical Backgrounds, Seasons of Love
Inks: Versamark; Memento - Summer Sky, Paris Dusk
Cuttlebug: D'vine Swirls folder
Chalks:  Pebbles Inc - Pearlescent chalks - shimmer
Paper/Card:  Papermania 8" x 8" card; Cordinations - Gemstones, Whitewash, Plain card

I really enjoyed making this card and hope that Jonathan likes it as much as I do.  Now, note to self - put it somewhere safe, but somewhere you can find it later!!

Finally, some of you may know that my daughter, Kathryn (9), has decided to start her blog to share her crafting.  Well, she set that up today and desparately wanted to join this Waltz.  She hasn't used WM stamps for her card (I wasn't too happy about her borrowing MY stamps) - but she will for the next one.

Versamark ink is ....

... oh so versatile.  I've had it in my craftroom for ages, but I mostly use it simply for embossing.  Last week's lesson in Rubber Stamping: Back to Basics course that I'm doing on MCC - My Creative Craftroom - covered just how useful Versamark ink is.  I've already shown some of my early attempts at brayering - not the best!!  However, today at craft class I decided to have a go at a resist technique.

It's easy peasy!!  But the catch is having good quality gloss card - which I didn't use in my early attempts - and makes a huge difference.  So I used some of my Stampin' Up! images, inked with Versamark and then brayered using Kaleidacolor inks.  I am delighed with both backgrounds, and I will post the completed cards once they are done.  In the meantime, this is what they are like now:

Now I know I've used the next technique before, but it's so simple and I'd sort of forgotten about it.  Simply using Versamark on a stamp, and stamping onto a pastel (or not too dark) card.  The image left is a tone darker then the starting card.  Easy!!  And effective.  Again, both these cards are works in progress, and I'll post the finished cards later this week.

 

That's all for today - I've got loads of house stuff - washing, ironing, etc to do, as well as finishing my OU assignment.  I've done some - but keep putting it off in favour of crafting :)))  That's so much more fun.  Anyway, I'll be back again soon.  Thanks for reading.