More Bits & Pieces

You could have knocked me down with the proverbial feather when I found out that my entry into Crafty Individuals' May Challenge had been picked by Malcolm as one of the five winners! This was my winning project (also my DT sample for Stamping Sensations May Challenge). For details of how I made it, and more photos, see my earlier blog post here.

My  prize was a free stamp of my choice. I chose the beautiful Butterfly Trio Panel, which I have long admired but for some strange reason never got round to buying, so I was delighted to have the chance to add it to my collection.

The first thing I made with it was a thank you card for Jean and Malcolm.

I embossed it with copper embossing powder on to black card, diecut the corner of the card with a Sizzix/Tim Holtz die and matted it with a paper from Crafty Individuals' "Travels In Italy" background paper book. The girl image is from the Crafty Individuals A4 Glossy Sheet "Domino", mounted on to Spelbinders diecuts. The smaller diecut is also copper-embossed around the edge. Sentiment by Crafty Individuals (a freebie). Can you tell they're one of my favourite stamp companies?! Not only for their stamps, but also for all the other gorgeous bits and pieces they sell to go with them!

I am, though, still loving my Altenew stamps, particular the "Beautiful Day" set, which I have used again for a birthday card for a friend.

She asked me to put it on my blog and explain how I made it. Hmm! I think it was actually much easier to make than to describe the method! But I'll have a go!

1. Stamped the silhouette part of the flower twice and the leaf spray three times on to post-it notes and cut them out to use as masks.
2. Stamped the left hand flower (four-part stamping) and masked it.
3. Stamped the right hand flower and masked that too.
4. Stamped the leaves three times and masked them all.
5. Keeping all the masks in place, sponged the entire background with various colours of pigment inks.
6. Overstamped with the harlequin and text stamps (Cherry Pie), butterfly (Chocolate Baroque) and flower sprays (from the Altenew set). The harlequin stamp was only partially inked as I didn't want the hard edges to show.
7. Removed all masks.
8. Sighed with relief, as that's the point where you find out whether the design has worked!
9. Coloured the butterfly and added shading around it and the main flowers and leaves with pencil crayon to make them stand out a bit.
10.Sponged pigment ink around the edges of the picture to define them.
11. Mounted it on to a 6" x 6" blank card.
Phew! Definitely easier to do than to describe!

Since I wasn't able to get to the recent Stamp Magic show (see my previous post) I decided I was fully justified in cheering myself up by spending the petrol money I saved on new stamps! Thank goodness for mail order! Haven't had time to ink them up yet, but the school hols will be here in a couple of weeks so watch this space! Thanks for looking!

A New Challenge For A New Year!

Happy New Year, everyone! Are you ready for our first challenge of 2015 at Stamping Sensations? Our theme for January is

* * * * * DIES AND PUNCHES * * * * *

We'd like you to show us what you can do with your dies and/or punches, either one or the other, or a combination of both, it's up to you.

Our lovely sponsor this month is the ever popular Sizzix, who I'm sure need no introduction. They have kindly donated a fabulous selection of their dies and embossing folders. The lucky winner will also receive a bonus prize of some gorgeous ribbons from Crafty Ribbons.

For my card I have used both dies and punches.

The background paper is by Bo Bunny. On top of that I placed the white punched square (using both the border and corner punches from a punch around the page set by Martha Stewart), followed by the scalloped and plain circles (both cut with Spellbinders dies). I stamped the sentiment (from Hydrangea set by Inkylicious) and the branch and flower (from the Majestix Oriental Blossom set by Card-io) and finally added the butterfly (stamp by Hero Arts) which was cut out with the matching Sizzix Framelits die, coloured with Promarkers and affixed with foam pads. Here's a close up.

One of my crafting resolution for this year is to break out of my comfort zone and try new things, so for this card I've gone for a colour combo I wouldn't normally use. The jury is still out on whether I like it or not! Another resolution is only to buy crafty stuff that I really need, as opposed to want, and to get some of my existing stash used up instead. Hmm. Wonder how long I'll stick to that one! Of course, the definition of "need" is open to interpretation........!

Anyway, I hope one of your resolutions is to join in our challenge every month, and we can't wait to see all your lovely creations! If you should need any inspiration, hop over to the Challenge Blog where my talented teamies have all made excellent use of their dies and punches. Thanks for looking!

Fluttering by!

I'm really busy at the moment, but just nipping in for a quick post. I rather liked the sketch for the May challenge at The Craft's Meow, so I thought I'd use it for a birthday card for a friend.

This is the sketch. 

 

And here's my card.

I used Craftwork Cards background paper and small butterfly stamp, K & Co paper for the semicircles on the right, Hero Arts/Sizzix Framelits (stamps and dies) for the two larger butterflies, and a Craft's Meow frame and sentiment cut with a Nestie die, as were the semicircles.

I'm entering this card in the Craft's Meow May Sketch Challenge (my first ever entry in their challenges, but hopefully not my last!)

Brilliant Day!

Well, the day finally arrived, and Sally, Megan and I set off to Sir Stampalot for our eagerly anticipated Blog Girl Get-together. It was lovely to be able to put faces to names (and blogs!) and spend the whole day playing, although with all the talking and laughing going on, not to mention eating (at lunchtime a delicious buffet appeared as if by magic!) some of us didn't get quite as much crafting done as we might have!

Brenda and Chris had prepared some wonderful projects for us to make, and since we wanted to try as much as possible, many of them were started and then put carefully aside to finish off at home. Chris's first demo was a really neat little album for recipes, photos, etc, with mini envelopes for pockets, then Brenda showed us how to make a lovely book/album using a new Sizzix Bigz Pro die using distressing and resist techniques. Other projects used brayering, masking and decoupage. I have yet to complete my little photo album, but have just finished the book.

(I used Distress Inks, and stamps by Hero Arts, Penny Black, Magenta, Inkadinakdo, and Crafty Individuals. The flourishes were cut with a die by Marianne Design.)

It was a very warm day, but the atmosphere of fun and camaraderie was even warmer. So to Brenda, Chris, Jules, Linda, Hayley, Rosie, Amanda, Sally and Megan, thanks for your company, and I hope you all enjoyed the day as much as I did. Thanks also to Janice and Andy for keeping the shop open for us to indulge in some retail therapy afterwards (not to mention during as well!) to everyone who contributed to lunch (Jules's heart shaped cheese scones were just to die for!) and huge thanks to Brenda and Chris for teaching us some gorgeous projects and for all their hard work which made the day such a success. Here's to the next time!