Charisma Cardz Challenge Week 47

This week we have "Christmas with a twist" over at the Charisma Cards Challenge, no red, green or gold! 

My card is blue with silver, no red, green or gold in site.  The backing paper is a Pinkpetticoat download, the greeting was printed on the computer, the stamp is a very old one I am not sure of the make but it is a blue rubber unmounted stamp from a set, I also used a Sizzix embossing folder and snowflake dies.  I have used the stamp set  quite a lot this year for cards and a calendar challenge over at The Craft Barn, I added a red scarf to the previous cards  but left it out for this one as no red is allowed.

I backed the card with pale blue snowflake paper, added a piece of navy embossed card which I ran a white ink pad over and curled the edges.  The greeting was edged with blue ink (Colourbox chalks) and crystals added and placed on the card.  The stamped image was clear embossed and coloured with the blue inks and Glamour dust added to the snowflakes.  The girl on the sledge was stamped again,coloured and cut out and added to the stamped image.  The snowflakes were then added to finish the card.

Passion for Promarkers week 177

 

The theme at Passion for Promarkers this week is "Distressing", have searched the boxes for some lovely distressed papers and a suitable stamp to colour, even have the sewing machine to hand.

 

I used papers from a Prima Botanical 6" x 6" pad, a Pollycraft Designs digi stamp, lace, cogs and watch parts and a die cut swirl.  The framed sheet with cogs  was used as a base, to this I added torn pieces of patterned paper (which had been distressed with my trusty distressing tool).  The image was coloured using promarkers in meadow green, greys, oatmeal, tan and camel, torn round and distressed and added to the card with a little stitching.  I found some watch parts and thought they would be ideal to stick to the die cut cogs.   The whatever stamp by Artifacts seemed appropriate for this card so it was stamped on the tag and a greeting "Whatever you do have a very Happy Birthday" printed inside the card.  More distressing was done to the rim of the card and a little distress ink added to parts.

 

Week 9 at the Craft Barn - Teal, Rust and White

 Another week flown by, the Craft Barn Challenge week 9 has arrived, a colour challenge teal, rust and white.

This one took some thinking about, I have June, July, August and September left.  Do I go with June or use the colours for another month?  I have a nice Michael Powell stamp of beach huts and a boat and thought of July or August, but finally decided on June and butterflies and flowers.

 I started with the circle, stamping randomly with various stamps in teal, rusty hinge and clear embossing ink the stamped areas were clear embossed.  Rusty hinge was was used to colour the background and wiped off the embossed areas to leave some white areas.  The teal dots were covered with crackle accents and the outer edge was bleached to give more white areas.  The flower was cut from 2 baby wipes which had been coloured teal and tan and a little glimmer mist.  A blue dot with crackle accents was added to the center of the flower before it was mounted on the stamped circle. 

   

For the main backing page the Agapanthus cluster was stamped around the outside in teal zeal ink, the butterflies and bees in brown then the stamping clear embossed.  Rusty hinge distress ink was applied over the back ground lightly.  Bleach was applied to the butterflies and bees to make the wing areas white. The calender and circle were backed with a teal coloured card before mounting on the backing sheet.

Don't ask why I decided on the circle, after working on it I was determined to make it work, hopefully it does!   The colouring on the calendar page is slightly richer than the photos, we could do with some nice brighter crisp winter days. 

Japanese Twinchie

Washing and Ironing done! Just enough time left to submit my twinchies for the Show us Your Twinchie Challenge No 10 - Two Colours.  I have been visiting some of your lovely blogs to see what twinchies are all about, I love them.

This is my first attempt, I have lots of Japanese themed stamps and thought they needed an airing.  The koi carp was stamped onto black card and embossed with gold powder, then the marble effect was stamped onto gold card.  Using 2 different sizes of Spellbinders square dies I cut a frame from the gold card, the largest die was used to cut out the embossed koi.  The frame was attached to the picture and a good luck coin attached, finished.  How easy was that! 

Only down side is the light for the photo.

Glittery Snowflake

Clean and simple with glamour and glitz another excuse to get out the Glamour Dust!

This year I wanted to use up the Kraft cards I bought last year to use for Christmas cards but didn''t get round to using.  I wanted this year's Christmas card to be easy to put together as I have a lot to make up.  With the aid of my Silhouette cutting machine, some lovely Inkadinkado inchie stamps and lots of Glamour Dust this is what I came up with.

  

The pine cones and inchie were stamped using brown Stazon and the inchie was embossed with clear powder (I want to colour some of the inchies with china blue distress ink and the embossing will help define the stamp).  The greeting was printed onto the card using the computer.  The snowflake was cut out and attached to the card and the inchie added to the center to give a little depth.  I didn't initially think about the Glamour Dust but the card needed a little sparkle to make it stand out more, the snowflake was covered in the dust and the cones highlighted a little.

All done my Christmas card for friends and family designed, now the production line gets underway!!  Fortunately I have a few cards made for recent challenges which will come in handy for the children in the family, one less job to worry about.

 This card is to be entered into the Addicted to CAS Challenge  "SNOW", the Less is More Challenge week 95 "Recipe Glamour and Glitz" (It is glittery!) and Allsorts Challenge Bring on the Bling (it is glittery and blingy)

Charisma Cards Challenge No. 46

The challenge over at Charisma Cards this week is "Colour Combo", lovely colours turquoise, teal, purple and pink (my interpretation of the colours).

 
I chose Christmas papers with teal, turquoise and pink colourings and a friendly Pollycraft Designs snowman which I coloured with promarkers.  This will be another Christmas card I can add to my slowly growing pile of cards to be sent out this year. Although I have made a start on the main cards (a nice CAS style) I still need some special cards for family and close friends.  This one will be lovely for one of the children.

My Silhouette  machine was out on the desk so I cut some snowflakes, the swirl was cut using a Magnolia die.  A little Christmas glitter and another card finished. 

 















 
Quite pleased with the end result, lovely colours for one of my grandsons. 

The Craft Barn Calendar Challenge Week 8

 

Another week has flown by and another calendar challenge at The Craft Barn, Children and cute!  This is a challenge.  I have only just returned to rubber stamping having used digi stamps for some years so, although I would have love to use a rubber stamp I had no children related ones so it had to be a Lilly of the Valley sketch Rosie Posy, the image is so cute I decided to order the stamp, sure I will use it again.

This is my May page thought of May flowers and went for pastel shades.  First the background, a little bit of colour using  scattered straw distress ink and a little embossing, then the image which was coloured with pastel coloured promarkers and glitter.  I found the glitter frames in my bits box, remnants from die cutting, and thought they would frame the image nicely.  The calender and  rhyme were printed and edged  with scattered straw ink.  The stamp arrived today so I added a few flowers from part of the bouquet to the verse and coloured with promarkers.

Passion for Promarkers week 176 - Colouring with Kraft

A tricky one this week at Passion for Promarkers "Colouring with Kraft".  Never tried it before as I know the dark colour makes it difficult.

Found a pack of Kraft Card and decided on a Christmas card, nice bright colours and maybe a little bleach if I needed to lighten the card.  I stamped a Molly Bloom Christmas Stocking stamp onto the Kraft card with Stazon ink and clear embossed the image.  Using dark green and Berry Red markers I coloured the image, so far so good!  It still looked drab so I added some white marker pen which lifted it a little.  Gold and silver glitter added the sparkle and gave the image a little more life.  The greeting, another Molly Bloom stamp, was added above the stockings and embossed with clear embossing powder.

I layered Kraft card, green dotty paper and Pinkpetticoat's "Night Before Christmas" paper onto a white 15cm square card.  The shape of the stamped image prompted me to cut out an oval shape with a low profile die, the image was mounted to rest just under the line "The stockings were hung by the chimney with care".  I finished off the card with bakers string and three sleigh bells in the colours used for the colouring, then added some holly leaves and berries which were cut out of Kraft card and coloured with green and red Promarkers.  The bakers' string was a light green so it was coloured with the green marker to make it darker.

 

Allsorts Challenge Week 181 - It's a Gift

Thought I would do something other than a card for the challenge at Allsorts this week.  As Christmas is nearly upon us I thought I would make a start on some favour boxes for the children, little presents for them to enjoy over the Christmas period and use afterwards to store little bits and pieces.

The box was cut from black card using my Sillhouette Cameo, this was a very expensive toy I should use more often but I still love using dies. I assembled the box and covered the sides, front and box lid with some free Holly Hobbie papers.  The picture on top was stamped with a Holly Hobbie Christmas Joy stamp, free with the papers, and coloured with a selection of Christmas coloured Promarkers.  The stamped image was too large for the box so the top half with the present was cut out using a spellbinders cutting die.  She looked lonely on her own  so poinsettias were stamped in the bottom corner and coloured, the edges were coloured lightly with scattered straw distress ink.  A little glitter was added and the picture was attached to the box lid. 

 Only needs some sweet treats and one favour box is complete.

Simply Less is More week 94 - Hardware

 Hardware is the theme for the Simply Less is More Challenge this week.  I was a little behind last week so made a start with a few ideas this morning.  This is what I came up with for the Hardware challenge.

I am trying to use up some of the craft items I have in draws and boxes, some have been there for years and need to be used.  This was a great subject to use metal charms.  We visited the S.S. Great Briton this weekend with our granddaughter and this prompted the Bon Voyage card.

A plain simple card, the waves were created on the computer and printed onto the card, the words were printed out and cut round to make a tag. the charm was then threaded onto a paperclip which was slipped onto the tag, it was then fastened over the wave pattern.

The greeting inside reads Good Luck and wishing you an enjoyable journey.  I have a nephew who is working in Australia for a year, I will save this card to give to his brother when he goes down under to join him in a few months.

Charisma Cardz Challengeweek 45 - Cool Colours

This weeks challenge at Charisma Cardz is to use cool colours when making your card.  I am being very furugal at the moment and sifting through my bits boxes to try and create my cards.  My very large stock of digital images has been getting an airing and I chose this cute little chap as I thought he would fit the cool dude sentiment very well.

The digi image was from Pollycraft Designs, the character is Dexter.  The image was coloured with promarkers in cool blue and green colours, the edge was coloured with green marker and mounted on a lemon background.  I found a punched piece of card which I attached round one side.  This was layered with a green and a blue square of paper onto the card.  I stamped a musical note (free stamp from magazine) around the card and attached the Cool Dude sentiment. 

The finished article - wasn't sure about the musical notes once they were on the card, a little bit too heavy, so put some glitter over them to try tone them down.

Passion for Promarkers Week 175 - Moon and Stars

What a lovely challenge this week from Passion for Promarkers "Moon and Stars".  Another chance to use a digi image which I can colour with my promarkers.  

I picked the Lillibean Fairy digi image by Pollycraft Designs and coloured with Promarkers.  The backing paper and card were from my scrap box, I highlighted the stars with a snowflake stamp which was a freeby with a magazine, and finished with some glitter to add sparkle.

A very quick card as I am short of time if I want to enter the challange which finishes tomorrow.  Photographs not very good I had to photograph them in a dark room, no daylight.

Fabric Tag - A Stitch in Time

 

Tags and Art Journaling are something I haven't done yet but seeing some of the wonderful work created by all you lovely blog ladies I have decided to give the tags a go, the art journaling will have to wait until time is more abundant.

This week's challenge at Artful Times is to make a fabric tag,   I gathered together some bits and pieces and thought I would do a sewing theme tag as I also wanted to do something for the Anything but a Card challenge.  I gathered together some scraps of velvet, hessian and  a laser printable fabric, printed out the sewing machine, coloured it, added some French knots and sewed it to the hessian.  The velvet was attached to a tag (Tim Holtz Die) scrunching it in places to give some texture. Using sticky glue I stamped swirls onto the velvet and rubbed with Moon Glow two toned pigment powder in opaline rosy tan.  The tag was finished  with a ribbon  and some binding which was  stamped with a watch and the words Tempus Fugit.

 

 Its amazing how many stamps and digi images you buy over the years and only use once, the sewing machine (Pink Petticoat) was a digi image which I thought I would use but never did, but the watch stamp (PaperArtsy) has been used lots. 

Challenges entered:

Artful Times challenge A Fabric Tag
Anything but a Card  A Stitch in Time

Allsorts Challenge Week 180 - Young at Heart

 

The Allsorts challenge this week is Young at Heart.  At the moment I am trying to use some digi stamps which I have on the computer I have quite a few and thought they should come out to play.  I trawled through and came up with a Pollycraft Design digi of a young girl with hearts.  As I am chasing my tail this week I ran up what I thought would be appropriate for Young at Heart and forgot to post it!!

Well here it is at the very last minute, hope it fits the bill.

Craft Barn Calendar Challenge Week 7

The calendar challenge this week at The Craft Barn is Candles, I wanted to try out my oil pastels and went with December as the only stamp I had was of a Christmas candle.  I worked on this page for some days and didn't like the results.  I tried the oil pastels out some weeks ago using browns, yellows and white stamped with a square postcard type flower stamp and embossed with flowers, I was very pleased with the result, but the Christmas colours on this project just didn't look right, eventually after adding all the embossing and the calendar itself the page has grown on me a little.

The background is three layers of colour, white, red and green Faber-Castell oil pastels, stamped with a Christmas stamp (years old make unknown) and a SeeD,s candle stamp, heated to set the colours. The details were scraped gently out to reveal the white oil pastel below.  The piece was embossed using a Tim Holtz Alterations Christmas Background embossing folder and the calender added.

 The candle, reindeer and Santa's beard were highlighted by scraping away the colour to reveal the white

At the last minute I realised I could have used a cake or cupcake with a candle using pinks, blues, yellows and greens and made my May page, its amazing how you sometimes get stuck on one idea and cannot move it on to something else, maybe Christmas is too much in my mind at the moment!