Happy Birthday Sian!

Good Morning!

Today (as you may have guessed from the title of this post) is my friend Sian's birthday, we met a few months ago after entering a new challenge at the same time and we have been chatting ever since.

I know she is OBSESSED with all things Verve, so I just had to make her card following one of the Viva La Verve sketches, and she told me that this circular one was her fave so it was a no brainer, I had to use this one!

I have used new DSP called Cheerful Treat, and some of the new in-colours, and I dusted off a punch that I haven't used for ages!

Hope you have a great day Sian, filled with plenty of crafting, family and friends!

See you soon, xx

Less vs More

Good Afternoon!

I have been a busy bee today, cleaning up our old house ready for viewings, very hard work! My hands were definitely build for crafting not cleaning. A couple of loads of washing (luckily the sun put in an appearance this afternoon so haven't had to put the tumble dryer on) and the food shopping, not a great experience on a Saturday afternoon but these things have to be done.

So I needed something nice to finish off the afternoon and what better way than the Less is More challenge.

Which this week is a sketch, I do enjoy sketches but I must admit that Less is More does not come naturally to me, here is that sketch that the lovely ladies have asked us to use

I decided to go for a monochrome card using one of the in-colours called Concord Crush, a gorgeous deep purple, one of the best things about Stampin' up! is that every is colour coordinated which makes monochrome cards super easy. I used Concord Crush card stock, ink, and patterned paper, all safe in the knowledge that they would all be a perfect match.
So here it is

I liked it, but I wasn't in love with it and I think it's because it was lacking something so I added just a few details, it's still simple (for me) but just not as simple as maybe the LIM ladies would have liked. Sorry ladies I really did try to keep it clean and simple, but my fingers got carried away, and my card ended up looking like this.

I'm much happier with it now, and I'll just have to accept the consequences of my embellishing actions.
Have a great weekend  xx

Splash of Green

Hello again,

well it's raining here, and I only have 11 days till moving day so I'm getting in all the crafting that I can before I have to pack up, hopefully I'll have room in the stop-gap to have my desk out while we're looking for our own place, otherwise I may go completely mad!

I decided to play along with another challenge, (another one! I hear you cry) I really do love challenges, and I have to get my fix while I can! This time it's the Play Date Cafe which is another colour challenge.

 The focus this week is black, white and a splash of green, I have been asked to make a few cards so this challenge gave me the inspiration for this card.

I have chosen the in-colour Pear Pizazz for my splash of green, I really love this shade, it's quite vibrant without being too OTT, I also coloured some rhinestones with a pro-marker to tint them.

I hope that I haven't used too much green for it to be considered a splash, it was quite hard to stop once I'd started adding colour.

Goodbye for today xx

Butterflies and buttons

Good morning!

I'm starting the day bright and early with a shot of espresso, card not coffee. Today's cards uses the colour combo of Early espresso, Real red and Very vanilla, and I hope you'll agree its makes a great combination.

I can't seem to make a card lately without my hands gravitating towards my butterfly punch, and this card is no different! But this time I wanted to try to use my buttons in a different way so I've added buttons and gems onto the butterflies bodies.
Let me know what you think.

I was quite pleased with how this one turned out, I wasn't sure while I was working on it, but it came together in the end.

Here's what I used to make it -
Stamps, Butterfly prints, Curly cute
Card, Early espresso, Real red, Very vanilla,
Ink, Cherry cobbler,
Accessories, Chocolate chip satin ribbon (sadly retired), Scallop border punch, Butterfly punch, Designer buttons, (gems from my stash)

As my last post said I've got new goodies, so I hope you'll pop back soon to see some more creations.

F is for friendship

Good evening!

I've been waiting to get my grubby (with ink so it's ok) little hands on the vintage vogue set since it was first shown in last years mini catalogue, but every time I placed an order there was always something else that I was seduced by. But never fear, when I was choosing my starter kit stamps I put it right at the top of my list and it is now sat in a neat little pile with all it's stampin' up stamp set friends.

I think its a great set for 'just because' cards, because of the fabulous F with friends caption. So that is what I have made for today's card.

Once again my ever faithful butterfly has made it on to this card as well!

I have also used the 'rock and roll' technique on the flowers of this card. This technique involves choosing two colours, one lighter than the other. Ink up your chosen stamp with the lighter colour, then with the darker colour angle the stamp so that you are only inking a portion of the design and roll the stamp around so that you have a darker edge to the image. You must remember to clean the stamp between each inking otherwise you will transfer the dark ink to the lighter ink pad.

Here's what was used -

Vintage Vogue stamp set, Butterfly prints stamp set,
Rich razzleberry CS, Pretty in pink CS, Rich razzleberry patterned paper,
Rich razzleberry taffeta ribbon, brights designer button, Butterfly punch,
Regal rose ink and concord crush ink.

What do you think? I'd love to know, please leave me a comment below.

Butterfly Prints

Hi there,

Today I have made another card using the Butterfly Print Stamp set.
It's a gorgeous set which has 5 stamps, 3 butterflies, the butterfly body, and a sentiment that co-ordinates perfectly!
I got this set originally because I liked the look of the Flight Of The Butterfly set but didn't want to spend £26.95 if I wasn't going to use it much. As the Butterfly Print set was only £12.95 (clear mount) I thought I would get this set and then if I liked it add the Flight of the butterfly set to my collection, its now at the top of my 'have to get' list, and the co-ordinating butterfly punch (£15.50) makes creating quick cards a breeze.

Here's what I came up with

This card didn't take long at all to make, but no one would know.

To make this card I used -
Butterfly Prints stamp set,
Butterfly punch, Scallop Edge punch,
Blueberry Crisp paper pack, Chocolate chip paper (retired), chocolate chip satin ribbon (also retired boo hoo)

Hope you like it.

My very first post!

I'm so excited my very first blog post!

I've wanted a blog for a while but I've never known how to get started, luckily I've had some help (thanks Jules!, You can find Jules blog in my blogs that inspire me section), and I think I'm just about there, although I've changed my mind about the background several times, so don't be too surprised if you return and it's changed.

I made a couple of cards yeaterday that I would like to share with you.

The first is a tent fold A6 sized card

This week I've signed up to be a Stampin' up demo, I haven't got any card stock yet but I'm eagerly waiting for it, so I used card stock that I had from my stash.
The stamp sets used are -
SU - Butterfly prints, Because I Care
I also tried doodling on this card with a white gel pen, I'm always worried that I'm going to ruin a whole card right at the end with white pen, but was feeling brave yesterday, so I did some faux stitching around the top section and some spots around the scallop punched circle (SU).

The second of my cards is more masculine

This one uses -
SU - Autumn Splendor, Because I Care (sentiment)
my favourite chocolate chip satin ribbon (yummy), and two patterned papers from the old olive collection (both sadly retired now boo hoo, but I think you can get some old olive patterned paper in the brights collection)

Hope you like them!