Thinking Of You

 

     A new challenge at The Paper Funday has begun today, we are an Anything Goes challenge with an optional twist, this month's twist is Thinking Of You.

      My card is quite small at only 4 inches square but it packs a lot of Autumn colour. The leaves were made by using double sided sticky sheets on card, then covering it with gilding flakes, I find this is much easier and faster than using special glue when covering a large area.

      The leaf dies are Vintage Leaves from John Next Door, they have a solid shape and a veined shape to match. Using the gilded card and some black card I cut several leaves to make a small bunch, each leaf has a little shaping so they don't sit completely flat.

      To continue the Autumn theme I have used a Autumn Orange linen card from Crafts Too, which is matted on black and then on to a Kraft card blank.

      A simple sentiment was stamped in black across the top, a small but bright card just to let someone know they are in your thoughts.

      There is a wealth of inspiration over on The Paper Funday challenge, pop over and have a look, then join in the challenge with your own project.

I would like to enter this card in the following challenges:

Hand Stamped Sentiments - #397 Inspiration 

Get Creative - #115 Fall/Autumn

613 Avenue Create - #202209 Anything Goes/twist-Leaves

Pammie's Inky Pinkies - #2236 Anything Goes

Love To Craft - #70 Anything Goes

Inspiration Station - #37 Leaves and Autumn Colours

Happy New Year

     Another card made with a die from John Next Door's new Art Deco collection, Kramer. The sentiment on this one makes it perfect to use in wishing you all a Happy Crafting New Year, let's hope we can return to workshops and shows soon.

     Using thick black card I cut the screen using John's latest Lantern die, I think it makes a great screen card because the feet just look right for it.

     With the Kramer die I cut two panels in the same black card and trimmed them down to fit the screen panels.

     To back these patterned panels I used a piece of thin card that had been covered with a d/s sticky sheet and then covered with guilding flakes. I've had these flakes for years, they're gorgeous but I can't 'save' everything.....it's time to use them.

    

     For the centre panel I wanted to add my sentiment but plain cream card looked wrong, so out came the Distress Ink and a blending brush. Using the die as a stencil I coloured the cream card with the same pattern as the panels but left it pale enough to see the stamping.

     I cut the cream card panel to be the same size as the others and stuck it on the screen card.

     The card looked good but not quite right, it was missing a focal point on the front. I searched through all my Mizuhiki cords to find colours that would go with the guilding flakes, stand out, but not too much. Finally settling on a mix of green, teal and copper, which can all be found in the flakes.

     The knots are simple but effective on oriental cards, adding a small touch of authenticity. 

     I hope next year sees us all return to sharing ideas and techniques in person, Happy New Year.

I would like to enter this card in the following challenges:

Creative Creases - #22 Use A Fun Fold

Time Out - #204 New

Modsquad - New.....include something new

Bubble and Koi

      The challenge at the moment on The Technique Twist is bubble painting. I remember doing this with a nursery class and having to make sure that the children blew through their straw rather than suck! I had forgotten just how much fun it was.
     I used some acrylic paint I had sitting around and put it with my washing up liquid in the lid of an A5 storage box. My twist was to use two colours, I started with blue and when that was dry went on to purple. What came out looked just right for water or sky.
     I have a stencil from Dreamweaver of Koi Carp which I thought would look good on my bubbles. I have used Flitter Glu and gilding flakes to colour my fish.

     In the second photo you can see the shine on the fish more clearly. The flake mix I used was Morris Dance from Indigo Blu.
     The corners of the bubble card are punched and then a thread has been run around the edge to frame the image. There is also a little distress ink added to the edge to bring the colour in.
     I have used a small snippet of oriental paper to make a ribbon effect and added a coin (thank you Karen) with some glossy accents in the middle. The phrase on the left is stamped and embossed in gold, I don't know what it says (I just hope it's something nice!) but I like how it looks.

I would like to enter this card in the following challenges:

The Technique Twist - Bubble painting

4 Crafty Chicks - Bling ( I hope gilding flakes qualify)

Time 4 Scrap - Chinese New Year 

Late Night Ruins

      There are several challenges this month that wish to see your New stash and a few that would like to see something that was new a while ago but has never yet been used so this set me thinking.
      I treated myself to a set of stamps from Chocolate Baroque that I've had my eye on for some time, Gothic Fragments. These stamps seemed to fit well with a Sheena Douglass stamp I've had for a while but not used before called Ancient Arches. I also found a set of Spellbinders in a sale that were also arches...meant to be wasn't it.
      Sheena has a rather good video tutorial on You Tube to create a scene with her arches stamp so I gave it a go, not too good so I did it again, still not so good, but third time lucky. I did things a little differently the third time and for me that seemed to work. I chose to stamp first and then add colour, this helped me get it in the right places and by this time the brush technique was well practiced too!

     This is a rather dark card but I really wanted to use blues, this lent more to a night time scene. My friends daughter is a bit of a Goth so this will suit her well.
     I cut the arch from the front panel before embossing, I had to use the Grand Calibur for this as I couldn't get it through my Sizzix with out folding it over which would have messed it up. The card is a very dark blue which embossed really well with a brick folder form Creative Expressions.
   

     The acetate in the window is some of the packaging from the Spellbinder die set, crafters waste nothing...it may be useful!
     I have used the Choc B stamp with Flitter Glu and gilding flakes on the acetate which gives a great effect. This stamp fits the second size arch die perfectly which made life much easier when mounting it up.
     With the addition of a little ivy cut with a Marianne die on tiny foam pads to the front my box card was done. I did try adding a little white to the card front but it didn't look right so I chose to stay all dark and mysterious.
     I'm hoping that this will also fit into a monochrome challenge, it is all blues including the stamping but the gilding flakes are silver with a few bits of gold so we'll have to try it and see.
    With the addition of a Christmas Sentiment this will be perfect for Bex, she doesn't do cute!

     It depends on the angle you view the card as to what you see most. With top light you can see the inside clearly but with front light the silver window really stands out. A card that changes with the light, much like a real ruin.

I would like to enter this card in the following challenges:

Heck Of A Challenge - New

Country View Crafts - Monochrome

Our Creative Corner - Untouched Item

Sparkles Monthly Challenge - New

CraftyHazelnut's Christmas Challenge - Shades Of Blue

Gilded Gem Tree

Another play with the new gilding flakes resulted in this silvery tree. I had to pick out the flakes carefully this time because I only wanted silver, not too hard as most of the pot is silver with only a few other colours mixed in.

I began by colouring white card with Distress Ink Shaded Lilac and a shaving brush. I've been thinking about getting some of those lovely dusting brushes I've seen available but thought I'd try a shaving brush I picked up in a charity shop first, I love the effect and think I might try and find some more shaving brushes at 50p each!!  I then added Seedless Preserve and Shaded Lilac to the card to give it depth, SP and SL are previously seasonal set Distress colours available now as single pads.

The stamp is from Chocolate Baroque and has purple gems stuck on with Cosmic Shimmer dries clear PVA, as are the clear gems on the edges. 

The image is matted on to white and then on to silver mirri card before going on to purple card and then the white card blank. I had to go and buy some purple card, I went through my whole stash and couldn't believe I had no purple!

I would like to enter this card in the following challenges:

52 Christmas Card Challenge - Purple/White/Silver

Jingle Belles Rock - Anything new (gilding flakes, purple card)

Craftyhazelnut's Christmas Challenge - Not Reindeer
Craftyhazelnut's Christmas Challenge Extra - Anything goes

Sparkling New Year

A Sparkling New Year to you all. This my first challenge entry of 2013 so I'm starting it off with a bang!
Over on Jingle Belles Rock the current theme is 'Look What Santa Brought Me' so I have set too with the FlitterGlu kit I got from my son and a new set of die's from Do Crafts that Santa would have got for me if they had been released before Christmas, honest!!
I have used the die's to cut my London skyline in black, silver and white glitter card. Having seen the fireworks at New Year I thought the clock face should be gold. I chose to have white at the back as I wanted to mount it on black card, then I could use my FlitterGlu with flakes and glitters to make the fireworks.
I have a firework stamp in my stash that has been around for ages, it originally came from Anita's. I followed the instructions in my kit to apply the FlitterGlu and was quite impressed with the result. I experimented with glitter, guilding flakes and foils to see what they looked like and though the foil was good it didn't have the right look for this card, so I stuck with flakes for the silvery explosion and fine glitter for the red, green and gold.
I think I shall be using this product quite a bit more. It makes using the stamps you already have more versatile as they're not just for ink anymore. For those of you not familiar with FlitterGlu it is available from IndigoBlu.