Swinging Lottie

This was my third attempt to make a card I was happy to post using the colour palette at CAS Colours and Sketches. The other two were 'OK', but just 'not quite right'.

Since it's Mindful Wednesday I decided to sit down with a simple stamped image, a paintbrush and three ink pads (Dusty Concord Distress, Butterscotch and Meadow Adirondack) and see what resulted. Even the brown for the swing, and to accent Lottie skin was a combo of purple and yellow! Hope that's acceptable.

Calm, relaxation and a pretty Lottie on a swing. This stamp set was still in its packet, I've had it at least 18 months, and it was nice to get it out and use it. Happy with the colouring it was with slight trepidation that I took a micron pen and scribbled around the edge, but I think it helps draw the eye in. A lovely simple layout from Freshly Made Sketches got me scrabbling for some paper flowers I had tucked in a box, and completed what I think it quite a cute, pretty CAS card. Hope you like it.

Addicted to CAS #64 - Animal (Lottie is undeniably a - very cute - elephant!)
CAS Colours and Sketches #125 - Elegant Eggplant, Crushed Curry, Garden Green
Freshly Made Sketches #188
Addicted to Stamps and More #146 - Anything Goes (getting straight in there today, after I forgot to link up my 80% inspired by the photo card yesterday :-( )

Birthday Flight

I wanted to make a birthday card, and inspired by the Tic Tac Toe challenge at CAS on Sunday came up with this little number.

Layout from Sketch Saturday, and saying Happy 6th Birthday to Allsorts as well.

Simple black embossed elements cut into tiles and then matted on a single black layout. Oddly the teal arrow head was the inspiration for the whole lot, and was just a scrap sitting in my coloured card box. I thought about creating a drop shadow for the sentiment in the same colour, but decided to leave it with just the single pop of colour, which I think was the right choice.

CAS on Sunday #59 Tic Tac Toe (I picked row one - Birthday, B, W & 1, heat embossing)
Sketch Saturday #362
Allsorts #312 - Happy 6th Birthday Allsorts

Bright Lantern Pods

After a brief interlude to turn my kitchen into the same kind of bombsite as my craft room, I'm back with one last card for today.

I find colour palettes with more than two or three colours a real challenge, especially trying to keep them clean and simple. I'm not really one for busy, hugely layered, deeply dimensional cards. They can look fabulous, but they're just not me. The idea of something that will go straight into an ordinary envelope, and I can put an ordinary letter stamp on appeals to me! Also, I've been undeniably influenced by Barbara Gray and her building dimensional art on a single flat white piece of card methodology. Maybe that's why I've been experimenting with faux layering.

No faux layering today, but a bright, four colour palette from Colour Q. I've paired it with a very simple sketch I found at TechnoStamper, having found some new challenge listings over the weekend, I think 'Challenges for Days' got me there.

I wanted to make a thank you card, and it seemed a nice sentiment that fitted the sketch. I created it from the Clarity word chains, created because there is no K in the sets and no thank or thanks either! Never mind, that's why we're creative :-) I'd never used the Lantern Pods stencil in my stash before, but I felt it lent itself to simple colour blocks, fulfilling the palette brief (I used Mustard Seed, Ripe Persimmon and Peacock Feathers distress and Raspberry Adirondack). Rounding off with both Simon Says challenges that are currently open.

Colour Q #292 (Coastal Cabana, Daffodil Delight, Strawberry Slush, Tangerine Tango)
Simon Says Monday: Thank you
Simon Says Wednesday: Stencil It
TechnoStamper Sketch Challenge #363

The cause of the kitchen bombsite was Apricot and Almond crumble. A new to me recipe from Rachel Allen's 'All Things Sweet' recipe book. Made with some apricots I picked up on the market at the weekend, which were sadly on the turn and best for cooking.

Nom. Nom :-)

CAS Wedding

One last wedding card, emerging from the junk room that masquerades as my craft room. Tidy-up imminent :-)

Wanted to pare things right back for CASology, whose keyword is Weddings this week. Fusion are celebrating 'Wedding Belles' and so I took the sketch very literally, albeit reorienting it, and took my colour palette (Teal, Yellow, Grey) from the inspiration photo. Were I to make it again I think I'd make the colour flashes a bit smaller, although I feel it probably still just about balances. Stamping in Archival Watering Can rather than black, for a change, and to fit with the colour palette.

CASology #147 - Wedding
Fusion: Wedding Belles
Just Add Ink: 263: Weddings
Sunday Stamper #357: All Kinds of Everything (Free theme/Anything Goes)

Sunny Annabel

It's Bank Holiday Monday here in the UK, so I'm having a crafty playday :-) The only downside is that every project turns my teeny tweeny craft room into a bombsite, so I have to do a full scale clear-up before I start anything new. Mainly because otherwise all the essentials like rulers, glue and that one vital stamp have all disappeared from view under a pile of detritus.

After last week's palaver with Colour Me! I was determined to finish on time today. I made a promise to myself to combine Colour Me with Viva la Verve this month, so I'm heading back to layout two from VLV and using this week's 'subtle' palette.

In the absence of Stamping Up inks I've used Scattered Straw and Peeled Paint distress, and Stream Adirondack. I picked the Do Crafts backing paper to complement the stripes in Annabel's dress (she's a cute Clarity Character Stamp), and then the line sentiment just followed on from that. The die cuts I had left (uncoloured) from my wedding cards session this morning.

Colour Me #72 - Subtle (Bermuda Bay, So Saffron, Pear Pizzazz)
Viva la Verve May #2
Allsorts #312 - Happy 6th Birthday Allsorts

Butterfly promise

I'm trying to build up a little stash of cards that I can make available to friends and colleagues, and raise a bit of money for charity.

What's distinctly lacking at the moment is any wedding cards, and with so many wedding challenges around this week here was an opportunity to remedy that. I've chosen Just Add Ink's wedding challenge for this card.

Shopping our Stash want 'Gold and Silver', always good for a wedding, and Freshly Made Sketches had a lovely layout which worked nicely. In fact I made four cards on this wedding/FMS theme as I found a pack of metallic card blanks which I hadn't known what to do with, and here's the one I've chosen to share with you, hope you like it.

Wanting to keep it 'CAS' I chose to stamp in the linear element, and chose a Clarity stamp called Lacey Curve, that and the butterfly fit into this week's Friday Mashup criteria.

Having made it, it strikes me that not only would this make a nice simple wedding card, it would also work for a Golden Wedding Anniversary.

Freshly Made Sketches #187
Shopping Our Stash #202 - Silver and Gold
Just Add Ink #263 - Weddings
Friday Mashup #210 - Butterflies and/or Lace

Soaring swallow

As always I'm making cards on the day the challenges close; but I love colour challenges and don't like to let them pass me by, especially if I'm a bit stumped by the palette.

Layout inspiration comes from Tuesday morning sketches, palette inspiration from Nachos and image inspiration from Sweet Stampin'.

In the absence of Stamping Up colours I used Evergreen Bough distress and Raspberry and Salmon Adirondacks. The background paper is from Do Crafts (Oyster Blush) and odd bits of ribbon I had lying around. A few pearls embellies and the jewel-like colours reminded me that J is for Jewels over at ABC.

Sweet Stampin' - Birds and/or Bees
ABC - J is for Jewels
Nacho Average #142: Strawberry Slush, Coastal Cabana, Crisp Canteloupe
Tuesday Morning Sketches #301
Curtain Call - Photo Inspiration: Totally Tassel (oops clearly too asleep when I posted this, forgot the colours in the photo worked here too)

Clock watching

Wow, I take a few days away from the blog and the page view count climbs to over 1,600. Thank you everybody for coming and taking sneaky peak at my work - hope you're enjoying looking at it as much as I enjoy making it.

I'd kinda burned myself out, so took a couple of days away from my craft desk to get my mojo back.

Yesterday I sat down with something that had been lurking on the back burner for months. An assortment of stencil challenges, 'anything but a card' and grunge had passed, but this was still a piece of greyboard with my grunge paste scraped onto it.

This month's challenge at Clarity is 'Clocks'. My original intention had been to set a clock mechanism into this piece, but I changed my mind. I was going to thieve the mechanism out of a very cheap children's 'design your own clock' kit, but in the end decided to actually make the clock and turn this into a piece of wall art, don't ask me how I'm going to hang it though!

Inspiration came from a piece by Maria Simms, fresco paint demos by Barbara Gray and the challenges listed below the picture.

Grunge paste through Clarity Clocks stencil, onto greyboard (backed onto same). Coloured with Paperartsy Fresco chalk paints (Hint of Mint, Turquoise, China, Marlin, Plum and Claret). Jumble of sponging, brayer walking, hand painting.

Clarity Stamp Challenge #27 - Clocks
Simon Says Wednesday - Stencil It
Time Out #31 - Grunge

A different sort of make ... tasty treats

It was tempting to call this '.. and now for something completely different'.

I set this blog up to get me to dive into my growing card-making/papercrafting stash that I wasn't really using. But it's not a good reflection of all the things I like to make. I've been sewing for almost as long as I can remember, knitting since I was at primary school (although I then took quite a long break!), and have enjoyed baking for a very long time. My paper crafting is a pretty new thing.

I have a notebook, that on its first page, titled Crafting 2006, says "make all own cards". I failed, or more correctly I didn't manage it :-) I think the first year I will manage it will be this year. I was massively inspired by the likes of Barbara Gray, Sheena Douglas and Joanna Sheen on Create and Craft during a bout of flu a few years ago. Barbara Gray is my paper crafting hero, and I love her blog.

However, since my first post here on 7th February, I've been neglecting some of my other crafts, unless I've gone on a 'binge' - I did a lot of knitting at Easter. Baking has pretty much dropped off the map. I received a new recipe book this week, All Things Sweet by Rachel Allen, and I went on a binge bake today. I'd exhausted my card-making enthusiasm, but still wanted to make something, however as is typical I couldn't decided what to make, so made three different things. Tempting?

Cinnamon crumble cake (at the front)
Double chocolate pecan blondies (at the back)
Banana, ginger and golden syrup bread (the half cut loaf)

I can't feel any less than delighted to have received over 1300 page hits since I set up this wee blog. No followers yet, but hopefully one day soon I'll have a blog that's worth people coming back to.

Gingerbread Stars

I was feeling a bit anxious about my abilities to produce a 'good enough' card for my guest star stamper slot at Color Throwdown, so I made two.

This was my second choice, but I'd still like to share it. Another cute Christmas card made with a Molly Blooms stamp (it came with the 'Christmas Carnival' kit), and a background textured with a Embossabilities folder from Spellbinders. Layout inspired by CAS(E) this Sketch.

Sweet Stampin' Christmas: Cute Christmas
CAS(E) this Sketch #123
Guest Star Stamper Color Throwdown #343 (Golden Yellow, Brown, Turquoise, Teal)

CAS Wee Folk

Mr Random picked me out at Color Throwdown #341, which means that I was both honoured and daunted to be Guest Star Stamper this week. My thanks go out to Tammy from the CTD DT who's been supporting me in prepping for my slot.

If you've seen any of my blogs before you might have gathered that I'm a bit of a Clarity Stamp addict (NAYY). So I've used some of their Wee Folk children in this card, also inspired by the sketch layout at CAS Colours and Sketches.

I look forward to seeing what you come up with the palette; as a quilter I love this week's inspiration photo.

CAS Colours and Sketches #124
Simon Says Monday: XYZ (I picked Y for Youth)
Guest Star Stamper Color Throwdown #343 (Golden Yellow, Brown, Turquoise, Teal)

Bonjour Soleil

A bit last minute this one, and a bit more last minute than usual as my half finished artwork vanished off my workdesk. After a lot of searching it turned up 'stuck' to the bottom of a box I'd placed on the floor.

Cute inspiration photo at Fusion gave the colour palette and the layout (Butterscotch and Slate Adis), and Less is More tied it together with their 'Hello Sunshine' inspiration. I picked up an old second-hand French novel at the week as I thought it might make a good background, and that's what inspired the sentiment. Hope you like it.

I used the Clarity letterbox kit and one of their stencils.

Fusion: French Twist
Less is More #224 Theme: Hello Sunshine

Retro autumn

Having been making lots of Christmas cards, I find myself working my way back through the year with something distinctly autumnal.

Dual inspiration from Retro Sketches layout and Colour Q's palette. I used Festive Berries Distress, plus Meadow and Butterscotch Adirondack. The background border is cut with a couple of Spellbinders dies.







Retro Sketches #165
ColourQ #291 (Hello Honey, Gumball Green, Bordering Blue, Poppy Parade, White)
Allsorts #311 - No Squares Allowed

Floral Crook

Slightly spitting feathers here in the UK this evening.

I had one of those rather awkward flashes of crafty inspiration at the breakfast table this morning, which necessitated a rush home from work to try and put it into practice before the deadline at 5pm.

As I said last week I wanted to try and pair Viva la Verve sketches and Colour Me palettes this month. I managed, with five minutes to spare, but operator error resulted in me thinking I'd had a catastrophic computer failure. 30 minutes later I realised I'd done something slightly stupid, and my computer wasn't a brick after all, but the Colour Me deadline had passed me by.

Sorry, rant over. Not to be outdone after carefully cutting out a mask here is my speedy afternoon effort (can't have been more than 40 minutes start to finish, including cutting the mask, and fishing out the right colours of ink - Distress Shabby Shutters and Picked Raspberry)

 To calm me down I'm going to do something I've never done before, and put a second entry into a couple of fab challenges.

Viva la Verve - May #3
Sweet Stampin' - Clean and Simple
Uniko #21 - Flowers (Belated Happy Birthday Bev - Hope it's OK to enter twice)

The one that got away: Colour Me! #71 Striking - Melon Mambo, Pear Pizzazz

Christmas Carol

When I saw CASology's keyword this week "Music", alongside Nacho's simple Sentiment layout, I knew I had to get out one of my big Clarity carol stamps.

As 'God Rest you Merry Gentlemen' is paired with a stamp of carol singers, this seemed doubly appropriate. In line with Jingle Belles 'digi' challenge I had hoped to find a music score paper amongst my stash of little used disks, but came up blank, and found these nice tone-on-tone Christmas words instead.

My original plan to stamp directly onto the backing paper failed, as the photo paper I use for printing on just wouldn't take the ink and the powder therefore grabbed very patchily. It was also too busy, so I made it more CAS by cutting a simple white layer to sit on top and stamping onto that.

Jingle Belles - We wish you a digital Christmas (DoCrafts "Silent Night" backing paper)
CASology #146 - Music
Sweet Stampin' - Clean and Simple
Nacho Average #141

Molly card

I said Molly might be back, and here she is, in a very simple layout to show her off to her best!

Colour palette from Tis the Season, Layout from Clean and Simple. Her wings put her in the Angel category, which fits over at Quirky, and lastly this week's Allsorts challenge - no squares.

Tis the Season #42 - Country Christmas (colour challenge)
Allsorts #311 - No squares allowed
Quirky Crafts #10-2015 - "Angels among us"
Clean and Simple Stamping - FTL12 Take Two

Molly Tag

I love a day when I can play, and this afternoon I was playing with alcohol markers. I have quite a lot, but I confess I've never really used them 'properly', i.e. graded shading etc. So this was my first attempt at some semblance of shading. I'm rather pleased. I used a mixture of Promarkers and Spectrum Noirs.

The image is from Molly Blooms, isn't she cute :-) With a 'cute' challenge over at Sweet Stampin' Christmas she fits perfectly, and I used the 'cute' page out of an old dictionary as a background, deliberately slicing the FMS sketch in the right place to highlight the word.

By my count this tag could fit about seven challenges, but to play by the rules I have to pick four. Two down - Sunday Stamper (Make a topper) and That Craft Place (Use tags) use up my quota. However, Molly may make a reprise later as I have a second coloured image in my workroom that's too adorable to leave hanging around for long.

Sweet Stampin' Christmas - "Cute Christmas"
Freshly Made Sketches #186
Sunday Stamper - Make a topper
That Craft Place - Tags