Wisteria Thank You

Hey there blog friends, just a quick post from me today.  I made a batch of thank you cards a while back and I haven't shared this one with you so far.

I love this Glitzcraft Wisteria stencil

I used Glitzcraft glitter paste with the stencil, mixing a few colours to produce a little more texture, kept the design really simple just adding the sentiment in the corner and layering over a slightly larger piece of purple cardstock.

Thanks for dropping by, hope you liked today's project.  I'll be back with more makes soon.

Fighting a Desire to Bake !

Do you ever wake up with a strong desire to create something, maybe dream about it too ?  Well I often dream about a design for a card, a sewing project or some knitting, but the other night I dreamed of baking something.  Woke up and the urge to get baking was even stronger.

Both the Hubs and I are trying hard to shed a few extra pounds of weight, so fresh baked cakes and pastries are a bit of a 'no no' right now.  So I thought I'd try to distract myself a bit to take my mind off it.

I decided to eat a healthy breakfast as I had lots of luscious fruit begging to be eaten - great start !

Sadly this delish start to the day still didn't stop me wanting to turn on the oven and bake something naughty So...

I thought that a meringue wouldn't be as bad for the hips as a cake and made into a Pavlova it would use up more of the fruit left over from breakfast (I'm sure the whipped cream had negligible calories ) - it was truly scrumptious !

However.... I just couldn't shake the urge to actually BAKE and the oven was still warm, so I just had to turn up the heat a little and make a lemon drizzle cake

We did manage to resist eating it that day and it improved with 'age' .  We did polish off the Pavlova though - well all that fruit and egg whites it's got to be good for you hasn't it ?   Answers on a postcard please Ha Ha ! 

That's it from me today folks, have a great day... let me know if my post makes you want to get baking too !

Bye for now, til next time.

Indian Style Happy Birthday

It's Wednesday again, halfway through the week and on the rundown to the weekend for many of those who are working.  I'm in the fortunate position of being retired and happily enjoy crafting in many ways, which seems to fill up most of my time ! 

So, to today's project which is a birthday card I created recently.  Quite a while back I bought a magazine (can't recall which one now, sorry) with which there was a free embossing folder and matching stamp set in Indian style, designed by Sheena Douglas. 

Both the stamps and embossing folder are very pretty and I embossed a piece of white card then coloured it with Pan Pastels, set with fixative spray.  Then this background sat around in my stash for a while.  I came across the pretty background whilst looking for something else and was inspired to create this card with it.

I added a piece of antique lace from my stash and applied some Ice Stickles to bling it up a bit.  I then diecut a label shape using a Sizzix die and stamped around the edges using a stamp from the freebie set using SU! ink.  Then in the centre I stamped the Happy Birthday sentiment using the same dark green ink, finally adding a little more Ice Stickles in the centres of the motifs.

Tools and supplies used :

* Magazine freebie embossing folder and stamps designed by Sheena Douglas
* Stampin Up! - Sassy Salutations stamp set; Always Artichoke Ink
* Ice Stickles
* Pan Pastels
* Spray Fixative
* Sizzix die and Big Shot machine
* Lace from stash

That's another birthday card for my stock, ready to use when I need a card in a hurry. 

I hope you've enjoyed today's project and thanks for taking the time to drop by, I really appreciate it.

Bye for now, hope to see you again soon.

Wishing you Brighter Days

LGood morning blogging friends, I hope you are having a great start to this new week.  I have a card to share with you today on which I used some newly acquired stash.

I'm very fond of the sweet stamps and matching dies from Clearly Besotted Stamps and am building up my collection of them - far too easy to do when they issue brand new designs every month ! 

I stamped the brolly outline onto a piece of white cardstock using Archival Black Ink, then overstamped using DI.  I then stamped the floral infill stamp using the same DI and diecut this with the matching die.  Then attached the diecut over the original stamped image, raised up on foam pads to create dimension.  I stamped the sentiment with the DI ink then overstamped with black ink to create a shadow effect. 

The clouds were diecut using a set of Memory Box dies and I dragged DI around the edges to create a rainy day effect and stamped a few raindrops using another of the stamps from the set, using the same blue DI.  As a final touch I added Glossy Accents to the raindrops.

Tools and supplies used :

* C6 scallop edged base card

* Clearly Besotted stamps and die - April Showers, April Showers Additions, April Showers die

* Distress Inks - Fossilised Amber; Mermaid Lagoon

* Glossy Accents

* Memory Box dies 

I hope you've enjoyed today's project, if you would like more details on how I created it give me a shout.  Thanks for dropping by and have a wonderful craft-filled day.

Under a Tall Tree I Will Lie.....

Happy Saturday dear friends, I can't believe it's the weekend again already where did last week go eh ?  I guess I must have been having fun and didn't notice it passing.

Well I have had fun playing with Brushos I have to say.  I've a couple of cards to share with you today on which I used these fabulous little pots of magical colour, same stamp, same water colour card and same Brusho colours, but a different final look I think you'll agree.

Here's the first one, don't you think the sky looks brooding and stormy on this one ?  I think so anyway like there's a storm brewing with winds whipping up the clouds.

and here's the other one, I think the sky looks much brighter and fresher, as if there are little fluffy clouds drifting by.

I stamped the tree image and sentiment onto the water colour card then spritzed the card liberally with clean water.  I then tapped a few Brusho crystals into the water, different colours on different areas of the card, to create the scene and just left them to develop and dry naturally.  I just love how so many different colours burst out of each one when it hits the water.  I think these are great words from JRR Tolkein.

I'm still in the early experimental days using Brusho's and will continue to play around with them, getting used to how they work and hopefully feeling more confident in using them. 

Finally I layered the water colour panel over black cardstock to make it pop before attaching to the base card.

Here's the list of supplies used:

* Tall Tree and sentiment stamps from a set by Rubber Stamps for the Creative Journey
* Water colour card
* Black card for layering
* Brushos
* Black Archival Ink
* C6 card blanks

I hope you've enjoyed today's cards, thanks for calling in to see my latest makes.

Red, White and Blue Congratulations

Good morning dear Friends.  Today I have a project to share with you on which I tried something new.  I'll be entering it for this week's Less is More Challenge as the theme is Red, White and Blue.

My project is the Anniversary card I've created for my Daughter and Son-in-Law for later this month.  Their wedding colour theme was Red, White and Blue so it is perfect.  I hope you like it.

 

 





I stamped the word image using Versamark onto a piece of linen finish cardstock and heat embossed using clear embossing powder.  I then added water using a large soft brush around the Congratulations, dropped in a few sprinkles of Colour Burst pigments.  Using a wet paintbrush I moved the colour around a little, dried using my heatgun on low setting and finally dabbing with clean kitchen towel to pick up any stray bits of wet colour.  I then added a few dots of white using a white Signo Uni Ball pen.  Lastly I rubbed a small amount of Ranger Distress Glaze to waterproof the watercoloured area.

Supplies used :
* SU! word stamp from the Sassy Salutations set
* Ken Olivers Colour Burst Powder Pigments
* Versamark Ink
* Clear Embossing Powder
* Linen effect cardstock
* Ranger Distress Glaze

Thanks for dropping by today, enjoy the rest of your day.

Dream, Inspire, Create

Good morning Friends, how're you doing today ?  Great I hope.  I have a few chores to get through today, a visit to a pal in hospital and then I plan on a little crafting time, just for me ! 

As it's WOYWDW I'll be back to add a pic of my workspace a little later.  In the meantime I'm sharing another project with you on which I used up one of the final backgrounds created a while ago using the BAT (Bleeding Art Tissue) technique.

This was one of the paler shaded backgrounds so I felt it could handle a much bolder design over the top and thought this fabulous Fern stamp from JustRite Cling Stamps was just the ticket.  Do you agree ?  The words are also part of this stamp set and perfect to set off my design.

Here's a list of tools and supplies I used to create my card :

* Crafters Companion Watercolour Card
* JustRite Cling Stamps 'Fern'
* Bleeding Art Tissue
* Su! Always Artichoke Ink
* SU! cardstock for layering
* C6 base card
* Archival Black Ink
* Scraps of white cardstock - stamped words cut out and black ink dragged around edges
* Pinflair Glue to attach words

Give me a shout if you'd like more details or have any questions on how I created this card, thanks for visiting I hope you enjoyed today's project.

Wishing you a fun-filled day.

Lilian's Challenge - Follow Your Dreams Tag

Happy Tuesday Friends, hope it's going well for you.  It's been a few days since I last posted something new for you to look at, but I see lots of you have been visiting and for that I thank you so much.  It's a thrill for me to see that so many of you have taken the time to drop by to see what new Craftiness I've been getting up to !

So, today I have a tag to share with you.  A group of my online crafting pals set ourselves a quarterly challenge with a theme and the current one was set by the lovely Lilian and her theme this time is 'Flowers'.  I decided to make a tag for my first entry, firstly because I haven't made a tag in ages but mostly because I recently acquired some new Crealies dies and one set is tags, so I used the largest one from the set to cut out my tag.

Here's a couple of close-up pix which show the Glossy Accents detail a little more clearly

 

 

These are the supplies and tools I used to create my tag :

* Crealies No 4 Stitched Tag die set
* Stampers Anonymous Tim Holtz Collection stencil - Blossom TH031 (flowers being the challenge theme)
* Distress Inks - Twisted Citron; Fossilised Amber; Abandoned Coral; Cracked Pistachio - to create  background, colour stencilled shapes and background stamping
* Visible Image stamp - Grunge Flourish - stamped using Abandoned Coral around edges of tag
* Crop-a-Dile  to punch hole at top, plus eyelet
* Length of chiffon ribbon from my stash
* Stamp set Eline's 'Footsteps in the Sand' stamp set - used faux stitching to stamp around the edges and the ART No both stamped with Archival Black ink
* Black Pitt Pen to draw around some parts of the stencilled design
* White Signo Uni Ball Pen Broad to draw around other parts of the stencilled design
* Ranger Distress Glaze - to seal and make waterproof the DI's, applied before Glossy Accent highlights
* Glossy Accents

If you'd like any further details of how I created my tag, leave me a comment and I'll get back to you as soon as I can and try to help.

Thanks for dropping by today, hope you enjoyed your visit and come back soon