Rufus The Reindeer

Had a quick visit to Embsey Crafts this afternoon, needed some card blanks, double sided tape and glue, boring necessities , having said I was certainly not buying any new Christmas stamps this year I somehow arrived home with this little fellow in my shopping bag. Took me a while to work out how to get the coloured background, brain doesn't work very fast these days, used my pan pastels and a bit of torn paper before stamping Rufus, then re stamped him on another piece of card and cut out just the body part. Enjoyed adding the decorations and stockings to his antlers. The snow is added with a stamp included in the set. Needed a white ink pad but ended up using some brilliance ink re inker to stamp with before it dawned on dozy me that I have the ink pad too, I'm fast losing the plot !

I want to enter this into this months Rudolph Days Challenge - anything goes as long as its Christmas

and

Crafty Hazelnuts Christmas Challenge - anything goes as long as its Christmas

Myth and Magic

This post does not really want to be here! First of all it posted early and now it's only posted the picture without the text, magic or what?

This is my DT piece for cardz4guys, this week Caz has chosen the theme of Myth or Magic. I was stumped with this one as I couldn't find any stamps to fit the challenge, finally found some papers with this mythical beast on, coloured with pro markers and mounted on red card. There are some great DT samples on the challenge site hope to see you there.

Feathered Friends

 

I've been playing with some free stamps that came with Creative Stamping, love these little owls. I also like that there are also small stamps with the set, like the feather I've used for the background on the blue card. The flowers are from a Penny Black set and the happiness stamp is from a really old set of stamps by Dee Gruenig, that's a name that was very popular at one time!  I'm entering these cards into the Twofers Challenge which is Weddings, although I don't have the word Wedding on my cards I hope these are acceptable.

also entering Alphabet challenge which is no designer paper

Butterflies for a Vintage Journey

I was very surprised to be asked to do a guest designer spot for A Vintage Journey, it was the first time I had entered their challenge and I was so happy my card was picked as a "Pinworthy" When I was told the subject for the August challenge I was happier still as Butterflies/Birds is something I love to use in my craft.

This is the piece I have made for this challenge

 

I started with a piece of  8x8 heavy cardstock and randomly stamped the background stamp from Papillon set with versamark ink and embossed in white, then applied mermaid lagoon and cracked pistachio inks over the resist. I then stamped various small stamps randomly over the background and added some texture paste through a stencil. I then stamped the row of butterflies from the same set in black archival.  Stamped and cut out the flowers from the Flower garden set and coloured them with fossilized amber and brushed corduroy DI inks. Restamped the row of butterflies onto a piece of card that I had coloured with the wrinkle free distress technique ,cut them out and 3d'd them over the stamped ones. Finally die cut the texture fades butterfly, coloured in with various DI's and then embossed it in its matching folder ( I do love these butterflies !) added some aquamarine treasured gold to all the butterflies. Finally mounted the piece onto black mountboard.

 

Its about Time

Our Challenge this week at Cardz4guyz is  "About Time " we'd like to see anything time related, clocks, watches etc , hope you will join us in our challenge this week.

My background is stamped with various watch stamps and clock related bits and pieces and the large clock face and hands lifted up on sticky pads. 

A Little Bird

This card is the result of playing about with the free stamps from the latest Creative Stamping magazine, I love this little bird sitting in the wreath of flowers , I liked that there are small stamps to go with the larger images and I've made my background with the small flower stamped with the same ink as I used to make the background with ink dusters.  The doily is a Cheery Lynn die that I've recently re discovered in my box of dies , I had a problem with it when I first got it and it got pushed to the back of the box but it cuts beautifully on the Bigshot so its going to be getting lots of use now.
Couple of challenges

Cheery Lynn designs - doilies         

Come And Get It Challenge - round things

Hello Sunshine

Well Mr Mojo has done a runner again and he's taking his time at coming back, I seem to spend an inordinate length of time staring blankly at pieces of paper and doing nothing, then I go off onto Pinterest and look with envy at what all the really creative folks are doing.  I do love this PB poppy stamp and so I decided I would have the matching die but I've given up trying to use it as I found it all but impossible to line it up, I don't normally have a problem as I use the trick of cutting the die out of a piece of scrap card and using it to line the die and stamp up but it doesn't seem to work with these so I've fussy cut it to use on here, simple stencilled background and sentiment stamp. I'd like to enter this in these challenges

Penny Black at Allsorts - summer flowers

Allsorts - share your favourite colour - has to be Red

Penny Black Saturday - Hot summer colours

swim little fishes

Got my new Blueprint sketch distress ink yesterday and couldn't wait to be messing about with it, what a gorgeous colour it is.  Just a bit of fun card for no particular reason, the fish stamp was free with Creative Stamping and I really like it, coloured them with Distress inks, Mermaid lagoon and
festive berries, added the bubbles with a white Signo pen and did a few water flicks.  I'd like to enter my card in

Addicted to Stamps - make your mark

Come and Get it - feature a creature

Aloha Friday Challenges - Ocean/water animals

Who's turning 60

This week at Cardz4guyz the challenge is for a Birthday card showing an age.  I don't have any specific age birthdays coming up but I've gone for 60 as I like this 60 speed limit stamp!  I must admit I saw a very similar layout of the circles on a card on Pinterest with a totally different image and sentiment and I thought the circles represented wheels to go with the speeding old time biker. The papers are bits and pieces from my scrap box and the stamp is Stampography although I have also seen this image as a free digital image online.  Hope to see you joining us at Cardsz4guyz this week with your cards for the man/boys in your life.

Stencil and stamps

Had one of those Blah days yesterday, after seeing off a pile of ironing I had nothing I really needed to do for the rest of the day but could not settle to do anything. On Friday a friend had called round and we were commenting on the fact that neither of us had used any of the stencils we "had" to have at Port Sunlight back in May so finally about 10pm I decided to start playing about with one of them.I had a go at the reverse stencil technique which I really liked ,used new distress ink colours , Abandoned coral, mermaid lagoon and cracked pistachio (I think !) then I flipped over the stencil and moved is very slightly to one side and inked through with the same colours.Added another of the texture fades butterflies and some bits of random stamping, finally added a piece of washi tape and tore some butterfly names off the tape and added them , stamped HB and voila !
I'd like to enter it into these challenges

Try It On Tuesday - Stencils
Creative Artiste Mixed media challenge - Anything goes with butterflies and flowers
Countryviewchallenges - summertime
The Mixed Media card challenge - butterflies
Butterflyspotchallenges - Butterflies + W is for washi

Butterflies

Not my usual style of card but felt like making something pretty for a change. I have lots of dies but hardly ever seem to use them ,this floral oval is one I do really like. The bottom lattice is cut with a Martha Stewart punch and I think they are the most contrary things ever ! they don't like paper that is too thin or paper that is too thick, they are the only punches that I have ever broken !  will never, ever buy any more of them, rant over, LOL. To get back to my card, the sentiment and butterfly in the centre are stamped with a stamp that was free with Quick cards a while ago, first time I have used it and I rather like it.  The larger butterfly just happened to be in my box of odds and ends on the table and was just the right colour to go on my card, I added a few sparkly gems to the small butterfly, a couple of tiny flowers from the Tiny Tattered florals to the large butterfly and a few pearls to finish with.  I'd like to enter my card into

Allsorts Challenge - Pearls and gems
and
Fantasy Stampers - lots of layers

Fred

This weeks challenge At CARDZ4GUYZ is to use orange and brown.  I thought I'd give Fred another outing and I've used him here with Stampin Up Work Of Art stamp as a background.  I have used brown card as a mount although because its a dark brown it looks black on here. Hope to see you at our challenge this week

Twofers

I Saw a new blog had started called Twofers and thought I'd give it a go. I've had a hard time with my post as when I tried to enter my cards on the challenge Linky wouldn't pick up the cards I was entering and was just picking up the two cards below so now I've had to start again, not happy, anyhow here's my entry

 

I couldn't get both cards to fit on side by side without losing a bit off one side so I'm putting them on after I've entered this into the Twofers challenge !

 

Well Ive just had another go at loading my cards and for some reason the Linky is still not picking up my cards, don't know what else to try !!!!

Here's the two cards separately so I'll just put one of them on and anybody who cares to look can see them both

 

 

Ive used a Sampendous stamp which really doesn't get used enough and the "foliage" round the edges is the hair from a woman stamp by indigo blu, I've never used it for its real purpose but it makes a good filler in stamp. On the first card I used texture paste through a stencil, I hindsight I wish I had not added so much cooour to the paste and I have tried to tone it down a bit with white acrylic.

 

More Poppies

The Challenge this month At Stamping Sensations is Anything Goes With a Stamp and dies, to be considered for the prize your entry must include Stamping.  For my card I have used a Woodware poppy stamp overstamped with a little text stamp from a papermania set. The Background paper is stamped with Hero Arts old French writing.

There is a fantastic Prize this month from Tattered Lace




Our sponsor this month is Tattered Lace who are very generously offering one lucky winner a £50 store voucher to spend at their on line store. The award winning Tattered Lace company needs little introduction, they are synonymous with quality products coupled with the unique style and flair of Stephanie Weightman, you will find the whole range of products on the website here as well as regular inspiration on their blog here.

Christmas Poinsettia

This months challenge at Sparkles Christmas is Ditch The Designer Papers -  use no designer papers which is something I'm always happy with ! I struggle to match up papers and I either make inky backgrounds or as on this card use embossing folders. I had just bought this Sheena Douglas folder and I've already made several cards using it.  The poinsettia stamp is an old PSX  I've had for years and it comes out every Christmas. Hope to see your cards on our challenge this month

Our Sponsors this month are  Crafty Sentiments Design who are offering A prize of three digi stamps

 

and

 

 

Crafters Companion who are offering a £10 Voucher