Fancy Floral

Another day, another experiment! This time a little bit of parchment craft using some Hero Arts stamps which were an Ebay bargain a few weeks ago.  The smaller flowers were stamped using Memento Elderberry ink on parchment paper, then I drew the white lines in pencil on the front & embossed them from the back. The larger flower was also stamped in Memento Elderberry but this time I embossed between the stamping to create the white on the petals.

The frame & numbers were created in Silhouette Studio, cut out on my Craft Robo Lite then I stamped a few leaves around part of it in white Brilliance ink.  The central cardstock was embossed using Couture Creations Tied Together embossing folder and I decided a few pearls were needed just to balance things out.

Cardstock: White - Xerox Colotech Plus 300gsm, lilac from stash.

Stamps: Hero Arts CG303 Luscious Bold Flowers, Inkylicious leaves

Ink: Memento Elderberry, Brilliance White

Papermania Pearls.

Hearts & Hatpins

My husband's Godmother celebrates her 40th wedding anniversary tomorrow so I wanted to make her & her husband a special card. I love the cards Sue Wilson makes but I just can't bring myself to make anything that busy. This, therefore, is my homage to Sue's style (albeit much more CAS), complete with homemade hat pins!

I love hat pins on cards but this is my first attempt at making & using them. I wanted them to be on the front of the smaller heart but I soon realised I had absolutely no idea how to attach them to it. I tried various methods using ribbon, all of them useless. I tried Cosmic Shimmer glue & ribbon; also useless. So in the end I resorted to good old sticky tape with the heart in front to hide the evidence! 

Cardstock: Xerox Colotech Plus 300gsm, DCWV Shimmer Stack

Stamp: IndigoBlu Vintage Flourish

Ink: Tsukineko Brilliance Pearlescent Poppy

Sentiment: Computer generated

Flowers, hat pins, flat backed gems all from stash.

First Time with FlitterGlu

I like messing with inks, but glitter is another matter entirely! I don't have a craft room - my crafting space is a small foldaway table in the living room - which makes glitter etc impractical.  So although I've had FlitterGlu & gilding flakes in my stash for ages, this was my first proper foray into the FlitterGlu technique. I do like the results but I'm not sure it's something I'd want to bother with too often, at one stage I'm sure I had more flakes on me than the card . . .

I was inspired by this card but, as ever, didn't copy it completely. The trellis was cut on my Craft Robo Lite from a template I made myself (shared on UKScrappers, if you're interested).  It was, in fact, only a test cut on quite thin card but it seemed a shame to waste it. However, the fact that the card was thin did make rubbing the flakes off with a "scoochie sponge" a very delicate operation.  

The hearts were cut from a piece of DCWV Shimmer cardstock which I'd stamped with Flitter Glu using a Kaisercraft stamp, gilded with Lancashire Rose flakes & then cut out on my Cuttlebug using a heart Nestability. The greeting by Elzybells (sadly no longer available) was stamped in Brilliance Pearlescent Poppy.

Rock Star Red

This had to be a quick card - my son only told me at 9pm last night that it had been his friend's birthday yesterday!  As his friend plays the electric guitar it was an ideal opportunity to test out my first Ebay purchase: Inkadinkado Rock Star stamps. A card I'd seen recently in red, black & kraft was the inspiration for the colour theme.

I started with the main image, which was stamped in Pearlescent Poppy Brilliance Ink then embossed.  The embossing was a bit uneven but as I planned to make the card quite grungy I decided to just go with it and sponged round the edges with Black Soot Distress Ink:

The background was a combination of more stamps from the Inkadinkado set, and stars sponged through a mask, all with Pearlescent Poppy again which I discovered isn't pearlescent on kraft cardstock!  The greeting was created in Craft Artist 2 Professional using Retro Rock Poster font.

Cardstock: Papermania Kraft, Xerox Colotech 300gsm, black from stash

Inks: Pearlescent Poppy Brilliance, Distress Black Soot

Embossing Powder: Papermania

Mask: maker unknown

Seahorse Sponging

Another card for my sister, whose birthday it was a couple of days ago. Seahorses and aqua colours are two of her favourite things so I combined them in this project, which is also inspired by Heather Telford's amazing sponging work.  If you've never seen her blog, it's well worth a visit.

The seahorse is a brass stencil which I sponged through using two colours of Versamagic inks.  I then inked round the edges of the main image with the darker ink.

The frame was cut using Nestabilities then I clear embossed some Inkylicious sea-themed stamps round it and sponged over the top, carefully dabbing away the excess over the embossed images because the Versamagic takes some time to dry and I didn't want to take too much away.

Cardstock: Xerox Colotech Plus 300gsm

Stamps: Inkylicious Seascape Memories

Inks: Tsukineko Versamagic Aquatic Splash & Ocean Depth

Love is the Thread

My sister is an accomplished seamstress so when I saw a range of sewing-themed stamps by Sue Dix for Personal Impressions I just couldn't resist them.  The sets are called "Lace and Thread", "Vintage Sewing" and "Love is the Thread" and this card is a mix of stamps from all 3.  And no, I hadn't been drinking when I took the photo above!

As teal is her favourite colour I used Memento Teal Zeal ink to randomly stamp some of the images onto a K & Company backing paper.  The main image was stamped onto an Inkylicious tag with some of the details of the sewing machine coloured in using a Cut 'n' Dry nib & more of the Memento.  The charm is by Crafty Bits, and the ribbon was coloured with Promarker Duck Egg.

Detail from card insert

Detail from back of card

Cardstock: from stash

Stamps: Sue Dix for Personal Impressions
Backing Paper: K & Co Addison Paper Pad 628052

Ink: Memento Teal Zeal

Charm: Crafty Bits