Key to my Heart

Wonders will never cease - two cards in one day, and a week early for Valentine's day rather than my usual last minute rush! A very quick card for my husband using some recently-purchased Clearly Besotted stamps.

As with my first card of the day this is based on the sketch over at Case this Sketch. The stamps were simply inked in Memento Tuxedo Black & Love Letter; using dewdrop ink pads made it easy to ink the "key" in the sentiment a different colour to the rest. A strip of backing paper which has been in my stash for ages, plus a strip of textured black cardstock kept it CAS, and I carefully covered the padlock in Anita's Clear Gloss.

Happy Birthday Less is More!

One of my favourite challenge blogs, Less is More, celebrates its 4th birthday so what better way to mark the occasion than to make them a birthday card? The theme is pink & grey, and I've combined this with the current sketch over at Case this Sketch.

Two things about this card are unusual for me: one, I knew exactly how I wanted it to look and two, I was able to devote enough time this morning to making it! I started off with the Clearly Besotted "Full of Surprise" present & balloons. The present was stamped in Hero Arts Soft Granite, the balloons in Picked Raspberry Distress Ink. I then painted the ribbons to match. 

The number 4 (by Kirsty Wiseman for Personal Impressions) and the greeting (maker unknown) were stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black. The paper by Teresa Collins was fussy cut, then I painted one of the stripes in Picked Raspberry, and the edge in Wink of Stella which unfortunately doesn't show up in the photos. I finished off with a black sequin in the centre of the bow. 

Happy Birthday Less is More - long may you continue!

I Heart Fuchsias

Another day, another challenge! At the moment I'm trying really hard to use up some of the stash I've accumulated over the last few years but never touched, also mixing it with some of my newer acquisitions. This card is based on the sketch over at I {Heart} Card Sketches although it can't be entered into the challenge there as I didn't use one of their images.

This card uses the Clearly Besotted stamps free with this month's Simply Cards & Papercraft magazine, stamped in Memento Bamboo Leaves & Angel Pink. The backing paper, flowers & jewelled brad have been in my stash for a very long time. I added a touch of Wink of Stella to the main fuchsia, which I hope you can see in the picture below.

Autumn

Autumn has definitely arrived here today and that's the theme of some of the challenge blogs I follow. I've combined the autumn theme with one or two other challenges & this was what I came up with:

The background is by Kaisercraft, stamped in Adirondack Paint Dabber in Terra Cotta. The leaves were created from One Strike Filler (aka spackle) using a stencil I made on my Sizzix Eclips. I coloured them by dropping diluted Distress Inks onto them as they take the colour very easily. I used a mix of inks: Fired Brick, Peeled Paint, Rusty Hinge, Gathered Twigs and Barn Door. The greeting is from Clearly Besotted's Many Messages set, in Memento Potter's Clay which was also used to stamp the Flourishes border by Marion Emberson Designs.

I'm entering this into the following challenges:

Addicted to CAS: Theme "Stencil"

Virginia's View: Theme "CAS"

Less Is More: Theme "Autumn's Bounty"

Stamping Sensations: Theme "Autumn"

CAS(E) This Sketch: sketch below

Happy Hexagons

I haven't done much card making since the new school term started, but this weekend I decided to make a real effort to spend some time crafting. The challenge over at Simply Less is More this week is "Mostly Words" which gave me the inspiration to make this for my nephew's 25th birthday card:

The hexagon stamps & dies are by Clearly Besotted but I found that lining up the stamps onto the die cut hexagons drove me mad - I couldn't get the stamps lined up at all so I threw away dozens of failures! The letters are Kirsty Wiseman stamps, and the hexagon stickers had been in my stash for several years so it was good to finally use some of those.

I'm also entering this into the challenges over at Sweet Stampin' Challenge and We Do Doobadoo which both have a masculine theme.

Smarty Pants!

Our son took a couple of GCSEs a year early & passed with flying colours (A* in Maths & A in English Lit). His congratulations card is a CASE of a card I saw a while back somewhere on the internet. As I have no idea where I saw it, I'm unable to credit the originator so my apologies if that's you!

It's an excellent way of using up patterned paper scraps to fill the shape I drew freehand. The Congratulations greeting is a Clearly Besotted stamp, and "smarty pants!" was computer generated. I'm going to enter this for Virginia's View challenge number 7.

Geometric

Another week, another challenge, this time the one over at Addicted to CAS where the theme is geometric. This was an ideal opportunity to try out a recent Ebay purchase of some Clearly Besotted stamps & dies, and another watercolour technique. This time the technique is to emboss with the dies rather than cutting the card, and to let watercolour paint fill the embossed lines.

I decided to cut out one or two of the shapes to let the black background show through, and stamped some of them with a variety of the stamps from the set. The greeting is by Woodware, and the enamel dots were created with Ranger Enamel Accents.

Third Time Lucky!

This card is for the one-layer challenge over at Less Is More where the current theme is Foliage. 

The greeting is by Clearly Besotted & was stamped in Distress Peeled Paint onto watercolour cardstock. The leaf stencil was a downloaded image (modified in Craft Artist 2 Professional to add an extra branch) then cut on my Sizzix Eclips. As embossing paste is all the rage right now I used my own version which is known in the US as "spackle", but I know it as "One Strike Filler". I mixed it on my craft mat with Distress Peeled Paint ink. A few arty water splashes were all that was necessary to finish it off.

This was my third attempt - the first couple of attempts initially turned out fine but I managed to ruin each card in different ways! Although I could reuse parts of them they wouldn't have been one layer so watch out for them over the next few days as they turn up in modified form.

Just in CASE

I often struggle to come up with inspiration for my cards but, for once, I had ideas a-plenty! This card is inspired by two challenge blogs: CAS(E) this Sketch! and CASE Study.

I started with a circles stencil which I designed then cut on my Sizzix Eclips.I tried several different colouring mediums from Promarkers sprayed with a manual airbrush to Distress Inks, until eventually I settled on sponging with Memento inks in Summer Sky & Cantaloupe.

The greeting is by Clearly Besotted.

Mother's Day Watercolour

I've seen a number of cards which use white ink for stamping the image, and I decided to try this on kraft card using Inktense pencils as my colouring medium. The ink I used was Hero Arts Unicorn which is the best white ink I've come across & is supposed to be fast drying - not on kraft, it isn't!! This turned out to be a happy accident because after leaving my first stamped image for a day to dry, I found that my watercolouring skills weren't good enough for the more detailed parts of the image, and I kept going over the lines. So I re-stamped & embossed it with clear fine detail powder to make the watercolouring easier.

The colour is Inktense Fuchsia & I returned to the image numerous times to tweak it until I was happy with the result. The greeting is by Clearly Besotted, stamped with Brilliance in Pearlescent Orchid, and the "raindrops" are Viva Decor Glass Effect Gel which I'd dropped onto a craft sheet & left to dry. Another happy accident is that although the overall card design just fell into place, it also happens to be the same as the sketch challenge running this week over at Splitcoaststampers so I'm going to enter it there.

Stamps: Hero Arts Delicate Blossoms CL449, Clearly Besotted Many Messages

Cardstock: Docrafts Kraft, Coredinations Fuchsia Fizz

Ink: Hero Arts Unicorn, Memento Brilliance in Pearlescent Orchid

Derwent Inktense pencil in Fuchsia

Viva Decor Glass Effect Gel "raindrops"

Meiflower Heart

Ribbon from stash

Seaside Watercolour

When I painted the main image for this card the first signs of spring were creeping in & it seemed like summer was on its way. But as I write this, the sky is grey & a cold wind is whistling around the corner of the house so let's hope that's a temporary setback in the weather.

Just lately I've been enjoying doing watercolouring, something my late father would have been very pleased about as he was a very talented watercolour painter. I've got a long way to go before I get to his standard but I've really enjoyed losing myself in the creative process. This image is one by Michael Powell and I've coloured it with Aquamarkers & a fine paintbrush, I really don't get on with waterbrushes as I find they make it more difficult to control the amount of water used.

I added a stamped greeting from Clearly Besotted, some birds by Inkylicious & a few shells (again, Inkylicious), cut out to add a little bit of dimension. I hope I'm not too late to enter this into the challenge over at Virginia's View - take a look, there's some stunning work on there.

Stamps: Michael Powell "Shore Thing"

Inkylicious, Clearly Besotted "Many Messages"

Ink: Hero Arts Shadow Ink in Charcoal

Cardstock: Anna Marie Designs, watercolour card unknown

Jack Russell Digi

Cards for men are always a challenge; add into the mix the fact that the man isn't particularly into sports and it's almost a challenge too far! Anyway, in this case he owns 2 lively Jack Russell terriers so when I found this digistamp over at Just Inklined I knew I'd found my card theme. Then the sketch over at Sketch Saturday caught my eye so I decided to play along and here's the result:

Although I've been into watercolours just lately, this time I decided to dig out my Promarkers which haven't seen the light of day for a while. A stamped greeting & a hand-drawn paw print completed the sketch, and I highlighted the nose and eyes with some Inkssentials Glossy Accents, which I think you can see in the picture below.

Cardstock: Anna Marie Designs

Backing paper: from stash

Promarkers: Cinnamon, Cool Grey 3, Cool Grey 5, Umber, Caramel

Stamp: Clearly Besotted Many Messages

Ink: Memento Rich Cocoa

One for the Chaps!

Just one chap in particular - my brother-in-law, in this case, who celebrates his birthday next week.  My husband's first comment on this card is that it's a load of . . . . . well, I'll leave you to work that one out for yourself!!

Believe it or not, this card was my inspiration. The golf ball stamp is by Craft UK,and is quite an old one as I'm trying very hard to find new ways to use my old stamps. The greeting stamp is by Clearly Besotted, from their Many Messages set. I first stamped & embossed one golf ball & the greeting in black, then masked off the centre of the card. I used my Woodware stamp positioner to randomly stamp the golf ball in various Hero Arts Shadow Inks in shades of black & grey. I decided the focal golf ball wasn't quite focal enough, so I used Anita's Clear Gloss to make it stand out a bit more.

I'm entering this into this week's challenge at Less is More.

Cardstock: Anna Marie Designs

Stamps: CraftUK and Clearly Besotted "Many Messages"

Inks: Hero Arts Black, Charcoal, Soft Granite Shadow Inks