Handpainted Poppies

The theme over at Less is More this week is "Flowers" so I took the opportunity to practice watercolour painting again. I've also belatedly realised that I didn't enter this into this week's "Flower" challenge over at CASology as I'd intended to. The poppy stamps are by Inkylicious, one of my favourite stamp companies. I stamped & masked the images in Antique Linen Distress Ink.

Then I smooched Adirondack Terracotta ink onto an acrylic block, mixing it with water then using that to paint the main image. The black is Cosmic Shimmer Iridescent Watercolour paint. The greeting is a Lucy Cromwell for Papermania stamp, stamped in Hero Arts Charcoal ink. Although the card looked too plain without any embellishments I tried to keep them to a minimum, just using a few pearls to finish it off.

Purple Blossoms

The theme over at Virginia's View Challenge this month is Stencil so I decided to dig out a stencil which I bought some time ago but hadn't used yet. It's called Summer Blossom Border by Imagination Crafts and I sponged Adirondack Eggplant through it for the background.

The focal image is a Hero Arts stamp from the Luscious Bold Flowers set, stamped & embossed in white on kraft cardstock then coloured with Adirondacks, and the greeting is by Imagination Crafts.

The finished card was for an elderly relative whose eyesight is failing so I hoped that the bold patterns would be easier for her to see.

Predominantly Purple

My mojo has gone AWOL again just lately, but the challenge over at CASology of the cue word "Purple" inspired me to make this sympathy card. Unfortunately by the time I'd finished it I was 30 minutes too late to enter the challenge!

I always think sympathy cards should be simple & understated, so this one was no exception: a brayered background overstamped with an Artemio poppy. The greeting is by Dovecraft. Simples!

Inks: Adirondack Cool Peri & Eggplant

Stamps: Artemio, Dovecraft

Christmas Catch-up Part 2

This was our son's Christmas card this year. As an avid guitarist the phrase "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" seemed most appropriate.  I was going to cut out the tree & guitar on my new Eclips but ended up doing it by hand (long story!). I got the tree from here then paper-pieced it. The guitar was stamped in Adirondack Red Pepper then glittered with my Wink of Stella clear pen & the rest was done in Craft Artist 2 Professional:

Cardstock: Xerox Colotech Plus

Ink: Adirondack Red Pepper

Stamps: Inspired by Stamping

Kitten Christmas

My goddaughter recently became the proud owner of a cute kitten called Lulu from the Blue Cross rescue centre.  So it seemed fitting to try out the new Inkylicious kitten stamps I'd bought from the NEC back in November for the Christmas card to her family, although I decided to use them with some bauble stamps rather than the butterflies in the set. I also decided to have a try at an ombre background.

Details from card insert:

Stamps: Inkylicous & free from DoCrafts

Inks: Adirondack Sunset Orange, Versafine Onyx Black

Black Forest

No, not the gateau! It's the title of one of my new Inkylicious stamps that I bought over the weekend at the NEC. I also bought some new Adirondacks so some of those are in evidence for the first time on this card.

I also bought a couple of mountain/valley masks so I had a play with those, too. I was trying out some new card and it showed up brush marks when I used my Inkylicious brushes - this isn't normally a problem so I switched to using a brayer which was better, and the sky looked better than it appears in the photos.

Cardstock: Anna Marie Designs

Stamps: All Inkylicious except greeting: Imagination Crafts

Inks: Adirondack Mountain Rose, Sunshine Yellow, Terra Cotta,

Memento Tuxedo Black

G is for Games

Card makers often dread having to make cards for the male of the species. Add into the mix that the male concerned is a teenager and it's doubly difficult. Mo Manning has some great digis which make this task a whole lot easier and when I saw this one of a boy intent on his games I knew exactly who it would be perfect for.

The main part of the image was coloured with denim & pear green Promarkers, the green chosen because it matches Lettuce Adirondack ink - one of the few Adirondacks I've got, and which I was using to make my own backing paper.

The backing paper was made by using my Inkylicious Ink Dusters with a combination of Denim & Lettuce Adirondacks then random stamping using Papertrey Ink game-themed stamps. I'm entering this into the "G is for . . " challenge.

Finished card size: 15cm square

Main image: Mo Manning "Video Boy"

Stamps: Papertrey Ink Text Style Boy Basics: Game On #2357

Main Promarker colours: Denim, Pear Green

Inks: Adirondack Denim, Lettuce

ATCAS #19 - Summer

Another card for my sister's birthday last week & which I decided was just right for entering into challenge 19 at Addicted to CAS, where the code word this time is Summer. This was my first try at brayering ink onto an acrylic block then stamping with it.  I masked off part of the block to make an "ink pad" about 10cm square then inked my cardstock with it. (I later discovered I didn't need to use the brayer at all, just swiping the ink pad across the acrylic block worked just as well.)  Once it was fully dry I stamped the images & greeting with Versafine then decided to resist the temptation to add any further embellishment.  I'm pleased to say my sister loved it!

Cardstock: Xerox Colotech Plus 300gsm

Inks: Adirondack Cloudy Blue, Sailboat Blue, Distress Antique Linen

Stamps: People & bird - freebie, Greeting Elzybells (no longer available)

Inkylicious Alliums Again

The main image for this card was created using the same stamps & Adirondacks as my last post, but I wanted it to have a different feel to the first one.  In any case, I try to avoid making two cards the same.  For the background this time I simply stamped the Inkylicious script stamp twice in Memento Teal Zeal, added some plain white organza ribbon & a Meiflower diamante buckle.  I did try to colour the ribbon with Adirondacks but got more ink on myself than the ribbon & also found that it just didn't seem to dry so gave that up as a bad job!

Cardstock: Xerox Colotech Plus 300gsm

Stamps: Inkylicious, Imagination Crafts

Inks: Adirondack Cloudy Blue, Sailboat Blue, Denim, Memento Teal Zeal

More Inky Experiments

This time with Inkylicious stamps & sponging with Adirondack inks.  The main image is the Inkylicious Allium 2-step stamp inked up with Memento Paris Dust & Adirondack Sailboat Blue, and you'll see from the picture below that I didn't manage to stamp it quite perfectly but I decided that I didn't mind the offset effect & used the image anyway.

The background to the main image was then sponged using Adirondacks Cloudy Blue, Sailboat Blue & Denim.  I spent ages trying to decide how to finish the card off until I decided to keep it simple, sponging again straight onto the main card & then partially inking up an Inkylicious small script stamp with a combination of the same inks.  The greeting was from Imagination Crafts, stamped in Memento Nautical Blue and I added a trio of square gems to finish.

Cardstock: Xerox Colotech Plus 300gsm

Stamps: Inkylicious, Imagination Crafts

Inks: Adirondack Cloudy Blue, Sailboat Blue, Denim

Memento: Paris Dusk, Nautical Blue

Flutter Vine Birthday

This card was made using my some of my purchases from a craft show at Leigh the other week.  I bought my first Memory Box die, Flutter Vine, as I thought it would go with one of my purchases from a few weeks ago, the Papermania Whimsy Tri-Boss embossing folder.  The "frame" was cut using the Spellbinders Card Creator Matting Basics set B.

I was inspired by this card, and did initially brayer the embossing folder with Adirondack ink so that the embossed card was coloured but the result was too patchy so I decided white on white would have to do.  

Finished card size: A6

Cardstock: Colotech Plus 300gsm

Papermania Tri-Boss Embossing Folder: Whimsy

Memory Box Flutter Vine die

Adirondack Cool Peri Ink

More Inkylicious!

The image on this card was made at the same time as the one on last week's sympathy card.  But as it's for a friend's birthday I obviously wanted it to have a completely different feel to it.  Despite having brightened it a little with some orange ribbon (actually, white coloured with Promarkers!) I still think the nature of the picture makes it a bit too sombre but I know my friend will still appreciate it.

Cardstock: from stash

Stamps: Inkylicious, Sue Dix "Love is the Thread"

Inks: Adirondack

Inkylicious Sympathy Card

I paid a fleeting visit to the craft show at Event City back in February - we would have stayed longer but it was so busy we really didn't enjoy it.  One stand I made sure I visited was Inkylicious where I bought some new Adirondacks & a number of stamps, including the Meadow Breeze set.  I then spent an enjoyable evening brayering & stamping a number of pictures to keep in stock for making quick cards.

Well, this week a close colleague's father passed away very suddenly so I decided one of the images I made the other week would be really appropriate to send from the rest of us in the office.  As the recipient is a man I tried to avoid the card becoming too feminine.

Base cardstock: from stash

Stamps: Inkylicious Meadow Breeze & Flight of Dreams (birds), 

Papermania Bunting by Lucy Cromwell (sentiment)

Inks: Adirondack Peach Bellini, Sunset Orange, Terra Cotta, Memento Tuxedo Black

Caught in Crystal technique

Another new technique for me, again involving the use of household items, and great fun to do!  I saw this on the blog of another of my favourite crafters, Sue Wilson.  Her tutorial is here but I didn't quite follow it exactly because I'd learned elsewhere that, rather than buying Crystal Lacquer, you could use Johnson's Klear Floor Polish, which I just happened to have handy.  Well, gathering dust in my utility room, to be exact;-)  

I've seen other crafters' comments that floor polish isn't as good as Crystal Lacquer but it looks pretty darned good to me!  Apart from the floor polish I stayed faithful to the tutorial, using Tim Holtz alcohol inks & Perfect Pearls. I loved the finished effect so much I didn't want to stamp onto the front of the acrylic, preferring to turn it into a simple triptych 

If you've never tried this technique, why not give it a go?

Finished card size: A6

Panel sizes: centre 9.5cm x 4cm, two outer panels 8.5cm x 4cm

Base Cardstock: Xerox Colotech Plus 300gsm

Blue cardstock: from stash

Inks: Adirondack Sailboat Blue, Latte, Meadow

Perfect Pearls: Perfect Bronze, Perfect Gold

Greeting stamp: Craft UK