Just a bit Flash....

To explain the challenge title a bit, here in New Zealand when something is a little fancy or a bit special we often call it "flash" - so for the challenge over at Southern Girls this time, we want to see something a bit pretty, shiny or glitzy on your projects.

 

I made two cards... one using a gorgeous pre-coloured image from The Paper Shelter and one using stamps I purchased from Krafters Cart.

 

If you are in a hurry to get a card done... The Paper Shelter has lots of lovely pre-coloured images.  Isn't she so sweet.  I printed Monique out and used a Spellbinders die to cut her out.  Layered on some textured metallic papers.  Added some stickles for snow and a sparkly snowflake and gem. 

 For this card I used two Altenew sets, both purchased at Krafters Cart.  I stamped the flowers onto some watercolour paper and cut out with my ScanNCut.  I then added a few strokes of Zig Real Brush colour markers and spritzed with water to move the colour about.    The sentiment is from the Happy Blooms set and is Gold embossed on to the Metallic paper. I used a circle frame I had sitting on my desk.  Originally the card panel was to be layered on a red card base, but I put it on upside down - so trimmed it off and added to a white card base.

Come and join us at Southern Girls challenge. 

Rosey Posey

Last week I saw a gorgeous cut file coloured by my online friend - Helen .  She is a designer for The Cut Shoppe.  I was impressed so quickly popped over and purchased the cut file.   It came as a PNG so I found a site where I could convert to a SVG file and cut it out of some watercolour paper.  I misjudged the size and cropped off a portion.

It turned out the perfect size in the end.  I used some Spectrum Noir Aqua markers to colour up.  I splattered some of the pink and green markers onto the background panel, added the cut and finished with a white embossed sentiment on black card.    I loved how easy it was to make such a cool focal cut with my ScanNCut.

Thanks for stopping by.... I'm off to create my card for the upcoming challenge at Southern Girls... my sample was supposed to be ready by today and I completely forgot.  Look out for the results on Thursday!

One Layer Wonders - Day 2 and Day 3

I'm taking the the One Layer Wonders class at Altenew Academy.    Day 2 was about masking and using a background stamp.

I don't have any Altenew Backgrounds so I used a Hero Arts one with some Altenew Inks

I did some rainbow stamping with some random colouring.  I stamped the sentiment with Altenew alpha stamps.  They have different inners for each letter.  I used  the rainbow colours to stamp the stripes.  The friend word is stamped directly onto a single layer by colouring the space where it goes with black pen, then white embossing.  Some drop shadows give the impression of layers.  The sequins are stamps by Winnie & Walter stamped with the Altenew inks.   Learnt lots of interesting techniques in the class.

I'm entering this one into the Bright & Cheerful challenge at Simon Says Stamp 

Day 3 was about Watercolour under painting.   Kelly used a bouquet of flowers for her focal point.  I chose to use a spray of flowers

I used Oxide inks to colour my flowers and the background.  The flowers are from The Best Mom set.  I used some Prismacolor pencils to enhance the flowers and added white gel pen dots and highlights.  Added a grey shadow to give the impression that the flowers are raised off the card.

Hubby was away today so I spend a goodly amount of time in my craft room.  I finished off my Fairy for the May class at Kit and Clowder and made a card using a cut file I purchased last week.  I'll share tomorrow.

Thanks for stopping by.  

One Layer Wonder and a little Toucan

Hi there.   I can't believe it's the weekend again!  Where has the week gone????  I don't seemed to have done much -  it's been cold and wet so have been hunkered down in front of the heater each evening so not much crafting done.  So today I race around and got the house work done, some veggie soup on, pull apart bread made (with the help of the bread maker) cookies baked and slow cooker casserole started... so time to have a bit of a play.   My first card is is a little Toucan I started last evening and finished off this afternoon

I used my Prismacolor pencils to colour this wee cute up.  The sentiment was masked so I could get it on two lines to fit in the Penny Black Chat Bubble die.   As it is a CAS card but I wanted some extra texture, I used a tropical flower die from Darice to emboss the background.  A few 3D liquid drops finished it off.

Plus I did Day 1's home work from Altenew Academy class " One Layer Wonders" which Kelly Latevola is teaching.  Day 1 was about giving the perception of a raised layer across the card.

Well this was definitely PRACTICE!  So many errors.  First off I didn't stamp the sentiment in the centre, but happy with the masking of the little sentiment.  Next I must have moved as I got some double stamping...then I realised I'd not used Copic friendly ink so some of it smudged when I went to colour.   My dark lines went a bit wobbly when I went to add the shading to give the perception of a raised layer... and both my dark and light grey Copics went dry on me.  Oh well that's hand made card making for you.   I did manage to save the sentiment panel by adding the extra flowers which made it look much better.    I do like the technique and will practice some more.  I used the flower stamps from Starry Flowers set with the sentiment from Flower Arrangement set.

Day three's class is there now so I've just turned on the heater here in the craft cave and am going to watch Kelly's magic happen.

Enjoy your weekend... hopefully get some crafting done.   

Polkadoodles Digi Choosday Craft Challenge - Outside.

Hi... I'm here with another Guest Designer card for Polkadoodles Choosday Digi Craft Challenge.

The challenge is Anything Goes.... and the team challenge was to focus on the sentiment.  This is a great challenge for the DT as the Polkadoodles shop has some totally awesome sentiment/quotes sets. 

I used a sentiment from "Quotes - Winnie Special Moments" and once printed, was die cut with a Spellbinders die.  My background papers all came from the "Winnie Celebrations 3 - Papers " set.  They co-ordinate beautifully.   I used some of the dotted purple paper to stamp my Heartfelt Creations stamps in a deep purple ink.  Once I cut them out, I put them into the Basic Flower Mold and spirtzed with water and run them through the Cuttlebug.  The water caused the ink to run and colour the flower.  The leaves were printed onto an other papers from this set.  

I loved the simplicity of this card which focused on the sentiment and showcased the beautiful papers.

I have entered this into the following challenges:

Crafting from the Heart  Anything Goes
 WordArt Wednesday  Anything Goes

thanks for stopping by and do come and play along with the challenge.

A bit of a catch up...

I seem to have got super busy this last week.    Thursday was my birthday and we went out to dinner with my son and his partner.   We had a good night with lots of laughter and great food.  Here is a picture of the gorgeous gift they gave me

Then over the weekend we went with our friends to Managwhai.  Haven't been up for a while.  The weather forecast was not looking good, but in the end, it was beautiful weather.  I went out for a walk on both days... Saturday a 50 min walk and today a 80 min walk.  I got some great photos of the walks

  A pair of Mallard ducks 

 Cute little bach at the end of our street

Harbour on Saturday.

and today I walked over to the Surf Beach 

It's hard to see but there were three dolphins surfing the waves with all the surfers.   Worth the hard walk to get there.  

We also went out for lunch at a nearby cafe for a lovely lunch.    After we got back I spend some time colouring and making some nail polish marbling I saw on Splitcoaststampers.  

 

I had a great time doing this colouring.  I'm loving the classes I am taking at Kit and Clowder.  I am learning so much about using my Prismacolor pencils. 

Thanks for taking the time to visit me.   Hope you all had a great weekend too.

Panda Birthday

It's my day to share at Die Cut Divas.... Our theme this month is Animals/Pets

Our lovely sponsor this month is Frantic Stamper Inc... and they have some awesome animal stamps you could use for our challenge.

They are also providing a cute little die for a prize for our winner this month

Super cute.

So here is my card.... a CAS cutie

This adorable Panda was stamped and cut with my ScanNCut machine.  I used my trusty Cuttlebug to emboss at each end of the panel with the cute little paw prints.  The butterfly is also cut with my machine.  Love the ScanNCut now I'm getting used to it.

Do come and join us for this months Animals/Pets challenge. 

Noel Christmas cards

I have a couple of Christmas cards to share today.  I did lots of colouring over the first few days of June for Kathy Racoosin's 30 Day colouring challenge.  I have also been spending some time working out how to use my ScanNCut and had found a great Noel text image, I wanted to try out on a card.  I set it up in Brother Canvas and decided I wanted to use it as an Eclipse card.  So I decided to stamp and colour a background to die cut.

I stamped the Hero Arts Poinsettia several times and coloured it.  I then cut it with the ScanNCut.  I cut several more white die cuts and one out of dark green card so I could layer the sentiment when I laid it back in the negative space.  I quite like the result, but think the background is just a touch too busy to see the sentiment that well. 

The next card came about as I was about to throw out the negative space of one of the white layers.   I looked at it and decided it was too good to throw away.  So here's what I did

I die cut a stitched rectangle and added some patterned paper behind the opening.  I added some Nuvo drops as embellishments. 

So that's my first two Christmas cards started. 

Thanks for stopping by. 

The Daily Marker 30 day challenge - Days 8, 9 and 10

I'm trying to do the daily challenge - some colouring every day for the 30 Days of June.... so far not too bad -
so here's Days 8, 9 and 10

Day 8:

A card for a friend who turned 60 on the 9th June.... Using a Bugaboo image coloured with Prismacolor pencils.

Day 9:

This one is for our friend's wife who's birthday is the next day (10th- she is a year younger)  I got some new Altenew stamps this week and used the Rustic Linen background with Old Paper distress ink to make a background.  I then stamped the Starry night stamps and used my Derwent Inktense pencils to watercolour them.  I cut the Happy die on my ScanNCut... a bit smaller than I'd have liked but it looks ok with stamped sentiment.

and Day :

This card is for the challenge at The Flower Challenge #21 - Use a previous challenge.  I chose Challenge #3 - Use an old stamp or die.  The stamp here is a Hero Arts one from 2010.  I used the Derwent Inktense pencils as they were still sitting on my desk.   Add some splatter and pencil does for the background.   Some gold washi tape completed the card.

Have enjoyed the mindfulness of colouring.  It is very therapeutic and relaxing if you just go with the flow and don't get caught up in trying too hard to get it right.

My son and his partner have just arrived to help hubby with some fix up jobs in the garage so it's time for me to go....

take care and take some time to colour this weekend

Kids cards

When I was at the beauty parlour the other week, my therapist was saying she has 13 nieces and nephews and was always looking for kids cards so I told her I'd make some.  Over the long weekend I got a few done...

 This one used some MFT Snuggle Bunnies and WPlus9 balloons.

The next two were inspired by Pinterest.  Used punched circles for my caterpillar and die cut circles for my birds. 

 Next is another MFT bunnies and the WPlus9 balloon

And my  final card uses MFT dragons

 I enjoyed making these cards and if she likes them, I do her some more.

Thanks for stopping by.

Polkadoodles Digi Choosday Craft Challenge - Outdoors

Hi there.... It's Chooseday again at Polkadoodles....

 

The theme is as always "Anything Goes" but the team challenge is Outdoor.... and oh what fun it was to choose an image to use... so many to choose from that would fit the bill... but I chose to use a cute little girl - Jump for Joy - Winnie Celebrations 3.   

I used some Patterned Paper from  Winnie Celebrations 3 Papers to paper piece her top.  And I found the perfect sentiment in Quotes - Winnie Special Moments.  I added some grass with a Fiskers punch.

I'm entering this into the following challenges:
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge - Anything Goes.
Fussy and Fancy - Summer Fling 
Simply Papercrafts - anything goes 

Thanks for stopping by




.

AECP Level 1 assignment.

I have now completed the first 10 courses on the AECP Level 1 so Virginia has set me an interesting and challenging assignment...I need to use three techniques learnt and make it a masculine card or a card for a teenager.   I've been thinking and thinking what to do....  And finally a idea came to me...

My three techniques come from Easy Ink Blending.... my softly blended ink through the stencil (this is very subtle in the background), For the Guys.... using geometric shapes and Let It Shine.....using some gold embossing.

I used Sea Shores blue inks for my stamping and ink blending.  The geometric stamps are from Sohcahtoa set and the sentiment is from Birthday Bash and all the embossing was with Ranger Gold powder.  I added a few black spots from the Birthday Bash set to add some extra texture.

I have really enjoyed the courses so far... onward to the next 10 classes in Level 2.  Thanks Altenew for this awesome program and letting me be involved. 

If you are interested in learning about some of the participants, including me, HERE

Entering this into the following challenges:
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge - Anything Goes 
So Suzy Stamps May/June challenge - Masculine

thanks for visiting today.  

Peachy Keen - Swap cards

During May I took part in two swaps - one being the Sursee Swap over StampNation and one being the Card Chain Challenge..  The theme for the Sursee Swap was Peachy....

I used a letterpress technique with an embossing folder and some Catherine Pooler Bellini ink.  Added some die cut flowers and leaves.  The folder and the dies were a freebie with a magazine recently.  My card went to Michelle in Melbourne Australia.  The Sursee swap is where you send an encouragement card to your recipient.  You might not receive on in return this month, but sometime when you least expect it a beautiful encouraging card will arrive in your letterbox.

My CCC card went to Dee who lives in Kenya, but gets her CCC cards sent to her sister in England.   I used the same technique and ink colours

 I used the sketch from the CCC challenge for May.  I stamped the flowers from Altenew, used a stitched oval die and a Winnie & Walter digital SVG cut with my ScanNCut.

This weekend is a long weekend here in NZ... to celebrate the Queen's Birthday.  And with being off sick last week, I had done the housework and hubby was helping our friend with his renovations on Sat and today.... I got lots of time in my craft space.... lots of cards to share over the next few days.  And a little drama this morning when we had a couple of hours heavy rain that caused some flooding in our backyard, some leaks upstairs in our big windows - water pouring through the seals - but once the rain eased, all went back to normal... luckily I got buckets in place quickly to catch the drips.


Here's a peek at some colouring I did today

One card made with one of these cuties.  My ScanNCut had a bit of a work out.

Hope you all are having a fun fulled weekend and maybe taking part in Kathy Racoosin's 30 Day colouring challenge.

Spring/Summer Coffee Lovers Blog Hop

Better late than never.... I finally got time to make a card for the Coffee lovers blog hop.  It finishes today.

I used a beautiful digital image from Graciellie Design;

Used Prismacolor pencils to colour it in and then cut it out with my Scan'n'Cut to trim it out.  Also used the SNC to cut out the circle sentiment.  The background was embossed with a folder and lightly sponged with a teal ink.

Glad to have had the energy today to make a card.  I am still not 100%  but getting better.

Thanks for stopping by.