One die - two different cards

I'm back... we had the most amazing 12 days with Emma, Andrew, Archer and Finlay... full of adventures. Went to Kings Park on King's Birthday Monday holiday and saw the wild flowers and watched the 21 gun salute... Boy was it loud!   Visited Caversham Wildlife Park, which was awesome- patted Kangaroos, saw Koala in trees, farm animals and lots of amazing birds and other wildlife.  Spent a day at the Royal Perth Show - animals, watched Polo Cross, and the kids had rides and played on the side shows.   Lots of playgrounds visited, watched Finn's swimming class.  Took an adventure into the city with Archie to see the Dinosaurs Alive exhibition and did a tour of the Perth Mint.  Visited two of the Giants in Mandurah for the day.  And took Archie to play Mini Golf, 10 pin bowling and spend some time in the Arcade!  All in all, a busy but fun time. 

So after 2 weeks no crafting... I managed to spend some time in the craft room this afternoon.   While I was away I purchased Crafting Inspiration #9 magazine.  It came with some Crafters Companion goodies - a stamp set, a die, an embossing folder and a stencil.   Today I CASED a card from the magazine - changing up the colours mostly...

I chose a grey-blue card for my base.  I die cut the little square die and trimmed it into three pieces.  I layered them onto a panel the same colour as the card base and added white strips down each side.  I die cut an oval for the focal point to sit on.   I stamped the vase and orange tree from the stamp set and coloured with markers and fussy cut it.   Added to the oval and finished with a little white embossed sentiment from the set.

I love the look of splitting the die into three and adding to the card so decided to try it for a Christmas card.

I die cut the square from gold card and trimmed it into three pieces and added to a red panel.  Added this to the white base and then added a focal image of a Poinsettia.  This is a Hero Arts stamp which I gold embossed onto white and dark green card.  I fussy cut the centre part of the white one and after fussy cutting the green one, layered it on top.  Cut some dots from the same gold card and added to the card. 

As first one was the first time using these dies and stamps, I am adding it to the October NBUS challenge. 

Animals at Sweet Stampin' Challenge.

 It's time to share my card for Sweet Stampin' Challenge.  Our challenge this fortnight is "Animals"

Took me a while to choose what Animal I wanted to use.   Went through my stamp sets and came across a couple of Crafter's Companion sets - and chose to use Simply Wild About You.  

Went with a very simple card...  die cut a Gina K Master Layouts 2 stitched rectangle and stamped the zebra  and sentiment.   Added some green and blue ink blending and then used a Tim Holtz spritzer tool (see below) - and some green watercolour markers to make some grass. 

Finished with some black dots. 

Do come and join us at Sweet Stampin' Challenge 

Simply Wild About You!

 I've seen a few samples for this challenge and as I was thinking about making a card for my grandson - I thought this sketch would be perfect for what I had in mind. 

I flipped the sentiment to the other side, but other than that followed the sketch.  I used a new to me stamp set called "Simply wild about you" from Crafter's Companion.   So simple to do as not much colouring required.  I did add a bit of shading along the neck after taking the photo.  The background papers are a digital download I had on my computer.  (silly me forgot to identify where I got it when I saved it!)  Just love how it turned out though and I'm sure Archie will love it too. 

I'm also entering it into Darnell's NBUS challenge.   - First time using the stamps.  

Stand Tall and Shine

 For my NZ card swap group this month, my friend, Suna, set us a challenge to used torn paper to ink blend sky or hills etc.  She did say to make it monochromatic... but I struggled with that and just used the torn paper technique.  

I tore my paper and used it as a mask to add the blue and green inks to symbolise  the clouds and sky. I had used tape to mask the edges.  I had been waiting weeks for my new stamps to arrive.  This set is Crafter's Companion - Reach for the Sky.  I saw it over on Natasha Foote's You Tube and after some searching found it at Simon Says Stamp.   I stamped the giraffe onto some white card with black ink and clear embossed it to get the shiny look for the sunnies. I coloured it with Spectrum Noir Tri-blends and some other alcohol markers.  I then fussy cut it and added to the card.  

As it was the first outing for the Giraffe set, I'm adding this to the NBUS challenge that Darnell runs.