Time Out Challenges: Pick Two

 2nd post today.... check out my first one Here

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Had great day in the craft room on this public holiday Monday. I’ve had lots of fun getting creative, and I realised I hadn’t made a card for the latest Time Out Challenges. It’s a fun “Pick Two” challenge: choose two (or more) words from the six provided and use them in your project in some way.

This time the words are: Earth, Rain, Pastel, Hope, Tree, Bloom 

I’ve chosen Pastel and Bloom.

 

For my card, I used a beautiful large floral stamp from Woodware: Floral Wonder. To keep the look soft, I stamped it in Memento Toffee Crunch ink, then clear-embossed it. I coloured the image with Altenew watercolour paints on smooth 300gsm Franceville card, which handled the water well and didn’t warp too much. I used two shades of soft pastel pink for the flowers and two greens for the foliage. Once it was dry, I trimmed the panel down and matted it on pink patterned paper. The sentiment is from another Woodware set, Word Fragments. I stamped it on a scrap of white card in Altenew Cloudy Night ink, die-cut it, and popped it onto the card. To finish, I added gold dots to the flower centres and a few pink dots for extra embellishment.  Really happy with how it turned out. 

More Christmas cards using the mixed media background.

 Well over the last few days, I've made up three more cards using some of the mixed media masterboard I made. 

I had used Gina K Master Layout 2 to cut the panel.  I then used some texture paste through a star stencil and sprinkled with some Diamond Dust glitter.  Matted it with the dark green card and added the gold die cut sentiment (minus the shadow layer) and some gold dots. 

Next I used a square panel of the background 

Matted the square panel with the dark green (looks black in my photo) and used a strip to add my red die cut sentiment.  Added some little red star embellishments.   A very quick card. 

And the last for today 

This panel was a smaller one cut with one of the dies and matting layer dies from Gina K Master Layouts 2.  The background panel is a white embossed panel (Christmas words) matted onto a white layer and added to the top folding dark green card base.   Added the panel to the base layers and then used a Hero Arts stamp and die set called Holly Jolly to make the leaves.  Used Catherine Pooler inks - Eucalyptus and Green Tea.   Stamped the sentiment from the Hero Arts set in Altenew Forest Green Crisp Dye ink and used a circle from Pinkfresh Studio's Mini slimline Essentials die set.  Added the die cut circle over the Holly leaves and finished with some dark green dots. 

Still two pieces of the background to make into cards.  

Mixed media Christmas background - Inspired by Ardyth

We have had a very relaxing weekend at our friends in Mangawhai.   Went up on Friday evening and came back this afternoon.   Got home at 3.00pm so after unpacking I heading into my craft room.   I had watched Ardyth Percy-Robb video (see it here) yesterday where she made one large panel of watercoloured and mixed media background using some powders to make her watercolours.  I really love how she managed to get such a gorgeous background and made 16 cards!   I definitely didn't get that many made!   

I used a sheet of Bristol smooth 250gsm card.  I taped it to my glass matt and went to town!  Used  Nuvo Shimmer powders in Blue Blitz, Cherry Bomb and Atlantis Burst and Pixie Powder in Lava Red.  I did stripes of colour vertically along the long side - then white paint stenciling, gold paint stenciling, used the blue and red paints to stencil as well.  Water splatters, gold paint splatters, spritzed with white shimmer spray and Fossilized Amber Distress spritz.  I forgot to photograph the panel before I chopped it up.  

I made one panel into a card this afternoon. 

I trimmed the panel to 3.25" x 4.5" and ran it through an embossing folder - Holly and used Catherine Pooler Eucalyptus ink to highlight the raised areas.   I matted it onto some dark green card and added to a white base.   For my sentiment I used a new to me die set - cut the words with the dark green and shadow layer from vellum.  Made some dark green enamel dots by adding some clear packing tape over a scrap of the dark green card and used a dotty die to cut the dots, 

And here are the other panels still to use

 so will be making some more cards so I can get my Christmas cards in the post by the end of this month. 

Bye Bye Black - Atlenew Challenge Live#13

 I was able to watch Jen Rzasa's live challenge this week - Bye Bye Black - don't use black ink on your project.  

I have to say I already had the stenciled background done and in my scrap pile.  It had been destined for the bin as I didn't mask while stenciling and got some of the green onto the pink and in one spot it looked terrible.  I had put it aside to bin, but hadn't quite got around to doing so.   I looked at it and decided I could salvage some of it.... and here's what I did!

 I trimmed the worst bit off and cut to 3" by 4.5" and matted it with a 3/8" border in the green card,  I can still see a couple of spots where the green went where it was not meant to, but all in all, looked pretty good.  The stencil was Altenew Rose Bouquet (an older one layer stencil). I then stamped the sentiment from Altenew Friendship Blooms stamp set in Rubellite ink.  Finished by added some dots made by covering a bit of the green card in clear packaging tape and used my dots die to cut a few out.  Love how this can make glossy dots in the exact colour to co-ordinate with the project. 

#altenewchallengelive  

Altenew weekly challenge - "Acute card"

 Jen Rzasa hosts a weekly Live challenge on the Altenew YouTube channel.  This week's challenge is "Acute" - use triangle/s on your projects.  It can be triangle cut card, triangular stamps, visual triangles of embellishments and so on....  

I made two cards for the challenge. First one was using a focal stamped image using the gorgeous gift stamp that Altenew sent me... and an embossing folder...

The Mod Square embossing looks like triangles with the 3D layers.  (Hope it is acceptable for the challenge!)  I stamped the Charming Bouquet and used my Scan'n'Cut to cut it.  I used Altenew Alcohol Markers from the Pocketful of Sunshine and Green Fields set to colour.  The sentiment is from Altenew Classic Greeting. 

My second card was totally inspired by Jen's video where she did some stenciling to make a background and then trimmed it to add to a card with some embossed triangular shaped embossing.  I actually made 7 panels... Two using Rose Bouquet Stencil... because I messed up part of the first panel and two made by the use of the Floral Garden Stencil - which covers a 4 1/4" x 11" panel and it got cut into the two panel.  This is an older Altenew stencil which you do the first time and then rotate it 180 degrees and ink again.   I didn't use them today so have two lovely panels for future use. 

I inked up the Rose Bouquet stencil - the pink was ink on my blending brush, so not sure of the actual colour.  Used Bamboo and Olive for the leaves.  First go I didn't mask so ended up with some green in the pink and it looked terrible.  I managed salvage some of it... so this second version I did mask off the eaves while doing the flowers and the flowers when doing the leaves.   I then cut the panel down to a 3 1/2 inch square and then trimmed it in half to make my two triangles.   I added them to a 4 1/4 white panel which gave me the space in the middle.  I added a strip of gold card down the long side of each triangle and added a sentiment from Altenew Sentiment Strips 3.  Added my homemade shiny dots in a visual triangle of 3 on each triangle.   Really happy how it ended up.   Doing a square card made it easier. 

I've had a really productive weekend with lots of fun playing with my supplies.  

Beautiful Day - Hello Beautiful and a bonus birthday card

 It's the final day for our challenge at Die Cut Divas.   

FLOWERS

Our sponsor this month is Altenew. They will be giving our winner a $50 gift certificate to their online store. Thank you Altenew for this very generous gift.

I am a real Altenew fan.... and have A LOT of their stamps, dies and stencils.   And today I've used one of my earliest purchases.  - Beautiful Day stamp and die set.   I've had this one for over 9 years!  

I stamped the focal flower and then lots of leaves and branches.  I used Shades of Purple ink set and Freen Fields inks to add the stamp layers on the flower and leaves.  I used some watercolour pens and Copic markers to add colour to the smaller branches and berries.  I then die cut all the pieces.   I made a frame with Gina K Master Layout 18.  I added some soft brown inking with whatever ink was on my blending brush.  I layered all my elements and added a sentiment from Hello Beautiful stamp set.   Added some home made enamel dots made by adding clear packing tape to some purple card and die cutting with my dotty background die.  

I also made a bonus card - because Altenew are a FAVOURITE company for make floral cards... so much choice. 

This card was inspired by Natasha Foote in her video #1171.  I used Altenew Sweet Spring Stencil.  It's an older stencil - just two layers.  I chose to used teal colours.  Fresh Dye inks in Aqualicious and Teal Cave.  Something a little different.  I cut the panel with a Pinkfresh Studio die - Folk Art Rectangle and then used Hero Arts Arches die to cut out the centre panel and also the next size up to cut a white arch.  I used the Teal Cave ink to add colour to the matting layer.  I stamped a sentiment from Altenew's Just a Number stamp set.  Added some of the Teal Cave to a scrap of white card and cut out with my dotty background.   Added to the card and added Glossy Accents to make my own enamel dots.  Loving doing this at the moment. 

Our challenge is open till 9.00pm Pacific US time  - Just remember to make use of your die cutting machine to die cut/emboss.