Bird Box

Good evening.  Today's card is an C5 one.  I started by stamping the the bird box from Jane Shasky's 'Slice of Heaven' stamps from Joanna Sheen website.  A beautiful stamp.  I coloured it in with a mixture of spectrum noirs and fleximarkers.  I then matted some dark blue card, topped with pale blue pearlescent paper and finally embossed some white paper using the m-bossibilities folder.  I used spun sugar distress ink to lightly sponge onto the embossed flowers.  The topper is inked around the edges using Stormy Sky distress inks.  The flower is a spellbinders flower again inked up with Spub Sugar.  The leaves are marianne dies as is the blue diecut at the back of the spellbinder flower.  Hope you enjoy this one.

Watering the Garden

Hi, it's has been another beautiful day here in the West Midlands - lovely and sunny although a tad too warm for me, but it is certainly better than rain.
Today's card is a paintbox poppet stamp from crafters companion.  These are lovely stamps and do take you backto a time when the world seems simpler somehow.  This one has been watercoloured with whisper pens.   The backing paper was from my crafty stash but if I remember rightly was printed from a crafters companion cd rom.  The plain green is co-ordinations card which has been embossed with a darice folder and sanded down.  Co-ordinations are brilliant for this and give a lovely effect.  The topper was distressed around the edges with distress inks - antique linen.  The flower is a marianne die.  Hope you like it.

Full of Fun

Hi all, hope you are enjoying the weather.  There is hardly a cloud in the sky here in the West Midlands.  Today's card is actually one I made last year and I borrowed the actual layout and adapted it slightly.  I don't know about you but finding a layout is probably the hardest thing about card making so I will freely admit that I do look at galleries for layouts and borrow them and then adapt them to suit me.  The stamp has been watercoloured using my whispers and it is a stamp from the adorables range by Jayne Nesterenko, who I have to add, is a brilliant designer and demonstrator on C&C.  Her workshops are also fantastic and she is such a nice lady.  Her adorables stamp range is available from Crafters Companion.  The leaves are from marianne dies.  It is a simple card I think but I hope you like it.

Water Lillies

Good evening, I know I haven't posted anything for two days, well I do have a good reason!  I had no chair in my craftroom.  I work part time and at home and on Monday my office chair broke - no comments about too many cakes please.  Tuesday is my day off and a crafting day but Wednesday I had to order another chair and in the meantime use my craft room one.  Well my new chair arrived and my craftroom chair has now been moved back to where it should be.  Honestly, the things I give up to get my employer to pay me - huh.  Today I thought I would have a change from swalk and use a floral Water Lily stamp from Circa Design. This has been watercoloured with whisper pens. Cut out with a marianne die and matted onto some black card.  The pink card has been embossed with a textured embossing folder from sizzix and then matteed onto some more black card.  The embellishments are also marianne dies.  Hope you like this one.

Belle of the Ball

Hi, well it's Tuesday which means my day off - brill - and it is a beautiful day outside with the sun shining and not a cloud in the sky.  Hope the weather is good wherever you are.  Today I have been playing with my latest Swalk stamps again as you can see.  She was coloured in with Spectrum Noir pens, cut out with spellbinders die cuts and matted onto some plain red card again cut out of spellbinders dies the ovals and scalloped ovals.  I used scattered straw distress inks around the outside of the image whilst it was still in the die.  I then used the same red card as the backing, matted with some white card and pricked around the outside and then embossed some paper with m-bossibilities folder, unfortunately I am not sure which one it is as stupidly I threw the cover away - sos.  Before embossing, and you may not see it, I rubbed some scattered straw distress inks onto the folder before putting my paper in.  This is quite a soft effect in the background, hopefully you can see.  The flowers are spellbinders Astor on the 2 outside and the large one is from floral tags set and again I inked them up with scattered straw whilst still in the die.  The flourishes are in the same red as the backing and are marianne dies.  Hope you like today's card and thank you for dropping by.

Day Dreaming

Hello crafters.  Today's card is again a square 6x6 - yes I do like my square cards.  I used a brown pearlised card as a backing, matted on some more of the brown pearlised embossing with my Grand Calibur and a Darice border embossing folder which I bought from Crafters Companion.  The green backing paper is some I had in my crafty stash but I did distress it with some peeled paint distress inks which I also used around the image too.  The image is a Lily of the Valley stamp called 'Daydream'.  Lovely little stamp isn't it.  This one has been watercoloured using a mixture of whisper pens and tim holtz new distress markers which are lovely and add more colour choice to my watercolouring.  Definitely worth thinking about if you enjoy your watercolouring.  I used the spellbinders standard circles small and classic scalloped circles small.  The flourishes are from marianne designs.  Hope you like it.

Jodie on Her Bike

Good evening, I know two posts in one day, shows I am keen doesn't it?  I finished this card this afternoon and will hopefully enter in in the Pink Gem Designs challenge 46, that's is all supposing I can figure our how to link their blog to this one.  This is an 8x8 card which gave me more playing room.  I coloured the image in first which then gave me a colour scheme.  The image is a digistamp from Pink Gem Designs called 'Jodie on her Bike'.  I coloured her in with, yes you guessed it, spectrum noir pens and cut her out with labels 20 spellbinders die highlighted the outside with tim holz distress inks.  I then used another spellbinders - Dhalia to cut out the two green dies which is actually co-ordinations - white wash - and then sanded down.  The flowers and leaves were Spellbinders Astor Die and Marianne dies LR0106/0150/1051. The flowers were cut out out in white card and coloured in with spiced marmalade whilst still in the die.  The leaves have been cut out in white and orange.  Hope you enjoy this.  Bye for now.

Girl Talk

Good morning, well it's Sunday again and doesn't the weekend go quick?  Today's card will hopefully make you feel summery!  Yes I it is a Humphrey stamp again, well I did just buy the latest set from Crafters Companion and they are gorgeous. Anyway, this is quite a simple card, some matting and layering going on with card and backing paper from stock.  Unusually this patterned paper was some I was given, I say unusually because I, in the main, use patterned papers from CD's because they are so easy to print out time and again and ofcourse that shop will be open 24/7. If you haven't tried crafting CD's do give them a go, you won't regret.  The images were coloured in using my Spectrum Noir pens which, if you do follow my blog you will realise I absolutely love.  They are so easy to use, blend beautifully and you can refill them so they are very economical.  The flower is a mixture of spellbinders and marianne dies coloured with my distress inks.  The top flower is from the Aster set, the leaves from the damask accents and the backing flowers are marianne dies.  Hope you enjoy. Bye for now.

Swinging Humphrey

Good morning crafters, it's been a pretty miserable morning in the West Midlands so far, coldish and drizzly, but on the upside it is a perfect day for crafting.  One of my favourite demonstrators/guest on create & craft is Sue Wilson, what she does with spellbinders is truly inspirational and this card was definitely inspired by her, so Thanks Sue.   I used the pricking technique around the outside and then matted an embossed backing paper which I made using the M-Bossabilities Splendid and Tim Holtz Peacock Feathers distress inks from his limited edition spring collection.  I actually inked the M-Bossibilites folder, and placed by paper in and them ran it through my Grand Caliber.  Quite a bold colour but I did like the effects.  I then stamped my Humphrey stamp, coloured it in using Spectrum Noirs and then die cut that with Labels 13, a definite favourite of mine.  The flowers and leaves are made with plain white card die cut with marianne dies and then inked again with the Peacock Feathers distress ink.  Hope you like. Enjoy your crafting. Bye for now.

Sing with the Birdie

Apart from being my first post this card is also the first one made from the new Swalk stamps recently released, called 'A Little Bird'.  I have coloured the image in using Spectrum Noir pens.  Cut the image out using Spellbinders die labels 13.  The backing paper is from the Swalk CD from Crafters Companion.  The two flowers were made using marianne dies and the two leafs either side are again a spellbinders die from the damask accents and using Tim Holtz inks - Weatherwood.  I hope you enjoy this.