City Crafter Challenge Blog - Hygge

This week, at City Crafter, we'd like you to capture the spirit of hygge.  Hygge is a Danish term for creating a cozy atmosphere and enjoying the simple things in life with good people around you. You could also take inspiration from this photo:

For my DT card I created a scene using stamps from My Favourite Things and sentiments from Avery Elle . I used a patterned paper which came free with a magazine - sometimes I look at it and think it's knitting and other times, I think it's something like woven basket - but definitely something handmade. But I think it's the pattern that's causing an optical illusion on my photo - does it look to you like the right hand side tapers towards the bottom? Honestly, it's absolutely square in real life!

I hope you'll take up this challenging challenge -but first please visit us at City Crafter and see how the DT were inspired by hygge.

I'd like to enter:
Cupcake Inspirations  cats
Crazy Challenge we love animals

Poinsettia

This image is a Lili of the Valley digistamp that I coloured one evening and then had kicking around because I didn't know what to do with it.  Last night my son came into my craft room to watch The Voice with me on my PC, and over those two hours I managed to finish the card.

While I was embossing the poinsettia on the XCut A4 cutting machine, the cutting plate snapped in two. This is the second time this has happened in less than 6 months. I guess I am very heavy handed and a bit slap-dash ...but I had my Big Shot for years and never broke the plate. Maybe being bigger makes the plates more vulnerable, I must be more careful as replacements cost £10 each.

I'd like to enter:
Winter Wonderland  anything goes
Sparkles Monthly  the word love
Fab n Funky Christmas
Christmas at Sweet Stampin anything goes
Creative Craft Cottage  red, image, die-cuts

Fabulous Birthday

Here's a birthday card I made for my friend earlier this week. Unfortunately it then hung around the house/ my partner's desk/ my handbag, hoping someone would buy it a stamp and mail it...well, today it eventually got sent off, several days late - whoops!

So, the image is by Stamping Bella and the die-cut 'fabulous'  (which I coloured red) and the yellow patterned paper I used for paper-piecing, were a gift from my lovely Inkspirational Secret Santa. The other bits of the sentiment are Avery Elle.
I'd like to enter:
QKR Stampede birthday card
Stampin Royalty dies
Inky Chicks  happy Birthday
Cut it Up  birthday
Sweet Stampers  add a sentiment

Bundle of Joy

My daughter has given me advance (for a change) warning that she'll be needed several 'new baby' cards for friends this year, so I'm using some challenges to get ahead,

Here I used a Personal Impressions stamp, coloured with markers. I cut a stitched banner shape from chevron -patterned paper, using the Silhouette.  The sentiment is by Sarah Hurley (the star is attached to it) and I embossed the background with a Taylored Expressions folder. Finally, I added tiny pearls.

I'd like to enter:
Addicted to Stamps and More  photo
Double D  zig zag
Mod Squad geometric

Inkspirational - Connect

Our new challenge at Inkspirational is 'connect'.

For my DT card I went with internet and electrical connections. I used the pendant light from MFT  'Our Story ' set , and combined with the computer , keyboard and 'hello' stamps by Sweet Dixie.  I made a rough mask and brushed the yellow ink for the light. I chose the paper because it reminded me of electrical circuits or even DNA.

I hope you'll come over to Inkspirational and see what the rest of the DT have made, and enter your own project.

I'd like to enter:
Watercooler Challenges masculine
Moving Along with the Times for a man
Brown Sugar  anything goes

Bird Friends

I was inspired by Time Out Challenges to make a card with a whimsical look .

I used a 'stitched' circle from 49 Market, birds and sentiments from Justrite and distressed wall stamps from Leanne Creatif.

As well as Time Out, I'd like to enter:
Make My Monday  birds
Cas-ual Fridays one layer
Brown Sugar anything goes

City Crafter Challenge Blog - A Few Stitches

This week's challenge at City Crafter is to use faux stitching on your project. 

Yes, I know Valentine's Day has gone but when I found this heart and stitches stamp from Inkydoodles in my stash, I knew it would be perfect for this challenge AND for a card for my partner. 

I stamped it onto a linen effect card base and then stamped it again in red on spare card, cut out three hearts and pieced them on. The sentiments are by Stamping Bella and Heidi Swapp. 

Our Guest Designer this week is Bailey Rosy , so I hope you'll come over to City Crafter and see what she and the rest of the DT have made , and enter your own project, 

I'd like to enter:
Give a Crafter a Cookie  photo
Sparkles Monthly love
Making Memories valentine

Pro-Am Showdown # 2 - New Home Card

Last month I shared my new, self-imposed challenge for 2017- Pro- Am Showdown.   The idea is to be inspired by some of the many mass-manufactured cards (the professionals) and make my own homemade version (the amateur).

My daughter asked me to make a 'new home' card for her friend who has many pets, including guinea pigs, so I used this birthday card for inspiration:

The professional card that inspired me

My guinea pig is a digi-stamp from a Craft Artist kit. I coloured him in and masked him with a rough circle shape and stamped the woodgrain (Hero Arts) which I coloured with inks. The banner and letters were cut on the Silhouette and the flowers are from Docrafts.

I'd like to enter:
Alphabet Challenge  you choose
Allsorts anything goes
Sweet Stampers  add a sentiment

Scoot and Slide

Here's a slider card, cut on the Silhouette.  The dog on the scooter is an old Penny Black stamp and the scene in the background was from a set that came free with a magazine. The sentiments are from Heidi Swapp and Avery Elle.

I'd like to enter:
The Male Room wheels
Retro Rubber  birthday - stamp must be 5 years old or more
Brown Sugar birthday
Double D  zig zag (the slider track is a zig zag shape. )

Carp Diem

My partner's step-father's great interest is koi carp- so I'm always having to come up with some twist on the koi theme.

This stamp is an old one - it has no branding on the wooden mount- and I've certainly used it before for his birthday card. I hope I've come up with a fresh design!

I heat embossed the fish in gold on black card and cut it out. I dry embossed the background and coloured it with Cosmic Shimmer gilding polish. The sentiment is Clearly Besotted.

I'd like to enter:
Try it On Tuesday  get messy - I hope it's messy enough - I had to apply the wax with my fingers , but it did wash off nicely!
Moving Along with the Times  for a man
Cards 4 Guyz no patterned paper

Gettin' Ziggy With It

The first time I tried Zig Clean Colour pens was at my friend Nonni's.....I thought they were lovely but I told myself I didn't need another colouring system!

Then I saw them demonstrated at the Stamperama show last weekend, had a little try, and walked away with a pack of 6 plus 3 singles. It's the vibrancy of colour, the blendability and the smooth feel of the tip that sucked me in.

For this card I used a Concord and 9th flower stamp and Waffle Flower sentiment.  The flower was stamped onto textured card and coloured with the Zigs. I did add some tiny drops of Glossy Accents to the big flower middle, but you can barely see them in real life, let alone in the photo!

I also tried colouring the flower using Zigs and spraying it with water:

Zigs and water 

I quite like that effect.

For comparison I also coloured the same image in some different mediums:

Promarkers (alcohol marker) 

pencils and solvent

I like this stamp coloured by any of these methods ( these panels could well make it onto other cards) but I do think the Zigs give a slightly different look.

I'd like to enter:
Simon Says Stamp floral
Crafting When We Can flowers
Addicted to Stamps  cas

Fairground Attraction

inside

My daughter is a great supporter of my crafting and that makes me feel I should make her something slightly spectacular for her birthday card. So, as usual, I couldn't think of what to make her until I saw the challenge at Cut it Up, to make a bendy card.

I've only ever made a bendy once before, and that was quite a simple one. So, in addition to the fantastic inspiration from the Cut it Up DT, I searched online for some good examples. I found this one by Crystal, which I used for inspiration.

Everything was cut on the Silhouette electronic cutting machine. The (pre-coloured) images are by Lettering Delights - as I had left this till the last minute, I decided against using the layered SVGs and instead, used the graphic files which I traced and 'print and cut'. The sentiment is a Clearly Besotted stamp.

As well as Cut it UP, I'd also like to enter:
Stampin Royalty just as I'm about to link up I notice it says 'dies' not 'die-cuts' and I wonder if digital cutting counts or just metal dies... ?
OohLaLa  die cuts
Crafty Friends anything goes
Creative Craft Cottage anything goes

City Crafter Challenge Blog - Old Stuff, New Look

This week's challenge at City Crafter, is to take an old project or old stash and make something new.

To be honest my project was not that old..I only got the dies for Christmas, but I wasn't happy with what I'd made ...here it is:

before 

On both projects the milk bottle and cookies are MFT dies and the words and spill were cut on the Silhouette.The background was an embossing folder.  As well as rearranging everything, reprinting the writing and cutting 'add cookies' bigger, I also decided to make the cookies look more tempting by adding 'sugar'.

This week, our Guest Designer is Magic Flying Boots, so please come and visit us at City Crafter and see what she and the rest of the DT have made, before entering your own creation.

I'd like to enter:
Unstampabelles use something new - these were my first attempts with these dies
Craft Cardmakers - add texture - embossing and the glittery flakes
QKR Stampede embossing
Happy Little Stampers Dies  anything goes
Tuesday Throwdown sentiment focal point

Bookworm

Here's a simple grungy tag that I will use as a book mark.

It was quick to make (well, if you exclude the time I spent looking for the stamps!) because it's one layer and uses only two inks - black and Dusty Concord Distress.

The luggage tag already had a bit of colour and grunginess, as it was one I'd use to mop up my craft mat when doing messy backgrounds some time ago. The text stamp in the background is Hero Arts, the main image is Stamping Bella, and the words 'book worm' are Clearly Besotted.

I'd like to enter:
Tag Tuesday  Bookworm
Country View 30 minutes or under
Eclectic Ellapu  anything goes

Hearts and Flowers Bag

It's my daughter's birthday tomorrow and it's become a tradition for me to give her some of those little heart-shaped chocolates you see in the shops at this time of year.

I've made this little bag to put them in - I cut it on the Silhouette electronic cutting machine and I used a stamp set from W plus 9.

I'd like to enter:
Just Add Ink  hearts, flowers
My Time to Craft anything but a card
Dragonfly Dreams hearts and flowers
Crafting When we Can  flowers

Just Ginger

Enough with the superfluous Valentine's cards! Here's a birthday card, made at my daughter's request for her friend. She told me she wanted a card with a big A on the front and a long-haired ginger and black cat.

I was lucky enough to win some digital images by Sami Stamps and so I decided to choose this one for the card. (Not sure if it's a giant cup or a tiny cat.)

I paper-pieced the cup and die-cut an A and a wonky circle shape. But when I tried to colour the cat ginger and black, I ran into difficulties. I don't think I've ever seen a long-haired ginger and black cat and when I tried it on some practice images, it just looked bad. So I decided to just make the cat ginger.

So, when I gave it to my daughter I apologised for the cat colour and she replied 'I didn't say ginger AND black - I said ginger OR black!'.

I'd like to enter:
Sami Stamps  circles
Alphabet Challenge  spots and dots
Happy Little Stampers  anything goes with dies
Creative Craft Cottage anything goes

Inkspirational Challenges - Photo

Our challenge at Inkspirational  is to be inspired by this picture:

For my DT project I used a new stamp by Penny Black and coloured it with markers and paper-pieced the coat. 

Our Guest Designer this week is Ros , my lovely team-mate from City Crafter. I hope you'll come over to the Inkspirational blog and see what Ros and the rest of the DT have made, and enter your own project.

I'd like to enter:
Addicted to Stamps  holiday
Penny Black Saturday something new - the stamp
Cards in Envy  valentine
Addicted to CAS pets
Deep Ocean  hearts

My Love Is Strong

Here's a minimalistic Valentine's card, which has been enlivened with a few touches of glitter which, of course, don't show up on the photo.

The strong man stamp, the little hearts and heart tattoo are by Avery Elle and I used one blue ink pad and one blue marker. I made the 'strong' on the Silhouette. 'My love is ' was made by cutting up some Waffle Flower stamps (the 'is' was originally 'miss'!) - I'm sure you can see that there were some spacing issues in the stamping...I've decided to call them the 'natural imperfections' of a handmade card!

I'd like to enter:
Happy Little Stampers  cas blue
Shopping Our Stash  winter blues
Casology  hero
Cardz4guyz love you
Stamp Ink Paper  love

City Crafter Challenge Blog - SWALK

I chose this week's City Crafter challenge ....SWALK.

For my DT card I embossed a Penny Black stamp in white on vellum. I stamped it again on cardstock, coloured it in and cut out the cat, which I paper-pieced onto the envelope. The greeting was made up of lots of separate Avery Elle stamps and the paper , which is ready-glittered was from a lovely pad my sister gave me for Christmas. 

Our Guest Designer this week is Jenny Martin , so I hope you'll come over to City Crafter and see what she and the rest of the DT have made...and enter your own project. 

I'd like to enter:

Penny Black Saturday  try something new (the sentiment on vellum is new for me) 

Retro Rubber Cross my heart (heart on envelope) Very old stamp ...five years? 

Use your Stuff  love is in the air 

Time Out  inspired by words 

Sweet Stampin  love is in the air 

You're so Sweet

Here's another card using a Stamping Bella stamp. I used the colour combo from Cupcake Inspirations and coloured it with markers and some touches of Wink of Stella. The hearts and 'you're so sweet ' are from the same set and the big sentiment is by MFT.

As well as Cupcake Inspirations, I'd like to enter:
Creative Knockouts birthday wishes
Challenge up your Life  hearts
Addicted to Stamps make your mark
Daisy Chain  heart

Hot Drink

Here's a Christmas card using a non-Christmas stamp (by Stamping Bella) - I hope it's Christmassy enough - hopefully the holly and the gold on green sentiment have ramped up the Christmassiness.

I'd like to enter:
Christmas Card Throwdown drinks
Allsorts  paper-piecing (on the stool)
Cut it up  hot drink (die cut is the holly)
Happy Little Stampers Christmas  holly