Make My Monday - Building, Town or City

It was my turn to choose the theme at Make My Monday this week and I chose - building, town or city.  I had loads of ideas - new home card, 3d village (ambitious!) , London or Paris themed card...but in the end I went with this (above).  I used a scrap of Basic Grey What's Up 12x12 paper that had the buildings on it. The banner is a sticker from the BG paper pack and I stamped the sentiment inside it. The dog on the scooter is a Penny Black stamp that I coloured in and cut out.

I hope you will join in the challenge at Make My Monday. 

I'd like to enter:
Eureka Stamps anything goes
Simon Says Stamp Monday  b is for - buildings, banner 
Craft Stamper anything goes
Through the Purple Haze  anything goes 

Make My Monday - Girly Birthday , and Empty Box Project #9

This week's challenge at Make My Monday  (note our new URL)  is 'Girly Birthday'.

For my DT card I used a stamp by Stamping Bella that I took from my 'empty box project' box.

Just to recap:

On New Year's day I revealed my stamping shame - a big box of unused stamps - and started my Empty Box project. My aim is to work through the box , one stamp/ stamp set at a time and see if I can use them. If I can't use them, I will dispose of them. The aim is to finish with an empty box.

There was no real reason I'd not used this stamp before - I like it but just not got round to it. Fot this card I coloured it with Promarkers and stamped the sentiment (Clearly Besotted) in the corner. The background paper is by Crafty Individuals and I added mulberry, glittery and sparkly flowers and gems. 

Please come over to our new web address and join our challenge at Make My Monday this week.

I'd like to enter:

Sweet Stamps girly

Pink Elephant girly girl

Fashionable Stamping Challenges colour between the lines 

Uniko  birthday
Craft your Passion anything goes 

Creative Cutting Challenge - Valentine's Day

Our challenge at Creative Cutting Challenge is Valentine's Day and here's my DT card. I used the lock from the Valentine Hearts file from the Creative Pointe and I gave it some texture with an embossing folder.

I made the background using a Distress spray and stamps from a range of companies including Bo Bunny, Glitz, Indigo Blu and a Craft Stamper freebie. I added the words which were die-cut on the Silhouette, gems and pearl and a flower that I made a while back in the melt pot.

If you have an electronic cutting machine, use an SVG to make a Valentine's Day project and join us at Creative Cutting Challenge. 

I'd like to enter:
Time Out  Valentines / hearts
Stamping Boutique make your own background
Cut it Up embossing
That Craft Place love/valentine
Just us Girls  photo

Empty Box Project #3 - Fairy

On New Year's day I revealed my stamping shame - a big box of unused stamps - and started my Empty Box project. My aim is to work through the box , one stamp/ stamp set at a time and see if I can use them. If I can't use them, I will dispose of them. The aim is to finish with an empty box.

This time, I tried out this set, which was a free gift with  Cardmaking and Papercraft magazine:

I stamped the fairy and the sentiment onto watercolour paper washed with gelatos. I mounted the paenel onto black and onto a green and gold butterfly embossed card (I think this was a Hunkydory freebie). I stamped the card base with the butterfly from the set and sprayed a die-cut leaf with green and gold. 

I'd like to enter:
Fantasy Stampers Fairy nice
Paper Creators Crafts anything goes 
Darnell's Challenge NBUS  

Inkspirational Challenge - Ombre

We have a great challenge today at inkspirational, chosen by our fabulous teammie Pia - ombre.

Aaagh! I had heard of ombre, I kind of knew what it was but I still had to pretend it was just for our followers that I needed a clear definition and here it is :Ombré is when the colour is graduated in tone eg. a colour that fades from dark grey to light grey. Of course any colour can be used on the project.

So this was a challenge for me, but one I'm glad I tried and I hope I've got it right.

I used a digi from A Day for Daisies and two sentiment stamps from Clearly Besotted.

One person who has definitely got it right is our brilliant guest designer Deepti.  

Why don't you give it a try and join us at Inkspirational?

I'd like to enter:

A Day for Daisies  ombre 

Addicted to stamps make your mark 

Red Rubber Inspirationals  birthday bash

Blast

Anything that looks navy on here, is in fact, black! 

I'm often reluctant to enter CAS challenges because of a fear that my card isn't CAS enough. I hope this card qualifies as CAS because I made it using the colour combo at Showcase Your Style - a challenge I found through Kylie's lovely card.

These stamps are from a 50s style set from Creative Stamping magazine. I wrote earlier that I have a difficulty with the stamps that come with this magazine - often there are so many samples in the mag that I feel there is nothing original left to do. So this time I used the stamps before opening the mag!

As well as Showcase Your Style, I'd also like to enter:
Red Carpet Studio  stars and new - new being the stamps.
Creative Card Crew for a child
Fantasy Stampers  birthday

Empty Box Project # 2 - Dovecote

On New Year's day I revealed my stamping shame - a big box of unused stamps - and started my Empty Box project. My aim is to work through the box , one stamp/ stamp set at a time and see if I can use them. If I can't use them, I will dispose of them. The aim is to finish with an empty box.

My son randomly picked out the first 3 stamps/sets for me. You can see the results of the first two here.  This is the third set: 

This set came with Creative Stamping magazine. Their USP is that they provide a full stamp set every issue and lots of samples in the magazine. But,perversely, after I've seen all the samples I feel less inclined to use them ! Anyway, the magazine is lost now and I've forgotten the samples but I was still stuck on what to do with these pretty stamps. 

I was playing around combining some of the smaller stamps in the set when I remembered a challenge I'd seen, and discounted at the time - anniversary at 4 Crafty Chicks . I don't generally make anniversary cards as I don't really have anyone to give them to, but I thought the sentiment (To love and to be love is to feel the sun from both sides) was perfect for this occasion. 

I stamped on some of the paper I made at my shaving foam session and added punched flowers, a die-cut fence and liquid pearls. 

As well as 4 Crafty Chicks, I'd like to enter: 

Love to Scrap - Liquid pearls, Text, Stamps, Corrugated card, Birds 

Ooh La La  words to inspire 

Creative Corner  Love is in the air 

Scrapping 4 Fun Guest Designer - Happy Birthday

Today I'm one of the Guest Designers at Scrapping 4 Fun  and the theme is Happy Birthday.

The papers I used for this card were made using shaving foam and acrylic paint. I have seen this technique demoed on the TV and no-one has ever got their arms covered in colourful foam like I did!

The stamps I used were given to me by my friend and teammie Sandie  and I paper-pieced them with the patterned paper I'd made.

Expect to see more of these shaving foam papers over the next few weeks, as I made a few.

I hope you'll join in the fun at Scrapping 4 Fun  with your birthday themed creations.

I'm entering this card into challenges for new things, as both the stamps and the shaving foam technique are new to me ( Crafty Boots, Shopping Our Stash, Country View) , and also Quirky Crafts CAS.

Empty Box Project #1

Yesterday I posted a photo of my big box of unused stamps  and announced my self-imposed project to empty the box.

To get me started, I asked my son to randomly pick out three items from the box. I have used the first two.

The first item was this box of stamps:

This box came as part of a scrapbooking kit that I bought for the embellishments and papers. I tested the stamps and you can see below why I wasn't really happy with them:

I know I could take them off the block and trim them, but I just don't like the images enough to be bothered! So if anyone, (UK for postage costs reasons) wants them, I will pull them off the block and put them in the post, if you leave me a comment with your email.

The second item was the flapper stamp, from Artisitc Stamper,  you see in the card above. I can't remember buying it but it had a £1 sticker on it!  I have never used it, I think, because of her hand - it looks like it should be doing something, like waving through a window or putting a bauble on a Christmas tree. Using a bit of masking, I made her touch some hanging stars (Sarah Hurley), and added Docrafts text stamp and a Wink of Stella (which of course, you can't see in photo!).

I'd like to enter:
Darnell's Challenge  NBUS
Sweet Stampin  anything goes
Seize the Birthday party
4 Crafty Chicks  celebration
Simply Create Too  Let's Celebrate

My Stamping Shame and the Empty Box Project

See this box? All those stamps inside are totally unused! Shameful!

In my defence I will say that most of them have been acquired rather than bought - a great many of them were free with magazines. But there are some that were purchased with enthusiasm and then neglected.

So , new for 2015, I am setting myself the Empty Box Project. My aim is to work through the box , one stamp/ stamp set at a time and see if I can use them. If I can't use them, I will dispose of them. The aim is to finish with an empty box.

I hope you will visit my blog and see how I'm getting on.

Happy New Year to all the wonderful crafters out there, especially my regular visitors to this blog.

Challenged! - Vintage Children

Thanks to the challenge blogs, I'm gradually getting a few Christmas cards done. This one is for the Vintage Children theme at Sugar Creek Holllow. The Stamp is by Personal Impressions .

Doing the Docrafts - Shabby Birthday



Remember my quest to use all the stuff I’ve got in Docrafts Goody Bags? The challenge at  Daring Cardmakers - How many Candles? – had me grabbing an unopened acrylic stamp set – ‘Build a cake’. I really didn’t know what to do with it so I looked to other challenges for ideas : Shopping Our Stash – Vintage/distressed/shabby chic; Stampin B's – use 2 border punches; Sugar Creek Hollow – Fancy borders.

Daring Cardmakers have a random draw to win a Funky Hand CD . To be in with a chance you need to leave a link to Funky Hand ...finger crossed!

Challenged! - Koi

My Out-Laws are koi carp enthusiasts, so I have several stamps on this theme. They're very good at having my son to stay for a few days, for which I always make a thank-you card.

The Thank You stamp is by Hero and the Koi stamp has no brand name, but I think it is Once Upon a Stamp. I cut an oval with my die-cutter and sponged the shape with Spiced Marmalade Distress Ink. I highlighted the fish with Papermania Metallic Pencil in gold.

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:
Less is More Seeing Double
Stamp, Scrap and Doodle Saturdays  Thank You

Challenged! - Anniversary card

This card is for my friend's silver wedding anniversary next month. Is it controversial that I didn't use silver??? A few challenges inspired my decisions - paper piecing, the umbrella ( 'inspire by a song' - Rihanna's Umbrella-eh-eh-eh). The tree is papermania. The couple is Unity Stamp, as is the sentiment , although I only inked part of it. The papers were Nancy Watt freebies from a magazine.
I'm entering this card for the following challenges:
Charisma Cards Inspired by a song.
Stampin' B's Anniversary card
Secret Crafter Inspired by a song
Challenge up your life Paper Piecing

Challenged! - Poppy Tag

I made this tag for the 'Mostly Red' challenge at Dragons Dream. My fingers are now mostly red too!

Challenged!- Love Fool

Here's a tag I made for Dragons Dream Tag it On  Roses and Metal challenge. It didn't really turn out as I'd hoped but I think I'll enter it anyway - don't know what else I'd do with it!

Challenged! - The first Christmas Card for 2011

Not just my first Christmas card this year, but my first Shaker card ever! Do you think icing sugar goes off? Maybe by Christmas the snow will have turned green!

Thank you to http://bah-humbug-christmas.blogspot.com/ for kickstarting my Christmas cardmaking. When I saw their 'sentiment/text' challenge, I remembered the 'softly fell...' stamp and the ideas fell into place.

Challenged! - Metallic Autumn

For this card, I used alcoholic inks to make a background paper, stamped a leaf with Versamark and embossed it with clear EP, with a little copper EP at the edges. I cut out the leaf and then rubbed it over with metallic rub-ons...rubbing it off again , so it was left in the veins of the leaf.

This card is for these challenges:

http://craftuscrazy.blogspot.com/ autumn colours

http://polkadoodle.blogspot.com/  autumn colours

http://thesecretcraftersaturdaychallenge.blogspot.com/  clours of  autumn

http://simplylessismoore.blogspot.com/ metalic

Challenged! - Card for a Man

I made this card for these challenges:
http://challengeupyourlife.blogspot.com/: Something for the men
http://theartisticstampercreativeteam.blogspot.com/ : Men/ All things male themed

The main image is Stampington, stamped in Versamark on vellum and chalked. The newspaper background is a clear stamp by Glitz and I made the final layer from an inked up Sizzix embossing folder on Kraft paper.

Challenged! - Travel

I saw two challenges this week with a 'travel' theme, so I thought I'd take part.Found the squashed bottlecap lying around when I was tidying up, maybe I should revive that craze!
http://thestampmanchallenges.blogspot.com/
http://dragon-dragonsdream.blogspot.com/