Masculine birthday

I made this card for my colleague, Ian - happy birthday, Ian! 

I used the shell image from Hero Arts' "Antique Engravings", and a sentiment from "Many Birthday Messages". I clear embossed the images onto white cardstock, and then painted Distress Inks in blues and greens over the top. I used a couple of very old punches from Stampin' Up to punch out the 1 inch squares and the postage stamp layering paper.  The sentiment is stamped in Intense Black ink from Hero Arts.

 Thanks for visiting :)

A happy rainbow

I made this card this afternoon, and decided to make a video, too. 

I just love the look of a rainbow of soft colours over a floral stencil - I could make cards like this all day!

I used the Funky Florals stencil from My Favorite Things, with Distress Inks in Abandoned Coral, Dried Marigold, Squeezed Lemonade, Twisted Citron, Mermaid Lagoon and Wilted Violet, with the sentiment from Simon Says Stamp's Big Scripty Greetings.

 I will be sharing this card over at Virginia's View Challenge - all about colours!

I will also be joining in over at Just Us Girls - their theme is "Let's hear it for the girls".

Thanks for visiting :) 

Masculine birthday card

I've been on a masculine card kick this month for the A Blog Named Hero challenge - have you joined in yet?  There's a voucher from Hero Arts up for grabs, and you still have a few hours left!!

I used the lattice background stamp from Hero Arts, along with a leafy stamp from Stampin' Up, and a sentiment from A Muse Art stamps. 

Thanks for visiting :)

Happy birthday, Aunty Shirley!

My Aunty Shirley has a special birthday this month, so I made her a special birthday card.

I used "Beautiful Bouquet: Ranunculus" from Wplus9, stamped a couple of times and then heat embossed onto some Canson watercolour cardstock. I then added colour using my Distress Markers, and then spread the colour using a wet paint brush. I finished with a sentiment from Gina K "Lots of Lines" stamped in Hero Arts intense black ink. 

 I will be sharing this card over at Virginia's View Challenge - all about colours!

Thanks for visiting :)

Rainbow stencil

I'm joining in today with Winnie and Walter's Gossip Column challenge, presented by Taheerah Atchia. (I must have missed it when it began (I was marking exams at the time), so I am glad that they have extended the deadline!) The theme is "Spectrum", and you have to check out Taheerah's rainbow-filled post - it's a mixture of science nerd, baking nerd, design nerd and mythology nerd - and I totally love it! 
Anyway, here's my card:

I used a My Favorite Things Mixables stencil with a spectrum of Distress Inks, along with a birthday die from Mama Elephant, and stamps from Winnie and Walter (The Big, the Bold and the Happy, and The Big and the Bold Extras), white embossed onto black cardstock. I finished with a scattering of clear droplets from Pretty Pink Posh.

 Thanks for visiting :)

Masculine thanks at A Blog Named Hero

I have a card over at A Blog Named Hero today- here's a sneak peek:

 Thanks for visiting :)

Two turtle doves

This week's theme at 52 Christmas Card Throwdown is "12 days of Christmas". I pulled out my "Peace Joy Love" set from Lawn Fawn, and stamped Two Turtle Doves. (well probably not turtle doves - I took some artistic licence!)

I had to do some reverse stamping to get the two mirror image birds (I just stamped the image onto a solid stamp with Versamark and then stamped that onto my white cardstock).  I white embossed the birds, and then coloured them with Copics (I was VERY careful to not touch the Copic marker to the white embossing). The little heart is embossed with red glitter embossing powder from Zing. The sentiment is from Simon Says Stamp "Big Scripty Greetings Holiday", heat embossed with Hero Arts gold embossing powder. I then cut the front panel using a stitched squares die from Lil' Inkers Designs, and mounted it using Fun Foam onto a piece of red patterned paper from the Lawn Fawn paper pad that matches the stamp set I used.

Thanks for visiting :)

Make a wish

Hello! I was determined today to make a card to enter into a challenge, but when I visited blogland, there was an abundance of wonderful challenges that were calling my name! So this card actually fits 5 different challenges!

I started with a top folding white card, and I masked a panel on the front of my card and blended some Abandoned Coral Distress Ink.  I then put the Cloudy Day stencil from My Favorite Things over the top and added some embossing paste. Before that was dry, I added some Iridescent Sparkle embossing powder from Judikins, and heat set it when the embossing paste had dried a little.
I stamped the Unicorn from Lawn Fawn's "Critters Ever After" onto some white cardstock with some Intense Black ink from Hero Arts (which is Copic marker friendly - I stamped the sentiment in the same black ink), before colouring with pale yellow and pale pink Copics.   I attached the Unicorn to the card with dimensional adhesive, then added glimmer upon glimmer upon glimmer - Wink Of Stella on the body, Star Dust Stickles on the mane and tail, and a sprinkling of sparkling clear sequins from Pretty Pink Posh. 

 I will be sharing this card at CAS(e) this sketch #181,  The Mixed Media Card Challenge (the theme is Sparkle), CAS Mix up challenge (I used Stamping, Markers, plus stenciling and embossing paste), Just Us Girls (Coral, Yellow and Pink), and Curtain Call Inspiration Challenge (Unicorn).

 Thanks for visiting! 

Experimenting with foil

I am a lucky duck - my family gave me a Minc Mini for my birthday! Unfortunately, I don't have a laser printer, so I've been trying out some techniques that I've seen people use in You Tube videos about foiling (like this one from Jennifer McGuire).
For this card, I stamped my Hero Arts "flower dot pattern" background stamp and clear embossed it onto some Autumn Rose cardstock from Papertrey Ink.   I then added some hot pink Minc foil and ran it through the Minc machine.

By comparing the stamped background image on the white cardstock to the foiled image, you can see that the pressure from the Minc machine squishes the embossing flat and thickens the lines in the image (I used the carrier folder that came with the Minc).  But I still like the image - it wouldn't work well with every image, though.

To foil the "happy" in the sentiment, I die cut some Minc sheets (which have toner over the entire surface), and then foiled the die cut word.  I added it to a black card base to tone it down a bit - so much foiling all at once was a bit too much!

Thanks for visiting :)

Masculine birthday card

I have a blue and green masculine birthday card to share with you today.  I saw an inking technique in a video that Jennifer McGuire did for Concord and 9th a few weeks ago, and I decided to give it a try

I added a sentiment from Hero Arts (Happy stamp and cut set) over a strip of glitter, and then some enamel dots to finish.

 Thanks for visiting :)

Watercolour flowers

I have a quick little watercolour card to share with you today, using a beautiful flower stamp from Stampin' Up, and a sentiment from Hero Arts.

 I will be sharing this card at Virginia's View challenge "All about colours". 

 Just Add Ink has a challenge to "Just Add S" - and I added Sequins!

I'll also be sharing over at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge - the theme this week is "anything goes"

 Thanks for visiting :)

Baby Boy card at A Blog Named Hero

I have a card over at A Blog Named Hero today - here's the card I posted:

Please come and visit me at A Blog Named Hero, and join in with our new challenge for July.

I'll be sharing this card at Just Add Ink has a challenge to "Just Add S" - and I added stenciling!

I'll also be sharing over at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge - the theme this week is "anything goes"

 Thanks for visiting :)

Acetate, embossing paste and flowers

I recently received an order from Hero Arts in the mail, and I wanted to try out the "Color layering for you flowers" stamp set, as well as some of the shadow inks I ordered (I mainly ordered them to make my life a bit easier when I wanted to do some stamp layering).
I decided to make an acetate card, and I used a stencil from Dina Wakely (that I have used a fair bit recently) to add some Wendy Vecchi translucent embossing paste to the acetate. 

Let me just say, acetate cards are very hard to photograph well!

Some of the smaller flowers are from Lil' Inker Designs "Fresh cut flowers". The sentiment is from the Happy stamp & cut set from Hero Arts.

 I'm going to share this card at Virginia's View challenge "All about colours". 

 Just Add Ink has a challenge to "Just Add S" - and I added Sequins!

I'll also be sharing over at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge - the theme this week is "anything goes"

 Thanks for visiting :)