Lavender birthday card

When I got my Big Shot Plus for Christmas, one of the first things I did was test out an A4 embossing folder.  The resulting sheet of rather nicely embossed pearlescent card was duly admired, then put to one side on my desk.
Time to do something with it!  I made a background mat on a kraft card blank, and cut the lavender panel from a 6 x 6" paper pad sheet.  The sentiment tag was cut out of another sheet from the same pad using a new die from Apple Blossom, which is actually just the frame, so I cut another out of purple card and so made a purple frame around the 'waste' from the frame cut out of paper LOL.

It looked fine, but ...... it needed a little extra, so I put pearls on all the intersections of the embossed pattern.  Happy now :-)

Beat the Christmas Rush - Mega April edit

I have fallen behind with BtCR this year, I managed January, but skipped out completely for February and March :-(  So here are twelve cards, for April!
These were started at the retreat, I had taken four sheets of 8 x 8" freebie magazine Christmas paper with me, to see how many cards I could get out of them.  Then I finished them off at home, stamping and embossing various images.
So, in the order in which I cut down the sheets ......
The completely covered A6 cards, four of these, two each of the designs shown here:

The A6 with panel:
 

The 5 x 5" panel:

 The triple slim panels:

 The nine patch:
 

The triple square:

Stamps, in order, are from Stamps by Chloe, Creative Expressions, freebie magazine, Woodware and the final stamped/embossed sentiment is from one of the CE bauble sets.
That comes to twelve cards from four sheets.... if I had planned ahead instead of making it up as I went along, I might have been able to get one or two more from the scraps!  I think my least favourite are the triple panel cards, the banner design didn't quite come out as I had imagined it..... but it's an idea to revisit later :-)  My favourites are the triple square and the nine patch - I have done both of these before and have now discovered that this particular alpha die (Dienamics) fits the squares perfectly, so there'll be some more of those to be done!  I like the CAS style of the triple square, though it is intimidating to stamp directly on the card, after the squares are affixed.... :-)

Buy it - Try it: Get well card

I forgot I hadn't blogged this BiTi .... I bought a magazine a while ago with a free stamp and embossing folder, thought I would try out the folder.  I can't remember which magazine it was, I only buy them for the gifts now and they all blur into one!!!

I ran some pink cardstock through the folder and lightly brushed over the raised areas with Picket Fence distress ink ... so lightly it doesn't really show in the photo .... LOL.  I had some freebie magazine papers and die cut a circle to go in the middle of the embossed card.  Then I die-cut some pennants (Nesties) and some leaves (Sue Wilson) and put the whole lot together.
I decided to make it a Get well card, because I don't have that many in the box, I need more variety :-)
So, the embossing folder, the paper, the pennants and the leaves are all new, a four-in-one BiTi :-)

Good Luck leaving card

A colleague of ours left work recently and this is the card I made for us all to sign.

I had to take the photo at work, with it propped up on my keyboard, as I forgot to do it before leaving home LOL.
I just used a combination of aqua (light and darker) and white, with a Presscut die which has three separate layers making the whole frame.  Then I cut three Memory Box butterfly bases and overlays to place on top.  The letters are die cut.
The presentation of the card took place whilst I was off sick, unfortunately, but I am told that she liked it :-)

DS2

Another layout to share!  This is the last one from the retreat, or at least the last one that I am happy with, there is one more which I need to re-scrap as it didn't really work LOL.

This one is a photo of DS2, smartly dressed for a day out in London.  Not an 'occasion' as such, so no obvious title .... I decided to just use his name instead.
The background paper is from Kaisercraft and I have used sheets from a 6" paper pad for the panels, which may also be Kaisercraft or possibly Bo Bunny??  The strips of paper are manufacturer strips from the base of some Studio Light papers and the ornate rivets are definitely Bo Bunny, though I can't remember from which collection.
I cut the title on the Silhouette (font: Monster Paparazzi).

Suited and Booted

Another layout, finally finished at the retreat .... in fact it was started at last November's retreat, but (big surprise!) lacked a title.
I now can't find the original sketch I used for this, the horizontal elements were originally paper strips, but I decided that I wanted a completely stamped layout.

Background paper is from Craft Creations, and the stamping is done with a combination of Stampin' Up and Paperartsy grunge stamps in various shades of brown.  I drew the circle around a template, moving it slightly twice so I got the multiple lines.  The title is die-cut - I freely admit I chickened out of stamping it direct to the page I had worked so hard on!!
This is actually my second attempt at this page .... the first time, I managed to complete all the stamping, attach the photo, write the journaling - then I dropped an inkpad on it.  I couldn't find a way to make the resulting ink mark look as if it was meant to be part of the grunge - so I had to start again!  Second time lucky :-)