Pin-spired Wednesday: emboss-resist cards

At the weekend I went with Karen to a retreat, held near Arundel.  Met lots of lovely ladies, did just a bit of crafty shopping and managed to get a few layouts and cards done :-)
I had taken some Pinned card ideas with me and here is the one I used for these emboss-resist cards.

I had prepped some white embossed images at home before leaving to pick Karen up - which made me late, I thought I had time, but it just ran away.... sorry Karen!!  It did make me determined to use them, so the effort wouldn't be wasted, and I finished all but one, which will make its own blog appearance in due course.
I used various shades of Distress ink over the white images, spritzed water droplets over the background and blotted off, then over-stamped with various images - more agapanthus (Stampendous), some script (?) and a sentiment (Satmping all Day). 
Having run out of pre-done embossed images, for the last card, I just made a similar background and over-stamped with the agapanthus and poppy heads (Lavinia stamps).
The great thing about being at a retreat, is that you can sit and play, without the washing up/cooking/etc calling from the background :-)

Pin-spired Wednesday: Get Well cards

I am going to try and blog something inspired by one of my Pins, every Wednesday .... feel free to join in :-)
Today I have a couple of get well cards, inspired by this Pin.

I reversed the design as I prefer the stamped image to be on the left.  For the agapanthus card, I stamped the splotches in shades of aqua/green/grey and added some grunge lines and a sentiment. The butterflies are stamped over pink/green splotches with grey water droplets.
Then I trimmed the image to size, matted onto silver and job done!
I am pleased with both of them, but I do prefer the agapanthus card, I think it's a cleaner silhouette than the butterflies. 

Buy it - Try it: Colour Challenge 2017

Nat over at Kool Kitty Musings is hosting a 2017 colour challenge, based on Pantone seasonal colours.  January's colours are two shades of blue, Island Paradise which is an aqua-ish light blue and Niagara which is a dusty darker blue.

I plan to do one in each colourway! I found some Bazzill in a colour called 'Seawater' which was a good approximation of the lighter shade.  To make the shaped card, I used a card creator die from Diesire ('Louise') and cut this blank from an existing rectangular blank, then used it to cut the mats.  It has a non-cutting edge for the fold of the card, so if using for mats you need to do that edge with a trimmer :-)
I embossed the Bazzill with a Swiss dot embossing folder. The paper is a magazine freebie, a bit thin to go straight onto such a textured background, so I made a mat of white card in the same size to stiffen it up a bit :-)  Then I punched a butterfly (Martha Stewart) and added pearls for the body.  The sentiment and punched strip are both from Stampin' Up.
Very unusually for me, I used this new die on the day it arrived in the post!!  I like the effect it gives, though it makes the A6 card blank a little short for the envelope - I 'm sure no one will notice though :-)

Less is more Challenge - Ombre

I thought I would start the year by trying some challenges, it's really something I ought to do more often :-)  The LIM challenge is to make an ombre card, gradual shading from light to dark, or vice versa.

I chose to make butterflies in graduated shades, using a Martha Stewart punch.  The butterflies are attached at the centre only, so the wings can be free, and I added white pearls for the bodies. The sentiment is from Hobbyart. 
I might do some more of these, they could be birthday, get well, best wishes.....

Late Christmas card round up

No, I promise I am not starting this early for next Christmas!!  These are the last few I made last year, but never had time to blog.
The first one is Pin-spired and is a take on the most pinned item on any of my boards, the Pin is here and to date it has been pinned at least 500 times ...... Pinterest used to give you an exact number of times it had been pinned from your own board, but that seems to have disappeared, just a global figure given instead now :-(

I used a Die-namics oval mat, Spellbinders deckled oval, snowflake background stamp and the main snowflake is from Bee Crafty.  Sentiment from Stamping all Day.

These cards are done using Sue Wilson dies and embossing folders.  I rounded the corners of card blanks and mats as I thought it went nicely with the snowflake.  Tiny peel off sentiments on SU punched tags, to finish.
OK no more Christmas cards.... until the 25th January ... mwah hah hah......

Buy it - Try it: 12 Years

It seems right to start my first blog post of the year with something I got for Christmas..... actually a little after the festivities, because I was waiting for the SU Sale-a-Bration to start on the 4th of January.  DH got me the Large Letters and Large Numbers stamps, along with the matching dies.  These are something of a considered purchase, the price tag for the lot is quite hefty.  But by waiting, I got four free SAB sets, plus making up the order to £200 meant 10% plus £20 in reward points, so I ended up being able to buy another stamp /die bundle.  Also, the SAB card tin, some A4 cardstock and a couple of pens, not shown below.

I decided to christen the letter dies, as I had a layout just needing a short title - needed to be short because the letters are large!

 

The two photos are - surprise! - twelve years apart.  DS1 on the right, DS2 on the left in both photos - the height differential has changed quite a bit! 
The main papers are from Maja Design and Studio Light, the strip is from Kaisercraft and the manufacturer strip is from Studio Light.
The smaller letters are die-cut using Memory Box Alphabet Soup.  I cut the large letters out of embossed cardstock, which flattened it a bit ..... if I had just thought it through, I could have cut the letters and then run them through the embossing folder :-)  Next time ... LOL.