Working with Vellum

This week at Sunny Challenges and Creations, I set the challenge, and did not give a sketch, but the challenge was to make a sympathy card. We all dislike making these cards, as it invariably means that a friend or acquaintance has lost someone dear to them and you wish to let them know you are thinking of them. My card this week was on a base of Elegant Eggplant. A piece of Whisper White was run through the Big Shot using the Petals a Plenty embossing folder then I also cut two ovals using the Ovals Collection in the Framelits and cut one in Perfect Plum and the other in white. I just love the Secret Garden stamp set and of course the matching framelits.......makes cutting so much easier dont you think. The leaves were Old Olive and once again used the Secret Garden Framelits to cut them out. I used Vellum cardstock for the flowers. Firstly I swiped the vellum with my embossing buddy to ensure I didnt get any embossing powder where it wasnt need and then I stamped with Versamark, sprinkled White Embossing Powder on the images and heat set them with my Heat Gun. I decided to use Perfect Plum, Wisteria Wonder and Primrose Petals Classic Stampin Pads with my Aqua Painter and colour the flowers. The sentiment is from Teeny Tiny Sentiments and I must admit that today I used my MDS for the very first time to add something to a card that I made. A very small step, it didnt bite me so I might just have to go in there again! The Elegant Eggplant ribbon I had in my stash and thought it finished the front of well. The Perfect Plum Oval was put up on dimensionals as were the flowers and the sentiment. Make sure you check out Kris and Vicky's blogs to see what they have created for you this week. We hope that you will join us in the challenge and remember it runs for two whole weeks now so you have plenty of time. Till next time.......

Sunny Challenges Week 22

Hello once again. I have been absent from this blog for just on 2 months now  family committments have prevented me from joining the girls at Sunny Challenges and Creations and  I will  be absent for a while longer unfortunately, but I will continue to take part in the challenges when I can. I am very fortunate to have such wonderful stamping friends  in Kris, Vicky and Shirley. Shirley stepped into the breech on very short notice and I will be forever grateful to her for doing this for me. The sketch this week is bought to you by Vicky and beside the colour scheme of Early Espresso and Pink Pirourette we also had to use this sketch.  These are not two colours that I would normally gravitate to, and once I got my head around it I thought that a baby card would be great in this colour combo. I used as base of Early Espresso and then placed the Pink Pirourette Card stock on that. I used the Baby Bundle Stamp set and and also the Jumbo Baby Tees Wheel that matches that set. I used the wheel to run along the long strip at the side and used just enough of the wheel to show the top of the little playsuits. The three panels on the right hand side I ran through the Big Shot using the Perfect Polka Dots embossing folder. I also cut the large and the medium oval from the Ovals Die. The largest in Early Espresso and the medium in Pink Pirourette card stock. I stamped the baby carriage using Early Espresso and  coloured the dots and the heart on the carriage using my Stamp and Write in the Pink  Pirourette and the wheels of the carriage in Early Espresso. I then cut around the image attached it to the ovals and then added some Basic Rhinestones to the carriage just to add a bit of bling. I stamped two sets of bootees from the same stamp set, coloured them and cut them out and attached them to the top of the oval, The sentiment was stamped in Early Espresso on Whisper White and then punched out using the Modern Label Punch, which I cut the two little 'knobs' off, The main image and the sentiment were placed on Dimensionals. I love the way it turned  out and hope you like it too! I have been able to do a couple of things and I will post them when I am able to have a bit of free time. They will be articles from the last 2 months that I have created. Till next time, happy stamping.

Double Fancy Folds

Today I would like to share with you a double fancy folds card that I designed. I  attended a class by my very good friend, mentor and honourary upline Kris McIntsoh and as we were making the fancy fold card I thought that I could do a double, so I set to and designed one! They are so simple to do and once you get the scoring right the rest falls into place so easily. I used a combination of colours that I would not usually use for this card and I also used my Dazzling Diamonds whch has been sitting neglected for quite some time :) I thought they added a lift to the finished card. The colours I used were Peach Pizazz Parfait for the base which I stamped with the vine from Elements of Style using Peach Parfait, and the mats were Bashful Blue, Cajun Craze and Whisper White. I love the softness of the Elements of Style stamp set, stamped it onto the Whiaper White using Stazon as I wanted to colour the flowers. On the two side panels I used Perfect Plum for the main flowers and Peach Parfait for the smaller blossoms and Old Olive for the leaves. The sentiment was stamped using Cajun Craze and punched out with the large oval punch then backed onto a scallop oval in Cajun Craze. I finished it off with two bows with a rhinestone in the middle and attached them to the card on the outer panels using mini glue dots (how I love them things!!)   I hope that you like this creation of mine and I would love to hear what you think. Bye for now, Gwen

A telescopic birthday card for a special friend

Today was the birthday of a special friend and to make her card I made a card that was a  case from Barb Mullikin it is a lovely creation using the Big Shot and the Circle Scissors Plus, which I must admit that I dont use often enough. I think the trick is to have it out where it can be easily accessed and therefore used! The colours I used were So Safron, Perfect Plum and Whisper White, I lightly sponged around the edges of the Whisper White with Perfect Plum and used the Stamp n Write Marker to add the little design around the edge of the second layer. Cottage Garden was the stamp set I used because I love the delicate forms of the flowers and the tendrils, of which I stamped in Pear Pizazz. I finished the card off with little butterflies that were run throught the Big Shot using the Beautiful Wings Embosslit. To hold the circles together I used some Butterfly Brads (not SU) but they seemed to bring the card together. My friend loved her card and I loved making it for her. We took her out to lunch to a resaurant nearby and had a lovely afternoon, and when we came home we held an impromptu class where everyone made one of these cards too. My next post is going to be another telescopic card, but with a very special person making it. Bye for now.....

Double Twisted Easel

There is peace and quiet in the house at long last.............the noise I hear is silence! Time to drag out my projects that I have had on the go, but had to put away until all the visitors had gone home. I have been working on some easel cards, my ladies are going to be doing these in class next week. I decided that rather than do straight easels that I would do twisted easels. The first card I made was a double twisted easel, which I am sharing with you today. I might add I had changed my mind about three times for the colour scheme and went back to the original colours that I had chosen to work with.Perfect Plum was used for the card base and Lap of Luxury designer paper was used for the Scallop Ovals and Concord Crush for the Large Ovals.The Pretty in Pink was embossed using the Finial Press embossing folder. I had some glitter thread (not SU0 and decided to to a little bit of 'string art' on the ovals. Lap of Luxury Designer paper was also used for the birds. Vintage Vogue was stamped in both Perfect Plum and Pretty in Pink and I placed the rhinestone brads in the centres of each one. Well Scripted was used for the sentiment. I cut 2 Modern Labels usi ng the punch of the same name, one in Very Vanilla and the other in Perfect Plum. The perfect Plum Label I cut in half and off set ita bit to look as tho there is a second label behind it. The ribbon is a CASE of a tutorial by Sharon Field I love this idea for the ribbon so different. I had a lot of fun making this card an I do hope that you like it too. Bye for now

Wild Wasabi, So Safron and Perfect Plum

Whilst I was talking to my good friend Kris yesterday,we were discussing my self challenges that I have been doing. So whilst talking to her I did the close the eyes trick and came up with the above colours. The random selection of stamp set was Loads of Love. So I set to work and put the Perfect Plum through the Big Shot using the Perfect Polka Dots embossing folder. I love the way we can emboss our card fronts in this way and there are no gaps of where the embossing folder finishes. Stamped the truck and the flowers from the Load of Love stamp set onto water colour paper with Stazon, coloured it using the watercolour pencils and the aqua painter (how I love my aqua painter). I stamped the trees from this same set in So safron onto the So Safron cardstock, attached this to the Wild Wasabi and in turn to the Perfect Plum Base. I attached dimensionals onto the truck to make it pop and then attached so So Safron Ribbon that I had to finish it off. I quite like this one too. Let me know what you think! Bye for now. Gwen