Happy Birthday Joyce!

Wednesday was Joyce's birthday and I made this card for her. It is a case of sorts from Terri Brennan and Sandy Hancock. The original idea came from Terri and Sandy put the instructions up on her blog www.sandystamper.com, so thank you to both of these lovely ladies for sharing. I used Elements of Style as my stamp set. The card base I stamped with the flourish from this set in the same colour as the cardstock then I stamped the main floral image on the Whisper White Top Note, removed the oval, and then used the watercolour pencils and the aqua painter to colour the flowers and the leaves. Stamped the bird from the same set onto a piece of Pink Piroeute designer paper using Sahara Sand. Tied a piece of Pretty in Pink ribbon around one side to finish it off. I think it looks better in real life than the pic, but I hope you like it as much as I do. Let me know wht you think. Bye for now Gwen

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

Baby Bundle in a Sunny Garden

 I have a baby shower to attend o the weekend and have made this card for the mum to be. The layout is one that I took from this weeks Try Stamping Tuesday Challenge #3 http://anotherchancetostamp.blogspot.com/ Jasmine already knows she is having a little girl so I used Pink Pirourette for the base and topped it with a strip if Pear Pizzaz which I had edged with the Eyelett Border Punch and topped that with the Sunny Garden DSP. This is such a pretty Designer Paper and I thought the colours were soft enough for a baby card. I also edged the Pear Pizzaz using the same border punch. I stamped the carriage an then coloured the spots and the rest of the pram using my Aqua Painter. I also stamped, coloured and cut out some of the other images and attached them to the card in various places. I finished the card off with Blushing Bride ribbon and placed the main image on dimensionals. This is such a cute card, I sure hope Jasmine likes it. Bye for now. Gwen

More Watercolours

Hi again, I am beginning to like this not so neat and tidy stuff! Well maybe I am not, but surprisingly I didnt find this card too much of a struggle! Watercolours are so much fun especially when being able to use the Aqua Painter too. I love the Aqua Painter it makes it so much easier to do watercolours and the colours spread so much esier and you have more control over how much water is released from the resevoir. The Every Moment set is one that I find myself reaching for more and more often these days. It is such an easy set to work with. I do hope you like what I have done, please leave me a comment and let me know your thoughts on it. Bye for now. Gwen

Vintaged Watercolours

This card took me so far out of my comfort zone! If you have not already noticed I like neat and uniform. This creation using the Seaworthy Set of Stamps was anything but neat and unifrom! I must admit I struggled to distress the edges of both the watrcolour paper and the Cherry Cobbler cardstock. I must admit though I do like the end result, hope you do too. Bye for now. Gwen

Self Challenge with Daffodil Delight and Friends 24/7

Here I am back again! I have had my card made since Thursday last week but have not had time to get in here to post it! Sounds a bit sad doesnt it? Last Friday I had a class and the ladies were making flowers of all kinds. It was a marathon session but they all went home very very happy with what the created. On Saturday I went to a class held by a fellow Deomo and it was my turn to be the student and I loved it. We all had a lot of fun but I was very very tired by the time I got home. Sunday I went to the local farmer markets here on the coast and had a thoroughly enjoyable time. In between all this I have been designing my daughter'w wedding invitations and all the other bits that go along with it. I would love to share those with you, but not just yet, that will be another day in th not too distant future.

Todays self challenge is Baja Breeze and Animal Stories

Boy oh boy! What did I let myself in for with this colour combination and stamp set?

The colour combination was Baja Breeze, with More Mustard and Cherry Cobbler from the Colour Coach. The stamp set was of all things Animal Stories. I immediately thought what a combination for a nursery style stamp set! Used the Baga Breeze as my base, and stamped just the antlers of the giraffe around the edges in ink the same colour. I then matted the base with More Mustard which I had embossed with Petals a Plenty embossing folder. Measured and cut 3 small squares of Cherry Cobbler measuring 4 x 4cm, topped that with More Mustard that I punched out using the 1 3/8" square punch. Stamped just the 'head and shoulders' of the Giraffe, Elephant and the Whale and also punched them out using the 1 1/4" square punch. The top and the bottom images are attached directly onto the More Mustard Mat, whereas the the centre image is up on dimensionals. To soften the look I added two small white bows and placed a rhinestone on each of the four corners of the middle image. I you remember yesterday I said the other stamp set to use was Friends 24-7. The Colour coach has decreed that I will be using Daffodil Delight and the images that will be stamped will be from the Friends 24-7 set. I hope you like what I am doing with thes little self challenges and if you feel that you would like to play along please feel free to join me and share your creations! Well thats it for today, so bye for now, Gwen.

River Rock Self Challenge

Today's self colour challenge was to use River Rock from the colour coach. It told me to use Cherry Cobbler and Marina Mist as well. The OceanCommotion set I used was the other choice from yesterday, but it lost out to Tropical Party in the draw from the hat! I used Marina Mist as the base for my card and layered a strip of Cherry Cobbler and then a smaller strip again of Marina Mist. I decided to use the Scallop Square Die for the River Rock just to add interest, then stamped it with ink of the same colour and the reeds from the Ocean Commotion set. The seahorse is in Cherry Cobbler as is the sentiment and the fish in Marina Mist. You can not notice it all that well in this photo but I have attached small rhinestones to where the eyes are one each image. I have just done the self challenge draw for tomorrow and the colour is Baja Breeze. I almost redid the selection but thought to myself if I do this now with a colour I really love working with what am I going to do with a colour that doesnt "do it" for me so to be fair to myself (and the little challenge I have set for myself) I am going to do the Baja Breeze Challenge and will be using Animal Stories set of stamps. Apparently the next set I will be using will be Friends 24-7 and the colour coach selection has not been made yet! So stay tuned!! Well thats if from me today, hope you like what I have done, leave me a comment and let me know what you think. Bye for now. Gwen

Time flies.................

Hi everyone, I have been snowed under with a variety of things that have prevented me from retreating to my own little haven for as long as I would like! Yesterday and today I have finally had some time to call mine and have been playing with the tutorials from Maria's blog on how to create roses and lillies and of course those beautiful sweet peas. I am holdig a class on the 18th and in this class I am going to show the ladies how to make these beautiful flowers so they will never be stuck for floral adornment on their creations ever again! So in all we will be doing 4 cards with 4 different flowers and then just as a treat we will also make a special box to put these beautiful creations in so they dont get crushed! I hope you like them, and that you will leave a message on my blog to let me now what you think!
Bye for now
Gwen

Tropical Party

I never seem to use the Colour Coach and I know that I should, but at times I have looked at the different colours and thought to myself "nah", that wouldnt look very nice. So yesterday I got my colour coah out closed my eyes and picked a colour and it was Garden Green. Now if anyone had told me even yesterday morning that the colours Garden Green Tangerine Tango and Bashful Blue would look good together I owuld not have believed them! To choose a stamp set to use was even more involved. Did the same close the eyes trick and picked a set from the IBC and it happened to be Ocean Commotion, then did the same with the Summer Mini and picked Tropical Party. Wrote them both down on a slips of paper and then picked one. Whew! That was pretty involved just to make myself move out of the traditional colours and get me out of my comfort zone. The set Tropical Party I will admit I have had since we were able to pre-order from the Summer Mini and this is the first time the poor set had seen ink!. I took the palm frond and stamped that onto the Garden Green and the Tangerine Tango in their co-ordinating colours, Stamped and cut out the trees and the coconut drinks and glued them onto the Whisper White and then sponged a bit of colour here and there and run it through the Big Shot using the Square Lattice embossing folder. The sentiment is from the Teeny Tiny set of sentiments and I added two chocolate brads. I think I will be using this set a lot more from now on. It has all the connotations of relaxing, retirement, being idle.............I wish! Well thats it for today and I will let you know now that the next colour that was chosen is River Rock. Now to be fair I dont think that I have used that cardstock either so it will be a challenge. I have also decided that I will use the Ocean Commotion set. It will be interesting to see what comes out of it. Bye for now. Gwen

My First Stamping 411 Colour Challenge!

I participated in my very first 411 Stamping Colour Inspiration Challenge today. The Challenge was to use Crum Cake, Choc Chip, Wild Wasabi and Certainly Celery. I have had such fun making the flowers that Maria has been doing Tutorials for that I decided to use some of them on my card! I know that roses dont come in Wild Wasabi, Certainly Celery or Crumb Cake, but they just seemed to fit with this challenge. I started by swiping the Crumb Cake with the same stamp pad, and embossed the Wild Wasabi with the Square Lattice Folder. Layered Certainly Celery Grosgrain Ribbon and Choc Chip Grosgrain Ribon across the card and then placed the mats of Choc Chip, Certainly Celery and the Whiper White( which was embossed with Petals a Plenty folder on top. The only stamp I used was the 'Life is Beautiful' sentiment from the Style Beautiful stamp set. A spot of Crystal Effects on each petal and a light smattering of Dazzling Diaminds finished the roses off. I would love to know what you think. Bye for now, Gwen

Male Birthday Card

Last night I remembered I needed a male birthday card for today. The colours in the card was not going to be a problem because as with a lot of the younger males these days their favourite colours seem to be black or grey! This particular young man loves anything to do with the water so as long as I gave him a card that  had something to do with fishing, swimming, surfing or saling I knew that I was going to be on a winner! Starting with Basic Grey as my base I topped that with a Vintage Wallpaper layer in Basic Black. The image I stamped on Very Vanilla using Black Stazon because I wanted to colour the image, which I did using Pumpkin Pie and my Aqua Painters.  I put some Grey Taffeta ribbon around the card just to break the black and wound some linen thread around the base of the card just to add a bit of interest. I might also add that this card is a Mini CASE of the card using the Seaworthy set of stamps in the IBC. This truly was a 5 minute card and I am so happy the way it turned out. I hope you like it too, let me know what you think.
Cheers for now, Gwen

Thank goodness for my "Another Day Box"

Today was a clean up day in my craft room, I was so busy changing things here, a different container there, you know how it goes............then my mobile rang. It was a customer coming to pick up her order a couple of days earlier than expected. Heavens I didnt have a thank you card made to give with her order and she is virtually 3 minutes away! Quickly grabbed my another day box and this is what I found, the hydrangea stamped image that has been in the box absolutely forever, so long in fact it was a Hostess Stamps from last years catty! Must admit I loved the Just Because stamp. This is what I came up with, I think the Certainly Celery ribbon and bow around the bottom softens it quite nicely, what do you think? Bye for now