Butterfly Bookmark

The cue word at CASology this week is book.

I don't really have any book stamps, so I thought I'd make a bookmark.  Which will come in useful, because I still prefer to read old-fashioned books rather than electronic books - despite being pretty much surgically attached to my iPad.

Here's where the inspiration came from:

Moxie Fab World Tuesday Trigger Honouring Ombré.  I'd honour that cake any day, ombré or not!

Muse inspiration, provided this week by Lori:

And Anything Goes at Simon Says!

Butterfly and swirl: Clearly Besotted Butterfly Wishes
Butterfly die: Clearly Besotted
Sentiment: pre-loved Stampin' Up set, so might be discontinued?
Distress Inks: Tattered Rose, Victorian Velvet, Milled Lavender, Dusty Concord

Red Washi Birthday

Over on the Hero Arts Flickr Group, Barb is having a challenge to make a card using grey and one other colour, and using only Hero Arts stamps.

At Less Is More, this week's challenge is:

WASHI TAPE

You can use the shop bought type or you can make your own one way or another. We know you will be inventive if you don't have any in your stash...

So the other colour I used alongside grey was dictated by the red striped washi tape.  I stamped the celebrate sentiment in the top border of the ledger (both in Versafine Smoky Grey) and everything else in Brilliance Rocket Red.

Hero Arts: CG138 Ledger, CG275 Birthday, AC026 Brush Strokes, CL611 Many Birthday Messages.

Tying The Knot

Ever get that feeling when a few challenges collide in your head?  That's what happened here.  This is the inspiration photo for the current Runway Inspired Challenge:

And this is the inspiration for Paper Smooches SPARKS Picture Perfect challenge:

Diagonals, that's what I saw.  And there just happen to be diagonals on the sketch challenge for The Paper Players this week:

Have a look at this post from Wida.  I think she's just set a new trend.  I was attempting to run a single baker's twine diagonally across the card, with an elegantly tied bow.  As you may know from previous posts, my bows tend to do their own thing and I couldn't get anything to look right, so I thought I'd try knots from Wida's chart instead. I quite like it.

BTW - it's not a good idea to change the colour of one baker's twine AFTER the card has been fully assembled with a million (ok, twenty) pop dots on the reverse of the panel.  But I did.  And the card survived unscathed, surprisingly!

Paper Smooches: Simply Said, Primary

One-One-One

This is my second post today - click here for Chevron Birthday.

I keep missing the deadlines for One Layer Wednesday, and I'm only just in time for this week's challenge, hosted by Heather, where the challenge is One-One-One - one image stamp, one colour and one sentiment stamp.  I've used this champagne glass stamp by Whipper Snapper Designs, a sentiment stamp from Waltzingmouse Say It Loud, and Dusty Concord Distress Ink because I wanted to draw some of the colour into the image with a water brush.  The only problem is that Distress Ink isn't the best for stamping a sentiment - but I suppose it looks, er, distressed.

Goth Flowers

Hanging out at Neat & Tangled's Birthday Bash again, this time at the Little Tangles technique challenge. 

This card incorporates a few techniques: watercolouring with Distress Inks, masking, highlighting and resist embossing.  

I stamped Dreams onto white card, and covered the banner with Versamark pen and clear embossed so that it would resist any colour.  Then I stamped the flower heads onto the card and masked them with spare paper while I applied Chipped Sapphire and Dusty Concord Distress Inks with a water brush, varying the intensity of the colour.  With the mask still in place I stamped Field of Sky in Chipped Sapphire randomly over the background.  Then I drew some stems and stamped a couple of leaves.  After I removed the masks the flowers looked a bit flat so I added a little pale grey shading to give them a bit of depth.  I also added some white gel pen highlights to the stamens and leaves.  I mounted the piece onto dark blue card, then onto a 148mm sq card so that there was white space either side.

I'm also entering this into Simon Says Monday Challenge, which is DOTTY.

Neat & Tangled: Dreams, Fresh Blooms

A Stamp In The Hand: Field of Sky

Distress Inks: Chipped Sapphire, Dusty Concord

Sakura Gelly Roll White Pen

Versamark Pen

Project Life Cards

Now I'm not a scrapbooker, nor am I a Project Lifer, but I do like a new challenge.  And there's a Project Life challenge at Little Tangles as part of their month-long Birthday Bash.

I like the idea of Project Life layouts compared to scrapbook layouts.  The PL cards are 2x3 so it's a great way to use up scraps of card, it's a small canvas to work on, it's no big deal if one doesn't turn out, and you could always use them as the focus of a card if you're not into Project Life albums.  So I had a go.  And couldn't stop.

Everyday Circles, Spellbinders circle die, ribbed red card.

Everyday Circles, drew a face, coloured cheeks and drew a border.

This stamp is the ideal size for a PL card!

Everyday Circles, Large Parker Numbers, Stickles

On The Strip, Large Parker Numbers, Small Parker Alphabet 

Fresh Blooms (that flower reminded me of a bird, added an eye, a beak, some legs and a leaf/wing), washi tape, dotted border.

Fresh Blooms (erratic flightpath due to too much honey...)

Everyday Circles, On The Strip, Stickles

Gerbera Birthday

Uniko Studio are having their second challenge, and this time it's a sketch:

I just happen to have some new Uniko Studio stamps so I can play along ;)  I like mixing sentiment fonts and elements, and these two are perfect for overlapping the words.  I stamped the gerbera and leaves on spare card and cut them out, then layered onto the card.

I've used the colours from CAS-ual Fridays' current challenge (love that aqua!).

Uniko Studio: All Occasions Sentiments #2, Pure Florals Gerbera

Cupcake, Anyone? (It's calorie-free...)

Mmmm, red velvet cupcake!  Little Tangles are continuing their month-long birthday bash, and their latest challenge is all about eating cake.  Lead the way.  No, get out of the way!

I've got several cupcake stamps by other stamp companies but the idea is to use Neat & Tangled stamps.  Danielle has kindly provided a couple of free digis, but I decided to bake my own.  I drew a cupcake on copy paper then cut it out to use as a template on card.  Once I'd cut it out in card, I cut it into the three components which made it easier to colour each component, then I fitted it back together like a jigsaw. Then I added some sequins, and a little birthday banner, and a red velvet folk heart.

I'm also entering it into the Simon Says Wednesday Challenge which is:

MONOCHROMATIC

* * * * * * * *

Little Tangles have another challenge running for party favours so I made this:

Unfortunately one of the chocolates was a bit squashed and not suitable for photographing so I did what any self-respecting girl would do, I ate it.  Definitely not calorie-free.

(I'm hoping I can link from one post to two separate challenges by the same host, otherwise I'll be back to edit this post).

While I was in baking mode, I made another red velvet cupcake for a goody bag:

And here's a group photo:

Enjoy!  I'm going to check if any more of those chocolates have squashed yet.

All stamps and sequins: Neat & Tangled
Party favour wrap - Craftwork Cards
Party bag - pound shop

Cut-out Butterflies

This card came about from the meeting of two challenges in my head:

A colour challenge from Clearly Besotted to use some or all of these colours (and at least one Clearly Besotted product).

And this inspiration from Therese for the current Muse challenge:

I love the cutaway idea but wanted to use a different colour palette.  I swiped Distress Inks across the card then cut out the butterfly shapes and affixed the piece to grey card, affixed it to a white card base and added a few sequins.  As an afterthought, I added a small stamped butterfly.

Clearly Besotted: Butterfly Wishes, Framed Sentiments, Butterfly Wishes Die Collection
Distress Inks: Fired Brick, Tattered Rose, Milled Lavender, Bundled Sage and Pumice Stone
Neat & Tangled: Sequins

Climbing Flowers

I've been playing with my new Neat & Tangled stamps.  I've used the colour scheme from Dynamic Duos:

And I'm also entering it into the Little Tangles Un-birthday Birthday Challenge which is running as part of the Neat & Tangled month-long birthday bash.

The challenge is to create a birthday card or project using a stamp set that is not usually associated with birthdays.  Which I did.  But then I also added a birthday stamp on the twill tape so I hope that doesn't make it ineligible ;)

I stamped the images in Versamark and white embossed them, and smudged some colour around them. There was already a kink in the twill tape so, being too lazy to iron it out, I tied some pink cord around it to make it look deliberate.  The pink cord had a mind of its own so I just let it do its thing.

Stamps: Neat & Tangled Fresh Blooms, Everyday Circles

Graffiti Dosh

Here's a card for those hard-to-make-for young men who don't appreciate cards with golfers or racing cars on them.  It's got money on it instead - far nicer to look at, and even nicer to spend :)

I'm entering it into A Blog Named Hero challenge 29, Reduce Reuse Recycle.  

The recycled bit is the paper bag which contained a pack of sequins from Neat & Tangled (don't forget to pop over for their month-long birthday bash - still lots of inspiration and prizes to be won).  I thought it would make a nice holder for dosh or a voucher card.

I've used the colours from colourQ's new challenge:

And as I've used all Hero Arts AC026 Brush Strokes stamps, I'm also entering it into the Hero Arts Stamp Your Story Inspired By challenge:

The tag made me think of using the bag on a card and the arrow - well I just got carried away with it :)

Little Tangles Guest Designer

A couple of weeks ago I won the Neat & Tangled Everyday Circles stamp set and a pack of sequins from Danielle's Neat & Tangled July Release.  So I made this card and entered into the Little Tangles Into the Woods challenge (where it got an honourable mention), CASE Study #151 (where it got an honourable mention) and CAS-ual Fridays Count Me In (where it was a contender).  Triple whammy!!

I was doubly delighted when Ren-Yi asked me if I'd like to be a guest designer as part of the month-long birthday celebrations, so here's a birthday card to help Neat & Tangled celebrate their first year.

I'd been playing around with a coloured-ink version of this card, and when I came to ink the stamp again I picked up the black ink out of habit.  As soon as it touched the stamp I realised it was the wrong pad and immediately stamped it off onto spare paper, but decided I actually liked the grungy look it gave.  So don't adjust your screen, it is intentional!  I stamped and embossed the "birthday" in white on the black panel then mounted the white panel onto the black and wrapped some twine around the piece before mounting it onto the card stock.  I had a lovely time picking out the rainbow of colours from my sequin stash too!

A birthday bash isn't complete without music, and one song guaranteed to get the party going is this one.  Enjoy!

Be sure to keep visiting Neat & Tangled throughout August for fun and giveaways!