Birthday Ovals

I seem to be stitching, scuffing and splatting everything in sight lately, and I've learned one useful lesson about paintbrushes.  The longer the bristles, the further the splat range and the less control you have over where it lands.  I tried splatting with a shorter-bristled brush on this one and it was much easier and neater (as neat as splatting can be, anyway).  And all the splats landed on the card instead of the desk and the walls :)

So this card is for a few challenges:

CAS-ual Fridays - use ovals.  I've used the CAS-ual Fri-Dies Oval Tag, both as a die and a mask.

The design has come from the inspiration at Runway Inspired Challenge:

At CAS on Sunday it's Stitched - Faux or Real

And at Simon Says Wednesday it's Happy Birthday.

Stamps: STAMPlorations Vignette: Live Love Laugh, Vignette Chevron and Arrows

How Many Shades of Grey?

Not fifty, anyway!  The challenge at the new-format CAS-ual Fridays is to use at least two shades of grey, and although you can use other colours as well, I chose not to because I'm also entering this into the Little Tangles challenge, Monochromatic.

The challenge at CASology is Paint, and I've used the sketch from CAS(E) This Sketch:

At The Card Concept, the challenge is to use a floral theme (clean and simple in my case), and at Seize The Birthday, it's anything goes with no toppings.

I masked an area off and stamped the images in Memento London Fog, then picked up some grey marker colour with a water brush and added shading to the images.  As I was painting a border around the area I decided that the right-hand flower should escape out of the border, so I had to mask the left-hand side of the partially-stamped flower and stamp the right-hand side of the flower.  I wish I had these afterthoughts beforehand.  I stamped the sentiment in Versafine Smokey Grey.  Danielle has made it easy to space the words in the Everyday Labels set - you just butt the stamps together and you get the exact spacing you need because it's built in to the sides of the stamps.

I added Stickles around the border but I was too impatient for it to dry before I took my photo.  (I actually wish they dried raised, because it would add dimension.)  So I took my photo and left everything set up while the Stickles dried.  When I went back, the backdrop (12x12 paper) had decided to fall over which knocked the card over onto my camera, so I had a lovely stripe of dried Stickles on the camera, and some smudgy sparkly bits on my card.  More haste, less speed!

Bag of Love

Remember the hessian (burlap) that I bought to make my own blocks?  Well, I had some left over so I made a little sack and tag for these challenges:

Curtain Call, Cuppa Cocoa:

CAS-ual Fridays Stamps, Blue - use at least one CAS-ual Fridays stamp or Fri-Die, and the colour blue:

Just Us Girls Technique Challenge, Inked Die Cuts

I didn't fancy the inked borders technique (far too messy for my liking) so I went for the white border and inked centre by leaving the die in place.  I made a stencil for the bag by die cutting the X and O twice, then sticking a thin strip over the O for a stencil font.

The cuppa stamp is Inkadinkadoo, and the tag die is CAS-ual Fridays.

iPhone, uPhone

I'm still in iPhone mode, and the more I looked at Marion's inspiration card at Muse, the more I saw an iPhone in that frame.  I wasn't sure how I was going to incorporate a flower and foliage into a card with an iPhone, but hey, that's what artistic licence is for.  Who needs a reason anyway?

I made some modelling paste up from Polyfilla and a combination of Distress Ink, Memento Ink, and because neither of them were working, a good dollop of purple acrylic paint, which I should have just gone for in the first place.  While the chevrons were still wet I sprinkled them with ultra-fine glitter.  And then the phone rang.  Rapidly drying stencils, glitter everywhere...

I'm playing along with CASology where the cue word is purple:

And with CAS-ual Fridays where the challenge is to have something extending over the edge of your card/project,

And at Seize The Birthday where the theme is always birthday, but this week's topping is chevrons.

And I'm also sharing it in the gallery at the Stencilled Online Card Class.  I so enjoyed that class.  If you were ever unsure about taking the plunge with stencils, give this class a go.

Not a Valentine

This was going to be a valentine's card for DH.  In pink.  I was messing with these retro stamps, using pink and green ink.  I'm not really a pink person, so I got bored of that colour combination and decided to go for a more masculine combination of blue and rust.  I stamped the blocks using Broken China and Rusty Hinge Distress inks, then spattered the panel with water and dabbed it away, and spattered both the panel and the base card with the two colours.  When I'd finished the panel, it reminded me of the Hundertwasser toilets in Kawakawa, New Zealand.  Now I can't send a valentine to DH that reminds me of public toilets, can I?  ... can I?

Anyway, I changed the sentiment to just a plain hello.  Still not sure who I would send it to....  For now, I'll enter it into these two challenges:

CAS-ual Fridays

CASology Contrast

Stamps: Vignette Retro Mod Shapes, Vignette Chevron and Arrows

A Word for the Year

The challenge at CAS-ual Fridays is to create a project using a word that represents what you hope for the new year.

Instead of a resolution, choose a word that describes what you hope for the new year.

maybe it's LOVE if you want to work on your relationships, or DO if you want to challenge yourself to something, or LAUGH if you want to lighten up, etc.

Use that word as the inspiration for your card, and keep it Clean And Simple

Have you guessed what my word is?  Thought so.  So why hello?  It's about communicating.  Keeping in touch with those you already know, saying hello to new people you'll meet through the year, and saying hello to new opportunities.

Coincidentally, the challenge at Little Tangles is Saying Hello ;)

I tend to buy inks a couple at a time, but today I went a bit mad and bought ten.  As I was playing with them on my desk, making pretty patterns with them, my card design suddenly came to me.  I would do ombré.  Or rainbow.  Or maybe combo.  Ombrow?

If the labels actually matched the ink colours, it might have been more ombré than rainbow.  (Starting at New Sprout, I used them in order anti-clockwise.)

The square blue sequin is part of my winnings from years ago for runner up in a cardmaker of the year competition.  There were a couple of tubes of large Gutterman sequins - these square ones and some large purple flat ones.  I could never foresee a use for them in my card making, and even tried to sell them twice, but no takers.  But the blue one was just the right size to cover up a mark on the card panel.

Because I've used new inks I'm entering it into Simon Says Wednesday Challenge, something new.

Stamps: Neat & Tangled On The Strip
Sequins: blue - Gutterman; others - Neat & Tangled

Happy 2014

I'm still making Christmas cards while I've still got the stamps out (once they go away, I won't get them out until November), but in between times I made this card for a few challenges.

STAMPlorations are having a Stamps and Silhouettes challenge and, while I don't start my Design Team gig until January, I thought I'd play along.  There are only a few days left for the challenge and design team call, so if you're still thinking about it, get a move on!

STAMPlorations are also sponsoring this week's CASology challenge, where the cue word is party.

CAS-ual Fridays are having a Happy New Year challenge,

There's a photo inspiration challenge at Just Us Girls:

And the challenge at Less is More is to choose a previous challenge.  I've gone for Week 42, Silhouette.

Here's the full view of my card:

I stamped the silhouette image, then masked it while I stamped three rows of 'happy'.  I left the mask in place while I flicked some Evergreen Bough and Mustard Seed Distress Inks onto the card square, then mounted it onto gold card, then onto the card base and added the numbers.

Stamps: STAMPlorations VIGNETTE Ever After, VIGNETTE Chevron and Arrows
Dies: Sizzix Girls are Weird.

A snowflake and Day 13 Advent Village

Here's another card I made from last week's Distress Ink master board, this time using Penny Black stamps.  I'm entering it into the following challenges:

CAS-ual Fridays - Let It Snow

CASology - snowflake

Simon Says Wednesday Challenge - Let It Snow

Penny Black Saturday Challenge - Christmas

Penny Black: 3897H Starflake, 3898F Joy Hope

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Day 13 Advent Village

Magenta Christmas Tree

This Christmas tree stamp by Magenta is one of my all-time favourites, so it's only fitting that I use it for their current challenge, Simply Christmas:

The current challenge at CAS-ual Fridays is to use a tree or trees on your project:

CFC122: Show us your Clean And Simple projects that feature a tree or trees.

And the challenge at Less is More is to use a metallic element plus one colour.

My metallic element is silver embossing.  My first instinct is always to go for gold (!) and the silver embossing powder tends to get neglected, but it got a run out today.  I paired it with Evergreen Bough Distress Ink which I used with varying intensity.  Because I wasn't adding a sentiment I painted a bit of ground under the tree to anchor it.

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Day 11 Advent Village