Orange Flower

I made this card several days ago, but we've just not bonded - I can't decide whether I like it or not, but one of the challenges I made it for is closing in a few hours, so in it goes.

The nearly closing challenge at Muse is to use Therese's lovely card as inspiration:

And this week's One Layer Wednesday, hosted by Ardyth, is to create a one layer card using green orange and white.

The flower is Hero Arts K5414 Real Blossom, stamped in Spiced Marmalade distress ink, the sentiment is from Waltzingmouse, stamped in Memories Soft Leaf and Versafine Onyx Black, and the leaf border is from Hero Arts CL477 Delicate Leaf Clusters.  And a sprinkling of Stickles in the centre.

Spots and Stripes

I was going to post this one tomorrow, but didn't want to risk missing one of the deadlines, so you've got a double dose of me today.

This card started life using the inspiration photo from Runway Inspired Challenge:

And the fiendish theme from Less is More:

It's a really tricky one this week girls!

Not only is it 

ONE LAYER, 

but we are also asking you for 

SPOTS and STRIPES

Then I realised it loosely fitted CAS(E) This Sketch:

And the CAS-ual Fridays colour-blocking challenge:

CFC93: Use blocks of color in your Clean And Simple creations.

As always, projects are NOT limited to just cards :)

Happy Birthday from Creative Expressions Urban Beat

Stripes from Creative Expressions Urban Life

Oblong from Hero Arts LL871 Circles and Heart Fancy Notes

Dots made using a Dottorific Pen

Hello, I'm back!

I'm back from my travels around the world.  Actually, I've been back since mid-last week, but I think my mojo caught a later plane as it only arrived back today.  First, the card, then I'll tell you where I've been and what I've been up to.

The challenge at Addicted to CAS is Wings:

I've used the colours from The Paper Players challenge

And Craft Stamper Magazine, my favourite UK stamping mag, has its first blog challenge - Take It, Make It, where you TAKE a specified technique and MAKE something with it.  The technique for this first challenge is faux airbrushing.  The challenge is open for two months, so you've got plenty of time to join in.

The butterflies are masks using the large die from Clearly Besotted.  The script stamp is Hero Arts S1832 Italian Poetry and the Happy Birthday stamp is from Paper Smooches Sentiment Sampler.  The colours are all distress inks - Peacock Feathers, Victorian Velvet, Peeled Paint and Walnut Stain.

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So where have I been?  Hong Kong, Australia and Thailand.  Both our sons have settled in Melbourne, so we had a stopover in Hong Kong to break the journey, then a couple of weeks in (very hot) Melbourne (first time we've all been together for four and half years - aaah!), then a week in (even hotter) Thailand.  We were looking forward to the cooler weather back home, and today it's snowing!  And it's been quite a challenge to readjust to UK time, and stay up beyond 6pm!

While we were in Melbourne I met up with my lovely blog friend Jenny from My Paper Epiphany - hi Jenny!  It's so nice that this obsession hobby enables us bloggers to make friends all over the world :)

Fairytale Crown

Fairytale crowns and tiaras aren't just for tiny princesses - even grown-up girls love them. Especially if there's a prince involved.

The cue word at CASology this week is Fairytale.

And the challenge at CAS-ual Fridays is Love Song:

CFC89:  With the Grammys coming up in a few days, we thought it would be fun to have a song inspired challenge.  Choose a song you love, then create a CAS project that is inspired by it!
Be sure to tell us the name of your inspiration song :)

The love song for this card is Rule the World (what else?) by Take That.  Gary Barlow can be my prince any day.

Pre-cut crown card from Craftwork Cards, platinum Stickles, AB gems, sentiment by Fiskars.

After a quick catch-up round blogland, I'm blogging off for a few weeks as I'll be way too busy to post (but I may peep in now and again to see what you're all up to).  See you sometime in March!

Sympathy Rose

Here's one of my many post-Christmas bargain stamps making an appearance again, this time on a sympathy card.

The challenge at The Paper Players is to create a sympathy card.  Always better to make them when you don't need them, ready for when you do.

And the challenge at Simon Says is Anything Goes, featuring Penny Black stamps.  The rose is Penny Black 2815K The Look of Love, and the sentiment is from Paper Smooches Sentiment Sampler.  Both the image and the sentiment are stamped with Versamark Smokey Grey.

Perfect Day

For this week's One Layer Wednesday, Ardyth has set the challenge to create a card depicting "Your Perfect Day".

My perfect day would have to include fish and chips on the terrace of the Duke of Marlborough at Russell, New Zealand, overlooking the bay as the sun is going down.  But since it's on the other side of the world it's not a regular occurrence.  In the meantime, my day is pretty much perfect when I'm stamping and making cards.  And I have just the stamp to depict this...

Colour scheme courtesy of The Play Date Cafe:

Fuchsia . . . Sprout . . . Canary

Stamp courtesy of Inky Antics.  Touch of sparkle courtesy of Stickles.

Playing Games

Back to CAS today.  The cue word at CASology is GAMES.  Cast your mind back to when you were a kid, riding around with your friends on bikes and trikes, without a care in the world.  Aah, bliss!  If it wasn't a layered card, I could have entered it into Ardyth's One Layer Wednesday "Your Perfect Day".  Oh well, it's an excuse to make another card :)

I used pale colours for the image (Inkadinkado), to make it look like the old-fashioned hand-coloured photographs.  Sentiment is from Penny Black 30-105 Gratitude.