More Bloomtangled Cards

A while ago I did a lot of die cutting using the STAMPlorations Bloomtangled #1 Cover Plate die to create a card for STAMPloration's 5th birthday. That left me with loads and loads of leftover die cuts. What a great excuse to do some more paper piecing!! Using the bits and bobs I put together three cards in the spirit of recycling and making use of those left over die cut pieces.

I was inspired by the floral image over at Just Us Girls, and I'm also linking up with the J is for Junk challenge over at the Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers (although no snark this time, sorry!). I'm also linking up over at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge where Anything Goes this week.

After the relaxing paper piecing, I die cut sentiments using STAMPlorations dies in gold mirri card, and added some sequins from my stash to the first card for the extra bling factor. 

Card: various coloured card from my stash, 200 gsm white card, gold mirri card

Dies: STAMPlorations Bloomtangled #1 Cover Plate die, Thanks word die, Celebrate word die, Feel Better Soon Phrase die

Other: gold sequins from my stash

Welcome Little One

I made this card for a friend a while ago but never got around to publishing it. The background panel is a watercolour panel which initially was meant for something completely different but didn't turn out as I wanted. But I couldn't just get rid of it so it ended up in my UFO pile and then after a while found it's way to this card. I love it when that happens. 

The front panel was lots of stamping and die cutting. The sky, sun and grass are inked with a mix of Distress Inks and Distress Oxides and the critters are coloured with Copics. I also stamped and coloured an envelope to match the card, again creating the backgrounds with Distress Inks, this time colouring the critters with coloured pencils.

I'm linking up the card over at Make My Monday where the theme is Coloured Image, Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge where Anything goes and Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers where the theme is Colouring. I'm also linking up the envelope over at Shopping Our Stash where the theme is to Get krafty.

Main ingredients:

Lawn Fawn stamps (Critters Down Under) and various Lawn Fawn dies

Tim Holtz Distress inks and Distress Oxides

Copics

Gansai Tambi watercolours

Christmas in July over at STAMPlorations

Today I'm excited to be showcasing a whole bunch of Christmas cards for the STAMPlorations Christmas in July post over on the STAMPlorations blog. Trust me, there is a whole lot more than the sneak peak of three cards you can see here. You can also win your choice of one of the STAMPlorations products I used for my projects (or a $15 gift card to the STAMPlorations store) by leaving a comment on the post over on STAMPlorations blog. Shery also has a generous offer, -25% off all Christmas in July products if you use the code CHRISTMAS25 on checkout. Hope all of this got you inspired to kick-start your Christmas crafting. Feel free to leave a link to any Christmas creations below if you were inspired by my cards, as I would love to pop over and take a look!

I'm linking up my third card over at CAS on Friday where the theme is, appropriately, Christmas in July and over at Simon Says Stamp Monday challenge where the theme is the same!

My Ice Cream is Melting!!

I can't recall a summer like this for the whole time I've lived in the UK. No rain, no clouds, just glorious sunshine! Everyone says that it will rain now, with Wimbledon starting... I know the garden could use some rain, but I'm loving the sunshine and warmth. I will think fondly on these sweaty, glorious, days when it gets cold and rainy and miserable again.

The July challenge over at House of Cards is lovely cold ice cream and all I could think about today was ice cream melting in the heat, so I went a bit wild with my watercolouring. I'm also linking up with the Ice Cream challenge over at Make My Monday and the Warm theme over at Time Out.

My card is super simple, I stamped the delicious ice creams from STAMPlorations Sweet Cravings using Antique Linen Distress Ink onto watercolour paper and watercoloured them using the colour scheme from the challenge, pulling the colours outside of the outlines of the images. After the watercolours dried (which is not long in this heat!), I stamped the sentiment from Bold Sentiments Sweet. Watercolouring is so much fun!

Card: Daler&Rowney 300gsm watercolour paper, white 250 gsm card

Stamps: STAMPlorations Sweet Cravings, Bold Sentiments Sweet

Ink and colouring: Tsukineko Versafine Onyx Black, Tim Holtz Distress Inks

STAMPlorations discount code: If you want to save 20% when shopping at the STAMPlorations store you can use the code STAMPGIRLKAROLA at checkout. The discount applies to all normal priced and discounted stamps, stencils and dies. The code cannot be combined with other discount codes.

Happy Unicorns

Can we talk about adulting just for a minute? I have just scrubbed my whole bathroom from top to toe, including the most disgusting task in the house - removing the hairs from the shower drain. The smell, the soapy build-up... blargh! I feel so good now that my bathroom is shining, and I know having a clean bathroom is its own reward, but sometimes I just wish someone would give me a hug and tell me what a great job I've done. So if you feel like you have been doing some adulting lately that you haven't been acknowledged for, just let me know and I'm more than happy to tell you what a great job you have done, as you truly deserve it.

Today's cards are for twin baby girls. I wanted to make something cute and colourful, and the idea developed from the watercoloured backgrounds. First, I created two watercolour backgrounds using Distress Ink and die cut the rainbows and painted them with Distress Inks too. I stamped the cutie unicorn and watercoloured with Distress Inks. Last, I die cut the clouds from a shimmery white card, and the letters from silver glitter card. 

I'm linking up with Just Us Girls and Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge where Anything goes this week.

Card: white 200 gsm card, Daler & Rowney 300 gsm watercolour card, white shimmer card, silver glitter card, Lawn Fawn Perfectly Plaid Rainbow paper

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Winter Unicorn and matching die

Dies: Lawn Fawn Fluffy Cloud Border dies, Rainbow die, Stitched Rectangle dies, Lawn Fawn Scalloped Rectangle dies, Cole's ABCs dies

Ink and colouring: Tim Holtz Distress Inks, Versafine Onyx Black