Bloomin' Marvellous birthday

I had to get up a bit earlier than usual this morning, and was greeted by the most stunning sunrise. Pink, orange and a bit of blue to admire while I got dressed. And when I got home from the gym in the evening, the sky wasn't completely black yet, you could just about make out a bit of dark blue on the horizon. It's not going to be long now when it's still light when I get home! This is the most amazing time of the year, when you know you have all the spring and summer still ahead. 

This week has been manic, and I haven't had much time for crafty business. Therefore today's post is just a quick little birthday card. The Stampin' Up Bloomin' Marvellous is a really versatile stamp set. It works for such a variety of occasions. Here, I stamped in various greens and yellows and cut out the tag using the Chalk talk framelits. I added some banners from my leftover paper scraps stash at the bottom and stamped one of the sentiments from the Bloomin' Marvellous set. I finished with a cute little bow for that final little touch.

I'm linking up with the following challenges:
Simon Says Stamp Monday challenge - B is for ... (bloom, blue, banner, bow, bird)
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge - Things that fly
Artistic Stampers - Spring is Coming
Artistic Inspirations - Anything Goes with a Twist of Green
Bunny Zoe's Crafts - Spring Colours
Sweet Stampin' - Use green

Inks: Stampin' Up So Saffron, Daffodil Delight, Pistachio Pudding, Pear Pizzazz, Pool Party
Stamps: Stampin' Up Bloomin' Marvellous
Cardstock: Craft UK Kraft card 5x7 in, Hobbycraft three shades of green 160 gsm cardstock, Hobbycraft three shades of blue 160 gsm cardstock
Papers: Stampin' Up Brights DSP Stack, International Bazaar
Other: Chalk talk framelits, blue bakers twine

More Unused Schtuff!!

I got my monthly fix of Stampin' Up stuff in the mail today, and there is so much new goodies that I don't even know where to start. I was supposed to clean the kitchen today when I got home from work. I'm sure the mess will still be there tomorrow...

So what is my new stuff all about then? I immediately fell in love with the new Bow Builder punch. Those little bows are just soooo adorable. And easy to put together! 

I also love the Irresistibly Yours DSP. I can't be the only one who never has the right colour DSP. No matter how many packs you buy, you never have a colour combo you would need. I guess it's the same evil force at work that causes the "I have nothing to wear" phenomenon, which strikes me so often. Again, I can't be the only one, right? Anyhow, this new genius DSP is white with some resist patterns on it, so you can colour it, ink it, spritz it or whatever else you can come up with to create a custom colour DSP. The pack comes with several different patterns. You can't buy it, you can only get it as a free Sale-a-bration gift when you order. How cunning of Stampin' Up!!! I will have to stock up on this jewel, so I might just "have" to make another order soon... 

And can I just mention the new Hello You dies? I love them so much. I have wanted to get on the "word die" bandwagon for a while as I love the creations I see out in cyberspace and now I can finally join in on the fun.

This card came together really quickly, all I needed to do was colour the DSP, quickly punch and assemble to bow and die cut the "Happy". The Birthday part is heat embossed in white, and to finish off I added two Candy Dots. The card was inspired by the colour combo over at ShowCASe Your Style. I was also inspired by the theme over at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge, which is "It's a Guy Thing". I think this would make a great birthday card for that special guy in your life. I am also entering the card in Darnell's NBUS challenge and Addicted to Stamps where the theme is "make your mark" and I coloured the background DSP with markers.

Card: Leonardo Stationery 300 gsm white card, Stampin' Up Black card
Stamps: Paper Smooches Sentiment Sampler
Ink: Tsukineko Versamark
Colouring: Stampin' Write markers Pear Pizzazz and Pool Party
Paper: Stampin' Up Irresistibly Yours
Other: Bow Builder Punch, Hello You Thinlits, Candy Dots Subtles, Papermania Seafoam White Embossing powder

Diamond sparkle snowflake

I really should get a snowflake stamp set with matching dies. Fussy cutting these snowflakes are a p-a-i-n! But I feel this time it was worth the trouble. 

This card is inspired by the great sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches. It's also inspired by The Friday Mashup where the challenge is to use the Diamond Dust Technique and the colours Island Indigo, Garden Green & Rich Razzleberry (or similar colours). I'm also linking up at Craft Your Passion where the theme is Bright and Sparkly and the new STAMPlorations November challenge where the theme is stamping and layers. I would also like to enter Completely Christmas where the theme is Anything goes with a twist... Add Blue and Sweet Stampin' Christmas where the theme is Snowflakes for a few more days.

I stamped the snowflakes in Marina Mist and Pear Pizzazz to create the background. I stamped and fussy cut three snowflakes in Marina Mist, Pear Pizzazz and Rich Razzleberry. Then I stamped the snowflakes all over with Versamark, and heat embossed with sparkling embossing powder. I assembled the snowflake using foam pads to give it some dimension. I love the subtle sparkle from the embossing powder. I stamped the greeting in Rich Razzleberry and tied a bow using purple ribbon. Last I matted everything onto Marina Mist cardstock and attached to white card.

The glitter embossing powder gives a nice subtle shine.

Card: Leonardo Stationery 300 gsm white card, Stampin' Up Marina mist card, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card

Stamps: Penny Black All is Bright, Papermania Urban Stamps 12 Days of Christmas Word Banner

Ink: Marina Mist, Pear Pizzazz, Rich Razzleberry, Tsukineko Versamark

Other: Papermania Holographic glitter embossing powder, purple ribbon from my stash

Another great Retro Skech and Colour Me

I wasn't going to post today, but I ended up doing a bit of crafting despite my Mojo being dead and gone once again.

Week after week I love the Retro Sketches. They never disappoint. This time I had too many ideas, and I started with one card, which didn't turn out as I wanted so I made this instead. Then I tweaked the first card and it turned out better than this one, but you will have to wait until tomorrow to see it. This card is also inspired by the new Colour Me...! challenge where there are two different colour combos to choose from.

Card: Leonardo Stationery 300 gsm white card, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card, Stampin' Up Pear Pizzazz
Paper: Stampin' Up Sweet Sorbet
Stamps: Stampin' Up Chalk Talk, Petite Petals 
Ink: Stampin' Up Rich Razzleberry, Pear Pizzazz
Other: Stampin' Up Chalk Talk Framelits, Petite Petals Punch, Papermania Rhinestones Capsule Verde and Capsule Heather

Nontraditional Christmas Colours

Yes, it's another Christmas card post. I was asked to make some Christmas cards with Finnish and Swedish sentiments, so who am I to argue. This card was inspired by CAS(E) this Sketch. For the first card I used the colour combo from CAS - Colours and Sketches. For the second card, I picked the colour combination myself. 

I really like the Clean and Simple look of these cards. Unfortunately the colours don't show in the photos quite as nicely as they do in real life, but you should be able to get an idea. 

I also stamped a few Christmas ornaments inside the card for a finishing touch.

Card: Leonardo Stationery 300 gsm card, Coloured 240 gsm kraft card Teal, silvery grey card from my stash

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Joy to the woods

Ink: Stampin' Up Bermuda Bay, Basic Grey, Crumb Cakem Pear Pizzazz, Soft Sky and Wisteria Wonder, Hobbycraft pigment ink silver

Other: Stampin Up Island Indigo ribbon, grey ribbon from my stash, Stampin' Up basic adhesive gems 

CASEing some more

I had so much fun doing my previous challenge for CASEing the Catty that I decided to make another card.I'm so disappointed with myself that I have missed the first 7 challenges of the series! It was hard to choose another project, as I wanted to try to recreate pretty much all of the cards in the Card Giving section (page 102-143). In the end I settled on page 115 where I found a great card with the "colour the chalkboard stamp with markers" technique (yes, of course that's the official name of the technique...). 

Stampin' Up Annual Catalogue 2014-2015 page 115

I don't have the great Friends Who Know stamp (although I know who I would make a card for using the stamp should I have it) so I used the only chalkboard type stamp I have - from the Chalk Talk set. I also don't have the Chalk Lines stamp set (would love it though) so I had to come up with a replacement for that too, and settled for the new photopolymer stamp set Show&Tell 2. And finally, I also realised I don't have a single black and white DSP, so I created my own using the Gorgeous Grunge stamp set. I think you can certainly see where the inspiration for this card has come from, but at the same time I have put my own little twist on it. I didn't see any rule saying you can only participate with one contribution to the challenge, so I'm submitting this as my second card for the challenge, and can't wait for the next one. I was photographing in rather challenging afternoon sunshine so the small detail photo shows the colours a bit more correctly than the overall photo.

Cardstock: Stampin' Up Crumb Cake, Whisper White, Calypso Coral, Bermuda Bay, Blushing Bride, Pear Pizzazz, Pool Party
Stamps: Stampin' Up Chalk Talk, Show&Tell 2, Gorgeous Grunge
Inks: Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black, Stampin' Up Crumb Cake and Pool Party, Stampin' Write markers in Pool Party, Pear Pizzazz, Blushing Bride and Calypso Coral
Other: Chalk Talk dies, scrap of DSP from Sycamore Street

Fresh Vintage in Fresh Colours

I own my fair share of embossing folders, but don't get around to using them nearly enough. So for my last few cards, I have tried to incorporate dry embossing. It does give great texture to backgrounds which would be boring otherwise. I have also tried to spend some more time on each card and stamp something inside the card and on the envelope as well to give the whole set a more elaborate finish.

I absolutely loved the colours and photo from this week's ColourQ challenge, and the photo immediately inspired me to use the Fresh Vintage stamp set, it's perfect for colouring using markers. And I decided that a large background panel in Strawberry Slush would be perfect when embossed with a flowery folder. Strawberry Slush is one of my absolute favourite Stampin' Up Colours, it's simply the perfect shade of pink so I was thrilled to have it incorporated in the colour challenge. For the layout I used this week's Freshly Made Sketch for inspiration. I am also submitting the card to Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge where the theme is Stamp It to celebrate Stamptember and the STAMPlorations September challenge where the theme is Stamps and Markers as I coloured the stamp using markers.

Cardstock: Coloured 240 gsm kraft card in Navy, Stampin' Up card in Strawberry Slush, Bermuda Bay and Whisper White
Stamps: Stampin' Up Fresh Vintage, Bloomin' Marvelous
Ink: Stampin' Up Bermuda Bay, Pacific Point, Pear Pizzazz and Strawberry Slush
Other: Stampin' Up Basic Pearls coloured with Sharpies, Embossing folder Spellbinders M-Bossabilities Enchanted 

Petite Petals graduation card

This is the second-to-last in the bunch of graduation cards I have made for my Sister's friends. It seems like ages ago when I started with the first one, and still I was struggling to get them all done in time. It's been a challenge to come up with something individual and unique for each of the new doctors, but I've had a great time creating. 

This card came together easily using the Stampin' Up Petite Petals stamp set and matching punch. It's so fun to stamp and punch the flowers, I could make oodles of cards like this. I also added some splatter using the Gorgeous Grunge stamp set (which seems to feature on about 90% of all my cards, but what can you do, if it ain't broken don't fix it). I die cut the letters and put everything together with a few adhesive gems for a bit of bling. I stamped a row of flowers inside the card and on the envelope as well.

I'm entering this card in Addicted to CAS which this week is about "Celebrate". If graduating as a Medical Doctor is not a reason to celebrate, I don't know what is. I'm also entering this week's Addicted to Stamps and more where the theme is CAS. I also had to enter the Shopping our Stash challenge as the theme was to use something you can't put away, and these two stamp sets definitely have seen their fair share of use in my craft room. 

Card: Leonardo Stationery 300 gsm Smooth White Card, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card, Stampin' Up Crumb Cake
Stamps: Stampin' Up Gorgeous Grunge, Petite Petals
Inks: Stampin' Up Blushing Bride, Pear Pizzazz, Pool Party, Sahara Sand, Smoky Slate, Wisteria Wonder
Other: Stampin' Up Jewels Basic Rhinestones, Petite Petals punch, Tim Holtz Alterations Inside Out alphabet die

Butterflies in a box

Just a quick post before I crash into bed. I made this box of butterflies a while ago. I used the same measurements for the box as I have used before here, here and here. Once you have made on card-in-a-box it's actually quite quick and easy to make more of them, although they look like hard work. What is hard work though is all the fussy cutting. For this card I cut quite a few butterflies. But it was all worth it in the end.

Cardstock: Leonardo Stationery 350 gsm Smooth White Card, Hobbycraft white 160 gsm cardstock
Paper: Dovecraft Princess Fairytale Designer Paper Pack
Inks: Stampin' Up Pear Pizzazz, Pink Pirouette, So Saffron, Wisteria Wonder
Stamps: Stampin' Up Bloomin Marvellous, Tim Holtz Visual Artistry Heartfelt

Birthday card for a star

Today's card is a birthday card for a friend of mine who has a birthday coming up shortly. She is a wonderful person, always there to help when you need anything. She always hosts me when I'm visiting home if I need a place to stay, despite being busy with her home and family. In short, she is a star. I got the inspiration for this card from a few different places. The colour combo is from this week's Color Throwdown as well as this week's Muse challenge. The star theme is also from Muse. The layout is from this week's Retro Sketch challenge. 

 

 

I used the Stampin' Up Sprinkled Expressions stamp set, a set which I was trying very hard to buy on Ebay for a long time. And as the story goes, once I managed to secure it I have hardly used it since. But it's such a great set and I particularly love to use it by colouring with markers so that you get multi-coloured images. I also used some Dovecraft Designer Paper which I had almost forgotten I had. Once again a reminder how a rummage across websites and then in your own stash can result in a stroke of inspiration. 

Cardstock: Stampin' Up Pool Party and Pear Pizzazz, Leonardo Stationery 350 gsm Smooth White Card
Stamps: Stampin' Up Sprinkled Expressions
Paper: Dovecraft Back to Basics II Designer Paper Pack
Inks: Stampin' Up Daffodil Delight and Pool Party ink and markers
Other: Tim Holtz Alterations Inside Out alphabet die and Vintage Lace die, green ribbon from my stash, Papermania Adhesive Gems in Capsule Verde

Multiple challenges Birthday Card

I usually tend to frown just a little bit at cards which are entered in a large number of challenges. I usually want to focus on one major theme, but each to their own. However, pretty much by accident I realised this card actually qualifies for three challenges! So this is certainly a case of the pot calling the kettle black. I started with The Colour Throwdown #282 with the below colour combo. I really like the colour combos as they get me using different colours to the ones I usually use. I always tend to gravitate towards the pinks and purples, so anything different is always welcome, and takes me out of my comfort zone a bit. 

Unfortunately I don't have Lucky Limeade, so I substituted with Pear Pizzazz. I also saw this amazing card from Teri's Craft Spot on my blog feed, and stole some ideas from that card. In addition, I got my latest order from Stampin' Up just a few days ago, including the wonderful En Français background stamp which I was dying to try out, along with the tag topper punch. I then realised I can enter this card in the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday "Tag it" challenge as well. When I was thinking about which sentiment to choose for the card I realised the theme for the Pink Elephant Challenge is Birthday, so I printed a simple Happy Birthday in Real Red using a free font called Forever in My Heart, so all of a sudden I hit three challenges in one. And that is how the cookie crumbles. 

Inks: Stampin' Up Daffodil Delight, Pear Pizzazz, Real Red, Crumb Cake, Tim Holtz distress embossing ink
Cardstock: Craft UK kraft card, Stampin' Up Daffodil Delight, Pear Pizzazz, Real Red, Crumb Cake
Stamps: Stampin' Up En Français, Hardwood, Petite Petals
Punches: Petite Petals, Tag Topper punch
Other: red ribbon from my stash, Sizzix Flower and vines #2 die, Papermania Seafoam White Embossing Powder