Birthday Petals

I am the ultimate party girl. To celebrate Saturday night yesterday, I opened a bottle of cider. Half a bottle later, at approximately 8pm I was sound asleep on the sofa. I woke up after 10 pm thinking I will not be able to go to sleep at all, but snuggled up in bed nonetheless. About 30 seconds later I was sound asleep, not waking up until 8 am the next morning. I do know how to do a wild Saturday night...

I was going to clean the house today. Instead I have been gardening and hanging around in the craft room. I have re-potted my little herb seedlings and planted some parsley. Despite my efficiency in the greenhouse, I don't have much to show for my time in the craft room. I did mange to finish one card though. The card is inspired by the challenge over at Time Out. I love the colours in the picture, and obviously the card is inspired by the flower headboard, the colours in the bedspread and the black frame of the window. I was also inspired by the colours over at Colour Me...! and the sketch over at Retro Sketches.

Card: Coloured 240 gsm kraft card black and raspberry pink, 160 gsm white card, Dovecraft 110 gsm premium vellum

Stamps: Stampin' Up Petal Parade, From the Herd

Ink: Tim Holtz disterss ink Aged Mahogany, Peacock Feathers, Picked Raspberry, Tsukineko Versamark

Other: Stampin' Up Hello You die, Papermania Seafoam white embossing powder (coloured with Coastal Cabana Blendabilities), sequins from my stash

Spring colours

I am in complete denial. I refuse to admit it's November. It's 20 degrees and bright sunshine outside. I picked raspberries from my garden yesterday. I cannot be November. Especially as it was August yesterday. I swear. So instead of making Christmas cards or fall cards, I decided to pick beautiful spring colours and flowers for today's card. 

The inspiration for today's card is a Viva La Verve sketch. I used papers from the lovely Stampin' Up Sweet Sorbet DSP and stamps from the Petal Parade set. Funnily enough, I didn't like the stamp set at all at first, but it grew on me. I also didn't like Summer Starfruit at all, but again it slowly grew on me. I didn't even like the DSP at first. So given that I didn't like any components of this card, I think it turned out rather nice after all.

Card: Stampin' Up Crisp Cantaloupe card, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card
Paper: Stampin' Up Sweet Sorbet
Stamps: Stampin' Up Petal Parade, Bloom With Hope
Ink: Stampin' Up Crisp Cantaloupe, Pistachio Pudding and Pool Party
Other: X-cut scalloped circle die

Indian summer or early fall?

This week the colours over at Color Throwdown are summery, but in my mind the yellow and orange bring a feeling of the upcoming fall. And looking out the window, that's exactly what it looks like. Leaves are starting to turn just slightly yellow, and evenings are getting dark although the days are still sunny and warm. It's so hard to give up the thought of summer, with dark and cold mornings to come. I guess it mirrors other things that are going on in our life currently, it was warm and carefree and happy and all of a sudden things have switched around and it's no longer all joy and laughter. But all you can do is have faith that just as the fall turns to winter and then slowly back to spring again, life will slowly turn around and get better.

And in the meanwhile, there is always crafting to bring those bright colours back into a drab life! The other inspiration for this card was the Mojo Monday sketch which should be quite evident from the card. Last but not least, I was inspired by the Indian Summer theme over at Make My Monday and wanted to use one of my favourite flower stamp sets, Petal Parade for a feeling of summer and sunshine.

I also stamped inside the card and on the envelope

Cardstock: Leonardo Stationery 300 gsm white card, Stampin' Up Melon Mambo and Pumpkin Pie cardstock, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card

Paper: Stampin' Up Pattern Stack - Brights collection

Stamps: Stampin' Up Petal Parade, Paper Smooches Sentiment Sampler

Inks: Stampin' Up Daffodil Delight, Melon Mambo and Pumpkin Pie

Other: Stampin' Up Sizzix Big Shot Vintage Wallpaper embossing folder, basic adhesive gems

Petal Parade inspiration

I'm cutting it very close to the deadline of the two challenges I'm participating in today. But I couldn't miss this week's ColourQ challenge, the colour combo is spectacular. And when I saw the inspiration photo, I knew exactly which stamp set I wanted to use. This card takes me right back to the heart of making your own cards - stamping! I just love stamping away and this set is perfect for making your own stamped backgrounds. Who needs designer paper when you can make your own so easily, and having so much fun in the process! I also loved the sketch this week over at the Pink Elephant challenge, and thought it would be perfect for displaying my hand-stamped background (although this sketch would also be perfect to get rid of a few of those hoarded scraps of designer paper as well). I guess it doesn't get said enough, but I am so grateful to all the people working so hard to provide us crafters with inspiring challenges every week, and who go through all that effort to come and comment on each and every one of our creations, spreading joy and encouragement to blogs like mine which otherwise might go completely unnoticed in the great vast infinity that is the Interwebs.

I also stamped inside the card and on the envelope.

Cardstock: Leonardo Stationery 350 gsm smooth white card, Stampin' Up Soft Sky and Wisteria Wonder card, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card

Stamps: Stampin' Up Petal Parade and Yippee-Skippee

Ink: Stampin' Up Old Olive, Rich Razzleberry, Soft Sky and Wisteria Wonder

Other: Stampin' Up Scalloped Tag Topper punch, ribbon and twine from my stash

Petal parade thank you

The theme of the current Shopping our Stash challenge is "Oldest punch or die". I can still remember buying the Stampin' Up Chalk Talk dies back in the days when I didn't even have a die cutting machine yet. I used them for a long time just by tracing the outline with a pencil and fussy cutting the shapes. Then finally I got my beloved Big Shot, and I just love die cutting. I love the feeling of turning the handle and popping the paper out of the die. So when I saw the challenge, I knew I had to make a card with these much beloved and well used dies of mine.

I decided to make a Thank you card, as you can never have too many in your stash (ok, so looking at my box of cards you *can* in fact have too many thank you cards, but that wasn't my point). I used the die to cut out a tag and stamped the cute flowers from the Petal Parade stamp set. I matted the tag onto Baked Brown Sugar card. The background is a DSP from a set called Tea for Two. Like all other crafting stuff, I hoard DSPs like crazy, but then I'm really bad at using them. I keep thinking I want to save them for a "special occasion", but what could be more special than crafting time? And I managed to use some random cream ribbon from my stash as well, so this is truly a great stash card. I have also bought the Summer Starfruit ink pad ages ago as I thought I would use it loads, but in fact this is the first time I'm breaking it out. I really like the colour combo of Baked Brown Sugar, Blushing Bride and Summer Starfruit, it has a rather retro feel to it.

Card: Leonardo Stationery 350 gsm Smooth White Card, Stampin' Up Baked Brown Sugar, Hobbycraft 160 gsm cream card
Paper: Stampin' Up Tea for Two Designer Series Paper
Stamps: Stampin' Up Petal Parade, So Very Grateful
Inks: Stampin' Up Baked Brown Sugar, Blushing Bride and Summer Starfruit
Other: Stampin' Up Chalk Talk Framelits, cream ribbon from my stash

Petal Parade in Rich Razzleberry and Coastal Cabana

I've been busy crafting this weekend, I believe the best cure for a cold is a good crafting session. And all the crafting challenges out there are a wonderful source of inspiration if you need to get your creative juices flowing. So, browsing the interwebs, I wanted to participate in the CAS(E) this Sketch #68 challenge. During the week, I had a quick play with my new Petal Parade stamp set just stamping randomly onto a sheet. I ended up making two cards from the stamped sheet. One for the challenge, and another just because I really love the colour combo of Rich Razzleberry, Coastal Cabana and Smoky Slate. I often struggle with my colour combos, not liking them in the end, but I think this turned out rather good!

For the challenge card, I made a banner from the sheet I stamped and matted it onto Rich Razzleberry cardstock. I used a die to cut out the doily in Coastal Cabana and coloured the sentiment using markers and stamped onto white cardstock. Punching the small banners only took seconds with the banner punch and then it was just a quick job to attach everything to Smoky Slate card.

The second card has similar components but a different layout and a little bling added for good measure.

Inks: Stampin' Up Coastal Cabana, Rich Razzleberry, Smoky Slate
Cardstock: Stampin' Up Coastal Cabana, Rich Razzleberry, Smoky Slate, Hobbycraft white 160 gsm cardstock
Stamps: Stampin' Up Petal Parade, Yippee-Skippee! 
Other: Nellie's multiframes doily and circle die, Stampin' Up banner punch, Stampin' Up adhesive gems.