CTC #400– Case Your Favourite Retiring Bundle

Welcome to our last CASEing the Catty Sunday Blog Hop for 2022, but don't worry we will be back in the new year with our first hop back being Sunday 8 January 2023.  Just in case it is your first visit here, the design team utilise the projects within the current Stampin' Up! catalogue to inspire our own projects each week. We also invite you to join with us in the challenge each week by using this inspiration in your own creations and uploading a photo to our Facebook page.

This week we are taking our inspiration from the retiring bundles from the Mini Catalogue. 

To check out which bundles are retiring check out my online store for the Sales & Specials, then the Last Chance Products.  If you sort by price, highest to lowest the bundles will appear at the top of the list.

I was inspired by this image from page 24 of the Mini Catalogue, I have loved this Collection not just the bundle, and am sad to see it on the retiring list. 

I haven't used this side of the DSP in many of my projects so decided to keep it the same but changed out the strip of DSP under the sentiment to be less bold. I kept the red for the berries so they stood out a little more in my version. I also added some Red Rhinestone Basic Jewels for some added bling.

I hope you are inspired to join in this last challenge for 2022, just use any of the samples using the retiring bundles from the Mini Catalogue to inspire your creativity, then post a picture of your project to the CTC Facebook page.

  

Time to hop on over and see what Julia has created this week.

Happy Stamping
Monique

CTC #397 - Case Texture Chic DSP

Welcome to another week at CASEing the Catty Sunday Blog Hop, where utilise the projects within the current Stampin' Up! catalogue to inspire our own projects each week. We also invite you to join with us in the challenge each week by using this inspiration in your own creations and uploading a photo to our Facebook page.

This week we are taking our inspiration from the Texture Chic DSP

I was inspired by this image from the Texture Chic Suite Collection page 98 of the Annual Catalogue.

I am not sure if the project in the catalogue is a card or a little box, but it inspired me to create a little card box. I started out creating one to hold 3"x3" cards, then I changed my mind and decided what I needed for Christmas was lots of gift tags.  So I made one to hold my "go-to" bulk tags. It is 4-1/2" x 2-1/4" and 1" deep.

Here are the gift cards I made to go inside.  These look impressive but are super easy to mass produce.  I cut a piece of A4 cardstock in half length ways to create two pieces that are 10.5cm by 29.8cm (you could also do this with the US cardstock as the initial sizes don't matter too much).  I stamped the snowflakes from Season of Chic along  both edges of the cardstock, then adhered a 1cm strip of DSP and 0.5cm strip of Distressed Gold Specialty Paper along one edge.  Next cut each piece into 2" wide pieces, you should get 5 tags from each piece, 10 tags in total.  Then use a tag topper punch on the non-DSP end and add some Bakers Twine or Gold Thread. I stamped the To and From on these but you could easily write that on yourself.  The little box I made holds at least 15 of these, and could hold at least 10 more. 

I hope you are inspired to join in the challenge this week, be inspired by the Texture Chic DSP in your project, then post a picture of it to the CTC Facebook page.

  

Time to hop on over and see what Julia has created this week.

Happy Stamping
Monique

CTC #396 - CASE A Watercolour Project

Welcome to another week at CASEing the Catty Sunday Blog Hop, where utilise the projects within the current Stampin' Up! catalogue to inspire our own projects each week. We also invite you to join with us in the challenge each week by using this inspiration in your own creations and uploading a photo to our Facebook page.

This week we are taking inspiration from projects in the catalogues that use a water colouring technique.

I was inspired by this card from page 72 of the Annual Catalogue, I was drawn to the water colouring background, and had a new technique that I wanted to try to achieve this.

Here is my card. I chose Gorgeous Grape, Melon Mambo and Bermuda Bay for my three colours, giving the card a bolder look than the original.  I am all in Christmas card mode at the moment so had to give this a Christmas theme even though the colours are non-traditional. Usually to create the background I would use my aqua painter to pick up ink from the lid of an ink pad, however I wanted to try something a little different. I have stepped it out below. 

I was going to just draw on the watercolour paper with my watercolour pencils, but when I realised I needed to sharpen them first another idea struck me.  I sharpened each pencil directly over the paper so that the shavings fell in three groups.

Once I had removed the wood part of the shavings I used my finger to rub the flakes of pencil core over the page, overlapping each colour slightly.  I was going to put a tissue over my finger, but it was good to do it directly as it gave me more control and gave me a better feel of where the shavings were. 

Then it was time to get out my Aqua-painter and I used horizontal strokes to activate the colour.

I then decided to sprinkle the left over pieces of core directly over the damp water colour area, and then spritzed it lightly with water.  Had I been planning on doing this I might have kept the core colours separate, but they were all jumbled in together so I just used them like they were. 

I let this dry completely, using my heat tool to speed up the process a little, then gently brushed off the chunkier pieces of pencil core to leave a cute speckle behind on the paper. I was so happy with how this turned out, the effect reminded me a little of when we had the Brusho pigment powders.  

I love that it is a technique that uses a part of the pencil that would normally be discarded. I think I'll call it the "No Waste Watercolour". Tell me what you think of this technique by leaving me a comment below.

I hope you are inspired to join in the challenge this week, just use any of the samples using water colouring to inspire your creativity, then post a picture of your project to the CTC Facebook page.

  

Time to hop on over and see what Rebecca has created this week.

Happy Stamping
Monique

CTC #394 - CASE Your Favourite Stamp Set

Welcome to another week at CASEing the Catty Sunday Blog Hop, where utilise the projects within the current Stampin' Up! catalogues to inspire our own projects each week. We also invite you to join with us in the challenge each week by using this inspiration in your own creations and uploading a photo to our Facebook page.

This week we get to CASE our favourite stamp set in either catalogue, how fun is that? You can choose a card, scrap page, or 3D item that uses your favourite, or at least one of your favourites (because we love our stamp sets equally, just like our children)!

One stamp set that I really love is the Leaves of Holly set and coordinating dies, so I chose this card from page 66 of the Mini Catalogue as the inspiration for my project.  

While I kept fairly similar to the original card in layout, I did change up the colour scheme. I thought it would be a fun take on the original to use Balmy Blue and Highland Heather as non-traditional Christmas colours and pair them with Granny Apple Green.  I love all the layers on this card, and I even added an additional one for the sentiment.  

I hope you are inspired to join in the challenge this week, just use any of the samples using your favourite stamp set,  in either catalogue to inspire your creativity, then post a picture of your project to the CTC Facebook page.

  

Time to hop on over and see what Rebecca has created this week.

Happy Stamping
Monique

CTC393– Case a Blending Brush Technique

Welcome to another week at CASEing the Catty Sunday Blog Hop, where utilise the projects within the current Stampin' Up! catalogue to inspire our own projects each week. We also invite you to join with us in the challenge each week by using this inspiration in your own creations and uploading a photo to our Facebook page.

This week we are taking our inspiration from techniques using Blending Brushes! You can pick a project from either of the catalogues so flick through them and see what catches your eye.

I was inspired by this technique from page 66 of the Mini Catalogue, I like the way you can mask off an area of the card and choose exactly where you want your ink to go. 

I wanted to keep the overall card simple so that the technique was the star of the show.  Because I don't trust myself to cut an accurate square I used one of the stitched square dies from Stylish Shapes Dies.  What I didn't realise when making this choice was that my blending would actually go through the small perforations and create a stitched border around the square!  How cool is that.   

The other thing that happened by accident on this card was that when I stamped the leave in Early Espresso it was taking ages to dry, so I decided to add some clear embossing powder so I wouldn't smudge it. To my horror of course the powder stuck to the sponged square!  When I looked closer I could see that there was more embossing powder at the bottom where there was more ink, and so when I heated it, I ended up with an ombre shine over the square which added subtle texture that I really liked. No mistakes, just creative opportunities.

With the choice of sentiment I decided to add a stamped insert into my card.  I did think about adding some colour to the leaves, but decided it makes a nice accent just as it is. 

I hope you are inspired to join in the challenge this week, post a picture of your project to the CTC Facebook page.

  

Time to hop on over and see what Rachel has created this week.

Happy Stamping
Monique

CTC #392 - CASE This Annual Catalogue Sketch

Welcome to another week at CASEing the Catty Sunday Blog Hop, where utilise the projects within the current Stampin' Up! catalogue to inspire our own projects each week. We also invite you to join with us in the challenge each week by using this inspiration in your own creations and uploading a photo to our Facebook page.

This week we are taking our inspiration from the card on page 58, specifically the layout of this pretty creation.

Here is the sketch we are playing with. 

I was playing around with different papers and card bases for this challenge and settled on this pretty Textured Chic piece of DSP with a strip of Distressed Gold for the feature. The fern frond is from Nature's Prints stamped in Soft Suede and then coloured in Pale Papaya then coloured with water colour pencils to bring out the image.  I have been doing a lot of colouring lately so decided to bring it into this project.  I will do a post soon showing my drawing and colouring journey.

I hope you are inspired to join in the challenge this week, just use the challenge sketch to inspire your creativity, then post a picture of your project to the CTC Facebook page.

  

Time to hop on over and see what Kathryn has created this week.

Happy Stamping
Monique

CTC #390 - Case the colours of Santa Express DSP

Welcome to another week at CASEing the Catty Sunday Blog Hop, where utilise the projects within the current Stampin' Up! catalogue to inspire our own projects each week. We also invite you to join with us in the challenge each week by using this inspiration in your own creations and uploading a photo to our Facebook page.

This week we are taking our inspiration from the colours in the Santa Express DSP. These are Poppy Parade, Petal Pink, Granny Apple Green, Evening Evergreen, Shaded Spruce and Mint Macaron. 

I wasn't sure what to do with these colours, but then it occurred to me that I have always wanted to try this stamped one sheet wonder technique. I have seen a few versions of this lately and thought these colours would suit it very well, having so many greens. Monica Formosa's creation for Colour Inkspiration Challenge was the first one I saw that really popped out.  I started by drawing feint lines on the A4 cardstock and then stamping my flowers first then filling in with greenery. It was missing something so I added some blended colour to darken up some areas. From this sheet I then made 4 standard sized cards, 3 mini cards, and 2 gift tags (not included due to being incomplete!). I wanted to make each of them a little different to show the versatility and appeal to different tastes. 

The three gift cards above turned out really well, I tried a petal pink background on one of them, but decided I liked the Granny Apple Green border much better. 

This is the first of the standard sized cards, this one featuring the lovely Evening Evergreen Ribbon.

This one I kept fairly simple as it had a lot of the stamped images, just adding some bling and the sentiment. 

My third standard card I chose to do a circle instead of the square for the sentiment and added different ribbon. I did think about adding some rhinestones as well, but decided against it. 

On this final card I added some rhinestones coloured with one of my Stampin Blends to coordinate, I think it was the Evening Evergreen.

I hope you are inspired to join in the challenge this week, just use the colours of the Santa Express DSP in your creation, then post a picture of your project to the CTC Facebook page.

  

Time to hop on over and see what the lovely Judy has created this week.

Happy Stamping
Monique