Fresh Vintage Valentine

Time for another challenge, or three!  This time I am entering in Colour Q, Freshly Made Sketches, and The Friday Mashup.  Have you noticed lately all the cards I am doing that feature the Fresh Vintage stamp set?  I just love the flower in particular from this set, and can't believe that when I first saw the set in the Sale-A-Bration catalogue I didn't think I liked it much at all!!!

I liked the "go long" theme at Freshly Made Sketches so made a card that will fit into the Small Open Ended Envelopes. Now the name of these initially had me not even thinking of buying them until we got to use them at Convention last year, although called 'small' they are actually 17cm x 8.9cm.  I have used the flower from Fresh Vintage again here both in the feature and again stamped in VersaMark on the Real Red card stock. 

Here is a close up of the featured heart.  In my last post I featured a little box with a heart on the front which I had made by stamping the flower from Fresh Vintage and punching out the majority of the flower with the heart punch.  When I was doing the clean up on my desk I found the scrap of card stock that was left over and I noticed how good the little swirls looked coming out of the punch out heart.  That was the inspiration for the feature of this card, what do you think?  I am really happy with the way it turned out, and even more happy that I have found yet another way to use this beautiful stamp.  

Happy Stamping

Workshop Cards

I wanted to take some time out from challenges to share a couple of projects that I presented at two workshops I did recently.  I love doing workshops and sharing new techniques with people, because I know how much I love it when I get shown something new.

Belinda's Card

My Take on Belinda's Card

The first one is a card inspired by a fellow Stampin' Up! Demonstrator Belinda Neil, I kept most of the card identical to hers but changed the colours because I wanted to showcase the bleaching technique.  I used Baja Breeze for the base and Soft Suede for the embossed panel.  I just love the satin ribbon put on as a little feature.  I think the "Just For You" stamp from Tagtastic set is such a good stamp to show off the bleaching technique because of that lovely banner in the centre.

This is the project from the second workshop I did, also using the Tagtastic stamp set.  The cards were inspired by the lovely Secret Sister gift I received in October (I will post a picture of that in the next few days), and the little card holder was inspired by something we were shown at our Regional training day - I told you I love learning new things!  The little card holder is made from the Two Tags die and holds 4 little 3"x3" cards and envelopes.  I used the bleaching on the embossing as well on the stamp to highlight it.  

The little cards are quite easy to make, the embossed oval is the perfect size to hold a piece of DSP or even a stamped image punched out with the large oval punch.  For these ones I punched the flourish from one of the sheets in the Beau Château Designer Series Paper.

Happy Stamping

Freshly Made Sketches

I had a bit of inspiration this evening as I was flicking through the blogs I am following when I found the Freshly Made Sketches Challenge with this layout ...

I have been looking at this new challenge blog lately and just haven't had the time to participate, but life has settled a little so I wanted to join in.

I had made up the stamped background a while ago and thought that it would be great for this card, as I could just see the doilies and snowflakes working together with the elements of the sketch.  I am so loving the colour combo of Pool Party, Concord Crush and Wisteria Wonder together, and although you can't see it easily the doilies have been stamped onto shimmer white card stock which gives them an added frosty feel.  I just had to add a couple of rhinestones to help bling it up.

I have a bit of time on my hands the next few days, so you can expect a few more creations from me, as well as some pictures over the next week or so of the lovely gifts I have received as part of Secret Sister Swaps.

Happy Stamping

Trick or Treat

For the last two weeks I have been working with a different team and I have thoroughly enjoyed working with them, and getting to know them all.  Next week it is back to my usual job, and back to part time work, which will leave more time for crafting!  Tonight I decided to have a look at my fav challenge blogs, with the thought of planning a card to make tomorrow, that was until I came across The Friday Mashup and was totally inspired by this week's challenge.  This week was a colour and theme challenge, and I decided to do both, creating a Halloween themed card using Basic Black, Pumpkin Pie, Lucky Limeade and Concord Crush.

Now in Australia we don't really celebrate Halloween, certainly not to the extent that it is celebrated in the US or UK, this is reflected in the limited Halloween products in our IB&C. However I did not want to let that get me down, and I think it was the little owl in the Warmest Wishes set that FMU are giving away this week. 

I used the owl punch and added some bat wings to give him more of a Halloween look, and a little green vest to match the new Lucky Limeade ruffle ribbon on the card.  I decided to use my new Dotted Scallop Ribbon Border Punch (boy that is a mouthful!!) and used two strips of it under the ruffle ribbon, I think the two of them go very well together. Can you spot the little bit of extra ruffled ribbon I have used to framed the Concord Crush circle? I cut a piece of ribbon in half lengthwise and then attached it to the back of the circle using SNAIL.

I did learn an important lesson on this card ... Use your black glitter before you add the letters to a multi-layered, embossed card! Boy does that stuff get everywhere!

Stamps: none!
Paper: Basic Black, Pumpkin Pie, Lucky Limeade, Concord Crush and Naturals Ivory; Lucky Limeade DSP Stack
Other: 2-step Owl Punch, 2 3/8" Scallop Circle Punch, 2 1/2" Circle Punch, Dotted Scallop Ribbon Border Punch, Lucky Limeade ruffled ribbon, Timeless Type Junior Alphabet die, black super fine glitter.


Happy Stamping