Project 385: A final doggy set

This final set post is for a girl on the team about to leave so I'm showing her leaving card as well.

I kept things super simple here. Her little dog is a friend of my little dog (friend is a strong word, more like pint-sized bully) and like me she lives for that dog. She's Finnish, and has a great Scandi style, so I wanted it to be clean and simple in execution. I decided to simply stamp 4 paw prints, use different powders and heat emboss them. I'm featuring the gold and turquoise here but I also did silver and red glitter (which I stamped upside down. Oops. It kind of works though so I left it).

Her leaving card is also really simple, featuring a paper cut silhouette of her, the dog, a glass of wine and a little speech bubble with the brand mark of her client for the past 3 years. I debated a 'longing for you' message but decided against it, the simplicity is really nice and I think it suits her as well. I'll miss her so much and I am gutted to see her go. Hopefully there will be future visits from her and we can see the little dog again in the future!

Project 384: More sets for Christmas

Set post number 2! I have been working hard on these the last few days. Yesterday I showcased 2 sets, today you get two more. These were much more personal to the recipients, not that the others weren't, I just spent a bit more time making choices on these.

The headline card and the ones featured here were great to make. The cards are from a Creative Stamping magazine freebie set that I either die cut or fussy cut and then colored using Spectrum Noir pencils. Rarely use pencils these days, it was great fun to get them out. I added glitter accents to make it pop out and then little touches of bling or mini pearls. Really simple but I think the recipient will like them.

And now these are just as random as you like. The colleague in question is moving from London to NY next year hence some of the featured stamps. The others are really just random things that made me think of her! I went fishing through my big wooden blocks and these are the ones that all seemed the best, I love going through those because they're not organised like my clear stamps, it's just a grab bag of fun. I painted the background with watercolored distress inks, really simple.

Project 383: First of several card gift sets

I am making a whole bunch of card sets as gifts for people. I should have started this process MUCH sooner but here we all are, crafting late into the evening to get things done before I see the recipients! I'm using it as an opportunity to go through my stash and use things I haven't played with in a while.

This is the first of a few card set posts. The set featured here was such fun. I stamped and die cut the fruit Sizzix set Claire gave me last year and used mini 4x4 cards as my base. The colored papers are from a Recollections square pack (no die cutting or trimming involved!) and I embossed them in different folders: the triangle is from Stampin' Up, the houndstooth is Sizzix, the swiss dots are Cuttlebug and the basketweave I can't remember. I added different sized enamel dots from Recollections to match each card. They took a bit longer than you'd think from looking at them but I really love them!

This next set was a bit simpler. I die cut some intricate butterflies and then layered them over punched hearts. I die cut big chevron patterned circles and added a few touches of bling and enamel dots. They would have been really quick if it weren't for the 8 die cuts required. Still, a very clean card and it makes a nice set for the person who is receiving it....thought I must say I prefer the fruit!

Project 382: Brazillian football baby card and 'Future Grandma'

A colleague is from Brazil and her brother just announced him and his wife are having a baby. She wanted to make him a card that showed his football team Flamengo as he has found out he's having a boy. She also wanted a card for her mom that congratulated her as - apparently - she has been bugging my colleague for a grandchild for some years now and she can now give her some peace!

The headline card features the card I made for her mom. I heat embossed the congratulations greeting from a baby set in white and then blended over it in Salty Ocean distress ink really lightly for the sky. I die cut a stamped plane from the same baby set (why is there a plane in a baby set??) and then colored it with ProMarkers. I cut  a scrap of green paper to look like a hill and then dotted it with Enamel Accent flowers. I added white Enamel Accents to the sky to make it look like sky writing from the plane, and then added the Future Grandma in glittery letters. What a weird card but I love it.

The next one is the card for her brother. I cut a number of red stripes and layered them over a black card. I added big black foam letters to make it more masculine and smaller red ones to balance it out. I die cut a circle and drew on some football spots, and then cut out two jerseys, a big and a small, in red and added black stripes. Finally I added a little insignia in white gel pen to complete it.

I love my random colleague commissions, they are definitely the strangest briefs and so much fun to fulfill.

Project: Christmas Scenes for MAWTT

There are few things I love more than a good Christmas scene. I love this time of year and all of the festive things that go with it! So to celebrate, Jan is hosting a Christmas Scene challenge at Moving Along With the Times and we want to see you create a project that depicts a cozy/festive/wintery/Christmasy scene.

I loved this so much I made two. The headline card features a great little stamp that Claire got me as well as a new sentiment I picked up in the Michael's Black Friday sale this year. I heat embossed it in black on a stitched rectangle die that I stole from Claire's stash...she really shouldn't be so generous with her stuff...or maybe she doesn't know she's being generous? ;) I used Distress Inks to watercolor the background, going from grey to light green and then blue at the top. I kept the area around the house blank and then used Wink of Stella shimmer to give it a lovely snowy sheen. The ribbon was a scrap on my desk and happened to go perfectly so I added it to the bottom for a little contemporary touch.

This second card features a big stamp that is also from the Michael's Black Friday sale. I used Stampin' Up khaki dye ink on brown card to get a stain look and then added a die cut sentiment from Dies R Us. The background paper is at least one or two years old...can't quite remember the origins there! I added tiny white enamel accents to make it look like snow and make it pop a bit.

I hope you have fun creating some scenes, can't wait to see what you come up with!

Project 381: Playmobile Pirate Christmas card

I regularly mention how weird my colleague card commissions are. I mean, I've had some extraordinary ones in my day including Shaun the Sheep and Pingu, a traditional Cossak dancing, and a Minion Valentine all come to mind......When one of my favourite designers asked me to make a Playmobile pirate Christmas card for her nephew of course I said yes!

I looked up a number of Playmobile images and then did a shameless copy after printing a few out. To make my life a bit easier I actually made a paper doll first in roughly the size of an A6 card and made all of the corresponding elements to fit that doll though ultimately I abandoned it when sticking down and just layered everything up on the card without it.

The shirt beneath the jacket is patterned DoCrafts Cranberry paper from their Christmas set and the sword is silver paper but everything else is just plain cardstock. I used a punch to get the eyes and smile (an eye cut in half!) and the feather in the hat is actually a little die I have but the rest is cut by hand with my trusty Fiskars finger blade. I drew the white hat details on with a gel pen. I added a few bling buttons and a candy cane with the peel off greeting and left the background empty. I didn't want to detract from my lovely pirate! I can't wait to give it to her, this was too much fun (despite the hour+ time to create)!

Project 380: Stenciled succulent cards

I'm still experimenting with my Black Friday purchases and today's post features a new Spellbinders die set I got. Claire and I love succulents and I love her die set that she has so I went looking for something similar.

I decided to make small 4x4 square cards as the dies are fairly small and I wanted them to be prominent. I used Tim Holtz stencils and Wild Honey Distress Ink for both. The headline card also features Squeezed Lemonade as a background color as I thought it needed a bit more. I left the card below white but added Mowed Lawn as the die also works as a stencil. The sentiment is an old one from a Fiskars set courtesy of Claire. I thought it worked really well here as the style is both modern and a bit 70s retro. I topped them both with a metal candi as I thought it needed just a hint more. Could be masculine or feminine, I'm really pleased with how they turned out.

Project 379: Little piggy birthday challenge

I saw the layout at Freshly Made Sketches and thought it would be great for a card I needed to make today.

I chose these three pigs from Bugaboo and colored them with Promarkers.  I used a stitched circle due and layered it over a scallop circle die. the sentiment is an old one that I heat embossed in white. not as neat as I wanted but never mind. I added the birthday boy'so name in enamel accents to personalized it. Not a child but a policeman in his 30s!

Simple make but with a few steps to keep it interesting. Hope he likes it!