Project: A tropical music card challenge

I have had a thoroughly relaxing Monday today - I just love a day off! I was inspired by the challenge  at Retro Rubber this week:

 I decided to get out one of my favourite summery sets - the Creative Stamping magazine set from one of the summer months of 2015. There isn't a bad stamp in the whole set, they're all a joy to use in isolation or combination. 

Because it's kind of an oval shape I decided to use the guitar but wasn't happy with the sentiment...until I remembered the music set from Creative Stamping magazine of 2016...so now I get to use a border stamp, a sentiment and a feature image all from 2-3 years ago. I stamped the border and sentiment directly onto a textured orange card that is from the Trader Jane Recollections set. 

The image is coloured with ProMarkers and then fussy cut out. I used tiny gold glitter glue dots to add a bit more to the paper and then added a hand drawn border - mainly because I cut my orange card too small and it looked weird! There is a bit of gold on the music to complete the dot in the sketch - hard to see though. 

Really fun challenge, thanks Retro Rubber team :) x 

Project: Wedding cards for Sketch Saturday

This week at Sketch Saturday we have a fun sketch for you to play with and an amazing sponsor MMedel Illustrations. Here's the sketch:

I rotated the sketch so the band ran across the top, with the little sentiment box on the bottom left corner. The image was colored with ProMarkers and then I die cut it out. In the headline card I used a square and the card below I opted for a rectangle. I added a spot of glitter glue to the flowers and the veil and dress. The background for each uses a big rose stencil and Distress Ink.


The headline card features spotted ribbon but I made a big oops on the stencil on the card below so I had to cover it with a bigger strip of paper! I used paper hearts from my collection (I regularly punch or die cut hearts in paper scraps as they are so handy) and then die cut the initials of two couples getting married this summer on top.

They are pretty busy but I think the attention to detail is fun. And happily I have two personalised wedding cards to give! Hope you enjoy the sketch as well :)

Project: Black, white and color at MAWTT

This week at MAWTT I got to choose the theme which was really fun. I love doing a colour pop so I thought black, white and one colour would be a fun one - thanks for playing along.

For my card I stencilled a yellow hexagon pattern and then die cut a black hexagon that was embossed with dots. I stamped the bee and fussy cut it out, colouring the stripes with ProMarkers. The sentiment is an old Sizzix one that I kind of forgot I had - I think it works well to have some curlicue against the hard edges of all the hexagons.

All in all I am really happy with it and hope it provides some inspiration for everyone playing along this week! 

Project: A lovely Bridal Shower challenge entry

I decided to play along with some challenges this weekend to make a Bridal Shower card for one of my best friends. She's Beatle-mad and I thought this All You Need is Love sentiment + die set would be perfect - I just needed to make a card around it.

So the combination of colors at The Paper Players and the layout at CAS(E) This Sketch were a perfect combo as she loves pink and orange:

I made an umbrella out of pink and orange papers to go with the 'Shower' theme (it is tradition after all) and I used a heart stencil to add some raining hearts to the background paper. I die cut the 'love' sentiment in yellow and orange for texture. I added a lime green border of heart scallops to add the fourth colour.

So while it's a wedding card it is super summery and cheerful - not the usual white-on-white. I think she'll like it and it was a fun way to get some inspiration this weekend.

Project: A geometric embossed sketch card

Another happy Saturday at Sketch Saturday to everyone. I absolutely love this week’s sponsor image from Sasayaki Glitter – how cute is this called ‘The Garden’? 

The sketch was also a lot of fun to work with – I hope you find some inspiration: 

I started by die cutting the image with a dotted edge rectangle die. I did two equal rectangles in plain card and embossed them with geometric patterns (a triangle and a diamond). I love how simple and geometric the image is so I thought this was a fun thing to play up. I chose a yellow grid background paper to bring some more yellow to it. 

I colored the image with ProMarkers and added some enamel accents to the little rosy cheeks. I kind of messed up the toadstool so I punched some small white dots to make this a bit cleaner. The yellow bow is also a punch from EK Success. 

I love the primary color simplicity and really enjoyed adding the little details. Hopefully you’ll enjoy it as well! 

Project: Masculine sketch birthday card

I saw the sketch at CAS(E) This Sketch and loved it. I had a lot of ideas to use stamps and punches and stencils but I decided to keep it really simple.

I masked off two stripes and used Distress Ink to blend in the stripes. I used Peacock Feathers and Blueprint Sketch to make it really vivid.

The sentiment and texture stamps are from Studio Calico. I added Enamel Accents in white to the Y on both lines to add extra texture.

It's masculine and fresh and I'm giving it to my boss for his birthday on Monday. Maybe it'll be good enough for a bonus. Ha!