Colored the rocket using spectrum noir markers. Stamped the star in Palette white ink and the planet in versamark. The sentiment is white embossed.
Another scrapbuster!
The brown die cut is a negative left after cutting some reindeer antlers. It’s time to celebrate was a single sentiment but I stamped it on different pieces of paper.
This card is perfect to use up your scraps!
The red die cut was actually a negative left after I cut a few red circles. I matted it on an aqua CS and stamped yee haw in versamark. The sentiment is also on a scrap that I’d. Pretty simple, isn’t it?!?!?
Stamped wood grain background in Walnut Stain distress ink on brown CS. Stamped the solid images in various distress inks on white CS squares. Sponged them with walnut stain DI. Same with the sentiment. Also distressed it using a ruler. I rubbed the sharp edge of the ruler against the edge of the CS.
I hoped you enjoyed the ideas and inspiration shared by the team on day one of the bloghop! Here’s another day full of creativity! Day 2 is devoted to anything-but –a-card!
I’ve had a banner on my to-do list forever! So when deciding what to make for the bloghop I figured that I should make a banner and check off that item from my list after all!
[My apologies for the poor lighting]
Instead of making something very specific like “happy diwali”, I chose to make something more generic based on the theme of diwali and which would also be an inspiration for everyday life. To me Diwali is all about celebration. Celebrate the festival, celebrate the homecoming of Lord Ram, celebrate with friends and so on. “Celebrate” is also an inspiration for me – it tells me to celebrate life. Everyday. As it happens. Celebrate every moment. Celebrate what you have.
Coming down to the mechanics of this banner: I used Cricut and SCAL to cut the triangles and the letters.
This banner is quite easy and quick to make; just that the glitter part takes some time and maybe a little messy but it’s worth it!
My second project is something that I plan to make for my friends this Diwali – little mason jars filled with some homemade treats! These jars are so cute and adorable!!
I used a 5” square of fabric cut using pinking shears. Here’s a closer look at the tag.
I cut the tag from white CS using Cricut and Tags, Bags, Boxes and More Cartridge. Stamped it with a background stamp using versamark and then embossed in gold embossing powder. Sponged it with various distress inks. Printed the sentiment on vellum using Word. Cut out the diya using Cricut and SCAL.
That’s not all! All my other team mates have some wonderful creations to share too:
Supplies
Banner: PTI cardstock, White 4” doilies, 65# cardstock for letters, Martha Stewart brown glitter, brown grosgrain ribbon, glossy accents, Inka gold platinum, Mini mister, Distress Inks – Mustard seed, dried marigold, broken china and peeled paint.
Tag: PTI white CS, Impression Obsession Damask cover-a-card, Vellum, Distress Ink – Fired brick, peeled paint and Dried marigold.
Welcome to the Diwali bloghop! I’m so excited to be a part of the two day diwali bloghop! We’re going to be sharing a ton of ideas for Diwali – from greeting cards to home décor, etc.! If you haven’t yet started your Diwali crafting, this is sure to get your creative juices flowing! Let me not hold you up with my chit-chat and get down to the real stuff! Note – if you’ve SCAL then you would be glad to know that I’m sharing all my cut files and you can use them for free!
Today, day one of the bloghop, we’ll be sharing greetings cards for Diwali. Diwali is my the most favorite festival and I love to make things for this festival close to my heart! So when I started to make a card for Diwali, I just couldn’t stop at one!
My first card is a more traditional take on Diwali. After all what is Diwali without Lord Ganesha and I find Lord Ganesha can be expressed in as many artistic forms as there are stars in the sky!
For the card above, I cut the outline in red, the solid in yellow and the mat in green. Adhered the red outline to the yellow solid using a glue pen. I’ve found a glue pen to be most helpful in gluing such intricate designs. You can use a toothpick or a glue bottle with a thin nozzle for the same. Stamped the Kraft cardsock with WMS Text-it in Walnut Stain distress ink. Put a strip of 1/2” double sided tape on either side of the CS and sprinkled martha stewart green glitter on it. Then burnished the glitter with a bone folder. Finally sealed the glitter by rubbing some glossy accents all over it, so that the recipient doesn’t have glitter all over him/her when he/she opens the card! 
A stark departure from the previous card, here’s a more modern take on Diwali!
I cut the string of lights using the Create-a-critter cartridge. Stamped “happy” from a bigger sentiment. Cut out “diwali” from a self-made patterned paper. Popped it up on dimensionals and to dot the “I” used the rhinestones. I’d created the patterned paper, quite sometime back and it was just perfect for this card; now I know that I should just create some PPs when I’ve time and stock them up. To make the PP, I stamped polka dot background in versamark on white CS, embossed in clear embossing powder and then sponged all over with Borken China, Barn door and peeled paint distress ink. Another simple and quick design!
My last card was inspired from this photo.
I sponged white CS with Faded Jeans in a circular motion so that the center was lighter than the boundary. Cut the lantern base in yellow and purple; and the embellishments in pink and orange. Used white tissue paper to make the fringe. Popped the lanterns on dimensionals. Embellished them with liquid pearls. With white gel pen, doodled some fireworks and used stickles Crystal to make some stars. I used “happy” from a bigger sentiment and cut out “Diwali” using SCAL and cricut.
I hope the above designs have you inspired; but wait there’s more! Here are links to blogs of all the other lovely ladies who’ve created beautiful projects:
Links to SCAL Cut files:
Supplies:
Hello everybody! I’m so excited to let you all know that we’ll be having a diwali bloghop from Oct 25-26th! We’ve a team talented card makers ready to showcase inspiration for all things diwali!
We would be sharing free cut files too and there’ll be a linky for you to link up your creations if you would like to play along! Day one would be devoted to cards and the second day to anything-but-a-card!
So mark your calendars!!!
When I was at Stamp-a-doodle in Bellingham I saw some samples using Inka Gold. This was the first time I came across this product and I was so impressed! It comes in a lot of colors so I figured I would give one a try! This is my first card using Inka Gold! I love that metallic look – isn’t it so cool???
I embossed Smokey Shadow CS with Textile CB folder. Rubbed Platinum Inka Gold over it with finger. At the back of the CS I drew a rectangle and then cut it using a craft knife. Stamped the sentiment on a scrap of yellow PP. Adhered it to the card base and the popped the embossed panel on top of it! Simple. Easy. And. Beautiful. I love such cards! I think this metallic look would work great for masculine cards!
I used the sketch here. I haven’t submitted it to the contest as I’m not sure if all stamps need to be from HA or not. This sketch is perfect to use up all your scraps! And I got to use the new stamp set that I bought! Eeeeeeeeeks! {insert happy dance here} I went it to this heavenly stamp store in Bellingham – Stamp-a-doodle! If you’re ever in the area, you.must.go.there! It’s such an A-M-A-Z-I-N-G store. Next only to heaven 
I stamped the polka dot background in various colors on the colored CS strips. Sprayed them with the glimmer mist that I made using Inka gold (again a purchase from stamp-a-doodle) and water. Just mix a small amount of inka gold and water in a mister and spray. Stamped the sentiment in black on the yellow strip – touched it up with a black marker and highlighted the “birthday” with glossy accents. Here’s a close-up.
I made this apron for my friend. This is the second time I’m using this pattern. I made the same apron for myself sometime back.
The pattern is McCalls 5643; and yes I used the remnant fabric as frills on this tote bag. I simply love it when I can put remnant fabric to good use!
Since I took the Stretch Your Stamps class, I’ve started using vellum more and more – which is good. I also think about various ways in which I can use my stamps. For example in the card below the dress for both has been paper pieced from patterned paper that I created using my background stamps! Yes it was a lot of work but totally worth it!
This is my first card with watercoloring using distress inks. I recently got the Koi waterbrush and took it for a test ride on this card. It was a lot of fun! Had to be given that I love to color – I find it very therapeutic, if I may say so. I also used Prismacolor pencils here and there where I didn’t have the right colors in distress inks. Then sponged the sky using Broken china. The sentiment was printed on the computer. Oh and I had to add some stickles because the adhesive on the vellum was showing up
I wanted to make something for my friend’s 5-year old when I came across this pretty bag. It just so happened that I’d the required and so I got working!
It was pretty straightforward to make this except a few things:
Above are just minor things which would make a difference for an adult but I think wouldn’t be so noticeable by a kid. I added the ruffles only on the front side since that was all the fabric I had. Each ruffle fabric was around 44” in length and as you can see it ruffled up pretty well. The outer fabric is home decorator fabric, the ruffles are quilting/regular cotton and the lining is also I believe regular cotton.
I hope the kiddo likes it!
When I saw this card, I was reminded of the Little Black Dress and I HAD to make this card! I didn’t have the same stamp (it looks beautiful and I was tempted to buy it) but having recently taken the Stretch Your Stamps class I was all about stretching my stamps. So I picked the best replacement I’d and I think it turned out just like I thought it would!
I clear embossed the background on a black CS panel and adhered it to the card base. Clear embossed the label and cut it out; also cut out a window in the label. Stamped the sentiment in black on Aqua CS and adhered it at the back of the window.
What would you do if your card turned out just what you’d in mind? And it was one layer? And it took only 15-20 minutes? I know – do a happy dance!!
I don’t know if I can classify this as a truly border stamp but this is the closest I had to a border stamp. Once again I used the color block technique – it’s a great way to use up your scraps!
I was inspired by a cowboy poncho for this design. For some reason the embossing didn’t come out perfect but I think that resulted into a nice worn/distressed look!
I white embossed the flowers on a color block pattern paper that I created. Also white embossed the leaves.
Once again it’s the blossom art stamps – seems like it’s hard to make a card without them!
The trick here – the label that you’re seeing at the back of the sentiment is actually cut into half. Since it was too small for the sentiment I “stretched” it by cutting it in half and accordingly adhering it behind the sentiment.
Stamped polka dot on the CS in Shabby Shutters. Stamped the label in Shabby Shutters. Cut it in half. Embossed the sentiment in white. Added the faux stitching using white gel pen. Adhered the two-pieced label and then the sentiment. Punched the border and added a white background. Added faux stitching border to the card.
Yes I’m missing Day 5 & 6 – yet to catch up with samples for those classes.
For once I can say that I’d some stamps in the category of the day and what better floral stamps than Blossom Art! I didn’t have microfine glitter but I really liked the technique of stamping on glitter so I did the reverse. I stamped and then added glitter to the image. The most important thing I learnt was to seal the glitter – I did that using glossy accents. What you need to do it rub glossy accents all over the glittered image with your finger.
The center of the flower seemed to be getting lost in the glitter so I wanted to bring attention to it. First I picked some rhinestones but the glitter was too overpowering. So I figured that I needed to soften it down and pearls seemed to do the job.
Stamped the image in Shabby Shutters on the CS. Stamped the image in black on white CS. Filled the area with quickie glue pen and then added glitter to it. I did one color and one petal at a time. Also somehow putting glitter on the image doesn’t work as well with me as putting the image to glitter. So I sprinkle some glitter on my non-stick craft mat and then after adding glue to the image, press down the image on the glitter. Added ribbon. Embossed the sentiment in silver on vellum.
Yes I’ve been going crazy with my distress inks – I think they’re worth the investment! This was a white CS and I turned it into orange! Magic! Of course the CS did get a little warped in the process. If you look at the card closely you’ll find a self-print on the orange.
Stamped the flower in versamark all over white CS. Tried to emboss with white EP but it wouldn’t stick. Don’t know why!! Nevertheless went onto the next step – applied the distress ink pad directly to CS and colored it orange. Cut a strip of white CS. Stamped the flower in orange on it. Colored a rhinestone using a sharpie and embellished the flower. Stamped the sentiment in black and the little dots are from out on a limb set. They’re actually supposed to be berries.
Once again I didn’t have any graphic stamps so I picked the one that was closest to the definition of a graphic stamp – one with clean lines.
Wow can’t believe this is the third card I’m using vellum on! The gingham and polka dots were done using background stamps. White embossed the flowers on the vellum. Cut two fine strips from cream CS and adhered it (to basically hide the vellum adhesive).
Since I didn’t have any letter stamps I thought I would substitute it with die cut letters. I cut the letters using SCAL and Cricut. The font is (I think) Frank Gothic heavy.
Absolutely love the cleeeeeeean look of these cards!
Stamped the cuckoo in Brilliance black and tries to emboss with clear EP. Didn’t help a lot. Sponged with distress inks. Cut an oval in sandstone CS, scored a frame around it and stamped the sentiment in memento black. Popped the panel on pop dots.
After I made the patterned paper using my background stamps here, the first card I made was this:
The butterflies were cut at 1” using SCAL and Cricut.
Collage stamps intimidate me and hence I’ve none in my stash. So I imitated the look with the stamps I had and I must say that the class is not just stretching my stamps it’s also stretching my creativity! This kind of a card would totally be out of my comfort zone if it were not for the class.
Stamped and embossed the flowers with clear EP. To give the flowers a little distressed look I brushed off some EP before heating it up. Sponged all over the CS with distress inks. Splashed some water on top of it and wiped it off to get those blotches. Did second generation stamping with text background stamp using Walnut Stain; I also removed ink from areas on the background stamp where I knew it would overlap with the flowers. Randomly stamped some sentiments – second and third generation stamping. I used second generation stamping so that the background is subdued. Adhered the SC to the card base. I cut a panel using craft fine and scored a frame around it. Popped it on top of the card. White embossed the sentiment on vellum. Wow – I’ve never used vellum consecutively on two of my cards! So I’m happy that the class is making me use all my supplies!
Color Combination
I enrolled in the the Stretch Your Stamps online class and today was the first day of the class. It focused on background stamps which was really good for me because just yesterday I’d made some patterned paper using my background stamps and wondering what to do with them!
Here’s my sample for today:
Can you believe that the only CS I used in making this card was a white CS?!?!? I created the patterned papers by stamping the background stamp in distress ink, embossing it with clear embossing powder and then sponging all over with a contrasting distress ink. I cut a strip of vellum and embossed it with swiss dots embossing folder. The sentiment was stamped with versamark on white CS, embossed with gold embossing powder and then sponged over with Broken China distress ink.
I intend to make a masculine (or unisex) version too using the same technique! Watch out for that!
