Stretch Your Stamps–Border Stamps (day 10)

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!

• Stamps: Waltzingmouse Back in the saddle and Way out West
• Paper: PTI white and others
• White EP, Versamark, Distress Ink Shabby Shutters, oval nestabilities, heating tool

Simply Sketches #12

I really like the sketch for this week – it turned out to be so different! Here’s my sample:

I stamped the card base with Polka Dots stamp in black. Rounded two opposite corners of the card base. Cut a circle using nestabilities and stamped the sentiment on it. Stamped the flower twice each on Berry Sorbet and plum pudding. Colored them with Prismacolor pencils. Adhered the circle to the center of the card base and the flowers on top of the circle. Mounted two of the flowers on pop dots. Simple!

• Stamps: Hero Arts Blossom Arts, Hero Arts Framed messages, CHF Polka dots
• Paper: Papertrey Ink Lemon tart, Plum Pudding and Berry Sorbet
• Others: Prismacolor pencils, Brilliance Black ink, Corner Rounder.

Tuesday Trigger and the journey of a card

I’ve been itching to make a card since I saw this week’s Tuesday Trigger. Especially the colors and the flower – they spoke to me. They were literally begging me to make a card based on them. So how could I disappoint them?!?!

Hence began the journey of a card.

Stop 1: I must make a tissue paper flower – that would look so lovely. An orange one. Oh no!! I don’t have orange tissue paper. Who used all of it?!?!

Stop 2: Never mind. Forget the trigger colors, I’ll make-do with pastel yellow. Flower done. Looks smaller and not as fluffy as it should be.

Stop 3: Make another flower. This time bigger and fluffier. Oops! This is too fluffy for a card – good for home décor but not for a card.

Stop 4: Think, think, think. Ah! The final destination has arrived. Use scallop circle nestabilities to make a flower.

Hence was born the flower on this card.

I cut the layers of the flower using scallop circle nestabilities. Inked the edges using Versacolor inks. Cut the petals.Then curled the petals using a pencil. Glued all the layer together, at the center. Then cut a small circle for the center. Dotted it with liquid pearls (big mistake! always do this step after your card is finished!). Cut the leaves using Cricut at 2.5 inches height. Embossed the sentiment with gold embossing powder. Embossed the card using swiss dots embossing folder. Glued the flower and then the leaves to the card. Popped up the ends of the leaves on foam dots. Dressed the petals with Diamond stickles.

A closer view.

• Stamps: Flourishes Flourished Words
• Paper: PTI Berry Sorbet, Pine Feather, Aqua Mist, Summer Sunrise
• Others: Cricut, SCAL, Liquid pearls, Stickles Diamond, Gold embossing powder.

Three-in-one

Yes, this card is for three challenges!! Here are the three of them:

• Caardvarks: The challenge was to make a baby card and I hadn’t made one since a long time so I thought to myself “why not?!?”!
• OCC Challenge – Bows: Yes at OCC we’d to use bows – knowing how fond I’m of embellies, I jumped at it!
• 2S4Y – That’s where I got this sketch! The sketch was very different from what I’d been making so I was tempted to try it out and see what I make out of it!

All together everything worked out very well and I’m soooo happy with this card! I sponged around the sentiment with pigment ink.

 

 

Supplies: Bazzill CS, DCWV PP, Flourishes flourished words, ribbon, favorite findings buttons, MS lace border punch, nestabilities oval, Tonic rounder punch, Versacolor ink.

Create Your Own Friday #14 – CAS

Once in a while, in the middle of layers you want to create a CAS (clean and simple) card! And that’s exactly what I wanted to do – get away from all those layers and embellies and what not. Not that I don’t like it but sometimes you want a change! I’m sorry the photo is not that clear, will try to get a better one when I can see a ray of sunlight amidst the grey skies :)

Not sure if you can see the embossed outline…IRL the card looks sooooo elegant! Just the look I was going for!

Supplies: Wasau CS, Papertrey Guidelines II, Versacolor inks, black pen, rhinestone, circle nestabilities.

Create Your Own Friday #13 – First timer!

Is there an occasion for which you’ve never made a card? Then now is the time to try it out :). I’ve never made a “Hi” or a general “hello” card in the 2.5 years that I’ve been making cards and whenever I saw people making them I would always wonder what they would do with it. Now, I needed some hi cards so I got busy making them. Luckily I’d a sentiment stamp just right for it! I made three of them with the same stamp but with a little variation in the layout.

 

 

I think they all turned our very pretty!

Supplies: Inkadinkado round borders, white EP, clear EP, versacolor green ink, versamark, buttons, grosgrain ribbon, white gel pen, liquid pearls.

Create Your Own Friday #12 – A notecard set

I made this notecard set to give to a friend. The wooden purse box was covered using PP and I found that KI Memories paper is just the right thickness for this job. Not to forget that it looks beautiful! Then I made coordinating notecards and envelopes. The notecards are 3.25 X 3.25 inches in size and the envelopes are 3.5 X 3.5 inches in size. The envelopes were a tad difficult to fit it so next time maybe I should go for a quarter inch shorter. This is the first time I made envelopes on my own but was very happy with it. I’d this nice thick cotton paper which was just perfect to make the envelopes!

All the notecards:

Supplies: DCWV and Bazzill CS, KI Memories PP, Justrite monogram stamper, clear and white EP, versamark, black pigment ink, MS lace border punch, tonic duo corner rounder, nestabilities.

Sketch Saturday challenge #94

The moment I saw the sketch on Sketch Saturday, I knew I wanted to make a card using this sketch and I also knew which stamp I was going to use :).

The napkins on the mice are paper pieced and so is the cupcake wrapper. The cupcake is popped up on dimensionals. The center embellishment was created by cutting a circle from felt and stitching a button on top of it. I recently bought lot of felt in various colors and was waiting to use it :).

Supplies: DCWV PP and CS, fiskars corner punch, Favorite findings button, acrylic felt, grosgrain ribbon, penny black acrylic stamps, Prismacolor pencils, OMS.

Create Your Own Friday #10 – Take-it-out!

Yes! Take out  that cardstock you’ve been hoarding for the last 6 months (or a year?!?!) or that punch that you haven’t stolen a glance at since you bought it!

The purpose of this CYOF is to bring out of your stash something that you haven’t used since a long time. We all know that we buy our supplies its as if the world would end if we didn’t get them but after they enter our home sweet home, sometimes they disappear into the black hole which is our supplies. So lets take a moment to look at what we have and what we haven’t paid much attention to and give it the much wanted love :)

So I took out of my stash this antique gold cardstock that I bought last September and haven’t used since. Of course before I bought it I always thought that not having it is the biggest hurdle in me not being able to make the most stellar projects! The other thing that hasn’t got much love but is a more recent addition to my family is the swiss dots folder.

However, now that I took them out I think they danced together to create this perfect piece. Have you ever thought that reality could be better than a dream? No? Me too but this card turned out be so much better than I had dreamed. Too much philosophy for a craft blog, eh? :)

It somehow reminds me of a saree – I guess its the shimmer and the elegance of the card!

Supplies: Antique gold CS, Bazzill CS, CTMH Decoratve dainties, gold EP, Oval nestabilities, satin ribbon, sheer ribbon, rhinestone.

SC 213

I picked this sketch from the sketch challenge at SCS – SC 213. It was so much fun to work with and somehow everything just fell into place! :) I’m glad I used an image from a swap that I received long back.

 

Supplies: DCWV PP, Bazzill CS, autumn leaves buttons, felt, nestabilities, stardust stickles, grosgrain ribbon, prismacolor pencils, OMS

A wedding card and a sketch

That’s two challenges in one: caardvarks challenge is to creat a wedding card and the sketch is from CPS.

One of my inspirations to buy the oval nestabilities was to create Becca Feeken’s style of cards – with the oval being the focal point and having some text; but ever since I bought them I didn’t get the chance to do that. So when I saw the caardvarks challenge I thought to myself – Now that would be a perfect opportunity to create such a card. Deciding on the colors was a breeze, surprisingly! Then the PP fell into place and I realized that for once I’ve some stamps that match the PP so I HAD to use them – I clear embossed with them; and hence the CS was embossed :). I really like the card that resulted!

The inside:

Supplies: DCWV CS and PP, Jolies Fleurs, clear EP, tonic corner rounder punch, oval nestabilities..

Create Your Own Friday #6 – Buggy!

Call it a buggy or baby carriage or anything else – it’s as sweet with any other name! :) I simply love how it turned out. It’s prettier than I imagined it to be – isn’t it?!?!? Ok time to give the due credit, I got the idea from here. Initially I thought I was inspired from it but after I finished it and looked at my inspiration again – I realized that I’d almost CASE’d it! CASE’d or not – it is cute!

 

I used the largest nestabilities circle (large) die to make the frame. I stamped the wheel with versamark using PTI Guidelines two stamp set and then clear embossed. The center is accentuated with liquid pearls.

Supplies: DCWV PP, Wasau CS, PTI Guidelines two, grosgrain ribbon, clear EP, liquid pearls, scallop scissors, nestabilities.

Create Your Own Friday #5 – What a girl wants!

Pink, glitter, rhinestones and pearls – that sums up what a girl wants! I started this card with the intention of entering a challenge that called for a circular card but was late for it so I decided to let it take its own twist! Then my goal was to make a monochromatic card and seeing so much of pink, I thought why not add all the feminine touch that I can add. So out came my liquid pearls (one of my latest possessions), stickles, rhinestone and ribbon!

Even though I’m late, I’ll still send it to the challenge at Lizzie Anne Designs.

The paisleys are embossed with clear EP.

Supplies: Wasau and Bazzill CS, Jolies Fleurs stamp set, ribbon, flower, brad, liquid pearls, stardust stickles, clear EP.

Crop your image

That was the challenge in LSC 228 (Limited Supplies Challenge) at SCS. I used my Inkadinkado Patterned birds and bugs set for this and I wanted to decorate the inside as well as the envelope but I’m not sure I was very creative at doing that. Next time!

Rules of the challenge:

1. Crop an image
2. Repeat the cropped image on your card at least 3 times (Oops, I’d forgotten this one but looks like I still made it!)
3. As for embellishments, let's go basic: brads and eyelets only!

  It was easy to decide on the colors of this card because there are only so many colored inks that I have :). The circles are popped on dimensionals, I don’t think that got captured in the photo. The dragonfly images are embossed with clear EP.

Supplies: Inkadinkado Patterned birds and bugs stamp set; DCWV, Bazzill and Wasau CS and PP, Versacolor inks, silver brads, scallop scissors, clear EP, nestabilities.

Create Your Own Fridays #2 – CAS Style

Here we are, with our next edition of CYOF! This time I tried a CAS (short for Clean And Simple) card and I must say that it turned out just the way I’d imagined if not better. This card contains two of my firsts: one is getting a border using nestabilities and the other is shading using sponging. I stamped the image in black ink, clear embossed it and then colored. For the water, I sponged using blue pigment ink and then added some swirls using a darker shade of ink and a tortillion. At the end I added some glitter to it. For the sky, I used a red, orange and yellow ink. First I sponged the yellow (lighter first), then shaded over it with orange and finally red. All the sponging was done with nestabilities in place so that color doesn’t go over other parts of the card. I also maked the image while doing the sponging. Okay too much talk and no card make readers anxious! :) So here’s the card…ta da!

 

I just love the splash of color on that white. I thought a lot and decided that any other addition to the card would interrupt the pristine look of the card. Oh and I colored those white dots, etc in the image with a white gel pen.

Challenge #1 – Happy New Year

I made this card last week but didn’t get a chance to upload it until today! The first challenge that I’m participating in this year is hosted by caardvarks!! I love their challenges – there’s always something different and enough time to complete your project. This time it was a sketch challenge and I must say that was a very unique sketch. This is my take on the sketch.

I did some hand-stitching with a red floss and this was my first time trying to do it. I added some glitter to the PP but it’s not visible in the photo.

Supplies: DCWV PP and CS, Flourished Words stamp set, rhinestones, nestabilities oval, stardust stickles.

CPS 134

Here’s my take on the CPS 134 sketch. This is card is a perfect case of when a crafter is so proud of something that an observer will not care about. What am I proud of in this card? I combined two different stamp sets seamlessly :), that’s what I would like to believe. The small flowers are from PTI Guidelines Two and the main image is from Inkadinkado Borders. I started with a red and yellow theme but when it became too hot a combo, I added some royal blue to cool it down.

All the stamped images are embossed with clear EP.

• Stamps: PTI Guidelines Two, Inkadinkado Borders
• CS and PP: Bazzill and DCWV
• Versacolor inks, clear EP, grosgrain ribbon, fiskars lace corner punch, nestabilities.

caardvarks challenge

Caardvarks has some lovely sketches for their challenge! If you haven’t seen them check them out at caardvarks challenge.

This is what I made for their challenge, its based on sketch #1. I popped the feet, the scallop circle and the sentiment on dimensionals and the gift is paper pierced.

Hmm…looks like I’m going for the soft look these days!

• Stamps: Penny black
• PP and CS: DCWV and Bazzill
• Prismacolor pencils, ribbon, white gel pen, rhinestones, pop dots.

My handmade light-box

Some time back I’d read on somebody’s blog “There’s a difference between home made and hand made”. Since then I’ve been careful in using the right qualifier :)

So I made a light box; its only functioning as a background provider right now because I don’t have the appropriate lights but still I would say its doing its job! I don’t worry about the light while taking teh photo and later just fix it using Windows photo gallery. I must say the software does an awesome job with just one-click! Look at the photos for yourself.

This is a fusion of Nichole Heady and Becca Feeken style and I love the way it turned out. There are stickles on the centers of the green pendants which are probably not visible in the photo. Guidelines two is my first and only PTI set, when I started making this background today I’d to trash the first attempt and re-start. In my second attempt too it seemed that the images were not aligning exactly. I was so frustrated and regretted buying this set. However, when I finished it I realized that the mis-alignment was not glaring in the eye.

• Stamps: PTI Guidelines two
• CS: DCWV and Bazzill
• Versacolor dark green and orange ink, nestabilties, sheer ribbon, stickles.

Super woman!

I’m not so fond of Bellas because they don’t give me ample playground for coloring and I love to color! Most of these I get through image swaps. Somehow for this bella I’d a catchy saying so I was motivated to make this card. In fact I’d been thinking of making it for mother’s day with the saying “for the super-mom” but never got a chance so here’s what I did…

I was so keen on using eggplant CS for this and just couldn’t decide what PPs would go with it. After spending couple of hours on just picking the right paper, I think it wasn’t a bad choice :).

The trailing hair and cloak is popped on pop dots. I created the sentiment using MS alphabet set and then clear embossed it.

• Stamps: Bella, MS alphabet set
• CS and Paper: DCWV and Bazzill Smoothies
• Nestbailities, Prismacolor pencils, ribbon, white gel pen, pop dots, clear EP.