Elegant Leaves for AYSI 385

 I do like a speed stamping challenge every now and again. It's good to be reminded that cardmaking can be an adrenaline inducing activity! 😀

This week at As You See It, we're asking you to use shades of green to create us something in ten minutes or less.

Before you decide that's not even possible, here are the rules:

• You can plan out what you're going to make 
• You can gather your supplies eg get out the stamps sets and block the stamps, get out the embossing folder or dies or embellishments
• Clean up time is not included

BUT

• Once you ink up a stamp, crank the handle of your Cut & Emboss machine or cut with your trimmer then the clock has to start.

I thought I'd go for green spring leaves so got out my favourite bundle, Elegant Leaves. I stamped the outline vein stamp three times: twice in Garden Green and once in Granny Apple Green. I used the fill stamp by inking it in Lemon Lime Twist then adding in some extra colour with sponge daubers and Granny Apple Green and Garden Green inks. 

Once they were stamped, I die cut them out. 

I used the timber impression die to create the horizontal line on a Basic White card front, then added the leaves (popped up on dimensionals).

The sentiment, stamped in Garden Green, is from the new Birthday Shoutout stamp set from the November Online Exclusives.

To finish off, I added a trio of Granny Apple Green Shimmering Dots. 

The inside was very simple with a pair of leaves, stamped identically to the others, on the Basic White inner. 

And the final time....

We'd love to see what you can do in ten minutes or less.  You can see what the rest of the design team have done, and link up your own entry, on the As You See It Challenge page.

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page. 

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Elegant Leaves for Paper Players 808

Thank you to the people who played along with my colour challenge last week. I was delighted by the varied uses people found for the one set of colours.

This week at The Paper Players, Stef has a double challenge for us: make something on the theme of 'Happy Autumn' AND make it in a Clean and Simple style. 

At The Paper Players, we have a reasonably relaxed view of clean and simple, or CAS, cards.

We are looking for cards that:

• Have lots of open, white space
• One focal point
• Minimal layers
• Simple embellishments (or even no embellishments)

Even though it is spring here, I've had a lot of autumn stuff on my desk largely because I love leaves and there have been some great new leaf sets at Stampin' Up! I've used the Elegant Leaves bundle (again!).

I started by stamping the leaf vein stamp in Cajun Craze on a scrap of Basic White. Then I coloured the filler stamp with sponge daubers using Timid Tiger, Crushed Curry and a touch of Cajun Craze. This two-step stamping let me have a pretty variegated autumn leaf, which I then die cut. 

I used one of the small skeleton leaf dies and a scrap of Gold Foil to make the tiny leaf. 

I used the new Rustic Check 3D embossing folder on a piece of Basic White to make the horizontal strip. With a linear pattern like this one, it's easier to tear the strip once it's embossed to help keep the lines straight. When it's a less obvious pattern, I usually emboss a torn strip.

The sentiment is made using the Sweetly Sentimental Hot Foil dies and Gold Hot Foil. 

Note: To do this, you also need the Stampin' Up! Hot Foil System.

I mounted the card front onto a base of Thick Basic White. No further embellishment was needed. 😀

You can see what the rest of the team have done, and link up your entry, on The Paper Players page. 

Here's a quick recap of our challenge rules:

1. Create a new paper-craft project specifically for this challenge.
2. Upload your creation to your blog with a link back to us.
3. Please provide a direct link to the post featuring your challenge entry.
4. Please link your card to no more than four challenges, TOTAL, including ours
5. Have fun, and thank you for playing with us!

Don't forget to check out the great inspiration from the rest of the design team.

Jaydee

LeAnne Pugliese

Claire Broadwater

Joanne James

Ann Schach

Jan Clothier - You are here

Stef Perry

Christy Stanford

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page. 

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Elegant Leaves for Freshly Made Sketches 757

Well, it turns out that I do my best procrastination in my craft room. I'll blame the lovely sketch at Freshly Made Sketches but the score for today is: jobs ticked off the list 2, cards made 3. And if I did it in minutes, it would be more like: job list 45 minutes, craft room 3 hours. 😀

I just wanted to create my own way today so I went back to my roots: lots of white space, layering of elements, pretty colours, nature imagery - in this case Elegant Leaves, since foliage is one of my go to things. 

The card base is Thick Basic White. The card front is embossed with the Textured Tree Ring 3D embossing folder. I was late to the party on that one - I bought it a couple of weeks ago but now it's on the Last Chance List. So it's still not too late to add it to your craft library. 

I replaced the small rectangle in the sketch with a small arch cut using the Everyday Arches dies. I added some background patterning using Gears & Textures in both Granny Apple Green and Lemon-Lime Twist inks.

The fun part was making the leaves. The Elegant Leaves bundle has so many options for creating leaves both stamped and die cut - not to mention two-step stamping options and layering stamps with die cuts - that my desk ended up littered with leaves in various configurations. 

The ones that made the final cut were: large leaf stamped with Granny Apple Green on Lemon-Lime Twist cardstock and sponged around the edges with Granny Apple Green ink, large skeleton leaf die cut from some DSP from Valley in Bloom, and medium leaf done in two steps. The outline/vein stamp is in Granny Apple Green and the infill stamp a mix of Granny Apple Green, Garden Green and Lemon-Lime Twist which were applied with sponge daubers.

I added a double bow made with Linen Thread to give the impression they'd been tied together as a bouquet of leaves and then added a trio of Shimmering Dots in Granny Apple Green.

The sentiment is made with the Sweetly Sentimental Hot Foil dies and some Gold Hot Foil. Note that this requires the Stampin' Up! Hot Foil system but you could add any sentiment, either stamped or embossed. 

I enjoyed making this card much more than I would have enjoyed spring cleaning the bathroom cupboards or cleaning out the garage then making a dump run... and those jobs will still be there tomorrow. 😀

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page. 

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Elegant Leaves for CAS Colours and Sketches 594

Today's card is inspired by the colour combination at CAS Colours & Sketches.

I love leaves so of course, I've taken advantage of the new offerings at Stampin' Up!. The Elegant Leaves bundle came out to play for this card. 

I started by creating an inkpad from a baby wipe that had been dripped with dots of Highland Heather re-inker and Bubble Bath re-inker. I stamped the solid shape of two types of leaf with this (plus some on the inside of the card) before using the leaf vein stamp in Peaceful Pine over the top. These have matching dies to cut them out with. 

Then I used some of the Elegant Leaves dies to cut leaf shapes in the solid colours. I cut a circle with Stylish Shapes and embossed it with the Softly Woven folder.  And because I can't help  myself where texture is concerned, I also embossed the card front with more foliage from the Fern & Flora 3D embossing folder. 😀

When it came to sentiment, the colours seemed reflective and elegiac so I went with wording that could be for sympathy, get well or just for tough times. 

To finish off, I added a trio of Peaceful Pine flat pearls.

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page. 

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

 

Elegant Leaves for Paper Players 803

Many thanks to everyone who entered into Joanne's candle theme challenge last week. This week, our hostess is LeAnne and she's chosen an autumnal colour palette for us to play with. As always, you can include black and white too. 

Here in New Zealand, we're moving towards spring but I love leaves so am always happy for an excuse to break out a foliage set. In this case, it's the newly released Elegant Leaves bundle. Although the leaves have many options for layering, I've just used the large leaf skeleton die cut and cut one from each of the three colours. 

Then, I've used one of the leaf stamps and randomly stamped over each of the leaves in the same coloured ink to give some colour variations. 

Before attaching the leaves to the card front, I used the bark pattern embossing die to create a horizontal for the leaves to lie on.

After that, it was a simple matter to add a sentiment, attach the card front to the Crushed Curry mat layer and then add it to Basic Black card base. 

To finish, I added a trio of sequins from the Sunset Sparkle sequins to finish off.

The team and I would love to see what you do with these colours. Will it be leaves or something completely different?

You can see what the rest of the team have done, and link up your entry, on The Paper Players page.

Here's a quick recap of our challenge rules:

1. Create a new paper-craft project specifically for this challenge.
2. Upload your creation to your blog with a link back to us.
3. Please provide a direct link to the post featuring your challenge entry.
4. Please link your card to no more than four challenges, TOTAL, including ours
5. Have fun, and thank you for playing with us!

Don't forget to check out the great inspiration from the rest of the design team.

Jaydee

LeAnne Pugliese

Claire Broadwater

Joanne James

Ann Schach

Jan Clothier - You are here

Stef Perry

Christy Stanford

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Elegant Leaves for Atlantic Hearts Challenge 695

 Let's face it. I don't really need much encouragement to abandon real life and escape into my craft room. Today, it wasn't bad weather. It was that the warm spring sunshine was filling my room with light and I'd seen a sweet sketch challenge to play along with. 😀

The sketch was the latest challenge from Atlantic Hearts Challenge. 

It enabled me to have another play with my new Elegant Leaves bundle (available from September).

I started by inking the spade shaped solid leaf stamp in Crushed Curry and adding extra colours with a sponge dauber. Over the two leaves I daubed Cajun Craze and touches of either Old Olive or Cherry Cobbler. Then I stamped over it with the vein stamp in Cajun Craze. I did similar with the smaller leaf.

I also cut a medium leaf skeleton in Cajun Craze and a small gold foil leaf skeleton. For the final foliage, I cut a small leaf trio in gold foil and the matching skeleton from Crushed Curry. I daubed some touches of Cajun Craze over that before layering the two together. 

I arranged, and attached, all of these over a stitched circle cut with Stylish Shapes. I stamped the sentiment in Cajun Craze, cut it then popped it up on dimensionals. Then I put is aside while I prepared the rest of the card.

I cut three Basic White panels, one 4cm and two 2.5cm. The narrow two were embossed using the Fern & Flora 3D embossing folder. The wider one was embossed with the Softly Woven 3D embossing folder. This folder will be available once the September-December Mini Catalogue goes live next month.

I arranged these over a panel of Basic White and adhered them before adhering the card front to a Cajun Craze card base. 

Then it was a simple matter of adhering the leafy sentiment circle to it and adding a trio of Sunset Sparkle sequins in autumn shades. And just because I love Linen Thread, I added a generous bow into the final mix. 

If you live in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up Demonstrator, I'd love to be yours. I can help you with ideas, get you catalogues and provide you with Stampin' Up products. You can leave a message in the comments or contact me using any of the methods listed in the Contact Me tab at the top of the page. 

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.

Elegant Leaves for Paper Players 799

Many thanks to all of you who joined in with Stef's colour challenge last week at The Paper Players. This week, Claire is giving us a double challenge: to look forward to fall and to do in in a Clean and Simple style.

By chance, a brand new stamp set had arrived fresh from the pre-order for the September-December catalogue. It's the Elegant Leaves bundle and since I'm a sucker for foliage, it went straight in my cart. And I'm not sorry at all!

This card is my first play round with it. I started with a Cajun Craze base. I was intrigued by one of the dies in the set and was happy to find that it imprints a woodgrain pattern into the paper. It was perfect to create a horizontal line to build my leaf cluster on. Because it actually does cut the paper, you get little peeps of the underneath colour.

There's a very pleasing array of leaves to both stamp and die cut, so I tried out a few for this. I started by using the baby wipe technique to stamp the solid leaf. I used drops of Crushed Curry, Timid Tiger and Cajun Craze to make my ink pad and stamped the large spade shaped leaf with it. Happily, it's a two-step stamp (if you want it to be) and I stamped the veins over top in Cajun Craze. Then I die cut it out. 

 For the other leaves in the cluster, I die cut the skeletal overlay for the large spade leaf in Timid Tiger, small skeleton overlays in Timid Tiger and Early Espresso, and a leaf trio die cut in Cajun Craze with a matching skeleton overlay. For that leaf, I sponged Cajun Craze on the overlay to give it more colour depth.

Then it was a simple matter to cluster the leaves around the sentiment, stamped in Early Espresso before adding a trio of Timid Tiger Flat Pearls. 

The team and I would love to see what you do with this theme. You can see what everyone has done and link up your entry at The Paper Players.

Don't forget that this is a Clean and Simple challenge so make sure you have an uncluttered design with lots of white space with minimal layering and embellishment.

Here's a quick recap of our challenge rules:

1. Create a new paper-craft project specifically for this challenge.
2. Upload your creation to your blog with a link back to us.
3. Please provide a direct link to the post featuring your challenge entry.
4. Please link your card to no more than four challenges, TOTAL, including ours
5. Have fun, and thank you for playing with us!

Don't forget to check out the great inspiration from the rest of the design team.

Jaydee

LeAnne Pugliese

Claire Broadwater

Joanne James

Ann Schach

Jan Clothier - You are here

Stef Perry

Christy Stanford

You can stamp with me, and shop with me, from anywhere in New Zealand. Click here.