Wednesday, 31 January 2018

Colour Inkspiration 26

Colour Inkspiration is a Facebook challenge that gives us a lovely colour palette to play fortnightly.
Here's the current challenge.


The colours and gorgeous graphic just screamed the seaside, so I got out Seaside Shore. It's been a bit neglected of late but it is a set I love.


The masked column uses all four colours. The shells/starfish are stamped in Sahara Sand and clear embossed. The seaweed was stamped in Tranquil Tide and clear embossed then I water-coloured the interior.


The fish are gold embossed and coloured with Stampin' Write markers. One is directly embossed onto the column and the other fussy cut so it could be popped up on dimensionals to give some depth.


This inside sentiment is from Seaside  Shore.

Update: Delighted to make the Top 5 at Colour Inkspiration!

Ingredients
Card: Tranquil Tide, Shimmery cardstock
Stamps: Seaside Shore, Perennial Birthday
Inks: Sahara Sand, Bermuda Bay, Emerald Envy, Tranquil Tide, versamark.
Other: gold and clear embossing powder, dimensionals, Stampin' Write markers in the three greens, aquapainter, sponges

Tuesday, 30 January 2018

Retro Rubber - Design Team Card

Romance is in the air at Retro Rubber Challenge this week, or at least it was for me. It's always good to have an engagement/wedding/anniversary card in the stash. This week's challenge will let you do that AND give some love to some of your old stamps.

At Retro Rubber Challenge, the rules are simple: Use a stamp that's at least a year old, tell us the approximate age of it (or them) and don't link up to more than ten challenges in total.

Use this lovely graphic to inspire you: colours, theme, patterns, shapes.... whatever you see in it that gets you wanting to create.


This card uses two older stamps. Firstly, the Brushstrokes background stamp (2015-16 Annual Catalogue) and then the very versatile Sunshine Sayings (2016-17 Annual Catalogue). Both stamp sets, along with the gorgeous Sunshine Wishes thinlits, are still current.


I chose one of the latest in-colours, Powder Pink, along with gold for this card since the inspiration photo was so pink and gold. I chose Very Vanilla as the base.


The 'love' is stacked to give it dimension and I've sponged it at the top with Powder Pink and moved through to Flirty Flamingo at the bottom. Black was too harsh for these colours, so I've used Early Espresso for the rest of the sentiment.

You have the next fortnight to join in with us at Retro Rubber Challenge and we'd love to see what you do with this gorgeous inspiration. Pop over to the site and see what the rest of the Design Team have done with it.

I am also going to enter this card into two other challenges.


You can join Stamp, Ink, Paper up until 4 February

and


Hearts Aplenty

You can join this challenge up until February 10


If you live anywhere in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up demonstrator, I'd love to help you with ideas and Stampin' Up products. If you would like a copy of the new Special Occasions Catalogue or the Sale-a-bration brochure and don't have a demonstrator, then contact me. You can message me through my Facebook page, linked in the sidebar of this blog or leave a comment below. 

Ingredients - all products Stampin' Up
Card: Powder Pink, Very Vanilla, Gold Foil
Stamps: Brushstrokes background stamp, Sunshine Sayings
Ink: Powder Pink, Early Espresso, Flirty Flamingo
Other: Sunshine Wishes framelits, dimensionals, sponges.





Sunday, 28 January 2018

The Paper Players 378 - Design Team Card


Last week's Love Notes challenge gave us so many wonderful entries at The Paper Players and we were delighted by that. I think this week's gorgeous sketch by Nance will also be popular, since it has such scope. Pop over and see what the rest of the team did with it.


My favourite new set from the Occasions Catalogue is Petal Palette and I'm still experimenting with it. I'm equally taken by the gorgeous Petals and More framelits that go with it. They make cutting out the stamp shapes a cinch but I'm most in love with the branch of leaves and the cut work lattice.


Equally lovely are the strip embossing folders, Petal Pair. I've used one of these for the horizontal element of the sketch. I've water-coloured the spray of roses. Unusual colours but I was inspired by the irresistible colours at Just Add Ink this week.


We'd love to have you join us at The Paper Players this week. Here's a reminder of the rules of the challenge.
  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. Entries linked to more than 4 challenges, including ours, will be deleted without notification.
  5. Have fun!
Here are the details of the challenge at Just Add Ink and you can join up there until 10 p.m. Wednesday night (AEDT)


Update: Delighted to be an Honourable Mention at Just Add Ink this week.

Ingredients - all products from Stampin' Up
Card: Tranquil Tide, Whisper White, Crumb Cake
Stamps: Petal Palette
Inks: Tranquil Tide, Lemon-Lime Twist, Crumb Cake, Black Stazon
Other: Petals and More thinlits, Stitched Shape framelits, Petal Pair embossing folder, dimensionals, rhinestones




Freshly Made Sketches 321

A quick swim and a trip to the movies is a pretty perfect way to finish off the weekend but first, I did manage to get this card done for the challenge at Freshly Made Sketches.


Perennial Birthday is another new set that I bought from the Occasions Catalogue but I'm only just starting to play with it. This challenge seemed a good chance to give it an outing.


I've been using Stampin' Blends a lot lately so decided to use my watercolour pencils and blender pen this time. I like the soft look they give. Melon Mambo and Rich Razzleberry blended nicely in the large bloom too.


Ingredients
Card: Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive, Shimmery cardstock, Whisper White
Stamps: Perennial Birthday
Inks: Stazon, Tuxedo Black, Smoky Slate
Other: Watercolour pencils, dimensionals, rhinestones, blender pen
All products Stampin' Up


Saturday, 27 January 2018

TGIF 144

Sometimes things are just meant to be. My classes resume next week after the summer holidays and I was in my room finishing off the samples when I came upon the challenge at TGIF: box cards.


So, it's not often that my class cards are challenge cards but this week...


The basic flower arrangement, based around Beautiful Bouquet,  is the same for each but the bases are cut in all five of the 2017-19 In-colours with Fresh Florals DSP.


I've added in a butterfly on a stem of clear window sheet, just to see how he looked. And I think he looks very fine! Sadly, since both the punch and Papillon Potpourri are retired the class ones might be sans butterflies.

Of course, doing this as a class is complete madness since to make things run more smoothly on each of the nights, I will do a lot of the stamping and die-cutting beforehand. It's just as well that my husband and I are binge-watching Vikings on Netflix during the hot summer nights - great chance to do all that Big-shotting. I'm sure my students will love doing them but I think that reason might prevail on another occasion. :-)

Ingredients
Card: Fresh Fig, Berry Burst, Lemon-Lime Twist, Tranquil Tide, Berry Burst, Fresh Florals DSP, Whisper White, window sheet
Stamps: Beautiful Bouquet, Butterfly Basics/Papillon Potpourri
Inks: Fresh Fig, Berry Burst, Lemon-Lime Twist, Tuxedo Black
Other: Layering Circle framelits, Bouquet Bunch framelits, Eclectic Layers framelits, Bitty Butterfly punch

As You See It 168 - Design Team Card

I was excited to see Amanda's sketch for the team at As You See It this week because it really got me thinking about how to play it.



I'd had Sunshine Sayings out to make a card for another design team and it was still on my desk. I got to thinking that the flower die in Sunshine Wishes would work well in this sketch.


The Powder Pink flower is the shadow image. The Melon Mambo one is layered onto a black one which is peeping out as a shadow, giving it more depth. There is clear Wink of Stella inside the petals of the blooms.


You have until Wednesday 7 February, 11.55 p.m. PST to join us at As You See It and we'd love to see how you see it.

If you live anywhere in New Zealand and don't have a Stampin' Up demonstrator, I'd love to help you with ideas and Stampin' Up products. Sale-a-bration is on and there's a new Special Occasion Catalogue out. Please message me through my Facebook page, linked in the sidebar of this blog or leave a comment below. 

And, of course, you can shop with me from anywhere in New Zealand.

Ingredients
Card: Basic Black, Melon Mambo, Powder Pink, Whisper White, Fresh Florals DSP
Stamps: Sunshine Sayings
Inks: Tuxedo Black
Other: Sunshine Wishes thinlits, Enamel dots, dimensionals, Pick a Pattern washi tape, clear Wink of Stella


Thursday, 25 January 2018

Stamp, Ink, Paper 134


Today was our third scorching hot day in a row and in the end, I was driven from my craft room into the swimming pool. Once the heat of the day passed from extreme to bearable, I got back in to finish this card for Stamp, Ink, Paper's interesting colour challenge.



Interesting because they're similar colours which, to me, was a bit scary. I decided to play around with some ombre effects, so I've blended the three colours together over some white embossed images from Amazing You, a Sale-a-bration item that I can't get enough of. I just love those flowers!

Then I've used two inks on the sentiment. I left other embellishments out to let the colours do all the work.


I'm happy at how smoothly the colours blended together to show off the white-on-white embossing and the warm colours certainly reflected the temperature today!


Update: Delighted to be a Top Pick at Stamp, Ink, Paper this week.

Ingredients - all products Stampin' Up
Card: Calypso Coral, Whisper White
Stamps: Amazing You, Perennial Birthday
Inks: Blushing Bride, Calypso Coral, Berry Burst, versamark
Other: White embossing powder, sponges.