Sunday 31 March 2013

Easter treat bags

Hello everyone,

I just popped on to wish you all a very happy Easter. It is also my youngest son's birthday this week so we are having a double celebration tonight and I'm busy in the kitchen cooking up a storm.

I made a few choccie treat bags to go on the table and used Melissa Bickford's cute little bunny stamps 'Polka Dot Parade' to decorate some bag toppers I cut on my Silhouette Cameo.


I used the grass from PTI Hanging Out, stamped a sun using Background Basics Polka Dots,chalked on some sky, and added little pompom bunny tails.


Such cuteness!!!

Have a great day and remember that it is a well known fact that Easter chocolate has no calories.

Enjoy the day.
Hugs
Carol x



Tuesday 26 March 2013

Penny Black Christmas card

Hello everyone,

Well we didn't get to go to the Lake District because of the heavy snow there :( so my trip for seeing a host of golden daffodils and cute lambs gambolling in fields will have to wait. I also had to miss the PTI Blog Hop yesterday so it has not been a good start to the week for me. However, the weather has been so wintry it has put me in mind of Christmas so I thought I'd make my first festive card of the year and start a pile that will hopefully grow before it gets frantic in November and December (always supposing I'll be able to remember the safe place I put them in of course).

.

I used a holly bough from the Penny Black 'a wish for peace' set that I got at the Northern Papercrafts show a couple of weeks ago and I used a water pen to colour it with ink and added some red glaze pen for the berries.  The top right panel used a couple of dies from Papertrey Ink and the greeting is a Sizzlits phrase die that I added some liquid applique on to add fur to the cute little hat.

I would like to enter this into the Festive Friday challenge which was to use the trigger word 'merry',  the Rudolph Day challenge over at Stamping for Pleasure, and the Christmas Card challenge.

Thanks for stopping by and stay warm.

Hugs
Carol x

Saturday 23 March 2013

Hello card

Hello everyone,

It is the last day of the Pattern Play course already



and today we were asked to do some paper quilting or weaving. I recently tried paper quilting on this card



after seeing it done on Pinterest, so today I tried a different method we were shown by Kristina and came up with this card.


I made the 'hello' from a Papertrey Ink die but after I cut it in the blue card, I found it got a little lost on the card so I cut it again in black card and offset it to give a little shadow which helps it pop.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend. We are supposed to be going to the Lake District for a few days tomorrow but it is snowing heavily there at the moment, and I have my fingers crossed for a quick thaw. Oh for spring to finally come!

Hugs
Carol x


Friday 22 March 2013

Balloon card

Hello everyone,

I'm back for Day 4 of the Pattern Play Class



and today we were asked to alter patterned paper again, this time using glitter, glossy accents and enamels etc to provide interest and detail.


I took strips of patterned paper and added glitter to the centre of the little flowers and used the Whimsy Balloon Die set to cut some balloons, which I altered with glitter and glossy accents. I wanted to try enamelling the centre of some of the flowers but liquid enamel is still on my wish list, so I experimented with some domes of liquid applique which I glittered before heating.


and I was really pleased with the dimension. Its so good to find a use for this that doesn't include snow!




I tried drawing in some balloon strings but I couldn't get them to look right and then I had inspiration and pulled out my Memory Box Prim Poppy Die from Dies to Die For and used the stems with the flowers cut off.  The bow is from Papertrey Ink Bells and Boughs and 


the very cute tiny little bows on the balloons are bow ties from the PTI Man and Wife die set. I had so much fun putting this card together and I really like how it turned out. I'm going to enter this into the Dies to Die for challenge  which this time has a spring theme and my happy balloons certainly remind me spring is coming, if not actual Easter Eggs! I am also going to enter it into the Simon Says Stamps challenge which is a spring/Easter theme.

Thanks for looking in.

Hugs
Carol x

Thursday 21 March 2013

30th birthday card

Hello everyone and a very warm welcome to Charmaine and Andrene who are new followers this week.

I'm back for Day 3 of the Pattern Play course



and for day 3 we were asked to use a difficult pattern paper on a project. Well I'd had this paper in my stash for at least 5 years and never found a way of using it, but I was asked to make a large 30th birthday card  and thought this might fit the bill. So two challenges to take me out of my comfort zone  - large cards are a challenge because there is so much space to fill - and finally using this very girly paper.


I made an 8 inch by 8 inch white card base, and I found a darker toning card but didn't have a paper that would go with it so I took a piece of paler pink card and stamped little hearts all over it to make my own second patterned paper. 





I typed the sentiment on the computer and used Papertrey Ink mat stack dies to frame it and inked the edge of the top frame with white ink


and I cut a row of hearts with the PTI heart border die to separate the two patterns


and a bought dress sticker finished it off. 



Whew!!!

Thanks for stopping by.

Hugs
Carol x



Wednesday 20 March 2013

Happy Birthday card

Hello everyone,








I'm back for Day 2 of the Pattern Play course and today we were asked to do stamping techniques on patterned paper. We were advised to stamp on papers that are rather neutral in background without a very busy pattern so I chose this paper






I stamped randomly with stamps from Papertrey Ink Damask Designs and then embossed with clear embossing ink.


I then added Distress Ink in spiced marmalade using the sponge tool


and ended up with paper that looked very different from the starting piece.

I chose a couple of contrasting papers (I told you I would be braver today!) and cut small strips from them to make a panel on a square card. I made a focal panel using a tag die which I altered by cutting off the tag top and then offset another tag to mat it onto. 



A sentiment, a little button and some rounded corners finished it off. On this photo you can see the pale yellow paper showing through the embossing - I quite like this technique! I love the fresh, clean look to this card which reminds me of the yellow and orange crocus flowering in the garden at the moment, so I am going to enter it into the Simon Says challenge for spring or Easter cards. I am also entering it into the Papertrey Ink Make it Monday challenge to use an inked background.

Thanks for looking in.

Hugs
Carol x


Tuesday 19 March 2013

New Home Card

Hello everyone and a very warm welcome to Therese who is a new follower. I hope you will find things to interest you here.

I have been away for a few days and came back home to find that I am already playing catch up on the Online Card Classes Pattern Play course. I have so much patterned paper that I could wallpaper the whole house with it but I rarely use it now that I mainly make cards rather than scrapbook. I have also moved to a more CAS look for my cards, and, truth be told, I am not very good at picking papers that will look good together on a card, so I really need this course.

The first day videos gave lots of tips for putting patterns together, but I am still lacking in confidence with my choices, so I played safe by using paper from one pack from Deja Views


I used a sketch from Case this Sketch



and was inspired by the stripes and and use of blue and green colours in this lovely card by Marion Vagg for the current Muse challenge.   I used different shades of these colours



to come up with this card


I used a technique that Jennifer suggested of adding white at the edges of the patterned paper to add definition, and  to use a Copic grey marker along the edge of embellishments to add some subtle definition. It is indeed so subtle that you might have difficulty seeing it on the edge of the little
 house!!


I also used a technique that Amber suggested of adding board behind the nested the die cut focal panels of paper so I could add foam to raise the little house without having it crease or bend.

Well thanks for stopping by and maybe I'll be a bit more daring in my choice of patters next time.

Hugs
Carol x


Tuesday 12 March 2013

Papertrey Ink Engagement card

Hello everyone,

Just a quick post to share an Engagement card I made for the current Muse Challenge.

This is the lovely inspiration card by Therese Calvird



and I was inspired by the use of an aperture and patterned paper to come up with my own card




I used Papertrey Ink stamps and dies by Melissa Bickford 'Heart to Heart 9, along with some aqua mist patterned paper and the Limitless Layers hearts dies. I am also entering this into the Moxie Fab World 'emphasize the negative' challenge.

Thanks for stopping by

Hugs
Carol x


Tuesday 5 March 2013

Quilted retirement card

Hello everyone,

I'm sorry to have been absent for a while but I had a week of lots of things going wrong. First my computer went haywire. I had just switched it on and some windows updates were loading when the electricity supply went off. After it came back on, all I got was a black screen and no amount of coaxing would get me any further. A good friend came to the rescue and tried for a couple of hours before he had to take it away for more ministrations. The upshot was that he had to wipe the hard disc and start again so I lost everything on the hard drive. Lesson learned! I will back up my data regularly. I will, I will I will. I am slowly getting programmes re installed but it all takes time. Then the shower went wrong and we need a new one so I'm having to wash my hair in the bath like in the good old days. I tell you it has made me realise how lucky we are to have all these facilities, but if we ever lose power, more of our lives will be spent just doing the bare necessities.

On the up side, one of my friends retired on Friday and we went round for dinner on Saturday to help her celebrate. She wants to take up quilting now she has time so I bought her the Quilter's Bible and as my sewing skills leave much to be desired I quilted a card with paper. I saw the idea on Pinterest somewhere and came up with this


I cut 2cm squares out of 2 different patterned papers and 2 colours of card which I had embossed before cutting. I cut some squares in half to make up the pattern and stuck them onto a backing mat of card.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope to get a little surfing time in this week as things return to normal round here.

Hugs
Carol x

LinkWithin

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...