Sue Wilson Easter Basket Easter card

Hello everyone and welcome to Addicted to Stamps and More! This time we have our holiday week for you.

As Easter will be our next holiday, I went with an Easter basket card

I used Sue Wilson's Easter Basket and Happy Easter die sets for the card and an old Waltzing Mouse Easter stamp set for the sentiments. The grass is from a Lawn Fawn set. There is only one little chick in the set so I did a reverse die-cut to have one looking the other way.  

You'll find plenty of inspiration from the team over on the ATSM blog and I look forward to seeing which holiday you will choose for your card.

Thanks for stopping by.

Hugs

Carol x

Waltzing Mouse birthday card

Hello everyone and a particularly warm welcome to some new friends who have joined us as followers. First up is Loll from Stamping with Loll blog. Loll is a truly talented cardmaker who offers lots of tips and tutorials on her informative blog. Loll is also one of the founders of Happy Little Stampers and is on several design teams. Next up is Carol from CM Designs blog. Carol is a very experienced crafter and blogger who has so much of interest on her blog. There are tons of tutorials to see as well as all the inspiration she provides for the numerous Design Teams she is on, and Carol is the Challenge Coordinator at Crafting for all Seasons. Last but not least is Nora from a Creative Touch blog, and she is also a very experienced Blogger. We 'met' on an Online Card Class some time ago and I have been a regular visitor to her blog ever since. Nora has a very eclectic style and makes amazing cards, as well as being very kind and supportive. Why not pop over to visit these talented crafters and leave them some love while you are there! 

Today is the start of another challenge over at Simply Create Too, and this time the theme is old, vintage or shabby chic. Right away I have to admit that this challenge took me way out of my comfort zone, and I realised that I must be a CAS girl at heart. I gave it my best shot but made several cards that ended up in the bin before I came up with this card

I started with Rustic White card from Papertrey Ink for the basecard, and the focal panel was embossed with an old Cuttlebug folder after I stamped the Happy Birthday sentiment. I then took the Spellbinders Labels 4 dies and cut the white label out. I used a stamp from the Waltzing Mouse Stamps Rescue Remedy stamp set and then inked it with Vintage Photo Distress Ink to give an aged look. I've had this stamp set since 2010  and luckily it was designed to be Nestie friendly. Some green paper from my stash was cut out and embossed with a larger die as a mat. I then simply layered up the mats and sandwiched some ribbon between before adding the flower and little heart as finishing touches. I have a sweet toothed friend with a birthday coming up so I thought this card would be fine to give her along with a yummy box of choccies.

Why not pop over to the Simply Create Too blog and join in with us this time.

I'd like to play along with

Whimsy Stamps challenge - use ribbon, lace or twine

Make My Monday - embossing

Sparkle's Monthly Challenge - vintage/shabby chic

Thanks for stopping by.

Hugs

Carol x

Mama Elephant Up and Away Easter card

Hello everyone, and welcome to another challenge over at Simply Create Too. We are halfway through the current challenge which is to make an Easter and or Bunny card, and I came up with this one:-

I used the very cute Mama Elephant Up and Away stamp set and stamped in black Versafine ink and then embossed with clear powder. I stopped using black embossing powder some time ago because no matter how much I swiped the card with an anti static pad, I always got some stray powder on my card, and black dots really show up. With the clear powder you really don't notice the odd stray dot or two,

I coloured the bunny with Copic markers and stamped the sentiments which come from the Waltzing Mouse Spring Baskets set. I stamped and coloured the umbrella on a separate piece of card, added some polka dots with a tiny spot stamp, then fussy cut it and raised it on foam tape to give some dimension. I matted onto orange card die cut with the Lil'Inker Designs stitched rectangle dies and then added a little white gel pen and some Wink of Stella to the umbrella and Bunny tummy to finish it off.

I'd like to play along with the following challenges

             Anything Goes

Hippity hop- Easter theme

Easter Critters

Animals

Why not pop over to the Simply Create Too Blog to see some more inspiration, and join in with us this time. You still have a week left to play along.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend.

Hugs

Carol x

Waltzingmouse Stamps Easter card

Hello everyone,

I've just popped on with a quick post to share an Easter card I made with Waltzingmouse stamps.

I stamped and embossed the eggs along the side of the panel and  watercoloured them with ink. I then stamped, and watercoloured another egg, cut it out and covered it with glossy accents. I stamped the sentiment and little flourish, added a few hearts and fixed the panel to the base card before adding the extra egg with some foam tape.

I used the colours from the current Dynamic Duos challenge

and was inspired by the photo inspiration over at Addicted to Stamping with the zigzag eggs

I'd also like to enter the Casual Fridays challengel which is 

Thanks for stopping by and have a good week.

Hugs

Carol x

Wedding invitations

Hello everyone,

I hope you had a good weekend and are all geared up for the week ahead. I am enjoying the last few days of my fifties before my I turn 60 this week, and I am looking forward to celebrations/commiserations with my family and friends.

The challenge over at Curtain Call this week is Sunflower Surprise



and I want to share some wedding invitations I made recently for some good friends of my daughter who were getting married. They wanted a sunflower theme in blue and yellow and needed 100 of them! In case you are interested in trying mass production, I'll outline the steps I took, but if not, just scroll through. As I had never made so many cards of one design before, I set up a a kind of production line with all the components before assembling them together, 20 at a time.



I kept the design simple with Papertrey Ink 'Fancy Flourishes' stamped randomly onto yellow card with Dandelion Memento ink, and I found a lovely flourishy invitation stamp at Waltzing Mouse Stamps (Big Day Essentials)that coordinated beautifully. I needed 100 die cut sunflowers along with their centres, but could not face manually cutting such a large number, so I die cut the shapes in black card, scanned them into the computer, and after importing them into the Silhouette software, I was able to cut them out on my Cameo. Once I had them cut out, I stamped the sunflower with the Dandelion ink and the centres with Blue Danube ink and the Papertrey Ink Simple Sunflower stamps. I stuck them together, curled the edges a little and added some glitter for some sparkle.

This was the result when it was all assembled, with the word panel scored a few times to add interest and a little gem popped on the 'o'

and this is the same one but for the evening invitations

I cut some small sunflowers to put on the back of the invitations

like this

I also decorated the envelopes with a stamp from Simon Says Stamp 'Envelope Sentiments' and tied batches of them together with blue ribbon. 

Here they are all packed up and ready for collection.

I also made the table names and place-cards for the tables, with, you guessed it, little sunflowers! This time they were really tiny and I shaped them to give some dimension

For these, I used the same technique of scanning and importing into the Silhouette software so I could cut them on my Cameo. The stamp is another one from Papertrey Ink, this time the 'Places Please Stamp Set'. I thoroughly enjoyed the challenge of making these, especially as I really like the couple but I would caution that it is not for the faint hearted. I learned such a lot as I went along, the major thing being to make sure you have enough materials before you start. I kept running out of the yellow card, and as it wasn't available locally I had to wait for mail order which held things up a bit. Nevertheless, I would encourage anyone to have a go - I got great satisfaction from seeing them all packed up and ready to go.

Thanks for stopping by

Hugs

Carol x

Christmas card for Waltzingmouse Blog Waltz

Hello everyone,

The 17th of the month means it is time for another Waltzingmouse Blog Waltz



and this time the theme is winter/Christmas. I was lucky enough to win a stamp set this month and I asked for the Nordic Winter set which is absolutely gorgeous and I couldn't wait to open it. Thank you very much Claire, I love it.

I decided to use this weeks WMS Sketch













which I flipped to one side to come up with this interpretation

I love the clear lines of this stamp set and the little tree stamp embosses beautifully.

I put a little light (gem) on the top of the tree and will enter it into Crafty Hazels challenge this week, also the Christmas Stampin all year's challenge which is to use a stamp (new or old) that has never seen ink, and Speedy the Cat challenge to use your favourite technique which for me is heat embossing. I won't keep you any longer because I know you will want to dance off and visit all of the other blogs today. Happy waltzing and thanks for stopping by.

Hugs

Carol x

Waltzing Mouse Christmas Thank you card

Hello everyone,

I hope you had a good weekend. Our choir had a singing workshop followed by a concert at the newly renovated Victoria Baths in Manchester and we had a great time. The acoustics were amazing and it was fun to sing with a crowd in the bath as it were! I'd like to Thank Case Study for making me a top pick last week, I was thrilled when I saw all the fabulous entries they could have chosen. Welcome to Sveta who became a follower of the blog this week

Today is the Waltzing Mouse Blog Waltz on the theme of being thankful

and as I had to drop out at the last minute for the previous waltz, I decided to kill two birds with one stone this time and also try to use the current Waltzing Mouse Sketch challenge. In an unashamed attempt to motivate myself to get on with my Christmas cards, I resolved to try to make one for all challenges I enter up to the big day. I laughed when I saw the sketch


but armed with my resolve I convinced myself that that I could make this into a Christmas Thank you card and came up with this:-

click to enlarge

I used the Block tree shape from Teeny Trees and embossed the star lights in white. I cut and matted a tag shape and sewed round the edges with green floss. For the background paper, I randomly stamped a tiny star shape in red and then matted it onto green card. A sentiment from Fancy Phrases was embossed in white with a couple of snowflakes onto a banner strip at the base of the tag. To finish it off I added a satin bow with a snowflake button and a couple of tiny gingerbread people at the base of the tree.

Thanks for stopping by and enjoy the waltz!

Hugs

Carol x

Waltzing Mouse Celebrate card

Hello everyone,

I'd like to welcome Melody as a new follower and take a moment to thank those of you who follow or visit the blog, especially if you leave a message because it really gives me a lift.

Today I decided to make something for the Waltzing Mouse sketch challenge which this week is a simple tag shape.



As this required a simple design, I decided to bite the bullet and try my hand at distressing. I don't know about you, but I see so many wonderful examples of shabby chic and distressed cards, but when I sit to make one, I always end up with a dirty looking mess. First of all I made the tag using the Eat Cake stamps. I silver embossed the cake plate and distressed the tag before matting it onto some pink paper.

I thought this might look better on a card so I made a couple of mats and mounted it, distressing the edges with Antique Linen distress ink. And ......

Thanks for looking.

I ended up with a dirty looking card again. My inking with brighter coloured ink is not too bad and I really try to blend the ink well but something is not right. Oh well its done now and maybe I should just try and accept that shabby chic and distressing are not for me!

We're going of to Lake District tomorrow for a few days, so I hope this nice warm weather holds for just a little longer.

Thanks for looking.

Hugs

Carol x

Waltzing Mouse birthday card and Old Stash Challenge

Hello everyone,

Its been a very busy week for me and I've just realised that I should have already posted this card for the WMS sketch challenge.  I decided to do a simple monochromatic card and used Off beat backgrounds, Gingham and Co  and Teeny trees, which are old friends by now so qualify for my September Use Old Stash Challenge.

I am also going to enter this into the Papertake Weekly challenge which is Anything Goes.

Sorry for the brief entry but thanks for stopping by.

Hugs

Carol x

Thinking of you card for Waltzing Mouse Blog Waltz

Hello everyone,

It Waltzing Mouse Blog Waltz today and the theme is tea or coffee. As I don't have any WMS tea or coffee stamps, I used a stamp that came free on a magazine a couple of years ago and layered it up on a cream card base. I used textured brown card for the layers and Nestabilities Labels 1 and 14 dies.

click to enlarge

Its a little difficult to see here but I stamped the chevron stamp from Off Beat Backgrounds on the base card in Versamark ink to add a little texture. The frame stamp and sentiments were from Frame It and the fancy frame stamp at the top was from Holiday Labels. I finished it off by cutting holes in the frame to add a little ribbon and stitched on a couple of buttons with some embroidery floss. I also used this weeks sketch for the design.

I can't wait to see what goodies everyone else came up with - so enjoy the waltz and thanks for looking in.

Hugs

Carol x

Waltzing Mouse Wedding Card

Hello everyone,

Just a quick post to add a new card I made for the Waltzing Mouse Stamps CASE competition, where you had to choose a card from one of the Design Team's samples for the SOAP event.

I chose to case Lynn Mercurio's beautiful wedding card and came up with this one:-

I used a kraft card base and some pearlised pink card which I ran through the Big Shot with a Cuttlebug folder. I then made a panel and although it is difficult to see in the photo, I stamped the dotty circles from Teeny Trees in pale pink ink

before overstamping with a frame from Holiday Labels 14 and a sentiment from Fancy Phrases. I added some satin daisies and gems underneath and a pretty bow with a heart button and a few paper flowers to finish everything off.

I hope you are having a good week and thanks for looking in.

Hugs

Carol x

Waltzing Mouse Stamps Birthday card

Hello everyone,

I hope you are enjoying your weekend and doing something you want to do instead of chores. Its the 17th so its Waltzing Mouse Stamps Blog Waltz, and the theme this month is 'birthday'.

I had very good intentions about the waltz this month and I was going to make a set of birthday party items but my mojo is still AWOL and I only managed a simple card

I made a similar card at Christmas but decided to give it different colourway and a birthday theme.

I'm keeping this short so you can hop along to all the blogs and see the inspiration.

Thanks for looking,

Hugs

Carol x

Birthday Card with Waltzing Mouse Stamps

Hello everyone,

Its a glorious sunny day here and I should be out enjoying the garden in the sunshine but I've been trying to convince myself that my current lack of crafting mojo is down to the fact that I've spent so little time crafting recently. I sat myself down and decided to follow a sketch challenge in the hope it would all come back. Ha. Bad decision. I've spent most of the day second guessing myself and I'm still not happy with what I've come up with, but it is going to have to do because a long cold drink is calling to me and I have my book group book to read by next week.

This is the sketch I took from Waltzing Mouse



and this is the first card I came up with

I thought it was ok, but its missing something and so I had another go and this is the second version.

Now I think its too busy and I cannot decide which one to enter into the sketch challenge. Oh well, I'll go off into the garden and come back to it later. Do you have days like this? Any comments would be very helpful at this stage.

Hugs

Carol x

Edited to add

Thanks for the comments Laura and Stella, I agree with you that the first card is probably better - I often do not know when to stop!

Recipe WMS Gingham and Frame it.

Papertray Ink Tiny tags

4th July card for Waltzing Mouse Blog Waltz and June Old Stash Challenge

Hello everyone and welcome to my blog. I'm sorry to have been AWOL for so long but we've been away for a week and its taken me some time to get caught up and find some time to craft. However, to help me get back in the swing, its the 17th of the month and its time for the Waltzing Mouse Blog Waltz.

The challenge this time is to create a card for the 4th July and at first I thought I'd have to pass on this one because I don't have any appropriate stamps, let alone anyone to send it to, but not to be daunted, I looked through my WMS stash and tried to be a bit creative with what I had.

I decided to make a US flag and started with the rectangular frame from Frame It stamped in red and then I created the stripes with some red ric rac. For the stars part, I played with the star tree from Teeny Trees and just kept stamping it until I had a panel that pleased me.

For the background I started with a white card base and cut four squares of Coredinations card stock and embossed them with a Cuttlebug folder, before sanding them to expose some of the core. A sentiment from Frame it, some ribbon and a few star gems for bling finished it off.

I'll update you on the ducks in my next post because I'm sure that like me, you will want to waltz off to see all the goodies on the other blogs. This card also counts as my June 'Use Old Stash Challenge', in my continuing attempt to use old materials that have been neglected in favour of shiny new stuff.

Thanks for stopping by,

Hugs

Carol x