Christmas Shaker

My first shaker card with lots of metallic sequins, hearts, snowflakes, gold glitter, distress glitter, beads and vellum snowflakes! The background is a mix of distress inks spritzed with iridescent gold glimmer mist. The Penny Black Christmas tree and sentiment is embossed with liquid platinum and the card front is embossed with pearlescent embossing paste using Simon Says Stamp Falling Snow stencil.

 

All shook up! A closer look at all the bits and my snow drifts.

 

Colour intensity and light levels courtesy of the very dull Irish weather with intermittent torrential rain!

Challenges:
Penny Black and More November Challenge: Anything Goes
Stamping Sensations November Challenge: Christmas
Virginia's View Challenge #9: All Things Metallic

Supplies

Stamps: Penny Black Wonder Collection
Dies & Stencils etc: Lawn Fawn Large Stitched Rectangles, Stitched Hillside Borders & Stitched Snowflakes Lawn Cuts, Spellbinders Oval Nestabilities, Simon Says Stamp Falling Snow Stencil

Ink: Versamark, Tim Holtz Distress Inks Salty Ocean, Peacock Feathers, Chipped Sapphire, Pumice Stone

Paper: White card & vellum from stash

Highlights: liquid platinum embossing powder, pearlescent embossing paste, sequins, glitter, beads,

Hope you enjoyed all shook up visit and see you again soon!

Forty Sucks!

More metallic madness! I love this embossing powder, so crisp and clear and a fabulous colour, somewhere in between gold and silver. I've gone for an elegant and layered look to contrast the cheeky sentiment. I've stamped the sweets multiple times with Versamark ink and heat embossed every so often, so that I didn't smudge the images.

This card only makes total sense when you realise I stuffed the envelope with 40 lollipops and sucking sweets! Great minds think alike, as my friend had created her own 40 Sucks lollipop dispenser as a party favour for the guests.

Challenges:
Craft for the Craic November Challenge #10: Birthday
Penny Black and More November Challenge: Anything Goes
Virgina's View Challenge #9: All Things Metallic

Supplies

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Violet's ABCs, Spooktacular
Dies & Stencils etc: Lawn Fawn Large & Small Stitched Rectangles Lawn Cuts

Ink: Versamark

Paper: White & gold card from stash

Highlights: liquid platinum embossing powder

Hope you enjoyed this metallic mad visit and see you again soon!

Tree Top Baubles

This is one of my favourite Waltzingmouse Stamp sets and I love using it in different way than originally intended. The baubles are created using the tree tops from the Teeny Trees stamp set. Memento Luxe inks are fantastic for their rich colour and second generation stamping, perfect for the Waltzingmouse Fanatics Colour Chalenge. However, they take a while to dry so I've clear embossed the baubles to allow me to do a little masking and not have wait too long. The bauble clasps are courtesy of bubbles from Half Pint Heroes and the strings are drawn with silver gel pen. I've used lots of silver for Virginia's View All things Metallic Challenge. Lots of stamping to join in with the Penny Black & More Challenge and the Christmas theme at Stamping Sensations Challenge.

Mirror card, glossy embossing and dull yet surprisingly bright in spots light give rise to 'fun' photography. I've tried lots of angles yet there is too much shine, not enough light or the colours are off. Hopefully you'll get the picture,  by taking all the photos as a whole!

Challenges:

Penny Black & More November Challenge: Anything Goes

Stamping Sensations November Challenge: Christmas 

Virginia's View Challenge #9: All Things Metallic 

Waltzingmouse Fanatics Challenge #30: Colours

Supplies

Stamps: Waltzingmouse Stamps Teeny Trees, Half Pint Heroes
Dies & Stencils etc: Lawn Fawn Large & Small Stitched Rectangles Lawn Cuts, Simon Says Stamp Happy

Ink: Memento Luxe Teal Zeal, Lilac Posies, Sweet Plum, Pear Tart, Encore Silver

Paper: White & silver card from stash

Hightlights: clear embossing powder, stickles, sequins, clear gems, silver gel pen

Pumpkin Patch Thanks

This autumn I was fascinated by all the white & gold pumpkins to be seen on the interweb, I wasn't brave enough to do it myself so I'll have to live vicariously through my cards. Virginia's View All Things Metallic Challenge has allowed me to indulge in my creative impulses without upsetting the kids who just wanted to carve the pumpkins. I've taken inspiration for my pumpkin patch from the Lawnscaping's Fall & Pumpkins Challenge and The Card Concept's Thank "fall" Challenge.

 

I've masked the face from my pumpkins and stamped in gold ink. Shading was added with a Cool Grey 3 ProMarker and a Bronze gel pen was used to colour the stalks. The pumpkins were then decorated using masks & gold embossing paste and stamps. The masked chevron stencil border echoes the wooden cladding in the photo inspiration.

At this time of year at 53ºN and with low pressure about, the quality of light is not all that you would wish, so my photos are a little darker than I would like. Oh for a photographic studio, but then I'd have to find another excuse!

Challenges:

Lawnscaping Challenges #93: Fall & Pumpkins [Honorable Gnome]

The Card Concept #22:Thank "fall" [Clean & Graphic]

Virginia's View Challenge #9: All things Metalic 

Supplies

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Spooktacular, Chevron Backdrops
Ink: Encore gold

Dies & Stencils etc: Lawn Fawn Large Stitched Rectangles Lawn Cuts, Spooktacular Lawn Cuts, Scripty Thanks Lawn Cuts, Simon Says Stamp Happy die, Zig Zag Stencil, Falling Snow Stencil

Paper: White card from stash

Highlights: bronze gel pen, stickles, gold embossing paste

Colouring: ProMarker Cool Grey 3

Hope you enjoyed your visit and we'll see you again soon!

Lawn Fawn Halloween

Lizzy's Halloween card on the Lawn Fawn blog inspired me to try some partial die cutting and Pamela Ho has a great video for partial die cutting of masked/joined images. I stamped the bats and then my hat, cat and pumpkin using some masking and then partially die cut the images in succession before using a craft knife to create a circular aperture. More partial die cutting to extend the large stitched rectangle die, lots of distress inking and a spritz of glimmer mist for the night sky and hey presto a cute CAS Halloween card!

I've been planning this card for ages but went away for the mid-term break without any craft supplies, hence my nearly missing the Lawnscaping deadline and the poor quickly taken photos. Thankfully my local craft club allowed me to make the time to get inky and sparkly! This card came together quite quickly and I love the CAS look.

In Ireland, Halloween is the biggest celebration in autumn and I've co-opted some American staples, such as pumpkins not turnips will be carved in this house. My Mum carved turnips for Jack-o-Lanterns before pumpkins were readily available and I don't recommend it, as turnips are very tough and lots of upper body strength is required! Oíche Shamhna Shona Daoibh!

Challenges:

Lawnscaping Challenge #92: Halloween Theme or Use The Colour Combo
Passion for ProMarkers Week #271: Add Some Sparkle
The Card Concept Challenge #22: Thank "Fall" for Halloween [Clean & Simple ]

Supplies

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Spooktacular, Home Sweet Home
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Tim Holtz Distress Inks Stormy Sky, Seedless Preserve, Chipped Sapphire, Black Soot

Dies & Punches etc: Lawn Fawn Large Stitched Rectangles Lawn Cuts, Home Sweet Home Lawn Cuts, Simon Says Stamp Happy die

Paper: White card from stash

Highlights: silver gel pen, Wink of Stella, star gems, glimmer mist, Tim Holtz brushed pewter spray stain 

Colouring: ProMarker/FlexMarkers

Hope you enjoyed your visit and see you again soon!

Purrfect Birthday CAS(E)#95 MtDSTechnique VVC#8

Masking and more and more masking, this card contains 3 types! Embossing and embossing, yes you guessed it, this card contains 2 types! I started out by masking off a rectangular section of my stencil with painter's tape and applied the embossing paste. While this was drying I created a party hat mask with post-it note tape, stamped up my images and coloured in my tabby cat. I've kept the mask with my stamp set so I can use it again. The sentiment is a combination of two sets, I masked out the word halloween with washi tape before inking in versamark, removed the tape, stamped and embossed on vellum. The birthday was then stamped and embossed. The sentiment was stamped and embossed in two stages as I didn't want to smudge the almost invisible versamark.

This card is a refinement of my last card. I wanted to use a more subdued palette and have a go at some masking. I've used CAS(E) this sketch #95 for the layout,  kept it clean and simple for Virginia' View Challenge #8 and tried a few techniques for Make the Day Special's October Challenge.

Challenges:
CAS(E) this Sketch #95
Make the Day Special October Challenge: Try a technique [masking & embossing]

Virginia's View Challenge #8: Clean & Simple

 

 

 

Supplies

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Spooktacular, Hat's Off To You
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Versamark

Dies & Punches etc: Lawn Fawn Large Stitched Rectangles Lawn Cuts, Tim Holtz Dot Fade Stencil

Paper: White card  & vellum from stash

Highlights: gold embossing paste, white embossing paste, glossy accents, gold gel pen, Wink of Stella, Lawn Fawn sequins

Colouring: ProMarkers Cool Grey 1, Cool Grey 3, Cool Grey 4, Pink Carnation, Blender.

Hope you enjoyed your visit and see you again soon!

CAS Patterned Paper Home

Time to pull out the papers and get piecing! I needed a quick CAS card before I visited a friend's new home, so took Lawnscaping Challenge's advice and used patterned paper. No colouring except for a little shading, just some die cutting and a little embossing. Hey presto, a sweet little card for my friend's family of four. I positioned my dies and stamps so the images' colouring made sense and would have a bit of interest. This took a little bit of time, but I had to wait for the embossing paste to dry anyway! I've one little boy bird and one little girl bird flying about as their parents keep watch.
I've kept this card Clean & Simple with lots of white space to enter Virginia's View Challenge #8 and have used Retrosketches #114 rotated 90º to enter their World Cardmaking Day Challenge. There are lots of great sketches in their Archive.

Challenges:
Lawnscaping Challenge #91: Use Patterned Paper  
Retrosketches #135: Your Choice - Retrosketches #114 
Virginia's View Challenge #8: Clean & Simple 

 

Supplies

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Home Sweet Home
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black 

Dies & Punches etc: Lawn Fawn Home Sweet Home Lawn Cuts, Wendy Vecchi Honeycomb Stencil

Paper: White card from stash, Lawn Fawn Daphne's Closet, Pink Lemonade

Highlights: white embossing paste, glossy accents

Colouring: Tim Holtz Distress Markers Old Paper, Iced Spruce, Squeezed Lemonade, Salty Ocean

Hope you enjoyed your visit and see you again soon!