In the Garden

Just a quick reminder that there is still a little time to enter the In the Garden challenge at Stamping Sensations this month. I made this card for one of our Site managers at work. We have an allotment with a shed, and I really wish it looked as well organised as this one! .
The stamp set is from Hobby Art and will definitely come in useful for cards for my Dad too.
I am slowly but surely tidying my craft table and discovering all sorts of bits and pieces. Thanks for looking!

November at Stamping Sensations

Good morning, It's time for a new challenge at Stamping Sensations and this month we are looking for

********One Layer Christmas Cards********

By one layer we mean your artwork must be stamped directly onto the base card, definitely no matting and layering. 
I've gone for a CAS design on both my cards. I started by laying a strip of masking tape across the card. I then stamped and dusted a little ink either side of it. On the first card I used Inkylicious Berry Branches and added 4 colours of liquid pearls and glitter glue. Once the tape was removed I stamped the Inkylicious sentiment along the space.
My second card is a very similar design using stamps from the Inkylicious winter spruce set. These cards take about 5 minutes to stamp and about 20 to dry, lol!

Please can I remind you we are a stamping challenge so must see a stamped image, sentiment or quote as the focal element of your artwork , this means:

Stamping must be the central point of attention and interest

On to our prize and this month. We have a super Tote Bag collection from Tattered Lace plus another small prize from them for a second winner.

Do pop over to the challenge blog and take a look at all the gorgeous creations from my multi talented teamies, and I look forward to visiting your great entries!

Thanks for looking! 

Rudolf day for April

Rudolf Day has snook up on me this month, but I remembered I had this little used Penny Black stamp and so made three quick one layer cards. I stamped in versamark and embossed in silver. This also gave me the opportunity to have a play with the new Distress ink colours, and for this one I used abandoned coral and cracked pistachio, before adding a bit of sparkle with jade and red sakura stardust pens and a water brush. The sentiment is a printed one from Craftwork Cards, perfect for sticking over dodgy stamping!
Here is a close up of the sparkle - you can just about see it

Next I had another go, this time managing to get the sentiment stamped straight (it is a very old one from stamporium, and no longer available), but without the sparkle.

And finally I tried another using mermaid lagoon and Cracked pistachio with a sentiment from Inkylicious

I like the new colours, but they are quite similar to some of those already out. Cracked pistachio is a paler version of evergreen bough, mermaid lagoon is similar to salty ocean and abandoned coral is quite like festive berries. These are all quite small cards - 4" square. I picked up a pack of these at the Range when I went to visit Lynne. With postage priced the way it is, more people will get one layer small cards than in the past.
 I'd better pop these over to Scrappy Mo's Rudolf Days challenge and then make the most of the sunshine. I have student finance forms to fill in later.
Thanks for popping by!

Un petit peu de Paris!

Hi There! It has been over a week since my last visit to Blogland, due to Ofsted at work, but I am not complaining as it means I can truly relax over half term! Before you ask, I can't say how we did until the report is published in about three weeks time. Apparently they have downgraded schools for revealing the result before they should!
 So, onto my cards. A few weeks ago I paid a visit to the Range to buy this sweet Paris Eiffel tower stamp by Dovecraft, as I has seen it on Ruth's blog and knew several people who would love cards with it on! My last Eiffel tower stamp fell apart last time I used it. When one of those friends said she wanted an unfussy valentines card for her hubby, I made the card above. I added the inkylicious delicate vine stamp in bundled sage distress ink and the waltzing mouse sentiment. I am entering this into this weeks Less is More, where the theme is Love and one layer.
I couldn't just make one though, so here is a second, on a square card this time and using spun sugar and shaded lilac DI, and a woodware sentiment.

very quick and simple, and already the stamps have paid for themselves!
Thanks for looking and I will look forward to visiting you this week!

Rudolf day for August

I was very naughty and missed Rudolf day for July. I was busy packing for my holiday and making my anniversary card! Still, it is the first one I have missed this year, which is a bit better than previous years! On to my cards for August...

I have made quite a few small one layer cards this year to cut down on postage costs. For this one I masked off a third of the card then dusted and stamped the remaining card with Tea Dye distress ink and Inkylicious tiny script. I then stamped the Christmas tree (Christmas tree curl - small) with memento cottage ivy and added liquid pearls. I love how they shine in the light.

finally I added a very old sentiment from Stampourium. I can see me making quite a few in this design, as it took longer for the liquid pearls to dry than it did to make it!
My second card is very similar to one I made earlier in the year, but I found a Chocolate Baroque sentiment to pop in the gap.

All stamps except the sentiment are from Inkylicious (Winter Spruce and Musical Melody). Inks are Memento inks in cottage ivy, northern pine and espresso truffle. I added dots of red stickles as holly berries and coloured the cones with a tea dye distress marker. Again, very quick and easy. Do pop over to the lovely Sarn's blog and take a look at her fab and very classy Christmas cards this month, and maybe even join in the fun!
Thanks for looking!

Inkylicious Willow Trees

If you went to Ally Pally and stopped by the Inkylicious stall you may well have seen this gorgeous tree stamp. I love it! It is so delicate and beautiful. I have been playing with it for a few days, and I can see it will be used lots! For my first card I ink dusted the base card in dandelion, lilac posies and tuxedo black Memento ink. I then did the same with a silk art card panel, masking off a moon/sun. I stamped the tree and added spots of quickie glue to all the buds on the branches before sprinkling with irridescent glitter. Here is a close up.

I then stamped delicate vine in black onto the base card to form a sort of frame adding some punched flowers with liquid pearl centres. I think it needs a sentiment top left, but can't decide which one to use yet! All suggestions welcome!

My second card is a one layer card. I masked off a panel that I dusted with Adirondack inks in mountain rose, slate, black and denim, masking a moon. I removed the masks before stamping the tree and added spots of star dust stickles. With this sky I was trying to recreate a sky we had during that smoggy week we had at the beginning of April. I may well try that sky again with a pinker sun next time.
If you need this tree, keep an eye on the Inkylicious Website or look out for Inkylicious at Stamp Magic, Doncaster Dome on 8th June 2014 or Summer Crafting, Doncaster Race course on 12th and 13th July.
Thanks for looking and for all your lovely comments!

Happy Burn's Night and Rudolf Day!

Hi there! Well, the 25th January came round very quickly didn't it? I have been busy doing the Big Garden Birdwatch and making a Hot Marmalade Pudding for our Burn's Night celebrations tonight at a friend's house. It is my turn to provide pudding. I have spent ages trying to get hold of a Drambuie miniature to make the custard with, but haven't found one. Should have tried at Christmas or in Scotland!
Whilst it is in the steamer I have been having a play and made two cards for Rudolf Day over on Sarn's Blog, so here they are.

and here are some 'closer-ups'.

The image on this one is a digi from Doodle Dragon Studios, the base card is stamped with Inky Doodles backgrounds 2 and the poinsettia is a Marianne designs die. The sentiment is from Craftwork Cards.

My second card is a one layer card stamped with Inkylicious stamps and a sentiment from woodware. I added various glitter glues, although you can only really see the red here. All inks used on both were by memento.
If you haven't done the Big Garden Birdwatch there is still time, as tomorrow is eligible too. Not as many unusual visitors this year for us as last, but that could be down to the snow we had last year. About half an hour after I finished we got a pair of black caps, coal tits and blue tits, which were noticeable by their absence earlier! The seasons certainly are out of kilter this year, as we saw hundreds of Catkins on the way home from shopping this morning - at least 4 weeks early. Our daffodils are a few inches tall too.
Hope you have had a productive day and you have managed to avoid the hail storm we had earlier. Half past two looked more like half past six here, it was so dark, and the hailstones were marble size rather than pea size!
Thanks for looking!

One layer Thank Yous

 I was having a bit of a clearout to house some new stash and found two quite small scalloped square cards, I used low tack masking tape round the edges and dusted the central panel with Distress inks.For this one I used the Summer set of Distress inks and the Inkylicious Allium stamps and a sentiment. I added glitter to the allium and a wobbly line round the edge of the panel to cover up some smudges!

My second card used the same stamps but this time I used the spring distress inks and  managed no smudges, lol!
I am entering this into a new challenge, the One Layer Simplicity challenge . The theme this month is to 'restock the shelves', and as I had used up all my thank you cards in my box, it was definitely time for some more! Thanks for looking and I hope you are having a great weekend!

Last Rudolf Day

It is the last Rudolf Day before Christmas and to be frank I am approaching headless chicken stage now! It is only my second time entering and I've got no where near enough cards yet- I am hoping to join in way earlier next year! Keep nagging me Sarn! Do pop over to Sarn's blog and have a look at her fabby makes
Here are my offerings - 2 CAS single layer cards, now postage is so expensive for anything else!

 First one features an Indigo Blu stamp, stamped and embossed with Kaleidoscope embossing powder. The sentiment is from Craftwork Cards.  The holly leaves are from Inkylicious and useful for hiding finger prints, lol! Take a closer look at the sparkle and shimmer!

Next I went for more traditional colours...

The second card is made using Inkylicious stamps from the Winter spruce set. I used a strip of masking tape to make the border across the middle and stamped the sentiment (woodware) in memento Rhubarb Stalk (yes, it isn't straight, but IRL it isn't quite that wonky, lol!)
Thanks for looking

Quick one layer Christmas cards and new Inkylicious stamps!

If you are looking for ideas for Christmas cards, then there are some new stamps from Inkylicious that are perfect for quick one layer cards.

 The branches, baubles and pine cones are all on a little plate called 'Winter spruce' and the 'Merry Christmas 08' is a single stamp.

I've stamped with Memento and Distress inks, as well as dusting with them on these cards. The Music Background stamp (also Inkylicious) provided a great vintage look in Antique linen Distress ink, as did the tiny script stamp above.

 Look out for these stamps and loads more at All Pally, Hobbycrafts Exeter, GNPE Harrogate, Stamp Magic Doncaster and Hobbycrafts Glasgow and NEC on the Inkylicious stand.
Bearing in mind the cost of postage I am making a whole load of these, along with some simple tree/ snow scene ones like this:

 Teal Zeal and Grape Jelly Memento inks were used with my ink dusters on this one. If you are off to Ally Pally this weekend have a wonderful time! If not, happy crafting wherever you are. Thanks for looking!

More Inkylicious creations

 Here are some more of the cards I made using Inkylicious stamps for create and Craft. The first is done with Adirondack inks in peach bellini, Mountain rose, Denim and eggplant and my ink dusters.

 Here is a one layer card using 'Winsdswept', crushed olive , Tea Dye and broken china distress ink. The background is created with ink dusters. I then sprayed with walnut stain to get the grainy effect.

Two more one-layer cards using spring Distress Inks, Meadowlands stamp, some sequin waste and tiny script stamp.

 And finally two cards using the Daisy fields stamp. The first is done with tumbled glass, shaded lilac and chipped sapphire Distress Ink. 

The panel on this card was brushed with peacock feather, dried marigold and black soot Distress ink. The base card was stamped with aqua Adirondack and the delicate vine. I love all of these stamps so much I have still been playing with them, despite not needing to do more samples! Again, they all work in black and also in colour. Thanks for looking and for all your lovely comments!

Less is more - one layer and 3 stamps

Hi There
It has been a bit of a topsy turvy weekend, so I'm later getting here than intended. There I was Saturday afternoon starting my LIM card and suddenly it was walked over by an ant! I cleared my craft space and found one more, removed the packet of boiled sweets and sat down to craft again. Five minutes later there was another! I've still not found where they are coming from, but I have spent some time crawling round on my hands and knees!
Anyway, I finally finished my card for this weeks Less is More challenge.

I have to admit I was inspired my my lovely friend Sylvia, to get out my Indigo Blu stamps. All of these are from the Poppy Meadow plate except for the butterfly that was from a set of butterflies I picked up in Tescos a few years ago. I added a bit of distress inks in Crushed Olive and Tumbled Glass with my ink dusters, and added some colour to the butterfly with aqua-markers, before covering it in glitter.
I have emptied my craft space a further twice today, chasing the elusive blighters, and found them very distracting, hence just the one card! However, it was not all bad, as I was delighted to discover I have won some flitter glu and Yorkshire Dales mega flakes  in the Samuel Taylor April challenge. That definitely made my day! Right, off to lay some traps and peer at the skirting boards!
Thanks for looking!

Doodling at Less is More

The theme at Less is More this week is doodling on a one layer card. Now although I do doodle a bit sometimes, it is never in an arty way (more scribble than doodle to be honest!), so this was a bit out of my comfort zone. I thought of what stamps I have that have very little detail and opted for my Waltzing Mouse Tea time sets. I got out my set of fine tipped markers and set to. Here is my first attempt.

I thought this looked okay, but decided I should try a bit of Zentangle. A Zentangle teacup...

Please excuse the wonky photo. Now there is probably some rule that Zentangle should be just black and white, but I added a little bit of pastel blue promarker and cool grey promarker to give it some depth. Then the tea in the cup needed colouring too.

At this point I should've stopped, but no, I wanted to try something else, so I chose three colours and tried to decorate another kettle. Disaster! I think the problem was I tried to do stripes rather than random shapes. I will show you, but please don't consider it for the challenge!

It reminds me of a poem by Paul Cookson called 'I'm not going out like that in the jumper Grandma knitted!'. I bet this kettle is thinking the same!!! I think I'll stick to black and white in the future!

Well, thanks for looking and I'll hopefully pay a visit to my fellow LIMettes later in the week.

Less is more birds

The theme at Less is More this week is birds and it needs to be a one layer card. I had a major reorganisation of my stamps over the Christmas holiday and rediscovered a sheet of Elusive Images stamps with lots of birds on, so I used those on my first card.

The ink dusting and stamping were done with big and juicy soothing sunset. I added a tiny bit of cotton candy distress stickles to the berries and the pattern on the bird.  Having seen Chrissie's and Mandi's cards this week I decided to take some inspiration from Chrissie's scene card on her blog and came up with this.

The landscape stamp is from stamp addicts and the bird of prey is from Inkylicious. I stamped all of it in Chipped Sapphire distress ink and  dragged colour onto the image with a damp paintbrush. I also added a hint of colour to the sky with my ink dusters. This was my second attempt, but I rescued the first by doing this with it (no birds, because I smudged the ink!)

both of these cards would be suitable for the stampalot challenge too, where the theme is monochrome. Have you seen the prize for stampalot this month? Feast your eyes on this little lot!

Isn't it a gorgeous colour combination?

Well, I'd better go as my niece and her boyfriend will be arriving shortly and we are going to go for a walk near Clumber park. Hopefully we will see lots of birds whilst we are out. Thanks for looking and I will hopefully get round to visiting you during the week.

Less is More - one layer and ink

The challenge this week at Less is More is a one layer card using ink, preferably in a way that is new or different to usual. I've spent several days thinking about it, and finally came up with this:

I stamped and clear embossed the agapanthus cluster (Stampendous) and then 'swiped' memento ink in angel pink, lulu lavender and summer sky. I've not done much swiping before, and to be honest, that random edge of ink makes me feel just a little bit uncomfortable! I then ironed the image using a sheet of kitchen towel to remove the embossing and leave a batik effect image. Finally I added the sentiment (Inkylicious).
Thanks for looking!

Less is more - One layer Sentiment

Here is my card for this week's Less is More.

I used labels 17 and labels 4 nesties to make a mask, sponged with memento cantaloupe  then stamped with some tiny stamps from See-Dee's whimsical garden collection and tropical collection. The sentiment is from an Inkylicious collection called Sentiments 1. I couldn't decide whether to put it straight or at an angle. I went for the angle in the end, because it was easier! What do you think? Thanks for popping by x