Monday, February 24, 2014

Autumn Splendour

It's not long now until March and here in Australia that heralds the arrival of Autumn, my favourite time of year. Here in the Blue Mountains the colours on the deciduous trees will be just stunning over the next few months - it always makes me wish I had some talent as a painter to capture that glory of nature. So I do the next best thing and stamp!

The projects for this month's classes feature Autumn colours and here they are:


Inspired by Patty Bennett, this one was a ton of fun with sponging and emboss resist.

Materials used:
  • stamps - Magnificent Maple
  • card - Sahara sand, whisper white, pumpkin pie
  • inks - crushed curry, pumpkin pie, cajun craze, early espresso, Versamark
  • other - sponges, brayer, clear embossing powder, heat tool, honeycomb embossing folder, Big Shot, dimensionals

The next card is more fun with sponges and ink, CASEing a glorious card by Tricia Traxler. I am especially pleased with how my leaf turned out! Take a lookie:


Materials used:
  • stamps- Magnificent Maple, French Foliage, Best Yet
  • card - cajun craze, very vanilla, naturals ivory
  • inks - so saffron, crushed curry, calypso coral, cajun craze, tangerine tango, early espresso
  • other - sponges and sponge daubers, embossing stylus and mat, dimensionals, non SU scalloped rectangle die

For our third card I borrowed the beautiful Simply Sketched hostess set from my SIL and went to town with watercolouring. Sanding the core'dinations card (in glorious cherry cobbler) made the perfect background.


Materials used:
  • stamps - Simply Sketched
  • card - cherry cobbler (plain and core'dinations), watercolour, more mustard
  • inks - crushed curry, more mustard, cajun craze, old olive
  • other - lace ribbon, aqua painter, dimensionals, mosaic embossing folder, ovals framelits, Big Shot, sanding block, sponge daubers

I love, love, love how this one turned out, the colours are so rich.

Have fun playing in the Autumn leaves and thanks for calling in!

Cheers
Kez

Friday, February 14, 2014

You Stole My Heart

I make a point of telling my two girls all the time how much I love them, so I don't usually join in the Valentine's Day hype - but this year I had an idea for a card so I ran with it. I also made them a gift bag of sweet treats.

As the card was very simple, I kept my gift bag simple also and just carried through the colours and motif. Here they are:


I printed the sentiment and stamp twice (created in MDS) and simply cut out the second heart with the matching die, layering it on top with dimensionals.

Materials used:
  • stamps - Hearts a Flutter (MDS)
  • card - pool party, real red, whisper white
  • other - dimensionals, Big Shot, hearts a flutter dies, pool party seam binding, Sweetheart treat bags, computer and printer

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers
Kez

Tuesday, February 11, 2014

80 Years Young

I was asked recently to make a card for a gentleman about to celebrate his 80th birthday. My brief was that his favourite colour is red and he really likes stripes - so naturally, the Nautical Expedition papers came immediately to mind. Assured that he does like boats, I went with that theme and paired it up with a great quote from the Daring Adventure set. It's an A4 sized card (ie four times the usual size) so that all the people at the celebration event can sign it.


The stamping part was done on MDS so I could increase the size enough to suit my large card. It also gave me the advantage of being able to really get the effect of that great ship graphic. I added a couple of retired brads and a chipboard anchor.

Materials used:
  • stamps - The Open Sea, Daring Adventure (MDS)
  • card - nautical expedition dsp, whisper white, midnight muse, purchased A3 navy card
  • other - deco labels framelits, Big Shot, dimensionals, cherry cobbler bakers twine, brads, chipboard anchor

On the inside I put a message that continues the adventure theme:


When I took it around to my client I was given three excited hugs, so I'm assured that she likes it! Hopefully the birthday boy will too.

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers
Kez

Sunday, February 2, 2014

Friends

In a complete change of pace from my cards over the past week or so, today's project is a soft and feminine shabby chic offering using a number of old favourites I just can't bear to part with. Hopefully trends in the papercrafting world will return to these pretty florals and elegant fonts, cos I miss them!


Materials used:

  • stamps - En Francais, Best Yet
  • card - blushing bride, soft suede, very vanilla, pear pizzazz, Springtime Vintage dsp
  • punches - hexagon, bird, itty bitty
  • other - designer frames E/F, Big Shot, rolled rose die, pearls, sponges, dimensionals, hot glue gun

To get the patchy look from your background stamp like I have, lay the stamp rubber side up on your table and ink it up then lay the paper on top and just press lightly in random spots (not all over the paper) - add some sponging around the edges and your shabby background is complete.

Thanks for dropping by.

Cheers
Kez

Saturday, February 1, 2014

NSU - Love You Honey

Today's card is my second offering with copic colouring - I'm very new at this but am loving the challenge. I think I enjoy it as much as watercolouring, although it is a bit more difficult I find!

Anyway, one of the images I couldn't wait to colour was this totally adorable Mo Manning drawing of Baby Fairy Bee. Sooooooooo cute! The curly hair gave me some problems and I can see I'm going to have to look up some tutorials on that, but otherwise I am quite happy with it for a beginner.

Check out this sweetie:


 Materials used:

  • stamps - Baby Fairy Bee (digital stamp - Mo Manning), Lovely Little Labels (SU)
  • card - perfect plum, whisper white, basic grey, pumpkin pie polka dot dsp, XPress It
  • other - SU jewellery tag punch, Cheery Lynn honeycomb die, paper flowers, mounting tape, copics, SU 1.6 cm organza ribbon, SU ovals framelits, Big Shot, hot glue gun, Spica glitter pen

I coloured the hair last and one of my brown pens leaked two HUGE blobs of ink! Luckily for me, they were right on the hairline, so I cut around the image and stuck it over a second one to save me having to start all over again! There was a fair bit of muttering going on, as you can imagine! LOL!

Well, hope you like my offering. Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers
Kez