Be True to You

 

I do love me a slimline card, so taking part in the Just Add Ink challenge this week was an easy decision. What wasn't so easy was deciding what type of card to make! So many style choices and I mentally skipped through quite a few before settling on a shabby chic look. It's been a while since I crafted as I've been recovering from an accident, so it felt amazing to be creating again and using some of my favourite techniques. Here's my card:

I began with a gorgeous sheet of paper from Stamperia's Spring Botanic collection which had the flower and splodges already on it, added some script and leaf stamping, then distressed and inked the edges. I stamped more leaves and cut them out, attaching them with mini dimensionals for added depth. The butterfly was stamped with archival ink on watercolour paper and coloured with aged mahogany oxide ink first, then SU's merry merlot which is a deeper burgundy. I really love how that turned out. After shaping the wings with my bone folder I adhered it with dimensionals, lastly adding the quote chip and some sequins.

Materials used:

• stamps - Very Versailles (SU), Specimen (Tim Holtz/Stampers Anonymous)
• card - crumb cake, early espresso, watercolour, Spring Botanic designer paper (Stamperia)
• SU inks - crumb cake, early espresso, merry merlot
• distress oxide inks - aged mahogany, bundled sage
• other - sequins, mini glue dots, TH quote chip, distressing tool, Dimensionals, aqua painter, ground espresso archival ink (TH/Ranger)

Hope you like it. Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers

Kerry

Edited to add: I was lucky enough to be picked for the JAI challenge. Many thanks to the JAI team.

Well, Speckle Me an Egg

The crafting world has been all a-buzz this past week since Tim Holtz and Ranger released a brand new distress colour called Speckled Egg - the first of twelve new colours we'll see between now and the end of 2021.

Isn't it a gorgeous shade? Sigh! Love it.

I was lucky enough to get my hands on it yesterday in my fav distress oxide ink and almost immediately upon returning home, sat down in my craft room for a good ole' play. Here's what I ended up with:

Materials used:

• stamps - You've Got This, Very Versailles
• card - whisper white, basic grey, watercolour
• distress oxide inks - speckled egg, weathered wood
• other - Copic markers, Stampin' Blends, texture paste, speckled egg re-inker, spatula, water spritzer, distress collage medium matte (Tim Holtz), Flourish stencil (Tim Holtz), paintbrush, Big Shot, Alphanumeric Tiny Type Lower thinlits (Sizzix), blending brush, Dimensionals, craft foam, distressing tool

I began by laying down the background using my two distress oxide colours, then once that was dry I stamped the script from Very Versailles with speckled egg ink. I stencilled the flourishes using texture paste coloured with speckled egg and while that was drying, stamped and coloured my flower. That was fussy-cut and adhered with Dimensionals. The last touch was the die-cut sentiment, which has two layers of card for extra depth. Because there's no matching cardstock I sponged some speckled egg ink around the edges of my whisper white base.

I'm not 100% happy with it - something about the design doesn't quire sit right with me. It feels like it still needs something but I also don't want to overwhelm it, so I just have to accept to live and learn and move on, lol. We're always our own worst critics, aren't we?

Thanks for calling in. Stay safe.

Cheers

Kez 

Stampers Anonymous Blog Hop #17

Well, hi! Welcome to the Stampers Anonymous Blog Hop for April. I haven't played along for a couple of months but you know I find it hard to resist when there's a colour challenge going on...

As usual, we're allowed to use neutrals such as black, white, vanilla and crumb cake.

This combo certainly got me thinking and I ended up with three samples to show you, all quite different styles, but hopefully that just means at least one of them will be to your taste!

For my first card I went with an animal that's grey and used one of my favourite techniques (ink blending) to incorporate the other two colours. Here's how that one turned out:

Materials used:

• stamps - Animal Outing, Butterfly Gala
• card - smoky slate, shimmer white, whisper white
• other - stitched rectangle die, circle die, Big Shot, Stampin' Blends, Stamparatus, blending brushes, craft foam

My second offering is much more subdued, this time featuring two stamps from the Very Versailles set plus some epoxy dots coloured with Stampin' Blends for small bursts of colour. All the embossing was done first, then I over-stamped with smoky slate ink to give this tone-on-tone effect. I love how it gives great shadow and depth to the sentiment.

Materials used:

• stamps - Very Versailles
• card - whisper white, smoky slate
• other - white embossing powder, heat tool, Stampin' Blends, craft foam, epoxy dots, embossing buddy, stitched rectangle die, Big Shot

And lastly, a bit of fun with those adorable meerkats from the SAB catalogue. Here's the front...

Now open it up, and...

So cute! Who doesn't love meerkats, am I right? LOL.

Materials used:

• stamps - The Gang's All Meer
• card - whisper white, Bermuda bay
• other - cloud die, Big Shot, Sahara sand marker, black marker, Stampin' Blends, Stamparatus

To follow along the rest of the blog hop just click on the buttons below to move back or forward till the circuit is complete, and we'll be very happy if you leave each person some comment love for their efforts!

Thanks for calling in.

Cheers

Kez