You Make Me Smile

Are you ready for a new Tic Tac Toe challenge? Here are the combinations we have to play with this time around:

I chose the middle horizontal line of pink, square card and CAS (clean and simple).

Isn't that face absolutely adorable? 🐷

Piggy is watercoloured and I added a touch of white gel pen to the eyes and cheeks. I love that the dies used for 'smile' are uneven sizes - for me, it adds to the playfulness of the card. I even used the number one for the 'l' rather than the capital L in the set. These dies have different font styles and sizes for all the letters and remind me of a ransom note with the letters cut from a magazine, lol.  

Materials used:

• stamps - Just Pig-Cause (Unity Stamp Co)
• dies - Word Play (Tim Holtz)
• other - MISTI, water brush, Sidekick, sentiment strip, white gel pen

I hope you'll get the chance to play along. Check out more samples to inspire you over on the TTTC blog.

Thanks for oinking by!

Cheers

Kerry

Sea Ya!

Today I'm playing along with the Simply Clean and Simple challenge for June. Their theme is always Anything Goes and this time around there's an optional topping of Nautical. 

As I do love me a nautical card and relished the challenge of making one CAS, I browsed through my Pinterest board and found a card by Ksenija that inspired me. Here's my card:

I masked off my paper and blended three shades of blue, then used a stencil on the back as a guide for the wavy lines, cutting and slightly separating them. The submarine has vellum windows and clear dots make great bubbles. I kept the sentiment short, sweet and punny, lol.

Materials used:

• dies - submarine (stash)
• stencils - slimline drifts & hills (MFT)
• distress inks - salvaged patina, peacock feathers, uncharted mariner, scattered straw, spiced marmalade
• other - blending brushes, clear dots, Coastal subsentiments (Waffle Flower), foam tape, vellum, Big Shot

Thanks for coming by.

Cheers

Kerry

Beach Vibes Only

It's been a while since I made a very clean and simple card but an idea popped into my head for a couple of CAS challenges so I went with it.

As I've been making lots of beach themed stuff lately (you'll see those in upcoming weeks), that was what came to mind.

I stamped the frame of the sunnies first then added the beach background, colouring it with Copics. My card background is a little bit of stencilled waves to add to the water theme, then some acrylic dots (clear and shimmery to look like air bubbles) and a sentiment rounded it off.

Materials used:

• stamp & die combo - Spectacular Adventures (Altenew)
• other - Copic markers, salvaged patina distress ink, blending brush, MISTI, Big Shot, Subsentiments Coastal (Waffle Flower), Dimensionals, opal rounds (SU), white gel pen, waves stencil

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers

Kerry

Simple and Elegant - Just Add Ink Challenge #741

It's Friday, which means it's time for another challenge with Just Add Ink and our brief for you this week is to:

I made a soft-toned sympathy card - something we unfortunately often need to have on hand, especially as we get older. 

For my focal feature I used a stamp/die/stencils set from PinkFresh Studios. A few pearls were all the embellishments needed.

Materials used:

• stamp, die, stencil set - Butterflies in Bloom (PinkFresh Studios)
• sentiment stamp - Country Flowers (Stampin' Up)
• distress inks - antique linen, dried marigold, saltwater taffy, shabby shutters
• Altenew inks - alpine aster, soft lilac, lavender fields, deep iris
• other - blending brushes, pearls, MISTI, grip mat, Big Shot, craft foam, Dimensionals

Do visit the Just Add Ink blog for more samples of simple and elegant to inspire you and if you create, we'd love you to share in our gallery.

Thanks for calling in.

Cheers

Kerry

Winter Wonderland

Experiencing a white Christmas was on my bucket list for quite some time and it almost happened the year my daughter was living in Scotland ... until a little ol' global pandemic came along and then nobody was going anywhere - hardly leaving the house, let alone to the other side of the world. Ah well, such is life. Now I enjoy winter in December through card making instead, lol. 

Today's card is for three challenges which happen to dovetail together very nicely.

 

 

My Tic Tac Toe choice was the top row of ink blending, snow and tree.

I began with masking my paper for the snowy ground and blended the sunset sky (red sky at night, shepherd's delight 😉). Stamping came next, then small touches of puff embossing powder on the tree branches and at the feet of the deer before gesso splatters for falling snow. I die cut some snowflakes to tuck behind, cut my scene into three parts to mount, stamped a sentiment and called it done!

Materials used:

• stamps - Postage Collage Winter View (Waffle Flower), Tiny Text Christmas (Tim Holtz)
• inks - blushing bride, lumberjack plaid, cherry cobbler, Versafine Clair nocturne
• other - snowflake dies, Sidekick, blending brushes, hills and drifts stencil (My Favorite Things), MISTI, craft foam, paint brushes, white puff embossing powder, heat tool, Versamark pen, white gesso

Thanks for calling in.

Cheers

Kerry

Nobody or No Body?

My attention was caught by the theme for the latest challenge at Addicted to CAS.

You all know I am partial to a pun, but I have to admit to being a bit unsure at first on what I had that would suit a clean and simple design. As luck would have it, I was sorting through some stuff and came across my dancing skeletons dies and the well-known phrase, 'Dance like nobody is watching' came to mind - and I realised I had my pun. Subtle but golden, lol. Here's my card:

I read enough whodunnits to know that skeletons are rarely just all white/cream, so I used a lovely mottled piece I had on hand from some oxide ink smooshing play. The sentiment was done on the computer and that's pretty much all there was to it apart from a little layering.

Thanks for dancing by!

Cheers

Kerry

PS - If you like a pun too, be sure to come back Monday night for a very special punny card...

Promise of Peace

Every now and then I enjoy the challenge of making a clean and simple (CAS) card and the theme at Addicted to CAS caught my eye and sparked an idea. I really hope I'm not the only one whose creative muse won't let me rest until I've sat down to see whether or not my idea will work ... 

And here's my offering:

This was a very quick card to make, probably no more than 10 mins start to finish. I die-cut the splat shape out of a piece of scrap card to use as a mask, blended with distress inks, stamped the sentiment and die-cut the gulls. Card done! 

Materials used:

• stamps - Sunrise, Sunset (Fairy Hugs)
• dies - Nesting Splat (Paper Rose), Guiding Light (Spellbinders)
• distress inks - scattered straw, saltwater taffy, abandoned coral, salvaged patina, mermaid lagoon
• other - blending brushes, MISTI, craft foam, Big Shot, VersaFine Clair Twilight ink

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers

Kerry

Summer Fun

It seems like almost every challenge blog based in the northern hemisphere has Summer has their theme at the moment. Certainly it's no hardship to be thinking of warmer days and outdoor fun instead of the rain and cold, lol. A couple of clean and simple challenges caught my eye and when an idea popped into mind ... well, you know how that goes ...

And here's my offering:

This was most definitely a challenge for me, I kept wanting to add things, lol. Even now my fingers are itching ...

Materials used:

• stamps - Postage Collage, Postage Collage Beach Days (Waffle Flower)
• stencils - Postage Collage Beach Days (Waffle Flower)
• dies - Postage Collage (Waffle Flower)
• inks - crumb cake (Stampin' Up), salvaged patina, peacock feathers, candied apple, carved pumpkin (distress), hickory smoke (distress archival), black
• other - blending brushes, Big Shot, MISTI, mounting tape

Still a ways to go before we can say goodbye to winter, but thoughts of sunshine and beaches are always welcome!

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers

Kerry

Just Add Ink #698 - Choose Two

It's a choose two challenge this week at Just Add Ink and the options we're giving you are

I chose flowers and leaves for a clean and simple watercoloured card. 

I embossed my stamped image, which gives a nice border when I'm watercolouring, and used my Zig real brush markers. I absolutely love these markers but you do have to be choosy with paper as they don't blend well on all brands. Here I used Ranger's distress watercolour card, stamping on the smooth side. 

Materials used:

• stamps - Caring Thoughts/Dear Friend (Simon Says Stamp)
• card - distress watercolour (Ranger), gorgeous grape (Stampin' Up)
• other - Dimensionals, MISTI, Wordies Sentiment Sheets - Everyday (Creative Expressions), craft foam, water brush, clear embossing powder, heat tool, Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers, black ink

We'd love you to get out your own flower, leaf and pot supplies, create and share on the Just Add Ink blog. Head on over to see the lovely samples my team-mates have made to inspire you.

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers

Kerry

Just Add Ink #694 - Just Add a Colour Combo

Who loves colour? Meeeeeeeeeee!!!! Woo hoo, it's time for a colour combo challenge with Just Add Ink and here's what we have for you this week:

I gotta say, this particular combo was a true challenge for me because in a month of Sundays I would not have thought to put these three colours together. Peacock and Cajun, sure, both bold beautiful autumnal tones from the same colour family - but to add fresh freesia? Nikki sure wanted to test us all when she picked these!

That being said, however, once I (finally!) settled on a design idea and began colouring, I came to like this unusual pairing. For me it was all about balance and how much space I let each colour take - the softer freesia could easily be overpowered by the darker tones. Here's how my card ended up:

I started with cutting my freesia base then used the same card for my back layer but darkened it by inking around the edges with matching ink. I sponged some more freesia on my white foreground and gave that some water splatters, letting them dry naturally so I'd get that lovely dark ring around the edges of the drops. My adorable little chameleon was watercoloured and I have to admit to going through a few trial runs before settling on this one, lol. I stamped my sentiment, added some gems and called it good!

Materials used:

• stamps - Colour My World (Clearly Besotted)
• card - fresh freesia, basic white (Stampin' Up), watercolour
• other - blending brush, aqua painter, MISTI, Dimensionals, craft foam, SU markers, clear gems

Why not try your hand at this fascinating combination too - you may surprise yourself just as I did! And it goes without saying that we'd love to see your creations in our gallery. Now head on over to the Just Add Ink blog to see what my fellow team mates did with them!

Thanks for dropping by.

Cheers

Kerry

Cats Don't Share

Once again the challenge at AAA Cards caught my eye:

I mean, come on! Ink blending? Yeah, baby! In what universe was I ever going to turn that away? 😂😉 

Nothing came to mind immediately so I just let it percolate in the back of my brain for a day or two until an idea started brewing ...

I die-cut first then coloured with oxide inks - I may have mentioned a time or two (thousand) how amazing these are for blending. It was very difficult to stop the orange bleeding into the white, but hey, them's the breaks. I just kept cleaning my brush and hoping, lol. Then it was a matter of picking which mischievious feline from the set would best suit, and as they're all so fabulous that was the hardest part of the card, lol. I think this one really looks like it's saying "mine!" 😂😂😂 So yeah, a very simple card but I love it.

Materials used:

• card - kraft, basic black, watercolour
• distress oxide inks - picket fence, carved pumpkin, mustard seed
• Tim Holtz dies - Mischevious, Bold Text Halloween
• other - blending brushes, Big Shot, craft foam, Ranger white pigment ink

Thanks for stopping by. May you have some ink blending in your day too!

Cheers

Kerry

Out of this World

The current challenge at AAA Cards caught my eye this week.

I remembered that I had a spaceman die-cut image I'd made but never ended up using, so I searched through my stash and found it, thinking it would be perfect for this challenge. Thank goodness for hoarding all those 'I might use it one day' bits and bobs! 😉

The die-cut pieces were coloured using Copic markers and I added a little white panpastel to the astronaut's face mask to give the illusion of rounding. I love the planets as balloons but my fav is definitely the space suit, so adorable. My sentiment was done on the computer as I don't have a stamp set with this theme - something I probably need to remedy as my new grandson grows, lol. If this weren't a clean and simple card I would use SU's Stargazing DSP, but it makes a great backdrop instead!

Thanks for floating by (lol).

Cheers

Kerry

JAI #665 - Just Add CAS

This week at Just Add Ink we're challenging you to make a CAS creation - clean and simple. Generally that's defined as minimal layers and embellishments and lots of wide open "white" space.

For my card I've gone for jungle themed cuteness with a sweet-as-can-be zebra.

I sponged a little green ink in my lower corner then stencilled some leaves in a slightly darker shade. The image was coloured with Copics then die cut and attached with Dimensionals.

Materials used:

• stamps - African Animals (C.C. Designs)
• card - basic white, basic black (SU), Monochrome Basics 1.1 (Paper Rose)
• distress oxide inks - bundled sage, mowed lawn
• Copic markers - C0,C2,C4,C5,E51,E40
• other - African Animals die set, leaf stencil, blending brush, MISTI, Dimensionals

Check out more clean and simple inspiration over on the Just Add Ink blog.

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers

Kerry

Love is Love

I was in the mood to create but it was late at night so I couldn't cope with anything too intricate. As luck would have it, I came across two clean and simple challenges I think go perfectly together - CAS on Friday's theme is LOVE and Addicted to CAS has RAINBOW COLOURS - and once an idea popped into my head there would be no rest until I tried it out. Here's my card:

Materials used:

• card - basic black, basic white
• distress oxide inks - candied apple, spiced marmalade, mustard seed, mowed lawn, prize ribbon, wilted violet
• other - Gentlemen thinlits (Tim Holtz), Big Shot, blending brushes, hills and drifts stencil (MFT)

I applied my colours on white card using a hills and drifts stencil and I like to think it symbolises love flowing all around us and through us. I then cut my gentleman die twice - one on the front side of the card, the second on the reverse to give me the mirror image. 

I feel it doesn't need a sentiment, so this is indeed a very clean and simple card.

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers

Kerry

Ummm....

A clean and simple challenge caught my eye this week and I thought the optional twist sounded fun.

And here's my offering

Materials used:

• stamps - Stamptember 2020 (Tim Holtz)
• card - basic white, granny apple green
• Copic markers - E42,E43,Y21,Y32,G20,G40,G43,R05,R24,R27
• other - craft foam, blending brush, Sahara sand marker, MISTI, white gel pen

Thanks for dropping by.

Cheers

Kerry

Edited to add: I was lucky to have my card picked in the Top 3 for this challenge. Many thanks to the AAA Cards design team. 

Stay Curious

The Less is More challenge caught my eye this week.

It's extremely rare for me to make a CAS masculine card so I was quite intrigued and gave it a bit of pondering before I came up with this card:

Materials used:

• stamps - Moth Study (Tim Holtz)
• card - crumb cake, very vanilla, basic black
• Copic markers - E31,E55,YR12,YR24,BG72,BG09
• other - stitched rectangle die, Big Shot, Small Talk stickers (Tim Holtz), Specimen remnant rubs (Tim Holtz), optical lens (Tim Holtz), craft foam, crumb cake ink, MISTI, collage medium matte, sponge dauber, in-colour faceted dots (SU)

Thanks for dropping in.

Cheers

Kerry

Challenge Duo

Today's card is for two challenges: my old friends at CAS on Friday are challenging us to use stencils and the good folks at Color Throwdown have another lovely combo to try.

 

Lime green, aqua and gold

Now, you know I'm a sucker for a good colour combo plus how could I resist the chance to use stencils? As an added bonus, it gave me an excuse to play with two of Stampin' Up's new in colours. Here's my clean and simple card:

I firstly stamped in gold ink then used layering stencils to colour the stamped image, brushing lightly for the first layer then putting more concentrated ink on for the second layer. I cut out the image using the matching die, found a sentiment and added a few gold pearls and voila! card done! 

Materials used:

• stamps - Itty Bitty Greetings (SU)
• stamp/die/stencils - Songbirds on Branches (PinkFresh Studios)
• inks - Tahitian tide, parakeet party (SU), Golden Glitz (Delicata), Tuxedo Black (Memento)
• other - clear embossing powder, heat tool, gold pearls, Stamparatus, Big Shot, blending brushes, Dimensionals, craft foam, stitched rectangle die, black marker

I hope you get the opportunity to be crafty today. Thanks for stopping by. 

Cheers

Kerry

Crazy Birthday - CAS on Friday Challenge #226

Hi all, welcome to another clean and simple challenge with CAS on Friday. I'm hosting challenge #226  where our theme is a ONE LAYER BIRTHDAY CARD. 

For my sample I chose to do some simple masking and watercolouring with an adorably quirky bird. Just love this little guy.

Materials used:

• stamps - Mini Bird Crazy and Things (Tim Holtz), Typed Sentiments (Paper Rose)
• card - watercolour (300gsm)
• distress inks - salvaged patina, black soot
• distress crayons - mermaid lagoon, twisted citron, prize ribbon, picked raspberry, carved pumpkin, mustard seed, crackling campfire
• other - post-it notes, MISTI, aqua painter, black soot archival ink, clear embossing powder, heat tool, white gel pen, black marker, water spritzer, blending brush

We'd love to see your card in our gallery and of course do follow the link to the CASOF blog to look at the other samples created to inspire you. 

This is my last challenge with CAS on Friday as I've chosen to step down from the design team after two years. It has been a pleasure and a wonderfully growing experience as a crafter and I hope if CAS is your jam that you'll continue to support their challenges moving forward. 

Thanks for calling in.

Cheers

Kerry

Spring Flowers - CAS on Friday Challenge #225

Hi all! It's time for another clean and simple challenge and this time around at CAS on Friday we're celebrating Spring Flowers.

I've yet to experience a spring here in my new home but back in the Blue Mountains it was always wonderful to see those first buds (usually freesias) pop up to tell you the cold days were numbered and the warmth and freshness of Spring would soon be on its way. One of the flowers I loved having in my garden was lavender, not just because it was a low maintenance plant and drought tolerant (very important here in Australia), but because it bloomed in mid Spring and gave us glorious colour and scent all through Spring and Summer. 

I’ve featured lavender on my mini slimline card.

Materials used:

• stamps - Flowers in Bloom (MFT)
• card - very vanilla, watercolour
• dies - Wildflower Stems 2 (Tim Holtz)
• distress oxide inks - villainous potion, milled lavender, dusty concord, bundled sage
• other - mounting tape, white bakers twine, V15 Copic marker, aquapainter, paint brush 

We would love to see your creation in our gallery if you choose to make one, and do pop over to the CASOF blog to see what lovely cards my team mates made to inspire you.

Thanks for visiting.

Cheers

Kerry

Bold and Beautiful Butterfly - CAS on Friday Challenge #199

Hi everyone and welcome!

It's time for another clean and simple challenge with CAS on Friday and this time around I got to pick our theme. Inspired by summer here in Australia, I decided on a colour challenge of turquoise/teal, orange and white. 

Such bright, cheerful colours that look stunning together - I hope they'll inspire you as much as they did me.

For my card I couldn't resist the opportunity to use this gorgeous butterfly from Tim Holtz's Specimen set, adding a little ink blending and stencilling for my background. The pattern in the centre of the inspiration picture gave me a Middle Eastern/Morroccan vibe, so I picked a trellis design along those lines for my stencil.

And there's plenty of shine and shimmer when it catches the light.

Materials used:

• stamps - Specimen (TH), Fancy Sayings (Clearly Besotted)
• card - whisper white
• distress oxide ink - ripe persimmon
• other - trellis stencil, distress embossing dabber (TH), crackling campfire embossing glaze (TH), heat tool, blending brush, craft foam, Stamparatus, alcohol markers, clear Wink of Stella, clear sequins

My fellow DT members have some beautiful samples to get your creative juices flowing over on the CASOF blog, so pop over to take a look. And, of course, we'd love you to join us in the challenge.

Thanks for calling in.

Cheers

Kez