Cute Card Thursday sketch

Cute Card Thursday is a year old- Happy Birthday to them! And to celebrate they have a fabulous sketch by Katharina, one I will definitely be using again.

I haven't used this Magnolia that came in my Winter stamp kit, so I thought it was time she had an inking up! I have watercoloured her and washed the background. I masked her and stamped the Magnolia swirly vine up the side, and then inked the edge of the tag. All the papers are patterned, just very lightly, and I have gone for a pastelly spring feel as the days seem to be warmer and drier now! The lacey ribbon was a rash buy, but it seems to work on this as it is not too heavy. Instead of a photo corner I have repeated the swirly vine. I inked up all the paper edges and stamped scrolls round my sentiment. To finish I added punched flowers and leaves, and folded one of the corners up and added a gem.

I have to say I am pleased with how it is looking, and hope its recipiant does too!
Recipe:
Stamp(s): Magnolia; PB Saluations
Colouring Media: Distress inks; colour box dusky plum
Papers: Fancy Pants Botanical
Embellishments: Punched flowers (EK Success, X Cut), punched Leaves (Em Leone), gems and ribbon from stash

Hearts and flowers

Another combined challenge for me ... crafting time seems to be slipping away from me during the week, so I have combined the Spoonfull of Sugar sketch with the Papertake Weekly Challenge, Hearts and flowers.

I watercoloured the image in and resisted the temptation to distress her!! So instead I did some faux stitching! The papers are all from a co-ordinating pack and come with the matching lace ribbon, so all I needed to do was raid my flower stash for some flowers! The dp does have rises on it, and the image has hearets on it to, so got both hearts and flowers in there! I wrote the sentiment myself.
Recipe:
Stamp(s): Penpal (Sugar Nellie)
Colouring Media: Distress inks
Papers: Fancy Pants
Embellishments: Prima flowers, Fancy Pants ribbon, brads from stash

Crafty Weekend

This is going to be a bit of a long post!!
I have spent the weekend with a fab bunch of crafty friends ... not partners or children ... just crafting! I can't believe how many cards I have made, and it was bliss crafting without having little fingers or paws fiddling, pinching or otherwise intruding!
For the retreat I did a demo on distressing and paper beads and these are the cards I made, using Sugar Nellie's gorgeous Bird house stamp.

I don't know who the papers are but I love them and have bought up the craft shop's supply!! I coloured and distressed the background using my distress inks, and distressed the papers using my paper distresser - a much coveted tool!! I stamped scrolls on the cardstock and added ribbon and Prima Hydraegena flowers.

I used the same image for this, but gorgeous brown dp (again unknown). I demoed making the paper beads that i put on this card. I love these paper beads - so quick and easy to make and a different embellishment on a card. No flowers on this one ... yet. I am pondering a couple, but not sure yet. I love my PB Duckling stamp, and haven't inked it for a while. I thought I would start on some Easter cards and combine a few challenges in the process. So I made this circle card for the PBSC this week, which is circle cards. I used my scalloped nestie to cut the circle and crop-a-dile to punch the holes. I used yellow cardstock and DCWV Pocketful of Posies papers. The duckling is distressed, and the ribbons are from my stash. I have scanned the card with blue cardstock behind so you can see the card.

For this card I used this week's sketch from Sketch Saturday - I used ribbon as well as papers for some of the elements. Its that fab duckling again, with cardstock and this cute little flowers and adhesive gems.

I have had these fancy pants papers for a while, but thought they would work really well with this gorgeous image by PB - Lazy Days, I added co-ordinating ribbon, brads and buttons to complete it.
The last three cards feature animals so all three fit this week's Secret Crafter challenge ... animals.

I can't wait for the next retreat!!

A pink Valentine

... well red and pink, but as slushy as I can get ... just for you Becky and Alison!!
Love really does seem to be in the air at the moment ... every challenge is love or Valentine's!! Either hubby is going to get lots of cards or I'll just have to find someone else to send a few too!!
So both Cute Card Thursday and Whiff of Joy have Valentine's as their challenge, so another combined challenge, using Lili of the Valley's sketch this week. Bit of a cheat combining them but I have a stinking cold and don't feel very crafty.
Anyway here is my effort...

I coloured and distressed Melinda and matted her onto that fab stripey paper, found at the bottom of my 12x12 stash. The heart is stamped and heat embossed using red tinsel powder to give it a bit of sparkle, and again matted onto the stripey paper. On the other side of the paper was ..pink heart paper!! So that is the backing, hopefully reasonably well covered with velvet ribbon, flowers, scrolls and a sentiment!

OK I really don't do pink, hearts, slush!! But I have tried!
Recipe:
Stamp(s): Melinda blowing Kisses (WOJ), heart was freebie, scroll TAC
Colouring Media: distress inks, heat embossing
Papers: Fancy pants Crush
Embellishments: prima flowers, adhesive gems and hearts from my stash