Less Is More Sketch

The Challenge at Less Is More this week is to use one of these two sketches, leaving plenty of white space.

I must say that my entry this week is totally inspired by Mandies' card, I liked the way she has used just part of the flower stamp, something I have been trying to do lately to get more use from some of my stamps.So I started by stamping part of this Floral Spray from Chocolate Baroque with Versafine Olympia Green ink and colouring it with Colour Soft pencils. The card I used is very slightly textured and doesn't colour terribly well pencils, but when I had finished I used a paper stump and some Sansodor to blend the colours which helped a lot. I trimmed it to size and inked the edge with the Versafine ink. I mounted it onto the card slightly raised on foam pads and stamped the sentiment underneath again with the same ink. I am fairly pleased with the result although I would probably add some ribbon or some sort of bling by choice.

I am also entering this for, Make It Monday; Anything Goes.
Stamps And Fun; Use a Sketch from Another Current Challenge.

Thank you for all your lovely comments.

Charmed

It is a very long time since I entered a card  for Less Is More, not
because I didn't want to I just seem to be busy doing other things. Anyway  I noticed this week that their challenge was to make and/or use a charm and as I like adding charms to my cards and I needed a quick card for a friend I decided to have a go. I stamped the Hero Arts flower twice, inked with seedless preserves and forest moss Distress Inks onto white card. Then the quote which is from Chocolate Baroque was stamped with Memento Tuxedo black. I trimmed the card and mounted it onto some mauve pearl card. I then wrapped some narrow matching ribbon with a flower charm threaded on it around and fixed it all to a folded white card. A nice quick card to make and one that I was quite pleased with. Sorry to Chrissie and Mandie for being absent for so long, I will try and be back soon.

I am also entering this for The Craft Room Challenge; Ink It
and Make It Monday; Anything Goes.

Alphatags H and I

Here are my H and I tags for this months Chocolate Baroque Alphatag swap. I had a hard time deciding on what to do for I, not so much because I couldn't think of anything, as that I couldn't match my ideas with any of my    Chocolate Baroque stamps. I had forgotten this set until
 my friend asked if I had a music stamp that she could borrow to make a birthday card for her son, and between us we came up with Instrument.
 First I will tell you about H for Honeysuckle. For both
these tags I began with a Crafty Individuals Shabby Tag, they are pre-printed with a light brown edge and some feint script. I first coloured the tag with Distress Stains, Antique Linen and Bundled Sage and then stamped a Crafty  Individuals  crackle stamp all over it with Brilliance Galaxy Gold . I used the main image from the CB Fragrant Honeysuckle set stamped with Versafine Olympia Green and coloured it with Coloursoft pencils. I stamped a small butterfly on some spare card and coloured it again with the pencils, cut it out and and fixed it to the tag with the wings slightly raised with silicon glue. The H was cut with I think, an Ex-Cut die and embossed using the Brilliance gold ink and Papermania Holographic embossing powder.I sponged a little Forest Moss Distress ink around the edges of the tag to darken them slightly.                                    


For the second tag I again started by using Antique Linen Distress Stain  to colour the center and Tea Dye Distress Ink around the edges. I stamped the CI crackle background first with Antique Linen  and then again across opposite corners with Brilliance Lightening Black. I stamped the image from CB Music Fanfare set onto the tag with Memento Rich Cocoa and twice more onto spare card. The images were coloured with a mixture of distress inks and a waterbrush, and coloured pencils.I cut out the instument with some of the flowers attached from one image and just the front flower from the other one and attached them to the tag image with silicon glue to give it a little bit of dimension. I try not to make them too bulky as the idea is to bind them with a book ring to make an alpha book. The  word instrument was printed onto Safmat and applied to the tag. The edes were finished off with a little Walnut Stain Distress Ink.

So now I am eagerly waiting to see what everyone else in the swap has been doing and which ones I get back.

Hello and welcome to Leslie, my newest follower and thank you to everyone for your kind comments, they are much appreciated. Jean

Pressed flower Card

I have a card made with pressed flowers to show you today, but not the traditional dried kind of pressed flowers. I saw this method in the April edition of Craft Stamper magazine in a feature by Riet van Zundert. She had made some beautiful cards and gifts and I couldn't wait to have a go.The flowers are placed between two sheets of paper or card and and then passed through a Cuttlebug or similar machine using the appropriate plates. The papers are then separated and the squashed flower petals carefully removed with tweezers and a soft brush for any stubborn bits.You then have one piece of paper with the print of the flowers and a  paler one with some of the colour and a fainter print from the back of the flowers.It is great fun to do and you have to be prepared to be surprised at the results because some flowers print their true colours and some turn out quite different. I think the paper you use could make a difference too.I used some small pansies and polyanthus as that is all that was suitable in the garden at the moment.The flowers need to be soft petaled and reasonably flat and the same goes for leaves which can also work well. They can be sprayed with mica mists before or after pressing for some added shimmer.
To make the card  I cut a piece from one of the flower papers                
 with a Go Kreate die, and then punched out some daisies in two sizes. I layered a pale green piece of card onto a 5"x7" ivory folded card,and then another ivory panel over the green.I cut the loopy circle with a Memory Box die, the lacy edge with a Marianne die and the flourish with a Tim Holtz die, all in the matching green card. I layered everything together and tied a lilac ribbon across and then fixed the daisies in place adding a little yellow Stickles to the centres.

I am entering this for Make it Monday's Always Anything Goes.

Thank you to everyone who comes to take a look here and to those of you who leave comments, they are all appreciated.

Magnolia Birthday

While I was staying with my youngest sister last week I stamped this beautiful magnolia image with a stamp from her very large collection. I don't know the make of it but I was drawn to it because I don't recall ever seeing it anywhere before and I do love to see the Magnolia trees in flower at this time of year.I stamped the image with Memento Rich Cocoa ink and coloured it with
pencils.I tore round the edge and used Tea Dye and
Tattered Rose DI inks to add some shading. When I came home I used it to make this card for my eldest sister's birthday at the weekend.I used a Chocolate Baroque corner stamp from the Nature Swirls set and Brilliance Pearlescent Beige ink to create a border round the edge of a square card, and embossed a piece of mauve pearl card using a Cuttlebug folder to make a background mat. The stamped image was the mounted with thin foam tape and I added some ribbon and roses from my stash.  To finish I stamped a tiny Happy Birthday ticket and two little butterflies which I had stamped and coloured to match.

I am entering this for the following challenges.
Marks finest Papers and Stamps;Make a Square Card.
Sugar Creek Hollow; Birthday Card.
That Crafty Place Challenge; It's All About Spring.
Fashionable Stamping Challenges; Spring Is In The Air.

Thank you for stopping by,and for your comments, I appreciate them all.

Alphatags E,F,& G

Hi every one, it is ages since I have posted anything here, but to be honest I have been sadly lacking inspiration lately and haven't made anything much worth blogging about. Thank you to every one who has stopped by anyway, and for all your nice comments. I see I also have at least one new follower so welcome and I hope you will find something to inspire you.
 Anyway although inspiration was hard to come by I knew I needed to get on with my E F and G tags for the Chocolate Baroque  Alphatag swap this month.I had several ideas for F but I found the other two difficult to find subjects that went with my collection of CB stamps, and in the end resorted to looking through the dictionary for ideas and these are the tags I came up with.

E for Easter:
This tag was first coloured using Paper-Soft-Colour by Viva, I like this medium because it gives a nice soft colour finish and the colours blend together very easily.I then over stamped it using the same paint with a stamp from the CB Texture Fragments set.The dangley branch is from the Wisteria Lane set and was stamped with Versafine Olympia Green.I stamped the cross from the With Sympathy set onto the tag with Walnut Stain Distress ink and then again onto some spare card and embossed it with WOW gold EP and then cut it out.I lightly rubbed Walnut Stain ink all over it making it slightly darker round the edge and then mounted it over the first one with 1mm foam pads.The Easter Blessings stamp is by Oyster Stamps and again stamped with Olympia Green ink.I added a narrow German Scrap border at the bottom and a green gemstone to the centre of the cross to embellish.







   F is for Fun Fair:
All the stamps for this tag are from the CB Carousel Horses set.The tag was coloured with Distress Inks in bundled Sage, Peeled Paint, Broken China and Stormy Sky, and the fairground image and the horse stamped with Memento London Fog.The bunting was stamped with the same ink and the horse with Walnut Stain on a separate piece of card and then coloured with ColourSoft pencils and cut out.I used a gold gel pen to add highlights on the horse.Both were attached to the tag with silicon glue and the words were stamped with black ink straight onto the tag and again coloured with pencils.I added the German Scrap tassel border to the bottom.





G is for Gears:
Now this is the letter that caused me the most trouble, but during my search of the dictionary I  found  this definition of gear, ( a toothed wheel that is one of a set of interlocking wheels ) and I thought of this lovely stamp that I have had for a little while but not had occasion to use yet. It is from a CB set called Stampunk Romance, so out it came.The tag was first lightly sponged with Rusty Hinge and Pumice Stone DI and then the image stamped with Memento Rich Cocoa.I used a Tim Holtz Embossing folder to emboss the top right hand corner and inked lightly over the embossing with the Rusty Hinge ink.I slightly distressed a gold letter brad with Terra Cotta  alcohol ink and distress stickles and added it to the other corner. I added some colour to the main image with coloured pencils and added distress stickles to the butterflies and flower centres.
This has turned into a bit of a marathon so well done if you stuck it through to the finish. I did enjoy making these in the end and I hope the recipients will enjoy them too. I am now looking forward to getting my swaps.
It may be a while before I post again as I am off to sunny (hopefully) Spain later in the week to see my sister.

A Little Bird Told Me...

Tomorrow is my sisters birthday and this is the card I have made for her.The base card is 5x7 inch ivory thick card with a panel of dark green deckle edged green card mounted to leave a small border.The next layer is very pale pink card embossed with a Tim Holtz brick wall embossing folder, and torn around the edge. The main image is a Chocolate Baroque stamp from a set called Pretty Birdcage and is stamped with Memento Rich Cocoa ink and coloured with Coloursoft pencils.The branch, bird and two front flowers are lightly decopaged, (just two layers).The shading  is done with Tattered Rose DI and the ribbon coloured with the same ink.The little gold bird is cut with a Marrianne die and to finish I hung an Ideaology chain tassle onto a birdcage charm and fixed it to the die cut with a brad.

I am entering this for Allsorts Challenge - Anything Goes Stamptacular Sunday Challenge- Charm me ( use a charm)
Make it Monday # 77 - Always Anything Goes.