Messing about with stamps

Morning all.  I'm way out of my comfort zone with the new challenge at Cardz4guyz.  The theme is 'Let's get messy' which is really not me at all.  Yes, of course my craft room is a tip and my desk is somewhere under a pile of miscellaneous rubbish but I hate to get my hands dirty.  When my sisters were busy making mud pies I would probably have had my nose in a book.  Don't like anything yukky!  Which gave me a bit of a problem for this challenge.  What was I going to create?  Inspiration came from my other half, although in an annoying kind of way.  He is totally addicted to coffee.  It's his one and only vice.  He's got a coffee ninja in the kitchen and I am forever mopping up splashes of the stuff.  So I went looking for a coffee splash stamp.  I eventually found this one from Altenew.  I was leaving it a bit late but Tara at Seven Hills Crafts is fabulous and I received it within 24 hours.  So I inked up a square with antique linen distress ink and then stamped it, rather ironically, in tea dye distress ink.  Here is my very messy card.

I did splash a little brown watercolour paint on just to get in the spirit of the challenge but I was very careful where I splashed it.  Now I'm off to wash my hands!

Please nip over and join in the fun.  

Thanks for reading.

Love Dawn x

Fuchsia Fun

I was recently asked to make a card for a friends daughter-in-law and, as I used an image from Sheepski Designs, I uploaded it to their Facebook Challenge.  I didn't blog it at the time.  It was just one of those things.  Imagine my surprise when, not only did I win, I was asked to be a guest designer for this month's challenge. Andrea kindly offered me a free digi of my choice (as well as my winning image) to create my card.  I chose this gorgeous Fuchsia and I had so much fun colouring it.  It turned out wonderfully.  Anyway, the challenge was to use layers so I did.  Here it is.

I coloured it with my spectrum noirs but added some finer detail with inktense pencils.  I'm so pleased  with the results.  If you'd like to join in the fun pop over and join the Sheepski Designs Facebook Page.  

If you are curious to see the card I won with here it is.

Thanks for reading.

Love Dawn x

Shake it off!

Here we are again with a new challenge at Back to Basics and Beyond.  These challenges do seem to come around quickly. I didn't mind this one though as I quite enjoy making the odd Shaker Card.  That, and I needed a golden wedding anniversary card.  I kept my shaker card very simple, cutting a heart from some cream and gold paper and printing the names of the recipients onto acetate.  I then filled the hole with gold hearts and 50s and stuck it onto a card.  Simples.  

The hardest part was making sure all the 50s were the right way around.  The DT have been really inventive with this challenge so please pop over for a look and join in the fun.

Thanks for reading.

Love Dawn x

Going Around in Circles

Morning all.  It's new challenge time at Make My Monday and today we want to see some circles.  I have a die with  connecting circles that I had bought and never used so it seemed like a good idea to get it out.  I cut it in black and inlaid it onto white card.  I then cut it in pearlised white, grey and pink.  I then inlaid those.  Yeah, right!  Good idea it may have been - flippin infuriating it was.  I was surrounded by lots of tiny little circles that kept disappearing.  I cut a few more to replace those and they got everywhere.  Well, everywhere but where I wanted them.  Then when I had finished it I didn't like it.  It was all going off at the bottom of the card and needed balance.  I cut a little birthday banner but it got lost on the card.  In the end I just grabbed a load of the left over circles and glued them where they fell.  Here's the result.

The picture is a little washed out and the pearlised white circles get lost in the scanning process but the overall effect is better than it ought to be.  Sometimes it is better to keep going than to give up.  What do you think to the end result?

I'd love to see what you make of the challenge.  Please pop over and give it a try.

Thanks for reading.  

Love Dawn x

Never too Late for Mardis Gras

Morning all.  I'm here with another DT card for this month's Sparkles Monthly Challenge.  We want you to create a stamped background for your card.  When it came to making my card I was looking through my stamps and couldn't resist creating a little Mardis Gras for my blog.  I've had this stamp set, from Avery Elle, for donkey's years.  I'm not sure if it's still available.  I fell in love with it but have rarely used it so this seemed like an opportunity not to miss.  I'm only a couple of weeks late for the actual event and the party does seem to go on for a while in New Orleans so I think I'm OK.  

I used the traditional colours of purple, green and gold. The stamp set comes with lots of tiny elements (stars, feathers, diamonds etc) so I loaded them all onto my stamp platform and covered them in gold embossing powder.  I then inked over the top with distress ink.  I stamped the mask and the sentiment in the same way and used purple colours on that before cutting it out and mounting it on my background.  Then I added my sentiment and a few 'Dame Edna' touches.  Voila!  Did you know that Mardis Gras is actually French for 'fat Tuesday'.  Don't say my blog isn't educational.  You'll be thanking me when that one comes up on Pointless.

Pop over and join the fun.  We do love to see what you come up with.

Thanks for reading.

Love Dawn x

With a Little Zest

Morning all.  New theme time over at The Alphabet Challenge.  We are into the tricky letters at the moment but, in this instance, Z is for Zesty Colours.  Lemons, limes, oranges etc.  Am I talking about a colour scheme or a fruit bowl? My sister, Marie, delighted in feeding all the babies in our family with slices of lemon just to see the expression on their faces.  Don't worry, they've all had years of practice in getting their own back. 

Much as I do like my citrus fruit, oranges are the only ones I can sit and eat.  So, what to do about the lemons and limes?  Let me show you...

I inked the background with distress inks and flicked it with some water with mica powder in it.  It looks as if I have spilt my drink but, believe me, I am never that clumsy.  The glass is part of a stamp from Crafter's Companion.  I have been using this a lot just recently.  

Please pop over and join in the fun.

Thanks for reading.

Love Dawn x

A Guy Card to Die For

Morning all.  Time for a new challenge at Cardz4guyz.  The challenge is 'To Die For'.  How very dramatic.  We don't mean literally of course but we would like you to use dies on your project.  I have hundreds of dies in my collection but I started out years ago with an old wizard machine and spellbinders dies.  I managed to brake the iron bar on the machine but I still have the dies.  Here I have dug two of the really old sets out to cut some tools.  The metallic background is a new embossing folder (it's getting so I have almost as many of them as I do dies).

Here is how it turned out.

The sentiment is computer generated and, other than that, I kept it fairly simple.  

Please come and join in the fun.  You may have some dies I need to add to my wish list. 

Thanks for reading.

Love Dawn x

Bingo!

Morning all.  It's time to go Back to Basics and Beyond.  We had some stunning pop up boxes last time but, unfortunately, not that many.  Hopefully a quick game of Bingo (Tic Tac Toe) will be more up your street.  Here's the card:

The idea is to choose a line across, down or diagonally and use those elements on your card.  It's a great idea if you are stuck for inspiration.  I chose the first line down and went pink with a tag and twine.  Here is how it turned out.

The elephant is from an old clear stamp set from Do Crafts.  Would you believe it, none of the set has seen ink before now.  Haven't we all got a few of those?  Please don't tell my hubby!

It's amazing the different projects you can make from the one bingo card so please pop over and join the fun.  

Thanks for reading

Love Dawn x

Good Luck Josh

Happy Monday everyone.  I suppose that most people dread Mondays coming around but recently one of our team got a new job (still with the same firm but in a different office).  It's so long since I changed jobs but I imagine that it must make Monday a bit more exciting than usual.  Anyway, as Josh was leaving, it gave me a good excuse to create a card for this week's Make My Monday challenge.  Our theme is something 'New'.  You can use new stash or create for a new home, baby or job.  Here is Josh's card.

The image is from Tiddlyinks.  It comes with some flowers and, up to now, I've only used those and not the typewriter.  I love how this turned out.  I added the bling as it was a bit boring before.  To be fair, I wish it looked like this in real life but the bling is just a flat glass orangy/brown.  It turned out like marbles in the scanned shot.  If anyone ever makes bling like that I'm first in the queue.  

Please pop over and join in the fun.  We do like to see your creations.

Thanks for reading.

Love Dawn x