a DAZ card

Occasionally I like to make clean and simple cards (CAS, or DAZ as I call them!) especially if I have a stamp that I think would look awesome.
This Kanban roses stamp is one of those stamps.

I decided to stamp directly to the card blank with Stazon, then stamped the roses again a few times on a scrap piece of cardstock so that I could layer the roses themselves.
I also thought that it would make a nice change to colour this image with SU inks and a water brush (another reason for using stazon)
Colours were a mix of garden green, old olive, close to cocoa, summer sun & barely banana.
The sentiment is from SU's 'best yet' stamp set.

Here's a closer pic of the layered roses...

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Sweet Stampin - anything goes
Allsorts - keep it simple
Simon Says Stamp - anything goes
Truly Scrumptious - Clean and Simple
Crafty Creations - CAS
Squigglefly - floral fantasy
Craft Your Passion - green, yellow, black & white

Exciting news to share!

As some of you may know, I have been guest designer for the current challenge over at Stamps R Us
Well I can now confirm that I will be staying on as their newest design team member! :)

At first, I was unsure whether to accept or not, purely because I was worried incase I didn't have time to join in at times (lots going on in my life right now)
But the lovely Jan has assured me that it won't be a problem if i need time-out. Thank you Jan xx
I only recently found Stamps R Us challenges, so you can guess how chuffed I am that I was asked to join this talented team of cardmakers.
As the new girl, I'm hoping that I can show this challenge blog to any crafters out there in blogland who maybe haven't seen their challenges yet.
I have 'met' the girls in the team, and know that we are going to have a wonderful time sharing our cards together. I'd like to thank each of them for welcoming me to their team :)


There is still time to join in with the current Operation Write Home birthday challenge. Closing date for challenge entries is 2nd October.

DT call for Sketch Saturday

We are currently looking for 2 new DT members!

Do you have your own personal blog?

Can you make one card each week?
You can use any craft materials you like to make your DT card but you must use the sketch provided.
We'd need you to post about our challenge on your own blog each week, leaving links to SS and to our sponsors on all posts.

Can you leave comments for our challengers?

Can you take a turn hosting a DT week.
you would need to make your own sketch for the challenge, arrange a sponsor, and arrange the guest designer (GD) too.

if you're interested, and want to know more, all details can be found HERE

Inspired by Fluff

Well another week has passed and it's Saturday morning, so that means it's time for another Sketch Saturday challenge.

This weeks challenge is sponsored by our good friends at The Craft Barn

This week Sandy is very generously giving our challenge winner a prize package worth almost £30! wooohooo! could it be you? the only way to be in with a chance is to join in our challenge this week.

Here's my card...

I have used the totally adorable Little Stars - Moon Lullaby digi stamp available for just 99p from Pollycraft.

Not so long ago, the lovely Faye made this beautifully cute card, she used Super Star, which is another of the stamps from the same Little Stars range from Pollycraft.

Now Faye loves yellow, everyone presumes she loves pink most of all (and she does love pink too) but yellow is her most favourite, and she used yellow as the colour palette for her card. It is a beauty! and inspired me to make a yellow baby card too, rather than automatically reaching for the pinks or blues.

Thank you Faye xx

Of course, I coloured this cutie in with my promarkers, I printed out the image 3 times so that I could layer parts of it once coloured.

I also added some white flock to the little cloud.

The papers used are all by Dovecraft (back to basics) apart from the plain yellow piece which was just from my scrap drawer and punched with my SU eyelet border punch.

The sentiment is handwritten.

I've decided that as well as a new camera, I also need to either buy or make myself a light box / photo box / other (delete as appropriate)

especially with the dark nights coming fast, I need to use my daylight lamp more often to take pics, and unfortunately that means glare (because I must be doing something wrong!) so I need to diffuse the light somehow.

Anyway, here is a close up of the layering of the image and the flock on the cloud...

Edited to add:

had another go at taking a photo in the daylight

Please stop by to see the beautiful cards made by The Saturdays this week, we also have the final cards by Jessica (our GD for September) and Lisa, who has decided to step down from the Design Team :(

I'd like to thank them both for sharing their talents with us all.

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges
MMCS challenge - boys & girls
The Paper Shelter - anything goes
Sweet Stampin - anything goes

Hope you all have a fab weekend xx

Guest Designer for Stamps R Us!

YAY! I am very honoured to have been chosen to be Guest Designer over at Stamps R Us! :)

This time the challenge has a BIRTHDAY theme, so a nice and easy one to join in with ;)

The challenge is also a special 'Operation Write Home' (OWH) event.

OWH is an organization that sends handmade cards to US armed forces in Iraq & Afghanistan for them to write home on.
Once you have made your card, and if it is suitable to send to one of the dedicated shippers (for example - NO GLITTER allowed), please consider passing it on to them, where it will be very much appreciated.
All details can be found on the Operation Write Home website. Thank you.

The challenge is sponsored by The Paper Shelter

who have a generous prize package for one lucky winner, could it be you?

The Design Team and myself were kindly given free images to use on our cards (Thank you!), here's what I made with mine...

Using 'Happy Birthday To Me!' by The Paper Shelter

printed 3 times & coloured with Promarkers, then layered in places.

The pretty background paper is by Echo Park (little girl)

The sentiment is a SeeD's stamp, and I punched out the tab shape and made the flowers and the rounded corners using a mix of punches.

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:
MMCS challenges - happy birthday
Passion for Promarkers - beary special

Sweet Stampin - flowers
(I won last weeks sweet stampin challenge with my teenager card..YAY! thanks girls xx)

Here's my second card...

Using 'Little Cowboy' by The Paper Shelter

also printed 3 times & coloured with Promarkers, then layered in places.
I used a pair of shaped scissors and my cropadile to alter the 2 layers of cardstock around the image.

The background paper is My Mind's Eye (Stella Rose - Hattie)

and the green paper is by Sizzix (little sizzles - country)
The brown strips are just card scraps, but I thought it worked somehow by layering/weaving them through the green paper.
The sentiment was printed off the computer.
 I wanted to add embellishments too, and thought that a sheriff's badge would look good, but I don't have any, so the little stars punched from copper coloured cardstock will do instead.

I would like to also enter this card into the following challenges:
Cute Card Thursday - anything goes
Prairie Fairy Fridays - snips & snails
Stamptacular Sunday - use a sentiment
Kaboodle Doodles - lots of layers


Thank you for stopping by today and I hope to see your entries for this weeks Stamps R Us challenge :)

Bunnies, bubbles... & bribery!

Mornin! :)
We kick start the weekend with another Sketch Saturday challenge! :)
and this week we are sponsored by

and you could have £10 to spend in their fab store if you're our lucky winner this week :)

Here's my card...

This will be my anniversary card to my hubby, so I will probably add the word 'husband' to it before he receives it, no rush though, it's not until next month.
I have used this totally adorable LOTV stamp called 'Bubble Bath'
Coloured as per usual with promarkers, I have ordered myself 10 new colours this week, and i'm hoping that mr postman will bring them today :)
I maybe should have used grey tones for this card, because apparently, our wedding anniversary this year is Steel (11 years)
Never mind, I went with kraft instead.... as ya do ;)

The sentiment and row of hearts were both from the 'let's celebrate' fizzy moon stamp set, this is new, I hadn't opened it until making this card. I was going to use the cute image from the set too, but when I saw the bunnies in their bubble bath I knew I wanted to use it for this card.

The paper is by Stampin Up ('Bella Bleu' DSP)
The border across the middle is a thick vellum that I found in my stash, it looks green in the photo, but it is actually an off-white colour which shimmers pale pink, but somehow my camera thinks it's green *tuts*
Actually I think my camera is packing up. I'm having difficulty getting it to link to my pc, it's taking several attempts and a lot of luck to get it to work. It is very old though.
Do you think hubby will treat me to a shiny new one?
bribery!..... yes!.... i'll buy 2 bottles of bubbly, one the (nice) smelly kind, the other the *hic* kind, what you reckon eh?

here's a close up of the image layered a little...

can you see the PALE PINK vellum on the left? ;)

Please stop by The Saturdays, they have made more beautiful creations to inspire you :)

I would like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Cute Card Thursday - anything goes

Colour Create - pink, brown, cream, white

Totally Gorjuss - nothing square

Thanks for stopping by, have a great weekend xx

Video Boy

This weeks Sketch Saturday challenge is being sponsored by...

 each month they offer a fabulous $25 shopping spree in their store to our lucky challenge winner, will it be you this month?

Here is my card for this weeks challenge...

The image is 'Video Boy' by Mo Manning, As usual I have used my promarkers to colour him in, I originally wanted the tshirt a different shade of green, but I don't have the colours needed (I can feel a shopping spree coming on soon)

I also need to get a new warm grey 1 and blush markers, both of mine are on their last legs now.

The green paper used on the base card is from Provocraft's Bitty Scrap Pad called 'windswept'.
The blue piece is by NitWit Collections, I roughed them up a bit to echo the 3 lines either side of the sentiment on the sketch layout. Then handstitched over the top with navy cotton... and yes I deliberately wanted the stitches to look that bad! lol

The sentiment was handwritten, as were the white shapes on the black 'console' buttons and the number 13 in the centre.

My son has snagged this card for his friends birthday in a couple of weeks time. The following day will be his other friends birthday too, and Jake has decided to make the card for him using one of my own designs for a teenage card.

thank you for stopping by today, I hope you will have time to stop by and see the other cards made by The Saturdays, there is such a mix of themes and styles using the same sketch :)

I'm entering this card into the following challenges...

Squigglefly - Blue & Green
Papertake Weekly - Anything Goes
Fairy Fun Fridays - snips and snails & puppy dogs tails
Sweet Stampin - for a teenager (YAY! I won!)
Totally Gorjuss - It's a man thing

Have a great weekend xx

Sketch Saturday - Lisa's DT week

Can you believe it's September already?!

where has this year gone? another school year starting already.

It's Saturday! and you know what that means, time for another Sketch Saturday challenge :)

being the first Saturday of the month, it means it is my week off and I get to play with a sketch provided by one of The Saturdays.

This weeks DT week is hosted and sponsored by Lisa, owner or The Craft's Meow, and you could win a TCM stamp set if you are this weeks challenge winner! :)

Lisa kindly sent me a TCM stamp set too, here is my card for this week...

This stamp set is called 'My Girl' from the Little Frieda & Friends collection.

I used my promarkers again, but decided to paper piece her little dress with the same paper I wanted to use on the card base.

The paper is double sided and this card shows both sides of the same sheet.

It's by My Mind's Eye - Stella Rose, from the 'Hattie' paper pad.

I finished off the card with a few gems.

The Saturday's have made some absolutely stunning cards to show you this week, but then they always do, they are such a talented bunch :)

Hope you all have fun with Lisa's fab sketch.

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Craft Us Crazy - Autumn Colours

Charisma Cardz - Anything Goes

The Pink Elephant - Paper Piecing

Thanks for looking,

Have a wonderful weekend xx