Embossed vellum

Another one for the men!  I first saw this technique demonstrated at a team training day by Jane Cutting and knew I had to share it with my card club ladies.  The ship is stamped onto vellum cardstock and then "coloured in" on the reverse side using an embossing tool. Easy peasy! but oh so effective.  

Petite Pocket

We made these cute little pockets at our last quarterly training day, they will be perfect for enclosing a monetary gift with your card don't you think?  They are also just the right size for one of those gift cards so I think I will be makikng a few of these decorated with Christmas papers. The Petite Pocket big shot die makes these so easy to cut out then just decorate as you choose.  This one is covered in papers from the Razzleberry Splash simply Scrappin kit and the flower is made using the floral fusion sizzlets.

Flowers and Diamonds, a girl's best friends

Another scrap book page! I found this one quite hard, anyone who knows me will know that I really struggle with the whole tearing technique. It just feels so wrong to tear or scrumple such pretty papers. Believe it or not I began with a plain white page and took my inkpads to the edges. I then added some strips of First edition designer paper, again daubed straight from the inkpad, to make a border. The paper layers are a mixture of punched paper and torn circles then I but some shapes from the remaining paper. The flowers are cut using a big shot die from designer paper and layered up and compiled with a very blingy brad. A final touch of some embossed butterflies flying through the  page from bottom left to top right. There's a lot to look at on this page and yet the focus remains on the photo of my beautiful daughter. 

Inked & Embossed

Another new technique! Well not quite, I have attempted this one once before.  This effect is achieved by taking an inkpad to the inside of an embossing folder before placing the card inside and running through the Big Shot. There are a lot of layers to this card, the pretty in pink base card and then Rose Red designer paper followed by a crumb cake layer and then the embossed layer, the embossing folder is elegant Bouquet. The butterfly was punched from dsp and attached with a rhinestone brad.

Stained glass techinique

Lot's of Luck Alice! Today is my daughter's first A level exam this year.  Fortunately they don't last long and it will all be over by the 20th, then we will have the long wait until results day. I shall have to think up lots of things to do so that we can pass those days pleasantly. Like some crafting perhaps?

Does this look familiar?  The design and colour scheme is the same as this card that I blogged at the end of last month but we highlighted a different image.
The technique is different too, this image was stamped onto vellum and then coloured on the reverse with marker pens, the resulting effect is reminiscent of a stained glass window.

Open Seas

I have a feeling that this is a stamp set that you might see quite a lot of. I have already used it several times and keep coming back to it.  The Open Sea has quite a vintage feel I think and so for this card I made use of that and distressed my papers a little.  The colour combination of Crumb Cake and Marina Mist is one I use a lot too but it works so well!

A Bit Shirty

Perfect for the men in our lives!  This shirt is made from just half a piece of A4 card stock, the pocket being made from the piece of card that was removed from the back. I added brads to imitate buttons and the tie is a piece of designer paper.  I used the white gel pen to add the stitching detail.  I used this card recently for a couple of birthdays but it could be a good one for Fathers day too!

Cheeky Girl

Oops! been nearly a month since I last blogged :S well on this blog anyway; I have been blogging on www.4thhestonlejog.blogspot.com
Anyhow, here is a cheeky little lady! I watercoloured the stamped image and layered her onto orange and yellow bazzil cardstock and attached the tag to the card with a brad. Backed onto a pretty plaid paper and a stamped message added to the bottom. Oh and a dash of glitter to add some bling :O)

Fabulous

Another from the HOTP kit. Cards suitable for men are in short supply round here at the moment so this one fits the bill quite nicely. More muted tones this time, some more of those fabulous brads, button ones this time, some inking to give the message a distressed feel and some ripping and tearing to add interest to the layered papers.

BIG Brads are FUN!

I discovered an unused Hot Off the Press kit recently so I had to have a play with it didn't I! I LOVE these outsize brads, they're so large that you can use rub-ons to decorate them. I added a flower design to the one on this card and used a similar one in the centre of the card which has an eyelet brad for the middle of the flower. The overall design is very simple with a matted message in the centre and a ribbon border at the top but on the whole quite pretty and effective I think.

And yet more!!

Back to Birthdays

Christmas is over! and I now have some table back and a little bit of time as it is the school holidays so back to birthday cards. I rediscovered this QVC kit when i was clearing the table for Christmas dinner. The hedgehog images are stamps from the Penny Black range which I watercoloured, the shopper is a Jolly Nation image.. They were matted onto holographic card and coordinating papers. The butterfly card is finished off with some matching peel-offs and vellum attached with gem brads.

Blue Birthday

I rediscovered this kit from QVC the other day, lots of coordinating papers in 5 different colours. I started out with the blue set as you can see. Lots of ripping and tearing, some vellum and some brads and finsished off with a couple of peel off greetings. What do you think? :O)

Chessington World of Adventures

We did have fun! This photo is of us on the Beano bus, it went round and round quite fast, Alice thought it was hilarious :O) The background paper is from the new DCWV kit as are the letters, the flowers and brads are from Brenda Pinnick :O)

Make a Wish

Charlie's 4th Birthday, what a handsome young man! He was such a cutie then :O) Papers are from We R Memory Keepers as are all the embellishments, the flowers are attached with coordinating brads, the sentiments with foam squares :O)

Together

Me and my baby girl, a sunny day out and a picnic. She was just walking and so of course wanted to walk everywhere :O) Papers are from the Flavia collection and the flower embellishments held on with brads are from Brenda Pinnick :O)

The Finished Article

Here are the finished envelope and insert now with added words!!! Much better dont you think?
It looks finished now.....well... it is finished because I have already given it to Iffi to be bound into the book lol :O)

CSF Forum Birthday Envelopes Challenge

Craftswap Forum is 2!! and to celebrate members have signed up to take part in a challenge to make birthday envelope books which will be auctioned amongst us for charity. I am in a team with 5 others called Coffee M8tes :O) and the theme that was allocated to us was Nature. My envelope is at the top and the insert (front and back) below, I'm not entirely happy with it yet, it doesnt feel finished but I have no idea what to do to it. All suggestions gratefully received.

The water in Majorca...

I haven't posted lately because we have been away in Cornwall for the Spring holidays, a lovely few days away :O)
These pages show our holiday in Majorca. Seven of us went away together for 10 days sharing two apartments. We had a great laugh and there are many crazy stories to tell!!
I wanted to use hot colours for the pages to reflect the temperature in Spain and I think these papers from Flavia work perfectly, the flowers are from Papermania attached with brads. :O)

More, more, more!

I finished the rest of the pages required for the House Mouse list today, just need to make sure I have all the addresses and then I can send them out :O)