Last but not Least

The last of the 6 cards I made for the Elusive Images DT application - a colour challenge.  Glenda had specified that one of the projects submitted must follow a specifed theme and given a choice of about 4 or 5 themes, I chose a colour challenge - Brown and Teal. 

This time the main image is by Clarity Stamp, but the patterns in the dress, and on the edge of the inside back, are done using what I tend to think of as "incidental stamps".  Those small decorative stamps that come on sheets of unmounted stamps which, while they are pretty, often sit around unused because we are not sure what to do with them!  The stamp in question comes from the Elusive Images "Delightful Damask" themeplate

To make the card I stamped the lady onto some white card using a permanent black ink, I also made several stampings onto pages of a post-it note pad, making sure that part of the image fell over the tacky area, this was for cutting out to make masks for the dress.   I placed the masks in turn over various parts of the image and coloured the dress using a stencil brush and Versamagic inks in the appropriate brown and teal colours.  The pattern was added  by overstamping through some of the masks with the pattern stamp from the Delightful Damask themeplate.  The border round the image and also on the edge of the inside back of the card was created in much the same way, using masking, stencil brushes and overstamping.  The right hand edge of the front of the card has been trimmed back to reveal the stamped border inside the card. 

The background layers were cut from card in the challenge colours, the ornate cormers were cut with a Cuttlebug die.  I should appologise for the photo, this one seems to have a lot of camera shake in it, I always take more than one picture of my card, but in this instance I must have deleted the wrong image from the camera and as the card is no longer in my possession I cannot take a better picture.

Birthday Card for a Man

As well as our Wedding Anniversary, hubby also has his birthday in June, so I made this card for him.

The background was created using torn paper masks with sponges and a mixture of Adirondack dye and pigment inks. The stamps are all from Clarity Stamp except for the Birthday greeting. I enjoyed playing with my sponges and inks, trying to get a feel the rays of the sun shining down through an early morning mist. However, perhaps the thing I enjoyed most about this card was that for once I seemed to get the matting nice and straight - hubby loves to tease me when my cards are a little squint and this time he couldn't!

Pop-Up Card

This card was made for a challenge swap, the challenge was to make a pop-up card. As soon as I signed up to join the swap I knew I wanted to use my set of cute doggy stamps from The Angel Company and make a 3D scene with them.

First I stamped the dog, his kennel and the little grass stamp with black Stazon. I coloured the images with Prismacolor Pencils, using low odour white spirit and paper stumps to blend the colours and then cut this out. With my pop-up element made the next job was to cut a liner for the inside of my card. This would become both the mechanism for my pop-up and also the background scene.

Next I measured the height and width of my cut out images and made the corresponding cuts and scores in my liner to enable me to fold the mechanism and then coloured my background by masking off areas and sponging on some Adirondack Dye inks for the hills and sky. The sun was also masked and then colour sponged on using Distress Ink and some light orange from a Kaleidacolour ink pad over the yellow Distress Ink to give it a little more "heat". Finally I took some Tree stamps from another The Angel Company set and stamped in my trees using more Distress Ink.

The front of the outer card has been decorated with papers from the Artylicious Butterfly Bliss CD and stamped with a text stamp from the same set of stamps I used for the pop-up images. However, while the little dog on the outside is also from The Angel Company, he is not part of the set I had been using for the inside of the card. I also use one of the inserts from the Butterfly Bliss CD to line the facing side of my liner (the bit where you would write your message to the receipient of the card).

With this all done the last step was to adhere the inner pop-up part of the card to the outer card and then mount my pop-up element onto the mechanism. There was quite a lot of work in this card, but I think the end result is worth the effort.

Some More Skinnys

Well life conspired again to keep me away from my craft stash last week - don't you just love it when you think you have lots of free time and things just happen! Oh well that's the way the cookie crumbles, maybe this week I can have a bash at making some cards for Fab's Christmas Challenge. I want to join his "nutters" this time and try to make 6. But first I have been making more skinnys for the swap list with a floral theme which I joined. The swap is organised by Craft Swap Forum.

From the left the first skinny was made using a stamp which is a limited editon stamp from Elusive Images and made avaiable to members of the Graphicus Guild. I stamped this with Black Stazon then painted the flowers with Twinkling H2Os, allowing the colours in the flower to bleed a litte into each other. The edges are inked with some Violet ink from a Petal Point pigment ink pad.

The middle skinny was made using a brayer and masking technique. The stamp is from the Laura Ashley Contemporary Collection. First I stamped my image onto my card stock using a Kaleidacolor ink pad (Desert Heat), next I stamped the image again twice onto a post-it note and cut the images out to create masks. The masks were then placed over the original stampings and I used a brayer to create my background this time using the Fresh Greens Kaleidacolor ink Pad.

The third skinny on the right was made with some Moondust Pearlecent card - I love the shimmer on that card. First I used a sponge to blend in 2 colours of inks which would work well with the Prima Flowers from the "Stone Rose" collection. The inks were from an Adirondack Rainbow pad called Stained Glass. I used the same ink pad to ink a stamp from Clarity Stamp and stamp the leafy background. Finally I stuck on the Prima Flowers and added a gem in the center of each.