Crafty Cardmakers Challenge 53 - Anything Goes

The Crafty Cardmakers Challenge Blog has been quiet for a while. Over the summer, various bereavements, illnesses and family commitments reduced the team to almost no one, so we decided to take a break. But, now we're back, and our new challenge is everyone's favourite - anything goes!

Last weekend, I visited the BSSBS show at Alexandra Palace. I haven't been there before, but I'm pretty sure I'll be going again! (Although I should probably start saving up now!) So, I've been playing with my new toys - including a Speedball Brayer and various stamps. I've had a couple of brayers for a while - the Woodware ones with the metal handles, but I find that the roller comes away from the handle if you put any pressure at all on those - so I've never had much success with them.

For the background, I used a Versacolor ink pad with various shades of blue. (It's a pigment pad rather than a dye one, but it seemed to work fairly well.) Then I stamped the main image (from Lavinia Stamps) in Versacolor in Graphite. The foreground grasses are also from Lavinia Stamps while the branches and leaves are from Clarity. Both of those are stamped in Distress Ink.

Of course, having had my play and created whatever I felt like, I found I had no paper to match. At least, not in the right size. Most of my paper is 150mm square, so finding something big enough for a 5 by 7 card was a challenge. I fell back on my favourite for such occasions - Coredinations card. The one I used is from the Chocolate Box collection, and I embossed it in my Wizard with a Papermania folder, then sanded it.

I hope you can join us this week, and help us to celebrate the fact that Crafty Cardmakers is back!

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:
Four Crafty Chicks where anything goes,
For Your Inspiration where there's a lovely photo-inspiration
Fussy and Fancy Friday where they want us to try a new technique (brayering - still new to me!)
Crafts 4 Eternity where anything goes,
Creatalicious Challenges where anything goes,
Card and Scrap where the theme is embossing/distressing.

One Stitch at a Time Challenge 82

This week on One Stitch at a Time, we want you to show us your digis! That's all - just use a digi. And we're sponsored by Bunny Zoe.

This week's image is by Stitchy and it's called 'new doll'. I put the background and sentiment together with the image in Photoshop Elements, printed, and then coloured the central section with Promarkers. I mounted it on card cut with my Fleur de Lis nestibility die.

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

Four Crafty Chicks where anything goes,
Crafts 4 Eternity where anything goes,
Cardmadfairy where it's 'Too Early for Christmas',
Creatalicious Challenges where anything goes,

New Toys!

First, I should apologise to so many of you out there. I stopped checking blogs during the summer, and when I went back in, there were thousands of entries backlogged. It scared me so much, I haven't opened Google Reader since! I'm hoping to get back into that, and to reading your blogs some time very soon. Our eldest has moved to Swindon for his new job and should be moving into a flat next weekend. Our younger son is back at university, and, while the house seems very quiet, that's how it'll be until December. So, between university visits for our youngest, things should have reverted to what passes for normal around here for a while at least.

Yesterday, I paid my first visit to the BSSBS at Alexandra Palace. I have to say, I was very impressed with the venue. While the actual hall was fairly utilitarian, the other areas are gorgeous, and the view is amazing. And there were lots of stamping goodies on show, so what could be better?

I've never had much luck with brayers. I think that's partly because my Woodware brayer keeps losing the roller. Anything but the lightest pressure on the handle causes the whole thing to flex and the roller goes off to do its own thing. So, seeing as most folk were using Speedball brayers for their demos, I decided to splash out.

Now, I did try to mask areas and come up with a landscape, but I wasn't impressed with the result, so I resorted to my Kaleidacolor inkpads, and in this case, the Bouquet one, and I added some stamped images, and I came up with this.

The central images are from Lavinia Stamps and they're stamped in Momento ink. The tree and grass detail are stamped in Distress Ink in Pine Needles, and the stamps are from Clarity and Lavinia Stamps respectively.

Over the last few years, I've built up quite a good collection of papers, but since I normally make 150mm square cards, that's the size I tend to buy. That's of limited use when I want to make a 5 by 7 card. So I dug out my Coredinations card - which was also 150 mm square, but by some careful trimming, I made it work! I embossed with a Papermania folder in my Wizard, and sanded the raised areas in the two larger pieces. (The smaller piece is embossed the other way around and 'upside down' compared to the rest.)

I added a little extra colour to the image (around the gate) with Promarkers, and a touch of 'magic' with Glamour Dust.

I definitely need to work on my brayering. One of these days, I may even come up with a landscape I'm happy with. Or I might even be tempted to have a go at Promarkering a landscape. Hm. Too many ideas and not enough time.

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:
Paper Sundaes where anything goes,
The Squirrel and the Fox where anything goes,
Stamp, Scrap and Doodle where they want your favourite colours. (I've used my favourite rainbow stamp pad - I love that combination!)
The Paper Shelter where anything goes,
Little Red Wagon where they want repeated images (branch and grass stamps are all repeated.)
Anything Goes where anything goes,
Try it on Tuesday where the theme is 'Wonderful World',

One Stitch at a Time Challenge 81

Before I get into this week's challenge, here's some news! A little while ago, the Stitchy Bear store suffered a catastrophic crash. Poof! And it was gone. Now, if you like digis, this seems like bad news, but the good news is that the shop is back and it's better than ever! And, to celebrate the re-launch, Stitchy has a freebie on offer! Just visit the new site here, register for the site, and use this code: a7b8ebc33b. It's only valid until tonight, so you'll have to be quick!

Now, to this week's challenge at One Stitch at a Time/ The theme this week is 'Favourites', and our sponsor  is Digis with Attitude.

This week I got to work with a really cute image from Reece's Scrap Pieces called Bathtime Lucy.

I coloured her with Promarkers and added detail to the bubbles with Sakura Stardust pen - probably my favourite ways of colouring an image. I love how the Sakura pen is so easy and mess-free while giving a gorgeous sparkle. As someone whose craft things are stored in small spaces in three different rooms and who crafts at the same table we eat at every day, I sometimes find the effort of looking out the glitter and clearing up the resulting mess is more than I can cope with when I'm short of time. With the glitter pens, I get the effect without the hassle. (That's not to say I don't use glitter too, but that's a different story.)

The butterflies are die cut from some gorgeous sparkly 'paper' from Craft Creations and finished with beads.

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:
Bows and Berries where the theme is glitter (glitter pen on the bubbles)
Kaboodle Doodles where the theme is 'lots of layers' (I've used six.)
Flutterby Wednesdays where anything goes,
The Paper Shelter where anything goes,
Southern Girls where anything goes
Cardmad Fairy where they want 'lots of layers' (I've used six.)
Our Craft Lounge where they want patterened paper.
Designed 2 Delight where they want die cuts (image, mat and butterflies are all die cut).