Friday Sketchers 75 and Trying Out My Winnings!

I joined Papercraft Planet this last week, and while there spotted a group with an emphasis on digital stamps called 'DZ Doodles'. I joined, and it turned out I was member no. 100, so I was awarded a free stamp from the collection. I chose one called 'Shelby Contemplating' and I used it with Friday Sketchers Challenge no. 75.



It's such a lovely image of a little girl lost in a daydream or thinking deep thoughts! I coloured it with my week-old Promarkers. (I'm still getting the hang of them and finding out which papers and cards are best.) The papers are from Papermania and Creative Cardmaking magazine, and the ribbon from the bargain bin at Hobbycraft! The text is perhaps a little deep for a little girl, but then again, you never know!

Many thanks to Diane Zyla of DZ Doodles for the image. There are some absolute beauties on the site.

Autumn Challenge Crafty Cardmakers

I was watching Create and Craft one night recently, or at least, it was on in the background while I was doing something. It was late and I got up to switch off the TV and a moment later I was hooked by someone doing a demo of what they called 'Faux Cloisonne' and I just had to have a go. Can't show you the card I made that night because it's needed for a swap, but when I saw this challenge on Crafty Cardmakers, I decided to do something similar.



The stamp is part of a set of clear stamps I bought in Partners, and I embossed the images in gold on dark brown card. Then, I pulled out my Twinkling H2Os and painted the leaves in Sunflower, Solar Gold, Indian Copper and Spiced Pumpkin. Once the paint was dry I coated each stamped image with 3D glaze and left it to dry. The card then just needed a topper, and I did that with an embossing pen and gold powder. I also painted on some gold Crafty Notions Shake'n'Spray then did the same with some die-cut leaves I've had in the house for a very long time. A bit of layering and ribbon and that was that! I must admit I love the effect, so there may be more of it in the future.

Creative Card Crew 32 and Sketch Saturday 73

This card is for Creative Card Crew Challenge 32 which was to include scallops in a card and Sketch Saturday Challenge 73.

I used a new (to me) stamp from Sugar Nellie coloured with my brand new Promarkers. It's not my first attempt, since it took me a while to work out (ask various experts) what sort of paper or card I should be using, but it's still an early attempt. It's mounted on various card, including a bit with scallops courtesy of my Nestibilities. (Why did I ever doubt how often I'd use them or my Wizard?) The paper is one I've had for quite literally years. For the bottom panel, I embossed a piece of the same gold card I'd used above, using a Cuttlebug embossing folder, and inked the embossed areas in green. I added some gems, ribbon and a sentiment from my collection, and there it is.

Note to self: Don't let people distract you while you're entering challanges. Otherwise you set up a post in your own blog but forget to link it in the challenge blogs. Fixed now.

Grey and ??? Card

One of the swaps on the Crafty Cardmaking Yahoo group this month was to make a card using the colour grey and one other. I considered all the options and finally decided to go for grey and white, and as I know my partner has received my card, I've posted it below!



I used my Wizard to cut smaller sections of the 'In Spades' medallion set, and mounted them in a square array. The backing paper pretty much makes the card - it's from a beautiful soft toned set from Paper Cellar called Victorian Classic. All I had to add then were some sticky gems and some ribbon.

Sketch Saturday 72 and Colour Create 29

Two challenges, one card.



The first is a sketch challenge from Sketch Saturday and the second is a colourscheme from Colour Create which called for red, yellow, black and white.

I'm one of those who find it difficult to incorporate black in cards, but I remembered that I'd made a paper with those colours from a Dover Books sample ages ago. Of course, I couldn't find it, so I had to start from scratch. The original is an outline of fans against a background, and I took one repeat of the background, coloured it, and made it into an A4 sheet. The two parallel backing sheets were made by inking up my new Spellbinders Impressiblity (it's called 'Floral Stone') and embossing pieces of white and yellow card with red and black. A bit of matting finished both of those. The image is one of the Sarah Kay stamps I bought recently. I added some ribbon, flowers and a sentiment and that's it. The sentiment is kind of an experiment. I like the look of the new stamps from Spellbinders that are sized to fit nestibilities. It's a great idea, but when I looked, the only set I thought I'd use in terms of the sentiments was just too big to be practical for cardmaking. So, I decided to do my own! I played in Photoshop Elements, sized a circle and placed each letter and symbol separately. (Unfortunately, there's no option to have anything other than a horizontal line as a baseline for text in that software, so I had to twist each letter separately and place it.) Next time, I'll probably make things a little smaller, but the theory works and of course, I can have any wording I like - and any image (within reason) in the middle, so it looks like I might have saved myself some money ...

Crafty Cardmakers Ribbons and Fibres Challenge

Several years ago, I got a bouquet of flowers that had some pink, lacy fibre tied in a bow for decoration. I kept it and I've been looking for a reason to use it ever since. Well, thanks to the latest challenge at the Crafty Cardmakers blog, I've done it.



I've used one of my new Sarah Kay stamps again, this time watercoloured with the colourscheme in mind, added some satin ribbon and some little flower gems.

And there will be no more cardmaking for now - the new Stargate Universe is due to start soon, and if it's even half as good as the original series, I'll be hooked.

Fred she Said Challenge

For World Cardmaking Day, Tracey of Fred, She Said wanted a card made from one of her lovely images - free or paid for. As it happened, I'd made a card using her beautiful freebie flower image for a different challenge and I had some unused bits begging to be put together.



Apart from using a different layout, I also used some of the other papers I made using the colours from the flower. Then, I added some clear Sakura Stardust pen to key areas for some sparkle, layered with various nestibilities, and added a bow. Once again, the image is so lovely that it doesn't need anything complicated to make a really lovely card.

Two New Stamps

And to celebrate, I've made a couple of cards. Typically of me, I don't plan the card in advance, and in this case, I just stamped the images and coloured them as the notion took me. Then, of course, I've got the job of trying to find all the bits I need to make a card.



This first one had a ready-made flower left over from a recent swap on the Crafty Cardmaking Yahoo group. I scrambled through my papers and found the plaid-style one which is actually a little more pink than lilac, but which somehow just seemed to work colour-wise. The other paper is from a collection I got ages ago. It won't cut on my trimmer, tending to bend instead, but I was fairly pleased with how it cut in my Wizard.



This second one was actually harder. Although I've got a whole book-full of bluish papers, this one was the best option. Then, when I tried to pull out the pink from the image, it didn't work at all. It took me a while to realise that using the yellow of her hair (and of the flower centres on the paper) would be a better option for introducing a different colour.

I assume it's because of my total lack of any artistic background that things like that aren't more obvious to me. I think I'm pretty good at working out what works and what doesn't when I look at it, but I've got to try it out. I can't just 'imagine' it and know.

The detail on the stamps is very clear and they both stamped easily. I like the Sarah Kay stamps but would like to find some that are a little less old-fashioned looking. I'd like to get something as detailled as these, but still with a full-featured face. And preferably without animals. (Fussy, aren't I?)

And both photos were taken on my now two-week-old camera phone. I'm reasonably impressed with the quality - it's certainly not noticably lower than from the rather elderly camera I usually use.