Summer Lilies

Inkspirational wants to see a birthday card and Stamping Sensations wants to see summer flowers so perfect to combine in this card:

The flowers are stamped and heat embossed in white, watercoloured, and fussy cut. I used foam tape to mount them.  I made this for my dear friend, Loll's birthday a few weeks ago but was very slow in posting it.  The lilies are Loll's favourite colours!  Good thing I have friends who like different colours to me or I'd do nothing but blue cards!!!

  

And that's it for me today - I usually post two cards but I've been really busy lately.  I'll be back tomorrow night with my Design Team card for Peace on Earth.

Supplies:
Stamps - SU Fifth Avenue Floral, unknown sentiment
Ink - ColorBox white, Distress Worn Lipstick
Paper - watercolour paper, white shimmer cs
Size - A2
Accessories - white embossing powder, foam tape, label die, watercolour paints, Reverse Confetti rectangle die

Northern Lights Christmas Cards

I've seen various people make northern lights backgrounds for card and wanted to give it a go.  I tried the ones where they create swirls of colour but I ended up with a horrid mess and tossed them.  Then I tried the technique in this video where the colour is in more vertical bands.  I ended up with three backgrounds I was happy with and turned them into three Christmas cards.

My favourite is this one as I got a bit of quite vibrant colour.

I stamped the image in black using my MISTI so that I go quite an intense image.  I then sponged a lot of Distress Black Soot ink along the bottom of the panel.  I heat embossed the little Noel sentiment in white on black cs and cut it out with a tiny square die and covered up a bit of smudged ink.

My second favourite is this one:

I die cut the village scene out of black cs. layered it over the northern lights background, and added a very small sentiment.

My least favourite is this one:

My northern lights turned out a bit too muted and I wasn't happy with my white splattering as I got some blobs that are way too big.  Black stamping or a black die cut didn't look right - not enough contrast.  So I went with a white die cut sleigh and horse and added two coordinating sentiments.

I found it easier to sponge the sky on a very slightly glossy cs - not as glossy as photo paper but with a definite bit of gloss.  I didn't find much difference between regular Distress inks and Distress Oxide inks (the first one was done with Oxide, the second and third with Distress).

My friend, Loll, also did some northern lights cards and we decided to post them on the same day.  Please go to this post on her blog to see hers - quite different to mine but beautiful!

Supplies:
Stamps - Stampendous "noel", Katzelkraft deer and trees, SSS tiny Merry Christmas, SSS Jingle Bells and Dashing All the Way sentiments
Ink - various Distress and Distress Oxide inks, SSS Intense Black, Versamark, Versafine Clair Twilight
Paper - white and black cs, slightly glossy cs
Size - A2 (the first two) and 6x4.25" (the third card)
Accessories - white acrylic paint, white embossing powder, tiny Spellbinders square die, Memory Box Country Landscape die, tiny sentiment die, SU sleigh and horse die

Christmas Horse and Snowy Dove

Two Christmas cards today.

For 52 Christmas Card Throwdown, the theme is "Critters".  I chose a horse.

The image is stamped and then coloured with coloured pencils.  To add some background colour, I used a simple bordering panel of red cs, and die cut the focal panel with a dotted rectangle that lets bits of the red show through.  And then stamped the sentiment in red.

And for Can You Handle the Pressure, the challenge is "In the Sky" (anything you can find in the sky), I chose a dove and placed it against a snowflake embossed background.

I ran the focal panel through the embossing folder and then lightly rubbed a blue ink pad over the raised sections.  I cut the dove and the sentiment out of a scrap of background I'd made using blue Inka Gold.  

   

Supplies for card 1:
Stamps - Serendipity Clyde, Make an Impression sentiment
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black, ColorBox Chianti
Paper - white and red cs
Size - A2
Accessories - coloured pencils, Sizzix dotted rectangle die

Supplies for card 2:
Stamps -
Ink - Distress Broken Glass
Paper - white cs
Size - A2
Accessories - snowflake embossing folder, dove die, peace sentiment die, fun foam

Snowman in Joy

The new Peace on Earth mood board consists of four images of snowmen, all wearing scarves and hats.  I pulled out an old snowman stamp that would fit inside the letter "o" of my large "Joy" die.  I also wanted to use some dp as a background - I'm on a mission to try and use dp on at least two cards a month!  I have to make a dent in my stash!!

I stamped the snowman and sentiment in grey ink and did a bit of colouring with coloured pencils.  The snowman stamp includes some snowflakes around the snowman but I needed to add a bit more snow to fill in the circle so I used an old peg stamp of random dots.

I die cut the "Joy" once out of matte silver cs and once out of scrap cs and glued the two together.  I trimmed the snowman panel to fit behind the "o".  Then added the whole thing to the snowy dp background.  I went over all the snowflakes and dots with a Clear Star gelly roll pen and added some fun flock to the hat brim, pompom, and mitts' cuffs.

There's lots of other ideas from the rest of our Peace on Earth Design Team.  We'd love to see if our mood board inspires you or if you just want to do an "anything Christmas" card.

I'm also linking this card up with the Neglected Stuff Challenge as the snowman stamp is one of my very oldest stamps and hasn't been inked up for a long time.

Supplies:
Stamps - Old Island Stamp Co. snowman, Rubber Soul sentiment, Rubber Stamp Tapestry dots
Ink - Versafine Clair Morning Mist
Paper - white and matte silver cs, red dp
Size - 6x4.25"
Accessories - Penny Black "Joy" die,

Cut Up Christmas and a CAS Cardinal

The latest Cut It Up Challenge is "Christmas in July".  Here's my Christmas card featuring lots of die cuts.  It's also for Inkspirational "Three of the Same" - I have three doves and three fir trees.  Christmas Cards All Year Round wants "Blue Christmas"

I die cut the house / trees die and the small doves out of white shimmer cs and layered them over a background created by smooshing with blue Inka Gold and then trimming with a square die.  I cut a square out of plain white cs and out of a dp that matched the smooshed background perfectly and layered everything on a square card base.

And a twofer for Sweet Stampin' "Christmas in July" and Addicted to CAS "Code Word Christmas":

A simple stamped and coloured (with markers) image, then trimmed with a rectangle die, and to add more interest, a thin frame was cut out of the rectangle and then cut again out of red cs and the red one was inlaid into the rectangle. 

         

 

       

Supplies for card 1:
Stamps - Art Impressions sentiment
Ink - Distress Faded Jeans
Paper - white and white shimmer cs, Paper Pizazz dp
Size - 4.75" square
Accessories - Memory Box house / trees die, Memory Box small doves dies, Spellbinders square dies

Supplies for card 2:
Stamps - Impression Obsession bird/holly, Hero Arts sentiment
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black, SU Real Red
Paper - white and red cs
Size - A2
Accessories - markers, SSS thin frames die, Spellbinders rectangle die ms

Red and White, and Red, White, and Blue

Cards for two colour challenges today.

For Color Hues "Red and White", I did a Christmas card.  It features poinsettias so it's also going to the Jingle Belles challenge "Poinsettia Perfection".

I stamped and heat embossed the poinsettias and the sentiment.  Trimmed the poinsettias with a square die and bordered with red cs.  Cut the sentiment out with a tag die and attached it with a red brad.  Added it all to a white card base.

Shopping Our Stash wants to see red, white, and blue.  I made a summer birthday card for my cousin who lives on the south coast of England - she loves the traditional beach huts on their beach front and of course, red, white, and blue are the colours of the British flag.  I am also linking it up with AAA Birthday's Summer Birthday challenge.  And I've never used the beach huts die before so I'm adding it to the NBUS challenge.

I die cut the beach hut die three times, out of red, white, and blue cs and then inset the blue and red into the white.  It was very fiddly but thank goodness for my fine-pointed scissors.  I used mottled blue and mottled light brown cs for the sky and sand, and added a die cut sentiment.

     

Supplies for card 1:
Stamps - Impression Obsession poinsettias, Northwoods sentiment
Ink - Versamark
Paper - white and red cs
Size - 4.5" square
Accessories - Ranger Rich Red embossing powder, Spellbinders square dies and tag die, red brad

Supplies for card 2:
Paper - red, white, and blue cs; light brown and light blue mottled cs
Size - A2
Accessories - unknown beach huts die, Lawn Fawn Happy Birthday die