Heart Love

Hi and welcome!  Today's post features the newest sketch from the Freshly Made Sketches team where our hostess this week is the talented Kim Singdahlsen.

I've mentioned before that angled panels on cards make my eye twitch, so you can imagine how I felt when I saw three of them!  I actually spent several days pondering how I was going to pull this off and in the end I decided to mimic the lines of the angles with a die.

So I used this circle die to cut three lines in a white panel and once that was done, I adhered it to a Gravel Gray card base.  I then die-cut the Caprice Heart dies from Grout Gray, Cement Gray and Gravel Gray cardstocks and layered them up.  The sentiment was cut down from a longer one and stamped in black ink on the same angle as the circles.

I positioned the heart so the centre opening was right over one of the circle cutouts.

And that's my card!  Simple and angled 😄

Thanks for visiting!  The DT have some gorgeous cards - in fact when I added my card to the DT blog, I saw that Lee Ann and I had very similar ideas!  Well, you know what they say - great minds think alike 😀

Products used:

Stamps:  More Essential Sentiments (MFT)
Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black
Cardstock:  White, Grout Gray, Gravel Gray, Cement Gray (MFT)
Dies:  Caprice Hearts (Birch Press Designs), Blueprints 21 (MFT)

Cheers
Karren

Sympathy Flowers

Hi and thanks for dropping by!  I'm here with my card for the latest Fusion challenge.

When I came up with the challenge, I had every intention of making a penguin card, but then I had the need of a sympathy card and thought the sketch worked well for that.

I stamped a whole heap of flowers and foliage from the Life is Awesome set, using various Altenew inks.  Once I'd finished, I arranged them into a bouquet for the top "banner" on the sketch and a smaller bouquet for the two "banners" on the bottom.

I die-cut a rectange with a stitched die and stamped the sentiment and adhered it to a Grout Gray card base.   Finally I adhered both floral arrangements down to the white panel.

I didn't add any embellishments to this card as it didn't really seem appropriate for a sympathy card.

Thanks for visiting!  There are a heap of gorgeous cards created by the design team over on the Fusion blog, so I hope you'll check them out.

Products used:

Stamps:  Life is Awesome (Altenew), Inspiration Mosaic (GinaK)
Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black, Buttercream, Warm Sunshine, Caramel Toffee, Paper Bag, Sunkissed, Orange Cream, Autumn Blaze, Firebrick, Industrial Diamond, Moss, Olive (Altenew)
Cardstock:  Grout Gray, White (MFT)
Dies:  Life is Awesome (Altenew) Stitched Rectangle Stax (MFT)

Cheers
Karren

Halftone Birthday

Hi and welcome!  I'm back with a card for the latest sketch at Freshly Made Sketches where our hostess is the wonderful Linda Callahan.  Check out her fabulous sketch:

This was my second idea for this card - let's just say the first one didn't pan out too well!  And this is the fourth attempt at this design - I'm glad there are two sides to every piece of cardstock 😂

I stamped a rainbow of halftone squares using various Altenew inks onto a panel of white cardstock.  I then took a black Multiliner and a ruler and drew the lines to mimic the sketch - except I forgot to lift the pen when I was drawing the line through the orange square.  To fix that, I stamped another orange square and cut it out before popping it up on foam tape.  I added some gray Copic liner on one side of each line to add a bit of faux dimension.  The big, bold sentiment finished the panel.

I die-cut the panel with a stitched rectangle die and added it to a white top-folding card base and called it done.

Thanks for visiting!  The DT have got some gorgeous interpretations of Linda's sketch so I hope you'll check them out.

I'm linking this up to Seize the Birthday who are looking for Stamping Only and Sweet Stampin' who are looking for bright and cheerful.

Products used:

Stamps:  Halftone Squares (Altenew), Make a Wish (Clearly Besotted)

Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black, Crimson, Orange Cream, Mango Smoothie, Bamboo, Aqualicious, Lavender Fields (Altenew)

Cardstock:  White

Dies:  Stitched Rectangle Stax (MFT)

Accessories:  Copic Markers, Copic Multiliner

Cheers

Karren

Edited to Add:  This card got a shout out at Seize the Birthday.

Good Idea

Hi all!  Just a quick post today as it's late at night, my time, and I've just realised I haven't written my post for the latest challenge at Freshly Made Sketches.  Doh!  Our sketch hostess is the very talented Jen Mitchell and she has a fun square sketch for us this week.

For my card, I went very simple and let my stencils do the work. 

I masked off an area on a square Grout Gray card base and stenciled over this gorgeous Penelope Dee stencil with white embossing paste.  After I removed the stencil and masking tape I sprinked on some glitter and set it aside to dry.

The coffee cup was stamped and colored quickly with Copics and cut with my Scan n Cut.  I added the face from another stamp set.  I stamped the sentiment onto a strip of Grout Gray and added a strip of black underneath to help it stand out from the card base.

And that was it!

I hope you'll head over to the challenge blog and check out the gorgeous cards from the rest of the DT.

Thanks for visiting.

Products used:

Stamps:  Perfect Blend (Gina K), Coffee Break (MFT), Coffee and Tea (SSS)
Ink:  Amalgam
Cardstock:  Grout Gray, Black Licorice (MFT) X-Press It
Accessories:  Deco Floral Stencil (Penelope Dee), Embossing Paste, Glitter

Cheers
Karren

Fusion Anniversary

Hi!  I'm here with a card for the latest Fusion challenge.  It's our 5th anniversary challenge and we're kicking off the year by each inviting a guest to join us.  My guest is the super-talented Ksenija Rizova and the card she has created is just gorgeous.  I hope you'll head over to her blog and let her know how beautiful her card is.

For my card, I sort of created a fusion but didn't follow the sketch 100%.

Onto a panel of Bristol Smooth cardstock, I white embossed several butterflies as well as some dots and rings to fill in the gaps.  After heat-embossing, I blended on a rainbow of distress ink colors before working on the rest of the card.

I adhered the butterfly panel to a white top-folding card base and then added some vellum, adhering it down the left side only.  On top of that I added some black and white striped paper and a white cardstock strip.  Both of these were adhered with foam tape.  Finally I stamped the sentiment, from CAS-ual Friday's Big Thanks set and finished with some sparkling clear confetti.

And, as a special celebration, CAS-ual Fridays have offered us a $25 gift code to give away to one randomly drawn entrant in this challenge, so I hope you'll join us.

Thanks so much for visiting.

Products used:

Stamps:  Blissful Butterflies (MFT), Scenery:  Big Bang Confetti (Winnie & Walter); Big Thanks (CAS-ual Fridays)

Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black, Versamark, Squeezed Lemonade, Mustard Seed, Spiced Marmalade, Blueprint Sketch, Peacock Feathers Distress Ink

Cardstock:  White, Bristol Smooth, Vellum, B&W Stripes (MFT)

Dies:  Pierced Circle Stax (MFT)

Accessories:  Sparkling Clear Confetti (Pretty Pink Posh)

Cheers

Karren

Pretty Amazing

Hi and welcome!  I'm back with the latest sketch from the team at Freshly Made Sketches and this week our hostess is the wonderful Jennifer Timko.  And here is her very cool sketch.

I went a tiny bit rogue this week and instead of having a group of elements in diagonal corners, I went with a stenciled pattern.  

I used Scattered Straw, Spiced Marmalade and Abandoned Coral distress inks on a panel of Bristol Smooth cardstock with the Sunburst stencil by Wendy Vecchi.  I like this stencil because the sunburst pattern is quite small and worked well in the corners of the card.  

Once the stenciling was finished, I die-cut the panel with a stitched rectangle die and then adhered it to a Persimmon card base.  The "you" die cut was stacked three high and the rest of the sentiment was white-embossed onto a strip of Persimmon card and die-cut with a sentiment strip die.

I tucked the banner under the loop of the 'y' to add some cohesion.  Finally, I finished with some confetti and some adorable little clear sequins that were part of a Christmas gift very kindly sent to me by a blogging friend.

I'm linking this card up to the new CAS Stencil Challenge

Thanks for visiting!  I hope you head on over to the FMS blog and check out the wonderful DT cards.

Products used:

Stamps:  You Matter (SSS)

Ink:  Versamark, Scattered Straw, Spiced Marmalade, Abandoned Coral Distress Inks

Cardstock:  White, Persimmon, Black (MFT)

Dies:  You (SSS), Stitched Rectangle Stax (MFT)

Accessories:  Sparkling Clear Sequins, Sparking Clear Confetti (Pretty Pink Posh), Sunburst Stencil (Wendy Vecchi), White EP

Cheers

Karren

Howdy

Hi and welcome!  Please give me a minute to dust off this old blog - this is probably the longest I've gone without posting a card, which is really, really frustrating because I'm just coming up on the end of two weeks off work and had great intentions of spending heaps of time making cards.  Well, the mojo and creativity disagreed. 

Anyway, I spent a few hours the other day making this card (yes, a few hours!) and it uses the latest sketch from the team at Freshly Made Sketches.  We're back and we're back with a bang because we have three new DT members joining us for the next 6 months.  I'm not going to tell you who they are and I urge you to head over to the blog and check them out.   

Today's sketch is courtesy of the delightful Amy O'Neill and it's a good one!  I decided to use the circle as a negative space and broke out a couple of NBUS sets.

I'm playing along with the color challenge at MFT Stamps as well, which is why I didn't create a scene behind my cowgirl.  To be honest, I did have a scene all made with grass and sky and then realised it used colors not in the color challenge, so decided to go really simple and have a plain gray background.  

I colored up my image in the challenge colors and then used the co-ordinating dies to die-cut the images.  The white panel was die-cut with an inside/out stitched circle die as well as a stitched rectangle die, after which I stamped the sentiment in the bottom right corner.  All elements are glued directly to the Cement Gray card base apart from the cowgirl who is popped up on foam tape.

Thanks for visiting!  Please head over to the challenge blog and check out our new DT members as well as everyone's gorgeous cards.

Products used:

Stamps:  Saddle Up and Celebrate, Best in the West (MFT)

Ink:  Amalgam (Gina K)

Cardstock:  White, Cement Gray, X-Press It

Dies:  Saddle Up and Celebrate, Best in the West, Inside/Out Stitched Circles, Stitched Rectangle Stax (MFT)

Accessories:  Copics

Cheers

Karren