Grateful Heart

Hi! My Simon Says Stamp February card kit arrived on Friday and I couldn't wait to have a play with it.  This was my first month subscribing to the kit, but I fell in love with the Artful Palette stencils and dies and had to have it.

I also happened to get around to watching Tim Holtz' latest live and he showcased the kit and the patterned papers.  I took one of his ideas and covered some strips of the patterned paper with packing tape to give a tile look.

I'm normally a CAS card-maker but my roots are in the collage-type of cardmaking from the late 90s, early 00's so it was fun to revisit.  I also dug out some really old embellishments for this card.

I started with a panel of TH kraft cardstock which I embossed with an Altenew clocks/gears embossing folder.  Once that was finished, I ink-blended round the edges with Walnut Stain distress ink and then went over various parts with a Stamperia stencil and the same ink.  I then added a bit of Black Soot to the edges before splattering on some Black Soot Distress Spray Stain and some Heidi Swapp Gold Color Shine.  I then set it aside to dry.

After adding packing tape to some strips of cardstock, I chose my stencil and die-cut various pieces.  For the sentiment, I stamped on some Pencil Eraser cardstock with Walnut Stain DOX ink before die-cutting and then adding some Walnut Stain distress ink around the edges.  All the die-cuts apart from the sentiment are adhered straight to the embossed panel.  The sentiment is popped up on foam squares from the kit.

The big round embellishment started out silver so I added some alcohol ink to it to colour it up, more in line with the rest of the card.  The butterflies were die-cut from a scrap of leftover Antiqued Bronze Distress Spray Stain sprayed cardstock and I added some tiny vintage pearls to the centre before popping up their wings.

Thanks for visiting!  This took me all afternoon but it was so much fun just getting messy and playing.

Products used:

Stamps:  Be Your Beautiful Self (SSS)

Ink: Walnut Stain Distress Oxide, Walnut Stain, Black Soot Distress Ink

Cardstock: Kraft (Tim Holtz), Pencil Eraser (Lawn Fawn), Curated Palette Collection (Tim Holtz)

Dies: Artful Palette (SSS)

Accessories: Traces of Yesterday Embossing Folder (Altenew), Daily News stencil (Stamperia), Teakwood alcohol ink, Rose Gold Mixative, Black Soot Distress Stain Spray, Antiqued Bronze Distress Spray Stain, Gold Color Shine (Heidi Swapp), expoxy rose, large grommett, Warm Pearl Stickers (Honey Bee Stamps)

Cheers

Karren

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Flowering Column

Hi and welcome! Another card made during my long weekend! This time for the Altenew Inspiration Challenge.  I had to pull out my new-favourite flower dies again and make this card.

After die-cutting everything from white, I did some ink-blending in the challenge colours before arranging in a vertical arrangement.  Onto a white card base, I added a panel of Morning Frost cardstock backed by a thin strip of rose gold matte foil (to bring in another element from the photo).

I adhered all the elements down and then stamped the greeting, finally finishing with some enamel dots.

Thanks for visiting!

Products used:

Stamps: Craft Your Life: Bewitching Rose (Altenew)

Ink: Versafine Onyx Black, Apricot Frost, Coastal Haze, Misty Harbor, Morning Frost, Evening Gray (Altenew)

Cardstock:  White, Morning Frost (Altenew), Rose Gold Matte Foil

Dies:  Craft A Flower: Garden Cosmos (Altenew)

Accessories: Tea Party Enamel Dots (Altenew)

Cheers

Karren

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Thinking of Cosmos

Hi! It's Freshly Made Sketches time and this week our hostess is Kim Singdahlsen.  I went from memory when making my card and sort of got my angled panels at the wrong angle but I hope you can still sort of see the sketch!

I have been waiting for these Garden Cosmos dies to come back in stock for a long time and snapped them up as soon as I got the notification from my NZ retailer, Krafters Cart.  They are just gorgeous and I'm so pleased with them.  I die-cut everything with white cardstock and did some ink-blending on all the pieces, going for a soft apricot look to the flowers.

The angled strips were cut, then stamped then embossed before being added to a white card base for a white-on-white look.  If you've been following me for any length of time, you might have known that I really struggle with angled panels so this sketch was a bit of a challenge, but by keeping it tone-on-tone, it was easier to work with.

Thanks for visiting!  I hope you'll check out the fabulous cards made by the rest of the design team.

Products used:

Stamps: Assorted Greetings (Gina K Designs)

Ink: Versafine Onyx Black, Apricot Frost, Citronella (Altenew), Rustic Wilderness Distress Ink

Cardstock: White

Dies: Craft-a-Flower: Garden Cosmos (Altenew)

Accessories: Burlap Embossing Folder (Honey Bee Stamps), Tea Party Enamel Dots (Altenew)

Cheers

Karren

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Blue Leaves

Here I am back again - two days in a row - that must be a record!  I made this card for the Color Hues blue and white challenge and the Inskpirational shades of blue challenge.

I was drawn to the blue squares in the Inskpirational visual prompt so after embossing and ink-blending my leaves, I decided to go with a postage theme and die-cut pieces with both a rectangle and a square postage edge die set.  I backed both pieces with a Midnight postage edge border and overlapped them for added interest.  I found the Herringbone Parquet panel already die-cut with my Midnight cardstock, so decided to go with a blue-on-blue theme.

Finally, I went looking for a pre-foiled sentiment and found this one which worked perfectly.  The postage images and the sentiment are popped up with foam tape to provide some separation from the background.

Thanks so much for visiting.

Products used:

Ink:  Uncharted Mariner, Chipped Sapphire Distress Ink

Cardstock: White, Midnight (C&9)

Dies: Postage Edge Rectangles, Postage Edge Squares (Spellbinders), Herringbone Parquet (The Greetery), Wonderful Sentiments hot foil and dies (Pink Fresh Studio)

Accessories: Leafy Splendor Embossing Folder and Stencils (Altenew), black hot foil

Cheers

Karren

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Snowy Plaid

Hi and welcome!  I'm here with a card for the latest Tic Tac Toe Challenge where I've gone down the left column with Texture/White/Plaid.

I added the Altenew Layered Plaid cover plate to a blue background and then added some hand-cut snow drifts on top.  The snowman was assembled using various colours of cardstock and the Honey Bee Stamps Build a Snowman die set.

Finally, I added the sentiment and called it done.  Thanks so much for visiting.  Head on over to the challenge blog and have a go yourself!

Products used:

Stamps: An Arctic Christmas (SSS)

Ink: Versafine Onyx Black, Salvaged Patina Distress Ink

Cardstock: White, Black, Sno Cone, Summer Splash, Blu Raspberry, Hot Fudge (MFT)

Dies: Layered Plaid A & B (Altenew), Build a Snowman (Honey Bee Stamps)

Accessories: Orange Copic Marker

Cheers

Karren

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Floral Book

Hi and welcome.  I carved out a bit of time today to make a card specifically for the final Color Throwdown challenge.  I haven't played along in challenges for several years now, but when I was a regular challenge player, Color Throwdown was always one I tried to create for.  I'm sorry to see the challenge go, but totally understand.    

Anyway, onto my card.  I wanted to try and create with softer versions of the challenge colours.  So I went with a vanilla-yellow colour, a soft orange and a minty green.  I added some ink to brighten up the colours some.

I decided to use an old die-set from SugarPea Designs which I have always loved.  I created the "book" using Acorn and Ivory cardstock and then worked on the floral arrangement and glasses.  I wanted the background to look a bit bookish too, so lightly stamped a text background with Fog ink.  I then spritzed it with Hickory Smoke Distress Spritz for some splatter and sparkle.  The floral arrangement was spritzed with clear shimmer spray.

The whole background was dry-embossed with the Subtle EF and I finished with a couple of random flowers on the background.

I'm also playing along with Time Out Challenge where I have chosen all of the options except Movie.  When I saw the challenge and decided to make a book, the "corners" option reminded me of turning the corner down to mark the page (not that I have ever done that - it makes my eye twitch just thinking about it!).

Thanks for visiting. And special thanks to the Color Throwdown team for all the wonderful inspiration over the years.

Products used:

Stamps: You Matter (SSS), Many Thanks (Altenew)

Ink: Fog (SSS), Obsidian (Altenew), Mustard Seed, Cracked Pistachio, Ripe Persimmon Distress Inks

Cardstock: White, Black, Vanilla Cream, Minty Mint (Altenew), Summer Sunrise (PTI), Acorn (Spellbinders), Ivory (Gina K)

Dies: Open Book (SugarPea Designs)

Accessories: Hickory Smoke Distress Spritz, Subtle Embossing Folder (SU), Clear Shimmer Spray (Tsukineko)

Cheers

Karren

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Thinking Of

Hi and welcome!  Our sketch hostess over at Freshly Made Sketches this week is Cecile Ribon.  She gave us an image that tends towards Christmas, but I didn't want to make a Christmas card, so turned it into a floral instead.

Both the floral and the sentiment are NBUS stamp sets for me so it was good to use them.  I stamped and die-cut the images and set them aside to work on the background.  I die-cut a double square frame and backed it with some patterned paper that I'd spattered with gold.  I did the same spattering on the white panel but used some scraps of paper to mask off the top left and bottom right so the gold was contained in a diagonal.

I didn't add any embellishments as I thought the gold was enough.

Thanks so much for visiting!  Please check out the fabulous cards made by the rest of the design team.

Products used:

Stamps: Garden Treasure (Altenew), Get Well Soon (Honey Bee Stamps)

Ink: Amalgam (Gina K.), Pastel Sunrise, Canyon Clay, Burnt Red, Misty Sage, Mossy Meadow, Warm Sunshine, Caramel Toffee (Altenew)

Cardstock: White, One of a Kind patterned paper (Paper Rose)

Dies: Garden Treasure (Altenew), Get Well Soon (Honey Bee Stamps), Nesting Square Dies (Waffle Flower)

Accessories: Gold Color Shine (Heidi Swapp)

Cheers

Karren

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CASE It - Distressed Leaves

Hi and welcome.  Over on Instagram I'm joining in the CASE It Instagram Hop and this month I was inspired by Amy Rohl and her gorgeous card which I've shown at the bottom of my post.  I created a panel with various Distress Spray Stains and Spritzes and used some Altenew dies to cut them out.  I then set about the card base with a postage edge panel which was orignally going to be left out and just use the frame, but I liked the look of the splattered panel so re-inserted it.

The outline for the leaves comes from a previously foiled black panel where I made a mess and it only partly foiled.  I've kept it for a couple of years and finally put it to use.  I think it adds a suitably grungy look to the card. The sentiment comes from a Spellbinders stamp set.  I finished with some gems.

Thanks for visiting.  Here is Amy's card - isn't it gorgeous?

Head on over to Instagram and check out the hop.  It'll be amazing as always!

Products used:

Stamps: Hello Sunflower (Spellbinders)

Ink: Versafine Onyx Black

Cardstock: Watercolour paper, Black, Kraft

Dies: Leaf Mix (Altenew), Postal Frames (The Greetery)

Accessories: various Distress Spray Stains, Hickory Smoke Distress Spritz, Gold Color Shine (Heidi Swapp), Back to Basics Gem Stickers (Honey Bee Stamps)

Cheers

Karren

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Pokemon-Inspired

Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches' latest challenge, where our hostess this week is Verena Shapiro.  As soon as I saw Verena's sketch I saw a Pokeball and couldn't get the image out of my head.  I couldn't make it work as a card but I was inspired by the yellow colour and went a bit Mondrian-inspired in my colour scheme for this card.

This was very simple to make - 2 coloured circle dies cut in half, a black circle mat and a blue sentiment strip with a black mat.  The hardest part was finding a suitably long sentiment.

Thanks for visiting.  Please head over to the challenge blog and check out the fabulous cards made by the rest of the design team.

Products used:

Stamps:  Sentiment Strips (Altenew)

Ink:  Versamark

Cardstock:  White, Black, Beeswax, Pomegranate (Spellbinders)

Dies:  Infinity Circles (Hero Arts) Fishtail Flag Stax, Fishtail Flag Layers Stax (MFT)

Accessories:  White EP

Cheers

Karren

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Bird Branch

 It's time for another challenge from the team at Freshly Made Sketches and this week our hostess is Linda Callahan.  I went a bit rogue with my card this week - distorting some of the elements on the sketch to fit my card.

I had all these elements apart from the birds already made so I pulled them out and tried to make them work with the sketch.  Apart from the bird and the grass and cloud stencils, these are all from an Altenew Craft Your Life kit.  I arranged the elements to sort of look like the sketch then found a sentiment for the top right corner.

I added some soft stenciling onto the card base for grass and clouds then adhered the images down.

Thanks for visiting.  Please check out the wonderful cards made by the rest of the design team.

Products used:

Stamps:  Rustic Charm (Altenew)

Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black, Razzleberry, Bamboo, Grass Field, Mountain Pine, Green Onyx, Hazelnut, Milk Chocolate, Almond Butter, Mossy Meadow, Rocky Shore, Mocha, Velvet (Altenew), Speckled Egg Distress Ink

Cardstock:  White

Dies:  Rustic Charm (Altenew), Layered Bird Branch (SSS)

Accessories:  Rustic Charm Embossing Folder (Altenew), Micro Cloud Edges Stencil, Grassy Edges Stencil (MFT)

Cheers

Karren

Flower Bunch

It's time for another Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge and this time I chose the top right diagonal - Flowers/Patterned Paper/Stripes to come up with this card.

I already had the flower stenciled so I only needed to fussy-cut it out.  Onto a white card base I embossed with the Subtle embossing folder and added some patterned paper strips in varying widths.  I then stamped a Mother's Day sentiment, added the flower popped up on foam tape and finished with some pearls.

Thanks for visiting!

Products used:

Stamps:  Bountiful Leaves (The Ton)

Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black, Forest Glades, Frayed Leaf, Evergreen, Pastel Sunrise, Canyon Clay, Burn Red, Moon Rock, Lava Rock, Nimbus, Dark Night (Altenew)

Cardstock:  White, Watercolor Wash Brights (MFT)

Accessories:  Pastel Pearl Stickers (Honey Bee Stamps), Subtle EF (SU), Flower Bunch Stencils (Altenew)

Cheers

Karren

Purple Spring

 Hi!  I'm here with my reminder card for the current Flower Challenge which is to use spring colours.  I'm not sure that these purples qualify as spring but it is what it is!

One of my favourite layering stencil sets is Charming Delight by Altenew, so I set to with various ink colours and the stencils and created this floral image.  Using the co-ordinating die, I cut it out and then spritzed it with shimmer spray to give a lovely shimmer to it.

I went with my go-to layout which is a panel down the left hand side of a white card base.  The darker purple strip was created using direct-to-paper and one of the purple ink colours I used.  The sentiment was from a Pink Fresh stamp set.

Thanks for visiting!  The design team have some gorgeous cards so I hope you'll check them out.

Products Used:

Stamps:  Miss Your Smile (Pink Fresh Studio)

Ink:  Obsidian, Enchanted Garden set, Warm & Cosy Set, Nature's Wonder set (Altenew)

Cardstock:  White, Proper Pinstripes Pastels (MFT)

Dies:  Charming Delight (Altenew)

Accessories:  Charming Delight stencils (Altenew), shimmer spray

Cheers

Karren

White Flowers

 
Hi!  Today I'm playing along in a CASE It blog hop over on Instagram.  I thought I would post here too because this is where I keep the record of all my cards.  But I encourage you to head over to Instagram and check out the other cards in the hop.  For my case, I was inspired by Donna Mikasa and her gorgeous wreath card (at the bottom of this post).

I first saw Donna's card over at The Flower Challenge (where she quite rightly won the March challenge) and just fell in love with it. I wanted to be inspired but not copy it, so I used the same dies but instead of colour on a white background, I went with white flowers on a coloured background. I also changed up the floral layout but kept the embossed background.

Check out Donna's gorgeous card below.  I hope I have done it justice.   

Products used:

Cardstock:  White, Peach Bellini (MFT)

Dies:  Chocolate Flowers (Altenew), Essential Stylish Ovals (Spellbinders), Wonderful Sentiments Hot Foil (Pink Fresh Studio)

Accessories:  Wood Planks Embossing Folder (Honey Bee Stamps), White hot foil

Cheers

Karren

Copper Bricks

Hi and welcome!  I'm here with my card for the latest Freshly Made Sketches challenge where Cecile Ribon is our hostess.  I was absent last week but back with this card: 

Time was again short so I had to to something quick.  Washi tape foliage and a stenciled background made this card pretty easy to put together.  The stenciling was done with Lunar Paste and it has a lovely sheen to it which you can see in the second photo.

The sentiment was put in the wrong place (doh!) because I wasn't paying attention so I hope Cecile will forgive me 😁

Thanks for visiting!  The design team have some fabulous cards so I hope you'll check them out.

Products Used:

Stamps:  Written Words (Concord & 9th)

Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black

Cardstock:  White

Dies:  Floral Shadow (Altenew) Watercolor Wash Freeform (MFT), Written Words (Concord & 9th)

Accessories:  Teal Shadow Washi (Altenew), Copper Lunar Paste, Salvaged Brick stencil (Honey Bee Stamps)

Cheers

Karren

Magnolia

 Hi and welcome!  Our sketch hostess at Freshly Made Sketches this week is Jennifer Timko and she has given us a classic sketch with lots of options.  A little back story before I post the photo of my card.  I really, really want the new Magnificent Magnolia bundle from Pink Fresh Studio, but I have so many stamps, dies, and stencils I am trying not to buy everything new that I like.  So I went to my stamp inventory, UpNote, and typed in Magnolia.  Do you know I have 6 stamps sets featuring magnolias...?  I chose this one by Altenew because it was layering and meant I didn't have to start colouring from scratch.

After stamping all the layers, I added some extra shading with Copics then die-cut with the co-ordinating die.  For the circle in the background, I used the Window Sphere die which doesn't cut the circle but cuts out all the horizontal strips.  I die-cut it into the card base and then adhered a piece of woodgrain patterned paper behind it.

I popped up the (previously) hot-foiled sentiment and the magnolia with foam tape and added it to the card base.

Thanks for visiting.  The design team have some wonderful cards using the sketch so please head over and check them out.

Products used:

Stamps:  BAF: Magnolia (Altenew)

Ink:  Amalgam (Gina K), Strawberry, Dusty Pink, Blush Rose, Misty Moor, Marshland, Espresso (Altenew)

Cardstock:  White, black, Wood Textures patterned paper (Craft Consortium)

Dies:  BAF: Magnolia, Window Sphere (Altenew), Hexi-Gem Sentiments (Spellbinders)

Accessories:  Gold hot foil, Copics

Cheers

Karren

Postage Flowers

 

Hi and welcome!  Today is Freshly Made Sketch Challenge Day and our hostess this week is Narelle Farrugia.  As soon as I saw her sketch, I saw postage stamps and that's the direction I took.

This is part of an earlier stenciled panel that I first used on this card.  I used the Postage Collage die to select three pieces to die-cut and then added the additional postage-style stamps on them.  The card base is white and onto that I added a Pastel Sunrise panel I'd stamped with the same colour ink and the Crackle background stamp.  I used this stamp on the stenciled piece as well so this ties it together somewhat.

To finish the card, I stacked a BetterPress sentiment three deep and called it done.

Thanks so much for visiting.  The DT have some gorgeous cards so I hope you'll check them out.

Products used:

Stamps:  Postage Collage (Waffle Flower), Crackle Background (SSS

Ink:  Rose Quartz, Peach Parfait, Purple Wine, Orange Cream, Sunkissed, Fire Brick, Mocha, Sea Forest, Marshland, Misty Moor, Puffy Heart, Mangrove Root, Cosmic Berry, Pastel Sunrise, Obsidian Black (Altenew), Lost Shadow Distress Ink

Cardstock:  White, Pastel Sunrise (Altenew)

Dies:  Postage Collage (Waffle Flower, Here For You Sentiments BetterPress and Hot Foil (PinkFresh)

Accessories:  Charming Delight Stencils (Altenew), Subtle EF (SU)

Cheers

Karren