Get Well Daisy

It's Fusion time!  For this challenge, we've gone for a gorgeous daisy photo and the sketch allows for lots of creativity. 

For my card, I took elements of both the sketch and the photo and made a get well card.

I stamped the daisy image and colored it using the techniques I learned in the free Kit and Clowder class.  I then die-cut the daisy and set it to one side while I worked on the rest of my card.

I took a strip of black and white striped paper and adhered that down the left side of a white card base.  Then I stamped the sentiment before adding the daisy with foam tape.

Finally I added some clear crystals, painted the centre of the flower with sparkle pen and called it done.

I'm going to link this up to the Anything Goes challenges at both 4 Crafty Chicks and Simon Says Stamp.

Products used:

Stamps:  Daisy and Bugs (Hero Arts), Essential Sentiments (MFT)

Ink:  London Fog (Memento), Extreme Black (MFT)

Cardstock:  White, X-Press It, B&W Stripes (MFT)

Dies:  Daisy and Bugs (Hero Arts)

Accessories:  Copics, Spectrum Noir Clear Sparkle Pen, Crystals

Cheers

Karren

Strength

I'm back!  This time with a card for the latest challenge at Freshly Made Sketches where our hostess is one of our camp mums, Jennifer Timko.  And here is her fab sketch:

Once again, I played Stretch the Sketch and modified the size of the circle in Jennifer's sketch😄

This was quite a simple card to make.  I started by masking off the top and bottom of a white card base then I sponged on Distress Inks in Spiced Marmalade, Picked Raspberry and Wilted Violet.  Once I was finished with the blending, I removed the masking tape.  I die-cut the "moon" from black cardstock and liberally spritzed it with shimmer spray then added that to the card with liquid adhesive.

Finally, I stamped the sentiment onto a strip of white card and angled one corner.  Card done!

Thanks for visiting!  Head on over and check out the rest of the DTs cards.  You'll be so glad you did!

Products used:

Stamps:  Essential Sentiments (MFT)

Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black, Spiced Marmalade, Picked Raspberry and Wilted Violet Distress Inks

Cardstock:  White, Black Licorice (MFT)

Dies:  My Monthly Hero Jun 2017 (Hero Arts)

Accessories:  Shimmer Spray

Cheers

Karren

Ski-sons Greetings

Hi and welcome!  Here is the second of the three cards I got to make on Saturday.  I used the sketch challenge at MFT Stamps for this card.

My first step was to emboss a falling snow stencil onto some Grout Gray cardstock using glimmer paste.  It's hard to see in the photo, but it gives a lovely shimmer in real life.

I stamped and colored this adorable bear and then cut him out with my Scan n Cut.  I embossed the sentiment onto black cardstock.  I adhered the sentiment strip behind the bear and then added both elements to the card with foam tape.  I finished with some Nuvo Crystal Drops and called it done.

I'm also linking up to Happy Little Stampers Christmas Challenge.

Thanks for visiting!

Products used:

Stamps:  Ski-son's Greetings

Ink:  Black Licorice Hybrid, Versamark

Cardstock:  White, Grout Gray, Black Licorice (MFT), X-Press It

Accessories:  Copics, White EP, Moonstone Glimmer Paste, Falling Snow Stencil (SSS)

Cheers

Karren

Berry Birthday

Hi and welcome!  I spent some time in my craft room yesterday making a couple of cards for some challenges and this is the first one.

When I saw the Addicted to CAS challenge pop up last week, I immediately thought of this NBUS stamp set from Sunny Studio.  It took me a week to get to it, but I finally put ink to paper and came up with this card.  I was also inspired by the current CAS(E) This Sketch challenge plus I'm linking up to Seize The Birthday.

I did some experimenting with colors for each of the layers for the berries, mixing my brands to get the best looks.

The strawberry was stamped directly onto the card base.  To get the achenes to show (the seeds), I stamped first with white pigment ink, then went over the top with Sunshine ink from SSS.  The other berries were stamped with purple inks and fussy cut.  One was popped up on foam tape and both were coated with Nuvo Crystal Glaze.

I wanted a big sentiment, but not too big, so went looking through my stash and found this one from PTI.

Thanks for visiting.

Products used:

Stamps:  Berry Bliss (Sunny Studio), Signature Greetings (PTI)
Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black, Poppy, Red Hot, Electric Red (MFT), Olive, Moss (Altenew), Velvet Orchid, Hydrangea, Blue Ciolet (SSS), Unicorn White (Hero Art), Sunshine (SSS)
Cardstock:  White
Accessories:  Nuvo Crystal Glaze

Cheers
Karren

Birthday Stars

Hi and welcome!  This will be another short post as I'm still not over my cold, but I am back at work.

Today's card is for the fabulous Amy's sketch at Freshly Made Sketches.  I love this sketch and am planning on making another card with it when I'm back to 100%.

I took a couple of liberties with Amy's sketch by making the horizontal strip part of the sentiment, but I think it still works.

Can I just say, this looks so much better in real life!  I stamped the bold Happy Birthday in Extreme Black ink then added the stars in various SSS colors.  Finally I ran the card through my Big Shot with my new Subtle embossing folder, which was part of what I chose with a recent prize from Jan at The Paper Players 400th Challenge.  I love this folder.  It's so hard to see in photos, but it gives a gorgeous linen-like texture to the card.  You can see it a bit better in the photo below.

Thanks for visiting!  Head on over and check out the fabulous cards from the rest of the DT.

I'm also linking this up to the Visual Triangle challenge at MFT's Summer School.  It's the only card I've managed to make for this round of Summer School 😞

Products used:

Stamps:  Happy Birthday to You (MFT)

Ink:  Extreme Black (MFT), Duckling, Cloudy Sky, Dusty Sage (SSS)

Cardstock:  White

Accessories:  Subtle EF (SU)

Cheers

Karren

A Star this Card Ain't...

It's time for another fun challenge from the Fusion team and here is our newest sketch and inspiration photo.

When I designed this challenge, I had great intentions of making a galaxy background like in the photo, but as I mentioned yesterday, I have a really bad cold and didn't get to make my card for this challenge until that cold was full-blown and my brain was not working at all right.  So after 4 days of trying to come up with a card, this the is best I could do.

So on Tuesday, I managed to spread some glitter embossing paste over a stencil and set it aside to dry.  Today (Thursday), I came back to it, looked at it for a long time, looked at it some more and finally came up with the card you see.  Nothing flash, but it's a card and it meets both the sketch and the photo, so win-win 😄

The "You are a" was stamped with an alphabet stamp and the "star" was die-cut from an alphabet die.

Here are another couple of photos.

Thanks for visiting!  The design team have come up with some fabulous cards for this challenge, so I hope you'll check them out.

Products used:

Stamps:  Calli Letters Upper and Lower (Mama Elephant)

Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black

Cardstock:  White, Black, Silver Foil

Dies:  Pierced Heart Stax (MFT), Urban Alpha Upper (Memory Box)

Accessories:  My Monthly Hero Dec 17 stencil (Hero Arts), Licorice Glitter Paste (BoBunny), star sequins

Cheers

Karren

Gumboots

Hi and welcome!  Today's post will be short as I'm currently suffering from the worst cold I've had in years!  Luckily I made my card for this week's Freshly Made Sketches challenge on the weekend while my cold was deciding whether to come out fighting or give up.  Unfortunately, it came out fighting and I've been off work since Tuesday.  Anyway, enough about my cold.  Here is Narelle, my fellow downunderer's (her term!) sketch:

And here's my card.

As you can see, I flipped the sketch to better accommodate my main image.  

I stamped, quickly colored and die-cut the gumboot image before mounting it to a Berrylicious stitched circle die-cut.  I also die-cut a Sour Apple stitched strip and adhered that to a white top-folding card base.  After adding the gumboots, I finished with a white-embossed sentiment and called it done.

Thanks for visiting!

Products used:

Stamps:  Showers & Flowers (SSS) KIS:  Just Because (PTI)

Ink:  Black Licorice Hybrid, Versamark

Cardstock:  White; Sour Apple, Berrylicious, Black Licorice (MFT), X-Press It

Dies:  Showers & Flowers (SSS), Inside/Out Stitched Circles, Blueprints 1

Accessories:  Copics, White EP

Cheers

Karren 

Alcohol Trellis

Hi and welcome!  It's Freshly Made Sketch Challenge day and this week I am the hostess.  I came up with a very CAS sketch which leaves the way clear to use your imagination as much as you want!

I had plenty of ideas for the sketch, but decided to use a NBUS cover die from WPlus9 and a rainbow of alcohol inks to come up with this card.

After dropping a rainbow of alcohol inks onto a sheet of Yupo paper, I waited until it was nearly dry then placed a copper foil sheet over the top and burnished it with my hands before peeling it away to reveal some beautifully foiled spots on the panel.  I then die-cut the panel with the Trellis background (to be honest, I don't know if it is Trellis 1 or 2 as I have both and didn't mark each one with its number).  Rather than throw away the negative pieces, I added them back into the die-cut piece , which was a painstakingly slow process, believe you me!  Once they were all back in place, I placed a piece of Press n Seal over the top and carefully adhered all the pieces to a panel of white cardstock.  So now I have another background for another card, some day 😄

I added the positive panel to a white top-folding card base then embossed the sentiment onto a black strip and added that to a copper foil strip, leaving only a hint of copper at the top of the panel.  Here's a view from a different angle so you can hopefully see the shine and foil.

Thanks so much for visiting.  The design team have all done wonderful things with my sketch so I hope you'll head on over and check them out.

I'm linking this up to the current challenge at Just Add Ink as well as the Create Your Own Background challenge at Simon Says Stamp.

Products used:

Stanps:  Lots to Say (Reverse Confetti)
Ink:  Versamark
Cardstock:  Black, White, Copper Foil, Yupo
Dies:  Trellis (WPlus9)
Accessories:  Alcohol Inks (Poppyfield, Limeade, Aquamarine, Sunshine Yellow, Indigo, Amethyst, Valencia Orange), Antique Gold EP

Cheers
Karren

Birthday Dancer

Welcome to another Fusion challenge! 



I played with the sketch this time, throwing in a couple of the colors from the photo.

Funny story about this card - I originally only had the patterned paper mounted onto black and then onto the card base, but after I added the sentiment it looked too stark, so I decided to stamp this NBUS ballerina.  So I carefully positioned her to fit onto the panel and stamped her and her outfit.  Looked quite good, if I say so myself.  I added the Nuvo Crystal Drops in black and took the photos.

But, when I was editing, I noticed that the pattern on the paper looks like a great big rock is smashing down onto her face!  Doh!  Oh well, it was too late to remake it and hopefully the recipient won't notice 😄And, I know the panel looks crooked on the card base, but it really isn't!

Thanks for visiting!  The DT have some fabulous cards to inspire you and our August guest designer has created a total wow card as well.  Head on over and find out who it is...

Products used:

Stamps:  Arabesque (Rosie's Studio), Essential Sentiments (MFT)
Ink:  Extreme Black, Coral Crush (MFT)
Cardstock:  Grout Gray, Thick n Thin Patterned Paper, Black Licorice (MFT), Salvage District (Prima)
Dies:  Linen Cover Plate (PTI)
Accessories:  Nuvo Crystal Drops (Ebony)

Card Chain Challenge

Hi!  I don't know if you've heard of the Card Chain Challenge, but it's an ingeniuous challenge whereby as well as making cards to meet challenge guidelines, we also send those cards to another challenge member.  How cool is that!  I've seen the reveal posts for months and always meant to play along and last month, I finally committed to just that.  Here were the challenge guidelines.  You can pick one, two, three or all four options.

Theme options:  Fish/Beach/Friendship

Product/Technique Options:  Rubberdance/Washi Tape

I went with the sketch and beach themes and came up with this card, which I sent to Dawn, who is also in New Zealand but in the North Island.

This card uses the June 2018 My Monthly Hero kit and I created a sunset scene by blending some distress oxide inks onto a masked off piece of Bristol Smooth cardstock.  Once that was finished, I stamped the ocean with Altenew inks then added Versamark ink to the bottom and embossed with the amazing sand embossing powder.

I finished with a die-cut Adirondack chair and a sentiment embossed onto a vellum strip, in keeping with the sketch.  Also in keeping with the sketch, I scattered a few sequins onto the card.

This was great fun!  I am always making cards but very rarely actually use them, so to make a card and then send it to another cardmaker was so cool.  If you want to check out the next challenge, there are still a few days to sign up, so head on over to Card Chain Challenge sign-up page.

Thanks for visiting!

Products used:

Stamps:  My Monthly Hero June 2018 (Hero Arts)

Ink:  Versamark, Black Soot Archival, Sea Glass, Ocean Waves, Dusk (Altenew), Abandoned Coral, Spiced Marmalade, Wild Honey, Fossilized Amber Distress Oxide

Cardstock:  White, Black, Bristol Smooth, Vellum

Dies:  My Monthly Hero, Slanted Sentiment Strips (MFT)

Accessories:  Sand EP (from kit), Clear EP, Sparkling Clear Confetti (Pretty Pink Posh)

Cheers

Karren

Peaceful Palm Tree with Video

Hi everyone and welcome!  I'm back with a card using the latest sketch from Freshly Made Sketches and this week our hostess is the wonderful Jen Brum.  Check out her sketch - it's very cool!

So, I sort of enlarged the squares on Jen's sketch because I wanted to create a scene on my card - like looking through a window.

I used a stitched square die to die-cut four windows from a white panel and then set to work on my scene.

I used Distress Inks to create my beach scene onto a panel of Bristol Smooth cardstock and once I was done ink-blending, I added some "sand" with a stamp from Distressed Patterns, then added foam and waves with a white gel pen.  I stamped, colored and die-cut the palm tree and set that aside.

I stamped a sentiment and some birds before adding both panels onto the card base.  Finally I adhered the palm tree and called it done.  I have a video of how I made this card and also how I worked out where to cut the "window panes" if you're interested.  You can watch below or over on YouTube.

I'm entering this into Addicted to CAS's Summertime challenge (hope it's CAS enough!)

Thanks for visiting!  Head on over and check out how the rest of the DT have used this sketch - I hope you'll give it a go, too!

Products used:

Stamps:  Penguins in Paradise, Distressed Patterns (MFT), My Monthly Hero June 2018 (Hero Arts), Special Delivery (SugarPea Designs)

Ink:  Black Licorice Hybrid, Extreme Black, Grout Gray (MFT), Unicorn White (Hero Arts), Antique Linen, Tumbled Glass, Salty Ocean Distress Inks

Cardstock:  White, X-Press It, Bristol Smooth

Dies:  Penguins in Paradise, Inside/Out Stitched Squares (MFT)

Accessories:  Copics, White Gel Pen