Latte

 Hi and welcome!  Jennifer Timko is this week's sketch hostess at Freshly Made Sketches and her sketch allows for lots of creativity.  I went a bit rogue with her sketch but I think you can still see it, sort of 😄

This card is a 180 from what I had planned, which involved sunflowers, but I am quite pleased with how it turned out.  The coffee and hand had already been made over my Christmas break, so once I had the idea, the card didn't take too long to come together.  

I stamped the Notebook Paper background stamp onto white cardstock then die-cut it with the Notebook Edge die.  I stamped the sentiment in Versafine Onyx Black and adhered it to a white card base with foam tape.

I added the cup and hand and called it done.  My "latte" looks a bit suspect - I was trying to get the milky coffee look but failed miserably.  Never mind, I'd drink it 😆

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

I'm adding this to the current challenge at Just Us Girls with their fabulous moodboard.

Products used:

Stamps:  Notebook Paper Background, Mini Messages & More (MFT)

Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black, Misty Morning (Altenew)

Cardstock:  White, Kraft, Cherry Crisp (MFT), X-Press It, Silver Matte Foil

Dies;  Notebook Edge, Creature Comforts, Crafty Hands (MFT)

Accessories:  Copics, white gel pen

Cheers

Karren

Grateful

 Hi all!  I am thrilled to have been invited to join the Tic Tac Toe Team O.  The invitation to join the team came just before we wrapped up the Fusion challenge so the timing was perfect.  For my first challenge with the team, Silke is our hostess and she has a wonderful board to play with (totally my style!)

I chose to play with the left-hand column - White cardstock, CAS design, Gold/Silver Embossing - to come up with this card.

I have wanted this Tufted embossing folder from Spellbinders since I first saw it, and took the opportunity to purchase it during one of their sales.  Once it arrived, I knew it would be perfect for this challenge.  I embossed it onto a smaller panel of white cardstock and adhered it to a white card base with foam tape.  For the sentiment, I die-cut the word "grateful" three times from black and once from matte silver foil and adhered them together.  The sub-sentiment was silver-embossed onto black.

I positioned the sentiments and adhered them, then added some silver pearls to finish the card off.

Thanks for visiting!  Please head over and check out the fabulous cards made by the rest of Team O.

Products used:

Stamps:  Grateful for You (MFT)

Ink:  Versamark

Cardstock:  White, Black, Matte Silver Foil

Dies:  Grateful for You (MFT)

Accessories:  Silver EP, Tufted Embossing Folder (Spellbinders), Silver Pearls (Honey Bee Stamps)

Cheers

Karren

From My Gnome

 Hi everyone!  Today's card uses the new sketch from the team at Freshly Made Sketches, where our hostess this week is Jacquie Southas.  She has a great sketch with wide open spaces.

Even though I am so over making Christmas cards, I got some new supplies and decided to use these adorable gnomes.  I am not a fan of complementary colours so red and green together make my eye twitch.  I therefore decided to go with red and teal and coloured up these cute gnomes before die-cutting them with the co-ordinating dies.

For the background, I stamped another NBUS Christmas stamp onto white cardstock with Fog ink and die-cut it with a rectangle stax die.  I created a mat with Amarena Cherry cardstock and adhered both panels to a Fog card base.

The sentiment was white-embossed onto some Caribbean Sea cardstock and then I positioned the gnomes on the sentiment to ground them.  

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

Products used:

Stamps:  Gnome for the Holidays (MFT Stamps), Holly Jolly BG (Honey Bee Stamps)

Ink:  Amalgam (Gina K. Designs), Versamark, Fog (SSS)

Cardstock:  Fog (SSS), Amarena Cherry, Caribbean Sea (MFT), White, X-Press It

Dies: Gnome for the Holidays (MFT Stamps)  Rectangle Stax (MFT)

Accessories:  Copics, white EP

Butterfly Trio

Hi and welcome!  Today's card uses the new sketch from Freshly Made Sketches where Judy Rozema is our sketch hostess this week.

I had already hot-foiled and stenciled the butterflies when I first got the set so I pulled them out and used them as the basis of this card.  Onto a white panel I ink-blended the same ink colours as the butterflies, then added a stencil and went over it again but with a bit more pressure.  Once it was finished I rounded the corners and added the sentiment with black ink.  

I wanted a bit more black on the card so added a strip down the left hand side of the stenciled panel.  I added the butterflies then adhered it to a white card front using foam tape.

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

Products used:

Stamps:  Butterflies (Pink Fresh Studio)

Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black, Blue Suede Shoes, Dress Blues, Sea Glass, Uptown, All That Jazz, Daydream, Black Jack (Catherine Pooler)

Dies:  Small Butterflies hot foil plate and die (Pink Fresh Studio)

Accessories:  Small Butterflies stencils (Pink Fresh Studio), Compass stencil (Stamperia), Silver hot foil, Clear Drops

Cheers

Karren

Triangle Birthday

 Hi and welcome!  Yesterday was my last day before heading back to work after the holiday break 😞.  While I didn't make as many cards as I would have liked, I did spend a huge amount of time adding about 80% of my "current" stamps and dies into Evernote.  I started using Evernote about 6 years ago but got slack and the thought of adding all my earlier supplies was too daunting.  But with the amount of product that I double (and triple) buy, I decided to invest the time and be more disciplined about keeping it up-to-date.  As of now, I only have sentiment dies, floral dies and tag dies plus all my stencils left to catalogue.  Then, of course, there are all my old wood-mounted stamps....  In the last week I've added 1373 stamps and dies and I've still got to go back and add suitable tags.  But it does feel good to have the bulk of the initial data entry done, even if it did come at the expense of stamping time.

But enough waffle.  Today's card was made by the current Color Hues challenge of light pink and gold.  I immediately wanted to use my new Waffle Flower stencil with these colours and came up with this card.

I tried really hard to get the gold pigment ink to show its gorgeous shimmer in the photos, but no luck, so just imagine there is lovely shimmer to the gold.  I used Pink Champagne ink from Catherine Pooler for the pink and Enchanted Gold Pigment ink from Altenew for the gold and blended over the Layered Triangles stencils from Waffle Flower.  While it was drying, I also blended the two colours of ink onto scraps of white card and die-cut the sentiment.  I added a black sentiment behind the pink and gold layers which you can see from the side, and then brought in the black frame to tie it together.

Finally, I finished with some gold enamel dots from Honey Bee Stamps.

I'm also entering this into Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge which is Something New and Darnell's NBUS challenge.  Both the stencil and die are new.

Products used:

Ink:  Pink Champagne (Catherine Pooler), Enchanted Gold Pigment Ink (Altenew)

Cardstock:  White, Black

Dies:  Happy Birthday (Couture Creations), Fine Frames Cover (Altenew)

Accessories:  Layering Triangles Stencil (Waffle Flower), Autumn Enamel Dots (Honey Bee Stamps)

Cheers

Karren

This card got a shout out at Color Hues

Stick Together

 Hi and welcome to the first Freshly Made Sketch challenge of the year, where our hostess is Amy O'Neill.

I first chose the die for the circle cut-outs then went looking for some images to fit in the centres.  This adorable Birdie Brown set fit the bill so I set about colouring up some images and cutting them with my Scan n Cut.  The sentiment is white-embossed onto black.  

The circles were cut from some Terracotta Tile cardstock from PTI.  I backed the cut-outs with black cardstock and then added the cacti.

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

Products used:

Stamps:  Let's Stick Together (MFT)

Ink:  Amalgam (Gina K. Designs), Versamark

Cardstock:  White, Black, Terracotta Tile (PTI), X-Press It

Dies:  Stitched Tri Peek-a-Boo Window, Stitched Rectangle Stax (MFT), Infinity Circle Dies (Hero Arts)

Accessories:  Copics, White EP

Cheers

Karren

To The Birthday Chick

 Hi!  I'm here with a card for the current sketch challenge at MFT Stamps.  I'm also playing along with the Anything Goes theme at Krafty Chicks and the AAA Birthday Challenge.

When I saw the sketch, I thought of the adorable Birdie Brown set "Birthday Chicks".  I stamped, coloured and die-cut some of the images, matching colours with the strip of patterned paper I'd chosen for the left hand panel.  I added white gel pen details to the birthday hats and black gel pen to the chicks' eyes.  The sentiment was white-embossed onto some Summer Splash cardstock and die-cut with a slanted sentiment strip die.

Thanks for visiting!

Products used:

Stamps:  Birthday Chicks (MFT)

Ink:  Amalgam (Gina K.), Versamark

Cardstock:  White, X-Press It, Limelight, Summer Splash, Party Patterns (MFT)

Dies:  Birthday Chicks (MFT), Essential Slanted Sentiment Strips (MFT)

Accessories:  Copics, white gel pen, black gel pen

Cheers

Karren