93rd Birthday

Hi and welcome.  I'm the hostess over at Freshly Made Sketches this week but this is a quick post because I've got some things to deal with in real life.

This card was made a few months ago for my dad's 93rd birthday.  I thought it would work for my sketch so I based my sketch off it.

For a very quick explanation, I used stencils and soft ink-blending for the muted background and ink-blended die-cuts for the focal point.

Thanks for visiting.  I hope you'll check out the wonderful cards made by the rest of the design team and have a go yourselves.

Products used:

Stamps: To the Wise One (Honey Bee Stamps), Mini Messages & More (MFT)

Ink: Gathered Twigs Distress Oxide, Antique Linen, Gathered Twigs, Tea Dye, Frayed Burlap, Scorched Timber, Speckled Egg, Iced Spruce Distress Ink

Cardstock: White

Dies: Rustic Garden (Spellbinders)

Accessories: Winter Wonder Background stencils (Honey Bee Stamps), Antiqued Bronze Distress Spray Stain

Cheers

Karren

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Coffee and Reality

Hi and welcome!  Today's sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches was designed by our other Camp Mum Jen Mitchell.  I decided to use a NBUS coffee die set for my card.

I die-cut and assembled the coffee maker and the cup and set it aside.  For the background, I embossed a dark brown square panel and onto that I adhered some patterned paper with coffee splats on it and then a stenciled newspaper panel.

The sentiment comes from a sticker set by Tim Holtz that has some fantastically snarky sentiments.  I don't know when I would use most of these but, boy they make me smile - I love me some snark!

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

Products used:

Ink: Gathered Twigs Distress Oxide, Scorched Timber, Aged Mahogany, Frayed Burlap Distress Ink

Cardstock: White, Dark Chocolate, Heartbeat (Altenew), Black, Hot Fudge (MFT), Silver Mirror Foil, Vellum, Graph Paper Garden patterned paper (Aall & Create)

Dies: Lovely Layers: French Press (Honey Bee Stamps), Rounded Rectangles (Hero Arts)

Accessories: Distress Mix Embossing Folder (Spellbinders), Small Talk Snarky stickers (Tim Holtz), Daily News stencil (Stamperia)

Cheers

Karren

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Pink Makup Bag

Hi and welcome.  I took some time today to make a card for the latest challenge at Seize the Birthday which is Primarily Pink, as well as the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge which is Make it Feminine featuring Paper Rose Studio products.  I made this card below and the patterned paper strip along the bottom is from Paper Rose Studio's One of a Kind paper pack.  I spritzed it with Distress Spritz and changed it from white to pink to match the rest of the card.

I assembled all the die cut elements using a mix of ink-blending and coloured cardstock.  I then arranged them and adhered them together.  The card base was embossed with the Plaster embossing folder which is a tongue-in-cheek nod to those who plaster on their make-up 😉

While assembling the various elements I added a thin strip of gold foil cardstock to tie everything together.

Thanks for visiting.

Products used:

Stamps: Essential Sentiments (MFT)

Ink: Versafine Clair Nocturne, Antique linen, Worn Lipstick, Picked Raspberry Distress Inks

Cardstock: White, Black, Gold Matte Foil, Vellum, Blush (Lawn Fawn), Bubblegum (MFT), Warm Sunshine (Altenew), Tutu, Fruit Punch, Alabaster (Spellbinders), One of a Kind patterned paper (Paper Rose Studio

Dies: Lovely Layers: Makeup Add-On, Lovely Layers: Zipper Bag (Honey Bee Stamps)

Accessories: Plaster embossing folder (Spellbinders), Worn Lipstick, Picked Raspberry Distress Spritz

Cheers

Karren

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

Mother's Day Roses

Hi and welcome to the new challenge over at Tic Tac Toe Challenge. This time I worked with the right column - floral/Mother's Day/Red.

This card involved hot foiling, stenciling and dry embossing and is lovely and shiny in real life.The sentiment stamp comes from a Honey Bee Stamps set and the florals are from Pink Fresh Studio.  I used Altenew cardstock and inks and dry-embossed the red panel with the Subtle EF.

Thanks for visiting.  I hope you'll check out the challenge blog and have a go!

Products used:

Stamps: Layering Wisteria (Honey Bee Stamps)

Ink: Versamark, Heartbeat, Misty Sage (Altenew)

Cardstock: White, Heartbeat (Altenew), Gold matte foil

Dies: Delicate Rosebuds Hot Foil and Die (Pink Fresh), Nesting Rectangle Frames (Waffle Flower), Layering Wisteria (Honey Bee Stamps)

Accessories: Gold hot foil, Gilded Embossing Powder, Subtle EF (SU)

Cheers

Karren

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Woven Congrats

It's Freshly Made Sketches day and this week our hostess is camp mum Jennifer Timko.  I had just received this floral die set so had to use it for my card.

I die-cut the floral image from Peach Bellini and Sage cardstock then added some light ink-blending for interest.  Once assembled, I adhered it to a vellum stitched flag and set it aside.  The embossed panel was lightly swiped with white ink to provide more dimension.

I finished the card with a pre-foiled sentiment.

Thanks for visiting!  The design team have some gorgeous creations, so please check them out.

Products used:

Ink:  Peachy Keen, Eucalyptus (Altenew), Unicorn White (Hero Arts)

Cardstock: White, Black, Peach Bellini (MFT), Sage (SSS), Vellum

Dies: Lovely Layers: Dianthus (Honey Bee Stamps), Hexi-Gem Sentiments (Spellbinders)

Accessories: Woven Embossing Folder (Spellbinders), gold hot foil

Cheers

Karren

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The Desk

Hi!  This card uses the colors at this week's Card Challenge.  When I first saw the colours, my mind went blank, but then I started scrolling through my MFT products and came across the various office die sets and decided to give it a go!  Confession:  all these products have never been used, even though I purchased the kit when it was released so... hangs head in shame... but pleased they finally got used because they are fun!

I created the "office" using various dies from three different sets.  The "wall" is stenciled with a small brick stencil and Lost Shadow Distress Ink.  The "floor" and the computer screen are patterned paper. I used the challenge colours as closely as possible, although the desk may be a bit too brown.  Once I'd assembled all the die-cuts I went looking for a sentiment and found this one (also never used) and thought it worked well with the office theme.

Thanks for visiting!

Products used:

Stamps:  Sticky Note Sentiments (MFT)

Ink: Versafine Clair Nocturne, Lucky Clover, Lost Shadow, Scorched Timber Distress Inks

Cardstock: White, Black, Celestial, Beeswax, Truffle, Teal Topaz (Spellbinders), Floor to Ceiling patterned paper (MFT), One of a Kind patterned paper (Paper Rose)

Dies: At My Desk, Office Greenery, Around the Water Cooler (MFT)

Accessories: Salvaged Brick Stencil (Honey Bee Stamps)

Cheers

Karren

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Flower Barrel

Hi and welcome!  Today's sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches was designed by Michele Ferguson.  I was originally going to create an arch as in the sketch but then found this NBUS die set from Spellbinders and thought the barrel would be a great substitute.

I went with a dark background and embossed it with a brick embossing folder before adhering the panel to a card base.  I then added a kraft coloured pierced frame.  All the die-cut elements for the focal point were die-cut with white cardstock and ink-blended with Altenew inks or Distress Inks.  The foliage was already ink-blended and I have no idea what inks I used!

After arranging the flowers and foliage, I found a pre-foiled sentiment and decided that this card would make a suitable sympathy card.

As an afterthought - I was just previewing this post before publishing and I looked at the card with the sympathy sentiment and immediately thought "body in a barrel" along the lines of my favourite TV serial killer Dexter, so maybe I need to replace the sentiment with something a little more appropriate 😱😁

Thanks for visiting.  The DT have created some gorgeous cards so please check them out.

Products used:

Ink: Orange Sorbet, Apricot Frost, Canyon Clay, Pastel Sunrise, Mocha, various green inks (Altenew), Scorched Timber, Gathered Twigs Distress Inks

Cardstock: White, Black, Dark Chocolate (Altenew), Paper Bag (Lawn Fawn)

Dies: Rustic Garden, Hexi-Gem Sentiments (Spellbinders), Chocolate Flowers (Altenew), Lovely Layers: Mini Fall Florals (Honey Bee Stamps), Pierced Rectangle Frames (MFT)

Accessories:  Gold hot foil, Rustic Brick Wall EF (Honey Bee Stamps), shimmer spray

Cheers

Karren

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Butterfly Love

Hi and welcome to the latest sketch from the team at Freshly Made Sketches where our hostess this week is Jen Brum.  I used the sketch to make a soft butterfly card.

The background text is a BetterPress plate inked up with soft brown ink.  I then die-cut the postage edge frame and adhered it to a white card base.

The butterflies were hot foiled, stenciled and die-cut and I chose three for the sketch (one more than the sketch but I like odd numbers). 

I finished with a sentiment chosen to cover as much of the horizontal panel as possible.

Thanks so much for visiting.  I hope you'll check out the rest of the DT's cards - they're gorgeous!

Products used:

Stamps: On The Line: Succulents (Honey Bee Stamps)

Ink: Versafine Onyx Black, Warm Linen (Altenew), Spiced Marmalade, Wild Honey, Dried Marigod, Fossilized Amber, Black Soot Distress Inks

Cardstock: White, Black, Alabaster (Spellbinders)

Dies: Small Butterflies hot foil and die (Pink Fresh Studio), Post Edge Expression Press Plate (Spellbinders), Postal Frames (The Greetery)

Accessories: Satin Pewter hot foil

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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Dramatic Strawberries

Hi, I'm here with my card for this week's challenge over at  Freshly Made Sketches where our sketch hostess is Jen Timko.  I decided to play with some NBUS dies from Honey Bee stamps and went with a dramatic dark green background to showcase them.

I die-cut the strawberries, leaves and flowers from various coloured cardstock then added some shading with a bit of ink-blending.  For the background I embossed a card panel with the Molded Frame embossing folder to mimic the additional layer in the sketch.  I then die-cut some embossed circles from the same green cardstock and adhered to the embossed panel.

After adding the strawberries, I went looking for a sentiment and found this one already foiled, so score!

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

Products used:

Ink:  Green Opal, Lemon Ice, Mid Yellow, Dark Chocolate (Altenew)

Cardstock: Forest, Pomegranate (Spellbinders), Jalapeno Popper (MFT), Reindeer Moss (Altenew), Harvest Gold (PTI), White 

Dies:  Lovely Layers: Strawberries (Honey Bee Stamps), Embossed Circles (Kat Scrappiness), You Are Everything BetterPress (Spellbinders)

Accessories:  Gold Hot Foil, Molded Frame Embossing Folder (Spellbinders)

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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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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Tool Birthday

Hi and welcome!  Today's sketch from the team at Freshly Made Sketches was designed by Jen Brum and rather than make a Christmas card, I decided to make a masculine birthday card with some new-to-me dies from Honey Bee Stamps.

I've said it before, but I'm a sucker for anything miniature and these are just so cute!  I cut them out using Milwaukee tool brand colours because my daughter's boyfriend is a builder and uses Milwaukee tools so I had him in mind while making it.

The red frame is placed over top of an embossed panel and I then arranged the tools and a white heat-embossed sentiment.

Thanks so much for visiting.  The design team have created gorgeous cards as usual, so I hope you'll check them out.

And in other news, even though I've been card-making for almost 25 years, I had never put together a cardstock swatch, so after watching a live by Amy Rysavy, I decided to swatch out my cardstock where I have more than 2 sheets of the same brand/colour.  These rings hold MFT, Altenew, Spellbinders, Lawn Fawn, Hero Arts, Simon Says Stamp and PTI (not all the colours for all the brands, of course!).  I haven't swatched my assortment packs of Concord & 9th, Simon Says Stamp, MFT or PTI because I have less than 2 sheets of a colour but this is probably enough to be going on with.  Amusingly, I have multiple companies with the exact same shade.  The photo below makes my colour-loving heart happy. I only wish it wasn't so expensive to ship cardstock to New Zealand or I'd have it all... I created the labels with my Niimbot labelling machine and the tag die is from SugarPea Designs (no longer in business).

Products used:

Stamps: Elegant Sentiments (Waffle Flower)

Ink: Versamark

Cardstock: White, Fog (SSS), Red Hot, Cement Gray, Steel Gray (MFT), Silver matte foil

Dies: Pierced Rectangle Frames, Pierced Fishtail Flag Stax (MFT), Lovely Layers: Woodworking, Lovely Layers: Pegboard Garage Tools (Honey Bee Stamps)

Accessories: Wood Plank Embossing Folder (Honey Bee Stamps), White EP

Cheers

Karren

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Work of Heart

Hi and welcome!  Today's sketch designer over at Freshly Made Sketches is Verena Shapiro and she has a classic sketch for us.  I used it to create a card for my daughter who is coming up to the end of her first year of high school teaching and it's been a tough year for her.

I started with the stamped images which I then stenciled and die-cut.  From there I embossed a Jalapeno Popper panel to provide some texture and adhered it to a white card base.  Two strips of patterned paper onto a white panel were used as per the sketch and I then stamped the sentiment before arranging the stamped images.

I finished with some enamel dots and called it done.  Thanks for visiting.  Please head over and check out the fabulous cards made by the design team.

Products used:

Stamps:  Awesome to the Core (Honey Bee Stamps)

Ink: Amalgam (Gina K.), Versafine Onyx Black, Heartbeat, Mossy Meadow, Green Opal, Milk Chocolate (Altenew), Antique Linen Distress Ink

Cardstock: White, Jalapeno Popper (MFT), B&W Stripes (MFT), Freebie patterned paper (Honey Bee Stamps)

Dies: Awesome to the Core (Honey Bee Stamps)

Accessories: Awesome to the Core Stencils (Honey Bee Stamps), Tropical Forest Enamel Dots (Altenew), Subtle EF (SU)

Cheers

Karren

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Berry Wreath

Welcome!  Today's card uses the latest sketch from Freshly Made Sketches which was designed by Kim Singhdahlsen. I went the obvious route with the sketch and created a wreath card using hot-foiling.

The wreath was created with both hot-foiling and stenciling.  Once I had finished that I created a wreath arrangement and set it aside.  Onto a kraft cardbase I embossed with a wood plank embossing folder.  I then added the wreath and finished with a hot-foiled sentiment and some champagne drops.

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

Products used:

Ink: Green Valley set, Tea Party set, Grapevine (Altenew)

Cardstock: White, Kraft, Black

Dies: Winter Berries Frame hot foil and die (Pink Fresh), Fishtail Flag Layer Stax (MFT), Holiday Florals Background hot foil (Spellbinders)

Accessories: Winter Berries Frame stencils, Clear Drops: Champagne (Pink Fresh), Wood Planks Embossing Folder (Honey Bee Stamps), gold matte hot foil

Cheers

Karren

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CASE Me A Christmas Card 2025

Hi and welcome!  I'm here with a card I've posted over on Instagram for the annual Case Me A Christmas Card run by Michelle Lupton.  This year we are doing several hops so I hope you'll follow along.

Join the fun with "Case me a Christmas Card 2025"! This series features ten creative hops in October—two on YouTube and eight on Instagram—where we’ll CASE (Copy And Selectively Edit) cards from fellow crafters. Make your own unique Christmas card inspired by someone in the hop, upload it via Inlinkz on @michelle_lupton ’s blog (link in Michelle’s IG profile), and you could even snag a prize from one of our awesome sponsors. Or leave a comment on the stops on the hop (either on IG or on YT)! It's all about sharing ideas, connecting with other cardmakers, and sparking your creativity for the holidays!

I was inspired by @kellyrasmussen - scroll down to see the card that inspired me. I was initially drawn to Kelly's gorgeous colour combo, then I pulled in the white pattern in the background as well as the general layout. I went with a white embossed background which I over-stamped with a Chalk Background stamp to soften it somewhat. For the focal point, I put together the die-cut Santa Man from SSS and finished by die-cutting part of the background from behind the red strip to tie it all together. And here is Kelly's gorgeous card.

Next Up in the Hop is: @kellyrasmussen

Hop list:

@michelle_lupton

@traceymcneely

@bowdangel

@annikarten

@channinpelletier

@scrapbooking_swe

@kailashcrafts

@karrenjnz

@kellyrasmussen

Products used:

Stamps:  Holly Jolly Background (Honey Bee Stamps), Chalk Background (Hero Arts)

Ink:  Versamark, Grapevine, Monring Frost (Altenew)

Cardstock:  White, Lagoon, Heartbeat (Altenew), Onyx Matte Metallic (Spellbinders)

Dies: Holly Jolly (Honey Bee Stamps), Santa Man (SSS)

Accessories: White EP, Rustic Brick Wall Embossing Folder (Honey Bee Stamps)

Cheers

Karren

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