Color My Heart Color Dare Challenge #442

Hi all

Another week and another challenge for Color My Heart Color Dare. I only participate fortnightly but the challenges run weekly so make sure you pop over to the blog to check it out on my ‘off’ weeks!! 

This week’s colour prompt is:

When I first saw this I knew I wanted to use the bold colours of Sapphire, Paprika and Sangria. They just stood out to me and I think they are quite retro so I decided to use my Uniko Style stamp set which to me has total 60’s vibes!

In the end I used all six colours to get the layers plus some dark grey for the flower centres. The sentiment is also from Uniko, another great stamp set called Anniversaire Arts Decoratifs. 

So let’s see what you make of the colours by joining in with Color My Heart Color Dare Challenge #442. Don’t forget to hop over to the blog to see what amazing inspiration the rest of the Design Team have come up with. 

Much love

Steph x

Color My Heart Color Dare Challenge #440

Good morning everyone 

Today we have a great challenge from Color My Heart Color Dare called Crazy 8! Since there’s more than 8 of us on the Design Team I don’t think it’s referring to us!! 😂

The idea behind challenge #440 is to select at least 4 of the eight blocks shown and they aren’t all colour based so you can do a bit of mixing it up!

As always we reference Close to My Heart colour names but you can use any brand as long as it’s a very close match.

For my card I chose the florals, Glacier, New England Ivy and Sundance (with a little bit of Peach thrown in at the end!).

As I haven’t done a slimline card in a while I decided it was time and I already had the florals stamped and heat embossed with clear powder from another project I had been working on. I have recently treated myself to some Spectrum Noir Triblend markers so I tried them out my flowers and was happy with how they work. I then fussy cut the flowers (I’m one of those strange people who quite likes fussy cutting!) and decided on my arrangement. I wanted to bring my main three colours into the card as much as possible so I used all three for card layers. I already had the sentiment stamped (again from a previous project) and as I’m trying to use up my ‘overflow’ bits and pieces I decided it would be perfect for this card. Finally I added some sequins, which is not like me at all but I seem to be more and more drawn to embellishments these days. 

There’s a fair few stamp sets used for this card so it seemed easier to list them:

Altenew Dahlia Blossoms

Simply Cards and Papercraft Issue 162

Simply Cards and Papercraft Issue 178

Simply Cards and Papercraft Issue 204

Creative Stamping Issue 81

Lisa Horton Crafts Festive Flora and Fauna

Hero Arts Calla Lily (sentiment)

Phew! That’s a fair few stamp sets!

So hopefully you’ve all been inspired to join in and you like the style of this week’s challenge. Pop over to the Color My Heart Color Dare Challenge #440 and see what goodness the rest of the Design Team came up with.

Much love

Steph x

Christmas Craft Creations April 2021 - Our First Birthday!

Hi all

Thanks for joining us today as we celebrate our 1st birthday! I might wander off in search of some cake... 

But before I do, this month’s Christmas Craft Creations challenge requirement is to have no stamping on your card.

For my card I started off by dry embossing the top half of a piece of white card cut slightly smaller than the card base. I used a snowfall embossing folder but I only wanted the top half to emboss so I only inserted part of the card into the folder. To this I added my die cut vehicle made from red, black and silver mirror card. Before I attached the vehicle I poked the Christmas tree just under the back portion to look as though it is resting in the truck bed. Finally I added a silver mirror card sentiment and attached the whole panel to the card front with foam tape.

I hope you like my CAS Christmas card and will leave a lovely comment. Please do head over to the blog to check out the rest of the Design Team’s fabulous creations and leave them some love too. As it’s our birthday there are even more prizes up for grabs this month so get your craft supplies out and join in, but remember to leave the stamping for another day!

Much love

Steph x

Citrus Butterfly Loveliness

Good morning all,

I was working on a butterfly panel over the weekend and heat embossed some butterflies with the intention of doing a lovely multi coloured blended background. However, as I completed the panel I realised it really had not worked the way I had intended!! So back to the drawing board and you will see the results I was really looking for later in the year as I was creating for one of my DT positions. 

So this left me with some lovely Distress Ink blended butterflies to use up. I decided to cut them out and give them a black background to really make them pop!

The Butterflies are from Uniko set English Country Garden - Butterflies and I have heat embossed them in Wow! Opaque White powder before ink blending with Distress Oxides in Spiced Marmalade, Squeezed Lemon and Twisted Citron. I have fussy cut them and layered them onto a narrow black panel before layering this onto a white slimline card blank. Finally I have added the sentiment using the really great Taylored Expressions Simple Strips Background stamps and co-ordinating die.

I am entering this card into the following challenges:

Uniko Challenge #64 - Signs of Spring

Happy Little Stampers April Watercolour Challenge

Freshly Made Sketches #480

Thanks for stopping by today. Nice comments always appreciated and give that warm fussy feeling!

Much love

Steph x

The Male Room Challenge #149

Hi everyone 

Thanks for joining me today and checking out the new challenge over at The Male Room. Challenge #149 is wood.

I do think a masculine card and a wood theme go hand in hand and I was a little spoilt for choice when I was trying to decide what to make. Initially I was looking towards a wood effect background stamp then I remembered I had a wood grain embossing folder too. I also have a fair few woodland themed stamps and papers so it took me a while to choose a direction! But here it is:

As you can see, the wood grain embossing folder won out! I inked the folder before running a light grey card through it so it gave the slightly darker grey grain. Think silver birch!

I’m constantly thinking ahead to what cards I need to make so I decided to make this into an anniversary card for my husband but as you can see our anniversary isn’t until July. However, July is a particularly busy month for birthdays, anniversaries and carnivals (I’m treasurer for our local carnival event) so I definitely have to get myself well ahead of the game. 

I die cut the heart into the embossed card (I then ran it through the folder again as it had lost some depth) and I stamped the initials, heart arrow and month onto a piece of grey card behind the heart aperture. I layered this onto red card to give a pop of colour and did the same with my sentiment strip which was stamped and die cut using Clearly Besotted products. 

So, how will you interpret the wood theme? Pop over the the blog to see how the rest of the Design Team took on the challenge and leave them some love.

*** Important Note *** Please remember to add the challenge graphic and link back to the challenge on your blog post. We are unable to consider your project for a win or honourable mention if you don’t do this. 

Much love

Steph

Color My Heart Color Dare Challenge #438

Good morning everyone 

As I write this post (at the back end of February) I am really wondering what changes may have occurred by the time this post goes live! Here in the UK we are in a third lockdown but with no specific dates given for the end of this one I sit here and wonder. 

What is for sure is that the Easter bunny will be visiting this weekend and plenty of chocolate will be eaten! And that leads us nicely onto this weeks Color My Heart Color Dare Challenge #438 and a lovely Spring/Easter inspiration photo.

Just look at those beautiful tulips. I do love a tulip so I used those as my inspiration and a very nicely timed embossing folder from Simply Cards and Papercraft magazine helped a great deal.

I ran a piece of white paper through the embossing folder before highlighting the pattern by gently rubbing a pink ink pad over the surface. The centre of the folder is a blank circle so I die cut a pink circle to match the pink ink. The magazine set did come with stamps and dies but I decided to use a sentiment from the Uniko Spring Botanicals Daffodil set. I used the Clearly Besotted With Love stamps for the tulips in the vase. I mounted the panel onto yellow patterned paper and added a green ribbon to cover the join. I felt it needed a little something more so I added some yellow enamel dots to the centre. 

I hope you feel inspired to join in the challenge. Head over to the blog and leave some love for the rest of the Design Team. 

Much love

Steph x