Christmas Card Club #13

Hi Ladies, I'm late, but have some cards for this week. Lorraine has set this fortnights challenge, which is Candy Canes/Gingerbread.
 Unfortunately, I don't have any stamps or dies that fit the theme, so I've gone back to a Challenge I missed whilst on holiday. That is Christmas Wreaths, which was Ritas choice back in April.

 The first two cards use a Penny Black stamp, called Adornment. The first is stamped in  Encore Metallic Green pigment ink, and then heat set with Stampendous Metallic Green embossing powder.
 The stitched circle dies were bought from The Works.
I added a few acrylic gems to give a bit of sparkle.
The embossing folder used is a Cuttlebug one, and I accidentally put my cardstock in upside down, so it's actually debossed!

This time stamped in Silver Encore pigment ink, and heat set with silver detail powder. Red gems in assorted sizes gives this one it's bling.
 The embossing folder is from Craft Concepts.

For the next two I built a wreath using a die from Sue Wilson, called Twig Wreath as a base, and then some holly twigs cut with the Tim Holtz Christmas Mixed Media die, and the Winter Greens die set. I've added some red gems for berries, and a bow at the top. I have no idea where the tiny Poinsettia die cut is from, I rather think someone must have gifted it to me. I had 2, in different sizes, along with some tiny deer. If anyone knows what the die is, I'd love to know. I rather think the sentiment die cut was gifted too, as I don't have a die like that.
 The embossing folder is by Dovecraft.

Last card, and made exactly the same way, but this time was cut from white glitter card, and some golden holly added, along with the smallest of the two poinsettia flowers.




The background is a folder that I think was a magazine freebie, as it has no info on it.
 The sentiment is also from an embossing folder by Crafts Too, and has  6 sentiments strips on it.

The Sue Wilson twig wreath die cut, along with an assortment of foliage.

Three of the Penny Black stamped images, I haven't done the copper one yet.

Some embossed backgrounds I made up, you can see the Crafts Too one 2nd from the right.

Christmas Card Club Challenge 11- Mistletoe & Wine

This fortnights challenge has been set by Rita, and is called 'Mistletoe & Wine'.
Well, the card I ended up making is nothing like I originally had in my head, mainly because when I finally found the word stamp I knew had the phrase on it, the words were nowhere near as large as I'd remembered, so wasn't going to work for what I had in mind.
You can see, they are just tiny words in one corner, even though the stamp, from The Stamp Bug Artifacts range, is actually called Mistletoe & Wine!



So, I needed a Plan B. Which is when my eye was caught by a stamp set I'd seen at Happy Stampers, but had sold out so I ordered it online when we got back. It was lay on my desk. waiting for me to get round to putting it away.

It's from a company called Stamps by Me, and is called 'Cheers'. 
 You get the two wine glasses, and in the top left corner, the splodgey shapes are wine to go in them. The guy at HS said that if you ink the stamp, then spritz with water,  it looks totally realistic.
 Anyway, I now had a new plan, so hunted out some heat resistant acetate, some  pigment inks and embossing powders, and set to work.

I stamped the wine glasses twice, once in gold pigment ink, once in silver, both by Encore. Heat embossed them in gold & silver detail powder- even though the acetate is heat resistant, you really do need to watch it carefully, and keep the heat gun moving. I had it in one spot on the silver for a second or two too long, and it buckled a little. It did flatten a little after it cooled, so I may still be able to use it. But went with the Gold ones for this card.

 For the 'red wine', I used Brilliance
Pearlescent ink in Crimson, and for the 'white wine', Encore Champagne metallic. Both heat embossed with clear powder. One thing I did notice was that the 'wine' doesn't fit the glasses perfectly, I had to fill in at the bottom, using a cotton bud dabbed on the inkpad. It probably works fine if you mist with water, but that wasn't going to work with pigment ink & acetate. I cut out both pairs of wine glasses.

 Now for the 'Mistletoe' part! I have a Sweet Poppy stencil of a Mistletoe wreath, and decided to use this, onto white cardstock. I mixed a custom colour for the mistletoe, using Cosmic Shimmer Clear stencil paste, and adding some Adirondack Meadow re-inker, as well as a dollop of darkish green Mica powder.

Spread over the stencil, no idea whether I'll get a shimmery paste or not, just an experiment!
It seemed to work ok, got a little shimmer, and a fairly realistic colour for the mistletoe.

I used an 8"x8" square base card, as the 'wine' showed up better against a white background. The patterned paper down the left side  just broke up the plainness a little. I matted the wreath onto dark green, then red cardstock, and fixed it off centre, so I could add the wine glasses. I stuck them down with a few blobs of Glossy Accents behind the embossing & wine.
 Some half pearls were added as mistletoe berries, and finally a small peel off greeting in gold.

The Making Of a Valentines Card

Well, I promised a blog post on it, so here it is.  It all came together fairly quickly, as the general idea had rattled around in my head over the weekend. Of course, the smart thing would to have got it made before I went into hospital, but lets not go there, hey?
 Kept it simple in colours- Black, White & Silver, with a small splash of red at the end.
 We bought the word stamp at the Hobbycrafts NEC last year, as it's a phrase special to us, we use it between us often.

  My Supplies: Silver Encore Pigment pad, Black Memento ink,- there was also silver EP and Black detail EP not in the picture- A Moon stamp from Lavinia Stamps,  and the word stamp from Inkylicious. The notebook was to try out the positioning of the moon & words, to make sure I could stamp it and die cut it with a heart shaped die.
 I had a 7" square card base as a starter, and cut a silver cardstock square to fit the front, then cut a black pearl layer to sit on top of that.
 Next came the stamping, and I first stamped the words in Memento Tuxedo Black, and then heat embossed with Black detail Powder, onto white pearl card.
 Positioning the Moon stamp needed a bit of care, as I wanted it to fit easily into the heart, but not obscure the wording.

Here you can see I had positioned the heart die I was going to use after I'd stamped the words, and drawn lightly around the outer edge of the heart, to give me a guideline.  

 I stamped the Moon using Silver Encore Pigment Ink, then heat embossed using Silver EP. That did actually cover the lettering in a couple of places, but I used a finepoint Black marker to bring the letters back.

The heart shape is from a set by Nellie Snellen, and is the largest die of the set.

I was intending to add a white card layer slightly smaller than the black one, to leave a narrow border, but then I looked at the white offcut that I had die cut the focal heart from, and it made a pleasing layout with  a larger black border, so I went with that.
I'd already pictured that I wanted a sort of sweep of hearts from one corner to the opposite one, so set about sorting some out. There are a various sizes, some punched, some small die cuts, all from oddments of glitter card/ stamped card or paper and vellum.
 I lay out my small hearts,roughly lining them up to opposite corners, then used some dabs of silicone glue to adhere them, so I didn't have to unassemble everything. Finally added the main Focal Point on top, using some foam pads.

Christmas Card Club- Star of Wonder/Any Star

Mid way through January, and the second of this months challenges for the Christmas Card Club, set by Maureen.
 I've done two cards, mainly because I was struggling a bit! lol.
The first one uses mainly Card-Io/Majestix stamps- The Snow Globe, trees and house are all from various sets of theirs.
 The star is a random one- no idea where it's from.
The Santa and sleigh is by Inkylicious, and comes with two versions facing opposite directions, a sentiment and a sprinkling of stars.
 The sentiment inside the oval is a small peel-off, I didn't have a stamp small enough.
 The snow globe was stamped in Silver Encore and heat embossed in Detail Silver EP, the star also stamped in silver Encore, but heat embossed with Crystal EP.
 Images stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black, and Distress ink Tumbled Glass sponged for the hillsides and added with a soft brush for the sky. I'd cut out a mask for the outside of the snow globe so I could keep all the ink inside it.
 The silver foiled backing paper is from Craft Creations which I've had for ages, I think it's discontinued now.
 I trimmed down the image panel and rounded the corners, then added some silver ribbon across the top left, and some ribbon and a bow on the bottom right.

I spotted this star stamp whilst looking for a suitable one for the first card. I'm sorry to say I have no idea who made it, it's a clear stamp and I've had it for years. Again it was stamped in Encore silver, and I used two Embossing powders on it. Silver detail for the words, and a WOW! powder, one of the Chloe Endean inspired ones, called Jingle Bells, for the star. It's sort of a gold/silver mix.
 Backed it onto some gold glitter paper, then some more of the Craft Creations paper in a different colour. I also added a torn corner of some star & snowflake embossed vellum I did myself using various stamps and crystal EP. First outing for this stamp, despite how long I've had it!
 It's annoying me, as I feel I should know who made it, but the only names that keep coming to me are people who don't make clear stamps, so I know I have it wrong. Feels like it's in the back of my head somewhere though.

Honey Doo BIrthday Cards #2

Delving into my stack of images, and this one is up next. The stamp is called Falling Flowers, and I stamped this one in Versafine Onyx Black, and heat embossed with Stampendous Crystal Embossing Powder.
 The image was stamped and embossed again onto Black vellum, so I could cut out the flowers.
 I die cut the image using the largest die from Presscuts Scalloped Rectangle set.Matted it onto black paper, then onto a 7" square scalloped card base.
 I added a Sue Wilson Lattice ribbon & bow to the side, and a small peel off sentiment.
 A few acrylic gems were added to the spots on the design, along with some Black Diamond & Crystal Stickles for the centres of the flowers.


Second  card in this set is this gold one:

The stamp is called Butterflies & Flowers Large Corner, from Honey Doo again. This was stamped in Encore Metallic Gold, and heat embossed with a WOW Embossing Powder called Jingle Bells. Stamped as well onto Gold vellum, and I cut out the butterflies as well as the flowers. When I attached the butterflies, I cut away the rear wing, and placed them over the stamped version using a blob of Pinflair Silicone Glue for dimension. The flowers have gold mixed seed bead centres.
 I matted the image onto Gold glitter card, and repeated that with a smaller piece for the sentiment.

Honey Doo Hexagon Cards

 These turned out to be way more work than expected! :)
  
 I decided to make a batch of birthday cards, and these are the first two.I have a die set for cutting hexagons, actually, a couple of sets, this one is the CreaLies XXL die set, and I used the largest die to cut out the image. The Spellbinders ones I have don't go up anywhere near this large. These are about 5" across at the widest point.





Once I'd cut out the image, I ended up drawing round it, then using a steel edged ruler to cut the next matting sheet, and so on.



Cutting the card blank was a whole new ball game though.Working out what size blank I needed to start with, then how much border I wanted. Good job it was all straight lines, is all I can say.

I stamped up a handful of various Honey Doo images, on cardstock and on vellum, for the flowers.

As mentioned in the WOYWW post, I brought out some old friends to play with. These pads are at least 10 years old, probably more, and apart from the gold one, have never yet been reinked, but are still as good as when I bought them.

As I don't have either White or Red in the Encore- not even sure if they have any-I added a couple of Brilliance pads in, again, had these for donkeys years, and they are still great.

 I heat embossed the images using Stampendous Crystal EP. All except the Gold, for that I used a WOW powder called Jingle Bells, one of their Embossing Glitters.

Next problem was going to be keeping all the flowers I cut out in their respective designs, so I didn't get them muddled. Cue something lying around in a drawer. Those packs of disposable trays for parties, meant for nibbles.

Perfect. All cut out, and gently shaped. Not easy to shape vellum, as it doesn't stretch like ordinary paper.











I trimmed down the stamped images in an assortment of ways, either with dies, or using a fancy blade on my trimmer.

I matted up the hexagon images first, then moved onto the card base. As you can see, the fold is at the left side here, and I nearly mucked it up at the first attempt! , So, rotated the card and image till I could get one side at a fold, and that turned it into a top fold card.

    I ended up making myself a few templates for matting layers and card bases, for the next time I think this is a good idea! Wasn't really too hard, just getting the dimensions right to leave the right size border all round, and then getting that from a square card blank.

It was just after I matted these two up, I realised I'd forgotten to add a sentiment, and  using a heat tool on something with DST on, tends to make it peel. So, unembossed stamping it was then.
 You can tell how much winging it goes on here, can't you?






Finished off the flowers with a spot of Glossy Accents, and some seed beads for the centres, then attached them to the image with another spot  of Glossy Accents.

WOYWW #389

Yep, thats another week gone, we're hurtling madly towards the Big C word! Link up at Julia's place as always, The Stamping Ground, for all the desks of delight.

A batch of stamped images on my desk, on Tuesday night, and they will still be there on Wednesday, as I'll explain in a while.


 The other half of my desk contains these- I decided, as you can see in the picture, to cut out a couple of the images with Hexagon dies- the Crealies XXL ones. I used the largest die to cut them out, then decided I needed to cut some hexagon shaped cards to use them on.





 Hence the templates on my desk, so I can just draw around and cut to size the relevant card base. For how often I'm likely to do that, I wasn't going to the expense of even larger dies.

 
 Speaking of dies, Angela Radford, you naughty little enabler you!
 I saw some cards Angela had made with this die, and decided I NEEDED it!

 

 I'll be doing a post with the cards I've been making, but thought I'd show you these. Some old friends I haven't played with for a while.
 Encore Metallic Pigment ink pads. I got them out to use for the stamping, so I could heat emboss. I bought these at least 10 years ago, when I first got into stamping, and everything was heat embossed. And they are as juicy now as when I bought them! Excellent value, they were.



All those flowers I punched out a couple of weeks ago? They were for this canvas Calendar I made for a FB friend, Erika. (Full post below this one.)Who, all being well, is coming to the crop. As are we now,
for definite.
My Colorectal surgeon we saw just over a week ago, said he'd try chasing up my appointments. Result? I have one today at 9.30, a Nuclear Lung Scan. You have to breathe in a radioactive gas, which shows how your lungs are absorbing oxygen, then they inject you with a radioactive dye, which shows them what the blood supply to your lungs is. Then on Friday, I have a CT scan, so he can have an up to date image. Then on the 28th, I have the other Lung Function test. So I'm good to go for the crop! Looks to me that it's unlikely I'll get the surgery before Christmas, to be honest.
Said to Doug earlier, I'm in that weird place- on one hand, I want them to hurry up and get it done, on the other hand, the longer it takes, the better.
 So I'll be around later to visit, after we get back. Being done at a Birmingham hospital,as it's a specialised test.

Triple Stamping with Molly

So, about time I posted something between Wednesdays, and as I'd gone to all the trouble of colouring the Molly images in, I thought a card with her on was in order.
I went about this a bit backwards, to be honest. I wondered if I could turn her into a triple stamped card, which meant masking her out first.

 
 I worked out the card sizes I needed, stacked them up, then added the Post-it mask. Its simple enough to get the right sizes- each stamping layer is 1" bigger than the previous one.

The stamps I used to over stamp with are mainly from the Molly Rules set, by Visible Image. I used Versafine Onyx black for the stamping of the phrase, barbed wire and skull. There is an ink splat stamp in the set, but I felt it was a little too large to work with this picture, so I used a smaller one from the Ink Splats set. I also used Adirondacks to stamp them in. I applied a layer of Stonewashed to the stamp, then just did a bit of random dabbing with Denim.

Molly unmasked!, and ready for layering onto dark blue card.To get the coloured layer, each one has to be 1/4" bigger than the stamped layer that will be matted onto it.
 Normally, I'd cut all the stamping layers first, then cut all the mats, but like I said, I was doing this backwards.

 I wanted to add a sentiment, and thought dog-tag style. I cut a piece of thick card a little larger than my stamp, which I covered in Black Soot Distress Ink. This is wet enough to be able to add embossing powder to it, and I used black detail for this. Three layers, and into the final layer I stamped the sentiment, which had first been coated in Silver Pigment ink.
 TIP:  Make sure you coat the sentiment stamp before you start heating the embossing powder. The pigment ink won't dry on the stamp, but you will want to be able to stamp into the molten powder before it can harden.
For the second part of the tags, I used a lock stamp, from the Max Rocks set. Done exactly the same way as the sentiment. When they had cooled, I coloured the edges and backs with a Black Promarker.


 Both tags  had a hole punched in one corner and were added together with a length of ball chain, and an eyelet put in the top of the matted panel to thread it through.
 If the embossing starts to crack when you punch the hole, a quick blast with the heat gun will fix it. Next time I'll make the holes first!

Supplies:
 Molly Rules, Max Rocks and Ink Splat sets, all by Visible Image
 Versfaine Onyx Black
 Distress Ink Black Soot
 Adirondacks (or any dye ink) in a couple of shades of blue.
Silver Pigment inkpad
Black detail embossing powder
 Black Promarkers
 Coloured Promarkers to colour Molly
 Ball chain & fastener
Dark blue card