WOYWW #512= The After Concert Edition.

We're back from our weekend away. The concerts- Birmingham Friday & Prestatyn on Saturday- were both fantastic, we had a great time.


As always, Wednesday id Desk Sharing Day over at Julias place, The Stamping Ground.

Couple of pics for you here.

 You really have to see the drum kit to believe it- it's enormous.

 Beside the sea, so we had to go down to the beach, then as it was lovely & sunny, an Ice Cream was in order. ( Julia did confirm it's the Law!)

   Having a look around the area during the day on Saturday, and came across Dyserth Waterfall, right on the edge of the town.















Took a short video on my phone.





So no crafting till we got back, and I got the Mothers Day cards finished. Based off a design I've used for Birthday cards, using Honey Doo stamps. Putting them down here so they don't show on FB, lol.
Speaking of FB, I'm putting this question in case anyone has any ideas. I have a crafting & blogging friend, and every time she- or anyone- tries to post a link to her blog posts on FB, it says it goes against their Community Standards. So, you ask for a review, telling them it's not spam, they review it, agree they got it wrong, then allow the post. Next time she tries to post, the same thing happens again! There doesn't seem to be any way to speak to a human being, and the Help Forum is totally misnamed! We suspect someone has maybe in the past marked her posts as spam, and that's what's causing the problem. But there doesn't seem any way of getting FB to sort it out. If anyone has any ideas, they'd be most welcome.
 Just got a Wedding card to make, then I'll be back to the glittering, lol.
 So, all that brings me to .......And Finally.......

 Anyone who wanted details about this years Extra Special, Super Duper 10th Birthday Crop, you can get all the info in Julias post, HERE.

Mothers Day cards,with Mixed Media dies.

Two cards made, using patterned papers, peel offs and a die set called 'Delicate Asters', from Heartfelt Creations/Spellbinders.










The set has 4 different sizes of flower, along with some centres and a leafy branch. I'll be honest, I've had this a while, but my early attempts with it were a nightmare for cutting. Getting all the flowers to cut cleanly was impossible, I had to resort each time to cutting each layer individually, which, if you want a few is incredibly time consuming. However, I recently bought a Precision Base Plate for the Big Shot, which I can use in my BSPro, and that does make a difference. As does trying to line up the dies to go through at the edge of the machine, rather than the centre.
 Word of warning, apparently over time the Plate can cause damage to the dies, so it's one to be used sparingly.
Back to the cards. I'd picked out some 7"x7" deckle edged cards that I got at Happy Stampers, and a couple of A4 sheets of white card to trim down to fit.
I'd been tossing around in my head a design for the cards, fairly simple to do, but look really lovely.
 Next came a hunt through the patterned papers- not for the faint hearted, I assure you. Finally settled on this one, which comes from a Dovecraft pad,called Amethyst Floral Prints with  designs by Kate Knight,which is quite an oldie, but is still available, certainly  on E-Bay. My pack is 8"x8", but it also comes in 12"x12".
Slight jump in the pictures here, I forgot to photograph the die cut stage! I used Tim Holtz Mixed Media die set #2, and cut this from the top left corner. I cut the paper sheet into 2 triangles, and trimmed them down to fit neatly.

 Next job was to find something to back the die cut with, and after rejecting patterned papers as being too 'busy', I decided on a Fuchsia coloured glitter paper.
 This was going to need a wet glue to attach, and my wet glue of choice is silicone glue, or Pinflair Glue Gel.
 The other point that would need to be addressed is that die cutting those MM dies does result in distinct warping of the cardstock, which meant I needed to apply glue to areas of the design, not just around the edges.
 I sorted that by using a small paintbrush to get into some of the finer detail areas.



 I worked on top of the glass mat, as it meant I could keep lifting the cardstock, and wiping off any glue that may have spread through the design.

  A little longer than a couple of strips of tape, but does a better job. Now it needing laying down with some weight on the top to make it set 
flat.


















While this was drying, I moved on to the flowers.

I cut some in a pale lilac pearl paper, some in white and some in a white vellum.

 I only used three of the four flower sizes to build them up this time.

I shaped them using a ball stylus, my pokey tool and a foam mat.

Stacked up using Ranger Glossy Accents, and seed pearls/ seed beads added to the centres, also with Glossy Accents.

 A few hours later, and the silicone glue has dried, and they are nice and flat.
 Here I added some peel off strips across the edges to finish them off neatly.

Foam tape on the back to give the panel a little dimension and support.

The flowers positioned on the patterned paper - they look similar to the paper, which gave the idea to use them.

A peel off Happy Mothers Day sentiment was added just below the flowers.

Mothers Day and Indigo Blu

Mothers Day. or more correctly, Mothering Sunday cards handed out, so now I can post them up. These were the Indigo Blu, Blazing Poppies panels that I stamped and coloured. The Poppies themselves are coloured with Promarkers, and the shading around them with Distress Inks.

 The centres of each poppy were given some definition with Black Diamond Stickles.
 After the shading, each was matted onto a matching cardstock, and then a medallion was punched, using the punch shown. This was cut out leaving a narrow border, then trimmed diagonally in half, to give a couple of ornate photo corners for each one.

 

Next up the embossed lines were created for the panel to sit inside.The base card is an A4 sheet of white pearlescent folded in half.

The long panels are added between the lines, and the main panel slightly overlaps this.

Fortunately,I'd used foam tape to add the panel, as it was only checking how well the photo had come out that I realised I had placed the pink cards panel upside down!  But it peeled off with out any damage, and re- stuck down.

As the only Mothers Day stamp I have is too large for the front of this card, I again used up some peel-offs for the sentiment.

WOYWW #301

Annnnnd we're back at our desks, sharing all our secrets, of the crafting kind, as usual. All thanks to our wonderful hostess, Julia, over at The Stamping Ground.
 There is actually some crafting going on, on my desk this week.

This is a stamp I got last week, from Indigo Blu, called Blazing Poppies. Although you could do them in any colour you wish, just as well, as my first set is blue, lol.
Two sets, as its Mothers Day ( Mothering Sunday) this weekend, and I need the card making fairies to help me get a bit of a move on here. One down, one to go.








First one for my Mom, who does like Blue, the second, for Dougs Mom will probably be in red.
The other pic on my desk, you will already have seen if you visited Cardarian ( Dolores) last week.
This absolutely gorgeous card turned up in the Happy Mail on Wednesday, a little before I actually saw it on her blog! The colours are amazingly vibrant, it really is beautiful. Thank you, Dolores, you really made me smile.
  So, a short and sweet desk this week, for a change.







Only one other thing I wanted to share, and I saw this on Facebook last week, on International Womens Day, and thought just how perfectly it sums up every single one of the WOYWW crowd. So, from me personally, thank you, to each and every one of my super-strong friends, for all your support, love and friendship!

A return to Triple Time Stamping

I like this really neat technique, which exploits the 'halo' effect you get when you stamp over a paper mask. For this card, which is on a 6x6 square base, the stamping pieces were 5", 4" and 3", and the blue mats 51/4", 41/4"and 31/4".

I cut all the white pieces first, then stacked them up using a repositional tape runner on the backs.














 I stamped the flower, which used to be a wood mount, by Butterfly Kisses, called Sakura,
in Brilliance Pearlescent Blue.










In order to get the effect, you need to make sure some of your images are stamped over all three layers.


I added some random small flourishes in Versafine Majestic Blue.
 The blue matting layers were cut next, and each stamped panel added to its corresponding mat.
 A useful tip here is to write a letter 'T'  lightly at the top on the back of each stamped and matting layer as you separate them. Its very easy to get disorientated when  flipping them over to add tape, and it can be awkward to get them layered right, depending on what images you have stamped with.
Before attaching to the card blank, I wrapped some ribbon around the panel. the sentiment is an old Penny Black stamp, and was stamped in Versafine Majestic Blue again, then die cut with a Nestie, Labels 4,small,  and a mat layer cut with the next size up (large set). I added it over the ribbon with some small foam pads.
 I repeated the design for two more cards, both for Mothers Day.

 This one was again stamped in Brilliance Pearlescent Blue, this time I used a brighter blue matting layer.  The second card was stamped in Brilliance Pearlescent Lavender, and a different scroll stamp used. The sentiment is die cut on the same Nestie die, just larger sizes.


Supplies:
White card for stamping
 Brilliance Pearlescent Blue and Lavender inkpads
 Versafine Majestic Blue
Matching cardstock for matting layers
Image stamp- 2 is best
Sentiment
 Ribbon
 Nestabilities Labels 4, large and small set

WOYWW #146

Hi everyone, been MIA for a few weeks- wrapped up in Wedding Stationery, and work. I've really missed joining the weekly workdesk wander, at the Incredible Julia Dunnits,so here I am again. Back on afternoon shift now, so have some more time (at last). I can go to bed when I want, get up when I am ready, and still get stuff done. Right now I am making a wedding card for someone at work who's getting married, I have a mug of coffee by my side, and Disturbed blasting from my PC- all is right with my world! :)
This engagement card was made for some friends, really simple, just a ribbon threaded through a Diamanté heart buckle, wrapped around a square of white card, matted onto another square of white, then navy to match the ribbon. Stamped the Congratulations in Distress Stormy Sky and heat embossed it with clear powder and matted onto a navy strip.


 This is the start of a Christening card for a little girl, using a Creative Expressions medallion stamp I've used for this before.

Been bargain finding again- I've wanted the Raven stamp from Jennie at The Artistic Stamper for a while, and she had a fab sale on Feb 29th, so I took advantage of her generosity, lol. Got some embellishment bits as well, I'll find those again and post a pic.
 The Halloween stamps are from Chocolate Baroque, I don't have any Halloween stamps, and these were a great buy. The little wood mounted Alphabets you can see were probably my best buy to date- we went to Kidderminster recently, as Beloved Husband wanted to go to PC World, and they have a store called The Range there, which has quite a big craft section. These stamps were in their reduced bin, 99p a set! I also got the other two for 99p each, a 'With Sympathy' stamp, and one that reads Thank You in scrabble tiles. The rosettes are done in a sparkly vellum, for the previously mentioned Wedding card, and to everyone who suggested it last time, a glue gun works great, thanks folks.

Last couple of pics, from my youngest son for Mothers Day, a Simons Cat pillow. On my pc desk, there are two Simons Cats, one each from Son & Hubby for Christmas, a Charlie Brown,as I am also a massive Snoopy fan, and sitting next to CB is Boris the Bat, a pressie from Beloved Husband. The tiny little white clay teddy was made by my Daughter in Law Becky a few years ago.





 So thats my little corner of the world today, hope you are all having a great Wednesday, see as many of you as I can get to over the next few days.

WOYWW #92

 Happy Whats on your Workdesk Wednesday to everyone, if you have found this at random, pop over to the Stamping  Ground to see what its all about, and maybe join in.

 The first of the items on my desk this week is a Mothers Day card, made with an Elusive Images plate, Morning Glory.It was stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black onto an alcohol ink background, then coloured with Promarkers.The base card was covered with paper from the Papermania Antique Cream pad, the image matted onto dark blue card, then layered with foam tabs. Purple dotted organza ribbon tied around the spine. The sentiment was computer printed onto vellum, heat embossed, then
attached to blue card with heart brads.




The second card using the same stamp, this time onto a pink alcohol ink background, matted onto pink pearlescent card. A sheet from The Far East paper pad was used to cover the base card.I used black peel-offs to create the line frame around the panel, and 3 small chinese coins added to the top right corner.

The third card, this time on blue/green alcohol inks. Matted onto dark blue card.The embossed background is a Quickutz embossing folder, Diamonds & Dots, which I embossed to the width of the card by putting the folder through the 'bug sideways.Dark blue gingham ribbon added, a sentiment stamped and matted onto an offcut of the lattice background, which was cut to a tag shape.I added some narrow blue ribbon tails, and a bow.

                                                                                

This is the card from last week with two of the fibre butterflies added. They were given anthers made from mizhuiki cord, with a tiny bead on the ends. I added a peeloff oriental sentiment, as all the stamps I have were just a little too big for the space.





The last thing I want to share with you, will probably have lots of you rushing off to your nearest branch of The Works!

I found these in there last week- tiny canvases with easel, as you can see, 99p each! The canvas measures 3 1/2 in (9cm)  x1 3/4 in(7cm), and is 1 cm thick. I have a couple of projects in mind for these, for a birthday gift later in the year. Though I shall probably get a few more, 'just in case', lol.