Lots of quick die cut cards!

Right, lots of cards here, all using die cuts, some as a frame, some as the main focal point.
 The top three use frame dies, and a Happy Birthday sentiment die from Quietfire/ Creative Expressions.They're all backed onto glitter cardstock, and the sentiment layered with black craft foam.

These four used up some scenic stamping images I'd done in the past that were in my UFO box,
The leaf shape is a Sizzix Framelits die called Birch Leaf.
 The star is from a set I think I picked up in The Works.
 The circle one is a die that was gifted to me, so I'm not sure exactly what it is. The die is white in colour, and I'm afraid I don't know who makes those, if anyone does, I'd love to know.

 All the cards use a C5 card base.


The embossing folders I used are ( far left) Ocean Waves, Creative Expressions, and on the right, Swallow Pattern, from X-Cut.
























These use a die by Memory Box, called Large Circle Burst.
 In each case I've backed them with glitter card, and then added a
Tim Holtz Butterfly die cut.
 I'll leave adding sentiments to these, so I can use them for many different occasions.

Not sure where the medallion die came from, may have been gifted. It's backed with a glitter paper with a shiny coating.

These use the Circle burst die again, and a die cut birthday sentiment.  The card bases are 5" square.

 The tree outline die I think came from Aliexpress, as I was trying to find the Memory Box version, but it seems to have been discontinued.
 The Chinese Lanterns is a stencil by Sweet Poppy, and was done in Bronze stencil paste.





Again, leaving the sentiment until I need them for something.

One of the cards from the first picture, the die is from Paper Trey Ink, called Quatrefoil.
 I matted it onto some rainbow glitter card, then added the sentiment layering it with black craft foam for dimension.

Here I've used a sable brown glitter card for the top one, and gold for the bottom. The sentiment done the same as before.I think a lot of these would make great cards for men, even with the glitter!

Final card is for a relatives birthday in December .

 I cut the panel from some metallic blue cardstock, and then cut the number from another scrap of it. It's backed with blue glitter paper. The TODAY word is a die I was gifted, and I think it was from a Stephanie Weightman set.

    

WOYWW #480

Good Morning folks, hope you are having a good day today.  Our local craft store, Amelias, had a sale day on Saturday, so of course it would have been rude not to visit.😀
 Snagged a few bargains- I love the Impression Obsession Cover a card stamps, and got a fab snowflake one, along with a Crafters Companion Birthday sentiment one, and a couple of House Mouse Christmas ones.






Not that I need any paper pads, but the Christmas 6x6 one was only a couple of quid.
Some Yupo paper which I've been meaning to try out with alcohol inks for a while, and a great set of TH Snowflake dies.

And then of course, Doug spotted some stamps he really liked! The Crow one got my vote too, as well as the Parrot in the set on the far right. Poor thing looks like he's missing a few feathers, lol. So feather stamps went in the basket too. I also picked up another Encore Metallic pad in a colour called Honeydew, and a Brusho colour that wasn't in the sets I bought, called Sunburst Yellow.

I finally got around to doing all the inserts for those Christmas cards on last weeks desk,the big Snowflake stamp is from Chloe.

The sentiment is an Inkylicious stamp.

Used it across the inside of the inserts, and on others I used a Santa & Sleigh stamp from a  Visible Image set.

This sentiment is from a Phill Martin set, called Snowflake Borders.













Hubbys birthday card, as yesterday was our birthday.

 Stamps from Visible Image.
















And a 40th card for my daughter, who's birthday is on Friday.
The card front was cut out with the Silhouette.


And that's pretty much me done, I think.
All that remains is for me to add my link over at Julias place, The Stamping Ground.

And finally..............................

Mistletoe & Holly Wreaths.

Tried a slightly different look with these two. After creating the wreath, a Sweet Poppy stencil, and sprinkling it with glitter, it was left to dry overnight.
To cut out the motif, I used the largest die from my Framelits Circles die set.
 With the Framelits,they cut right at the edge of the die, so to get a white matting layer, I just drew lightly around the outside of the die with a pencil, then cut out with scissors.
 After matting the black image sheet onto the white matt layer, I added a few half pearls as the mistletoe berries.
 The greeting is another peel-off, trimmed from a Merry Christmas border, as the space in the centre of the wreath is much smaller than on the Holly wreath.
 The whole thing was added onto a square card base.

The gold Holly wreath was created exactly the same way, adding some small red acrylic gems to form the berries. Another small peel off greeting- I'm determined I'm going to get them used up, lol.




For the other wreaths I'd made, I returned to a square shape.

This one was done on a glossy cardstock, and it's not the easiest thing to work with when using stencil paste. Again, a few berries from acrylic gems and a greeting in the centre.

Here, matted onto white, then black cardstock, and added to a white card base. This time the greeting is also layered using the same card combination,and mounted using foam pads, below the image.

Back to the Mistletoe wreath, and a return to the square format.

Supplies:
 Sweet Poppy Stencils: Holly Wreath & Mistletoe Wreath
Gold and pale green glitter
White and Gold Stencil paste.
Acrylic gems in red
 Half pearls in white.

WOYWW #336- The Nec Edition

Yes indeed, it is the NEC edition, linking up with Julia at The Stamping Ground. First thing I will say is that very early on- the second aisle to be precise,- I admitted defeat and let Hubby go and get a wheelchair to push me round in. We'd started down the first aisle, and halfway down was Inkylicious, so we stopped to shop there. By the time I was paying for what we'd chosen, I felt like I was going to faint. So we headed back to the entrance, and I sat on a chair for a while.
 When I felt ok, we resumed where we left off, and finished aisle one, and got halfway up aisle two, as far as Visible Image. Same thing happened again, and I paid for my stamps and we went back to the entrance so I could sit down. At this point I had to admit that there was no way on earth I was going to be able to walk the whole show, and let Hubby go off to get a wheelchair, as they hire them out, as well as mobility scooters.He came back with a mobility scooter, as they had no wheelchairs left. I hadn't wanted one of those, as being a non driver, I had expectations of destroying stands and displays all round the hall.It turned out to actually be very easy to use, and made the world of difference for me.So, on to the spoils of my rampage around the show:

A small selection from Inkylicious, and some from Lavinia stamps- most of the stamps bought today were a joint choice, my Enabler was very restrained this time, I have to admit. Can't remember where I got the little Gorjuss stamps from, but they were only £1.75 each.

On to Visible Image, the site of my second almost faint, sorry, Mark & Helen! I bought a few stamps that time, and went back a little later and got the others I wanted.

Some more stamps from Cardio, loved the penguins and snowmen! The two Creative Expressions stamps came from The Art of Craft, after I saw some stunning samples done with them.

Could not resist these when I spotted them, I remember reading somewhere that they were not going to be made available over here, so grabbed them while I had the chance.It's the stamp and die set of accessories for the Crazy Bird stamps. The Crazy Words stamp was Hubbies choice.

 A cardstock selection- some Lavinia Stamps scenescapes, some Lavinia Matt cardstock, a few sheets of embossed card in black, and some card blanks. I really do like the square format, I think it's my favourite base.

Some dies and stencils- Sweet Poppy metal stencils, and a variety of plastic ones.The dies were a couple of Happy Birthday ones, including the large one at the front, which will make a card on it's own, layered up. I think this pic contains most of Hubbies enabling, lol.



 

  The square Dylusions journal was a surprise to come across, I've only ever seen the A4 & A5 version. A Tim Holtz spray bottle, and a couple of sheets of chipboard letters & numbers, along with a sheet of Cut n Dry. Can never have too much of that stuff.

Finally, the odds and ends. I visited the Powertex stand, as I'd seen the Buddha heads on Kylas blog earlier in the week, and I've wanted some for ages. I also came across a lovely Green Lady, and a pack with two Native American casts in, so was very pleased.The packs of craft bottles were in a £1 bargain bin,there are two rolls of ribbon with a golden Bee on, from the same place, I spotted the box of wooden cogs on another stall, and finally, 3 rolls of masking tape!
 Thanks to having the mobility scooter, I got to really enjoy the day, and could take my time browsing. Which may account for spending so much, lol.
 But, I can now get up and down to my craft room unsupervised, which means I can spend some time crafting, instead of reading or just surfing the net. First job, however , will be to get this lot loaded into Evernote!  
I will do some extra posts showing the stamps and stuff completely, as in these pics they are lay atop each other, but that's for another day. I'll be visiting later, have a nice Wednesday everyone.

WOYWW #322

WOYWW? again, and there is quite a bit on my desk this week. Actually, this is the tidiest shot, there is worse to come. Been playing about with my new alphabet & Bird Crazy dies, 2 posts down, and made a card with them and the Bird Crazy stamps, in the post below this.

  So, the next to worst photo:
















Everything bar the kitchen sink, but there was no room for it!
And now, in all its terrible glory- those of you with a nervous disposition may want to go and hide behind the sofa, and peer through your fingers-

As I said, I made one card yesterday, and had idea for a couple more, so I'm working in the tried and trusted 'push it to one side and carry on' style. Except I'm about to run out of side.

This little fella will be taking a starring role, supported by a cast of die cut text.

In case you don't get down to the card post, here is my weekly enable: Sharpie markers are on sale in Tesco- multi colour packs, black packs, neons, all sorts. LOL. So thats my show & tell for this week, I'll be linking up with you all via Julia at The Stamping Ground, and see if anyone has made more mess than me!
 Oh, by the way, the PET/CT scan went fine last Thursday, just waiting for the MRI appointment now, expecting it to be early next week.
Quick update:  Had a phone call this morning, and I have an appointment to see Mr Radley at the QE tomorrow afternoon.Apparently, he's on holiday for two weeks from next week, and wanted to see us beforehand. Fingers crossed this appointment goes better than the first, otherwise me and him will be having words!

Crazy Bird Birthday card

This is the card I was working on yesterday, inspired by something I'd seen in a crafting video. Can't remember whose it was, I've watched so many lately! It was the die cutting of a word, and placing a coloured paper behind it that had got my attention.

This one used a piece of the Brushos test pieces behind the 'Birthday' cut out.
 One thing I know now I need is a proper magnetic plate for holding the letters, and I've ordered one from Amazon. It's intended for the Spellbinders Wizard, but in one review, the person uses it in her Cuttlebug, and the size looks right, (5x7) so I know it'll work in both machines. Way cheaper than the Sizzix one, and that will not go through a 'bug.
 I did find a work around, but it's not perfect- that 'B' looks a little wibbly to me.

This was my work- around. The X Cut alpha set came with a magnetic storage sheet, so I drew some lines on it to line the letters up with, using a Sharpie permanent fine tip (by the way, all the Sharpies are on a special at Tesco at the moment, lol). I placed it on top of my steel shim, to give it a bit more stability. It does hold the piece in place, but not as firmly as you would really like. Especially when you are trying to find the right shimming to get clean cuts.
So after a bit of faffing about, trying to figure how I needed to place the card to get the word in the right place and orientation, I finally had the start of my card front.

 Tip here, be careful not to lose any of the filler bits to the letters B,R,D & A- you will need them later on.

Next step was to trim down a piece of one of the Brusho backgrounds, which was attached behind the cut out word with DST.

Now you can see why you need the little waste bits- to fill in your word.






I knew I wanted balloons, but was pretty sure I'd never bought a balloon stamp- so, on the off chance, I looked amongst the 'freebie' stamps you get with magazines- lo and behold, a balloon stamp! I stamped it onto the remaining piece of Brusho background, and cut out just the balloons. To give them a little shine, I added some Glossy Accents, just a drop, and smoothed it over with my finger.
 Put them aside to dry, and turned to the Crazy Birds.

Stamped him in Memento Tuxedo Black, onto one of the scraps from when I was trying to get the word orientation right.
Before I started colouring him, I used some Masking Fluid on his eyes, so they would stay white.







I applied Distress Inks, with finger daubers, my home made ones, to colour him.







 Here are the various pads I used-the Squeezed Lemonade for his tummy, and Fossilized Amber & Wild Honey on his beak. Mermaid Lagoon on his body, then Faded Jeans over that on his wings, and the edges of his body.

Now, to die cut him. I added some low tack tape to hold the die in place, but was pleasantly surprised at how easy this one was to line up.

Die cut, and only a tiny little bit of white around his beak, which I solved by going all round the edge with a black marker. Even the legs cut out well, so far I'm impressed with these dies.







 Now I decided to add the word 'Happy' to the front, so I cut the letters from the same card as the card front, and stuck them down with Pinflair Glue Gel, for a 'white on white' look.
 I stamped the strings from the balloons onto the card front- I don't trust my drawing!-  so they'd look like he was holding them in his beak, then stuck the balloons on top, with Pinflair again, then stuck my bird down,balancing him on top of the 'Happy', and having removed the Masking Fluid first.
I shortened the height of the card front, and matted it onto a dark blue piece of cardstock, as blue seemed to be the dominant colour on the images.

 I wanted a top fold card for this, but as an A4 sheet isn't big enough to fold this way, I cut two pieces of white pearl card, the one about 1/2" longer than the other.

The longer one was scored across the top, then that flap folded over, and DST added on the back.








The shorter piece placed under the fold, and stuck down.

Card front added with DST, and it's done.

I used one of my Brusho pieces behind the word, but obviously you can use anything. It occurs to me that this would be a good way of using those sheets of backing papers that are always left in the pack because we don't like them for whatever reason. You only see a small portion of the design done like this, and you can use different words- Sorry,( a belated birthday card), Love, Friend,Hi, Hello, and so on and so on.
 I can see a number of these being made over the next few days- they are a lot quicker than this long post implies, lol, and perfect to send to almost anyone, male or female.