Happy Birthday Card

Good morning. I'm back with a quick birthday card. One to add to my stock pile for when my calendar flashes up a friend's birthday and it's too late to knock one up (why iCal is your default set at one day????? Dozy numpties like me need at least a week's warning)

Mind you, with the bright, cheerful colours going on here, I'd happily pop this card in the post and address it to myself just so that I can see it brighten up my own mantelpiece.

Right I'm off to go and enjoy some of that lovely, if somewhat rare, sunshine today

Quick & Colourful plus a Little Adventure

Just a quick post today - no bells and whistles, showing a card I made whilst the web was down temporarily this morning (something to do with BT Broadband)

I sponged two colours of Distress Ink onto watercolour paper, Picked Raspberry (which I always read as Pickled Raspberry) and Salty Ocean. I used a stitched Lil Inkers Die to cut it out. I then used another die to cut out the sentiment in yellow card. I backed it all onto a glittery green base and stuck the whole lot onto red card.

Oh, I almost forgot. Though I'm not posting about it as regularly, I'm still incorporating Adventure into my life and yesterday I attended something for the first time which Nick had arranged. It's an adventure I would never dream of doing - Go Karting! At an indoor centre in Manchester called Karting 2000.

(Not a photo we took. It's from their website)

Up front I'll say I'm happy to have tried it once but it really, REALLY wasn't my thing. Nick had a great time, which makes me more than happy enough to have attended. But I am not the most ambitious person when it comes to speed. I even have little old ladies overtake me on the motorway.

For 15-20 minutes, I stayed in the left hand side, pootling along at the slowest speed possible, cringing whenever I hit a tight bend. Everyone else happily squealed their tyres, threw themselves round the course and overtook me, many, many times. Oh and the noise! Those karts don't half make a racket. I was relieved when the chequered flag was waved to indicate the end. I am so glad there weren't any photos taken of me in shabby overalls, complete with a hair net and racing helmet, gagging on the taste of petrol that seemed to be permanently in my mouth.

If I hadn't come across exactly as a petrol-head to Nick before, then I think it sunk in afterwards. Boxing, I can do. Boys' toys, I don't. My normally pristine palms, had blisters. I was in danger of developing callouses!!! I couldn't wait to go home, run a bath, add lots of smelly salts and wash any evidence away that I had been near oil and grease.

Today, inking up a card in bright colours, I feel more at home.

POW!!!

You know what? I didn't think I'd be making anything in June, nor have the time to post if I did. Looks like I was wrong.

I was busy scribbling up some notes last night when I thought sod it and downed tools. I cleared my desk and pulled out a new die set which arrived in the post this week.  Bam Bubble by Paper Smooches.

Okay, so I didn't do something wildly innovative with it. In my defence, I had to get this idea out of my system. I'm afraid that the moment I saw this shape, this is what it said to me. And you know how much I love a simple, punchy design.

The word was die cut with a lettering set, out of felt. I was trying to think of a way to make them pop from background and I remembered seeing felt used by other cardmakers online in their designs and thought I'd give it a go.

Ahhh! It feels good to make something again :)

Colour Q Challenge

Hello There Sweet Friends

I haven't joined in a creative challenge for some time now. I'm happy just making stuff as and when the urge arises these days. However, I was tempted to have a go at this week's Colour Q challenge.

And here's the card I came up with

I used the same flower die, the Memory Box Whimsy Circle, which I used in my previous post except this time, I filled in all the spaces. It meant cutting into three different colours of card and selecting the pieces from each to create a whole flower as above. So I have extras left over to use another day. The addition of a button not only finishes the design off, but adds the pink colour from the scheme.

Intense Just For You

Hello there lovely readers

I've gone a bit wild with my colours again. It wasn't intentional. It started out by having a pink die cut piece just hanging around on my table which I thought should be used somehow.

I bought a new stencil from Dutch Doobadoo and dabbed the pattern over the scrap of card with versamark ink. I sprinkled black embossing powder over it and heat set. It's given it a really funky effect which you cant really see so well in the photo below. You'll have to take my word for it :)

Once I had my pink and black cut-out, I looked in my card stash and instantly thought I'd try it against it's complimentary colour, a yellow green. It was intense and in-your-face and just perfect. I stamped the sentiment, punched it out and added another die cut, this time using a subtler blue-green card.

I am just loving these happy colours. My head may be pounding but surrounding myself with rich colour is bringing a smile to my face.

Thinking of You in Pink

Hello my dahlings

Thought I'd have a play with my Washi Tapes this time around. I sit staring at them on my shelf on a daily basis and as deliciously designed as they are, I never rip into them. So I thought I'd change that.

And it couldn't be any easier. I just cut down some white card and wrapped a few strips of the tape around it. I didn't cover the whole card as you can see, however the white seemed too stark and i wanted more colour. I trimmed a piece of fuchsia card and stuck this on instead.

I stamped the sentiment (in black - I know - not ready to loosen the chain on that one yet) onto pink card and die cut it. I mounted it onto the fuchsia card and trimmed by hand, to create a border. I tried the design against the black background and it felt like it needed another pop of colour. The hint of orange as a matting layer just gave it that extra oomph I was looking for.

Let's hope that I am tempted to use my Washi Tape again, before it gathers dust on my shelf as I really love the effect it gives.

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day!!!!

Not that I'll be sending out any cards, flowers or chocolates myself. Nor, to the best of my knowledge, will I be in receipt of any. Not because I'm alone and loveless. If you've followed my blog, you know that's not true. Nick & I simply don't bother with it. By mutual agreement I may add too. If I want chocolates or roses, on any day of the year, I know Nick would oblige. Anyway, Nick & I celebrate our Anniversary only 10 days earlier. So it just seems too soon to go through the whole rigmarole once again.

I'm happy for the other suckers, romantic souls out there to fly arrows from cupid's bow and book dinners, buy flowers and send confectionary gooiness to their bunnikins and baby bears. It's a day for fun and silliness and who can begrudge it?

I say it every year but for new readers, today is also my parents' wedding anniversary. Which may partially explain my own reluctance to celebrate the 14th. Yes, I do give them a card.

So the card above is my contribution to the lovesick everywhere.  My valentine to the blogosphere. It's a cut and paste job using Spellbinders Square Nesting Dies. I sellotaped the dies together to form one & ran them through four colours of card. I cut two of the largest square shapes out of more card and stuck the various sized frames together onto them. I trimmed both squares on the diagonal and swapped them about. One of those squares is used here, the other for another time. The heart was die cut from velvet paper.

And if the Postie does happen to drop a little something on my doormat today, I'll let you know

CAS(E) this Sketch # 62

Great design over at CAS(E) This Sketch this week. Simple, clean, graphic and ready to interpret in any style.

Me, I wanted to maintain the clean lines and include a bold colour palette. This time, my hands hovered over some purple cardstock.

And to give it extra dimension, once I had trimmed the purple card down to size, I cut away the two triangles. I adhered the centre piece to the black card first. Then I added back the two triangles but using foam pads to raise them. 

The stripes were created by laying a strip of Washi tape over some pink card and then trimming in half, lengthways on a guillotine. The sentiment is die cut from black card.

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Supplies

Dies: Cherry Lynn - Love

Clean & Graphic Embossed Card

I'm still adding to my stack of birthday cards and wanted to make a black and white card, accented with a small amount of one other colour. Looking through my stash of card, I decided to go with pink. It's one of those colours that I love to set against black.

I first cut through the white card, about a third of the way down, with a die. I then ran it through an embossing folder. After placing a strip of pink onto the black card, I added the embossed card, leaving a gap for the pink to be seen.

I die cut the circles and stamped the border and sentiment with a freebie from Craft Stamper Magazine.

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Supplies

Stamps: Craft Stamper Magazine - Time To Celebrate

Dies: Spellbinders - Labels 17 & Circles,  L'il Inkers - Stitched Circles

Embossing Folder - Cuttlebug - Damask