Love and Friendship

This category includes: Valentines Day, engagement, wedding, anniversary, friends

We three birds

Hi everyone!

Today I’m playing along with this week’s challenge at Freshly Made Sketches.

I’m determined to make my way through my ‘new stuff’ box this year and so for my CAS take on the challenge, I used the Simon Says Stamp Layer Bird Bunch dies set that I got in their Thanksgiving sale – so not THAT old, considering what else is in my box!

I created the background with a Taylored Expressions stencil that could have been made for the sketch and coloured the birds with distress inks and coloured pencil. I adhered the birds and a few branches from a Sizzix set to my card base and added a sentiment by Clearly Besotted.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Layered Gliding Butterfly

Hi everyone!

Today I’m playing along with this week’s challenge at Freshly Made Sketches.

So many lovely layers with this sketch – a fab challenge for me this week as I wanted to do something different for all those layers but also ensure nothing detracted from the focal point.

To start, I embossed some vellum with the Simon Says Stamp Blooming Field embossing folder. I then die cut a Marianne Designs background image and positioned it on top of the vellum. Finally I added a butterfly from the amazing Gliding Butterflies embossing folder and die set. To complete my card, I added a few gems.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

A gliding fly by!

Hello everyone!

Today I’m playing along in the Color Throwdown challenge using some products that arrived this week in my order from Simon Says Stamp.

The combo this week is orange, pale blue and cream – another set that’s perfect for autumnal cards and I loved the inspiration photo so much – I was VERY tempted to pull out my pumpkin dies! But my keenness to use some of my new purchases won instead!

I love the Simon Says Stamp Gliding Butterflies embossing folder and stamp set as soon as I saw it in this year’s Stamptember release! I rarely pay full price for embossing folders but this one is too special and I’m to impatient to wait for a sale. I coloured the butterflies with Altenew and distress inks and thought about using some foundry wax like Nichol Spohr did with her AMAZING inspiration canvas. But I decided against it in the end because I need more practice with that medium!

As I wanted to use a lot of butterflies, I chose a slimline cardbase and applied a few sprays of Unravelled distress mic spray. The shimmer is amazing!!

I stamped a sentiment from the Thinking of You set (30-825) that Penny Black kindly sent me before adhering the butterflies to my card base.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Butterfly smiles across the miles

Hello everyone!

I’ve created a card for two of my favourite challenges today – Freshly Made Sketches and the Color Throwdown challenge which has a combo of green, orange and blue.

Lots of different techniques and manufacturers for this one! A background panel embossed with a Simon Says Stamp folder, Craft Consortium paper cut with the Altenew Fine Frames Circles die and Memory Box’s Beloved Snowflakes die, an ink blended butterfly created with my favourite Memory Box butterfly (Vine Butterfly) and finally a Mama Elephant sentiment. It didn’t take too long to create as each of the techniques is pretty quick!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Blue blossom branch

Hello everyone!

Today I’m playing along in the Color Throwdown challenge which has a combo of coral, light blue and navy.

I remembered a card that I’d made for a similar combo a few years ago and decided to showcase another stunning background die – the daisy chain background by Pinkfresh Studio. I adhered it to my card base and adhered a frame that I’d cut with an arch die. I cut the Paper Rose Blossom Branch die from some glitter card and added it to the card base. I coloured a few flowers with alcohol markers and then filled in the rest of the flowers with the die-cut petals – quite a laborious process, I have to say!

Finally I added a sentiment by Birch Press Design to complete my card.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

the 

Woodblock Wednesday: Silly Pup

Hi there!

Today I’m playing along with Amy Tsuruta’s Woodblock Wednesday challenge which is a monthly challenge celebrating our fabulous wood-mounted stamps. If you’ve read my blog for a while, you know I love my old wood-mounted stamps and could never part with them! Back in 2019 I even challenged myself to use them for the duration of a couple of the Daily Marker 30 Day Colouring Challenge – you can read about that here and here.

I saw a post about the challenge by Lin on instagram today and knew I had to play along. I love seeing how some cardmakers use their older stamps with newer products and I decided to do the same for my card! I chose the fabulous Silly Pup by Hero Arts. This stamp is dated 2006… Seriously, how can this be 17 years old?? I remember buying him – I generally buy cat stamps as I’m surrounded by cat lovers and so it was a Big Deal for me to buy a puppy stamp. But look at his spots!!! How could I not get him?!

I stamped and fussy cut him before adding coloured spots with my Twinkling H2O paints. I stamped his head a second time and adhered that to his body some foam tape – I did toy with using an action wobbler which would have been quite fun!

For my background, I dug into my newer supplies – the Birch Press Design String Art Frame die. The sentiment is also newer – by My Favorite Things.

Amy also said she wanted to know how we store our wood-mounted stamps. I store mine in A4+ Tuff boxes which I keep in my craftroom cupboards. I’ve taken photos of each Tuff box and indexed them so I know the exact location (cupboard/shelf). When I want to use a wood-mounted stamp, I look through my photos and can locate my stamp very quickly. I’ve had this system in place for YEARS and it works really well for me. Wish I could be that organised with my clear stamps and dies!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.