Summer

Altenew Ultimate Challenge Blog Hop

Hi there!

I’m excited to say that the AAA Cards Challenge was invited to join a fun blog hop that Altenew is hosting. A total of 12 challenge blogs are participating and you have the chance to win one of 10 $25 Altenew gift certificates. Full details are on the Altenew blog.

Some of the AAA Cards DT have already joined in with the fun and created some cards using Altenew products – check them out on the AAA Cards blog!

I love Altenew products and have all their ink cubes – they are my go-to whenever I do layered stamping! I also have so many of their floral stamps but as my cardmaking preferences are leaning more towards die-cutting nowadays, I decided to pull out some of my beautiful Altenew dies for my card.

I cut and coloured some foliage from the Branches and Berries die set using my Twinkling H2O paints – can you see that shimmer?! Next I cut the vases from the Mantel Decor – Spring Die Set. You would not believe how I stalked UK retailers waiting for this set! I just love the size of those vases!

I wanted to use the Textured Burlap die to ground my vase cluster but felt that the whole die cut competed with the delicate florals. I toyed with embossing it on the card base but in the end I decided to use part of the die cut to ground the vases. Finally I added a sentiment from the Flower Vine stamp set.

Hope you enjoy the blog hop and can join the fun by sharing your own cards on the Altenew link up!!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

AAA Two Quarters with Favourite Colours Twist

Hi there!

It’s time for a new challenge at AAA Cards!  This fortnight we’d like you to create a CAS card using two quarters of your card. Lots of rules with this one:

  • there needs to be two distinct quarters on your CAS card
  • two quarters could be one half, but we’d like to see a space between the quarters if this is the layout you opt for
  • ideally we’d like to see all images and the sentiment confined to the two quarters, but we will allow a sentiment to straddle the two quarters or even a sentiment outside of the two quarters as long as it’s not too big or dominant
  • the rest of the card should be plain empty ‘white’ space without any pattern, texture or embossing

The optional twist is ‘favourite colours’.

I must confess, this is my least favourite challenge theme! I know DT members have to stick to the rules and I’ve really struggled with designs for this one. Luckily, I remembered that the last time we had this theme, there was some AMAZING inspiration in our gallery – I particularly loved the designs that Sent Sue and Darnell came up with. Many thanks to all of you for inspiring me with this challenge theme!

I chose the elegant Bali corner die by Memory Box for my take. At first I tried the design on a UK A6 card base but it looked like each die cut took up more than a quarter. So I tried it with a larger (7″x5″) base. It looked perfect! However, like Sue, I got out my ruler and calculator and got measuring. Turns out each die covers exactly one quarter of the card base! Amazing!

I used to say my favourite colour was purple but I don’t really have a favourite colour at the moment. I have lots of favourite colour combos but in the end I decided to keep the colouring very simple and just blended some wilted violet distress ink on the flowers.

To complete my card, I added a Clearly Besotted sentiment.

My team mates have come up with some beautiful cards which are on the AAA Cards challenge blog. We are also joined a previous challenge winner and one of my favourite cardmakers, Trina, who always comes up with the most beautiful cards. I’m guessing blue will make an appearance on her card!! You know, I still think Tim Holtz should have named his latest colour Trina Blue!

Hope you can play along with us!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

AAA Up to one third with interesting twist

Hi there!

I seriously can’t believe we’re into May, can you? It’s time for a new challenge at AAA Cards – we’d like you to create a card using up to one third of your card base.

So this week’s optional twist confused me a bit because I wasn’t too sure what ‘mystical beasts’ are – I’ve always thought of mystical as being spirtual or supernatural…. Anyway, Google sent me to ‘mythical creatures/beasts/animals’ whenever I searched for ‘mystical beasts’ so in the end I went with mythical and chose the fabulous Hero Arts phoenix die!

I lightly traced a few points from the die on to a piece of card to help my graduated ink blending and then cut out the image after I’d finished blending. I was a little concerned that there would be too much yellow, but I was so pleased when I pulled the die away!

To complete my card, I stamped a sentiment from an older Hero Arts/Basic Grey collaboration set.

My team mates have come up with some beautiful cards which are on the AAA Cards challenge blog. We are also joined a previous challenge winner and one of my favourite cardmakers, Pam, who has some amazing die cut cards on her blog.

Hope you can play along with us!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

[Small edit to make it clearer that my confusion was over the word ‘mystical’ rather than ‘beast’!!]

AAA Less than one third and summer in January

Hi there!

After a long break, we’re back with our first challenge of 2021 at AAA Cards!  This fortnight we’d like you to create a CAS card using up to one third of your card. Our optional twist this time is ‘Summer in January’.

I was a bit stumped by the optional theme at first as I didn’t really feel like creating anything summery when it’s so cold outside… but I have been fortunate to experience a few southern hemisphere summers over the years. As I was thinking of those adventures, I vividly remembered eating an ice cream with a friend in Circular Quay and decided to use that memory as my inspiration for a fun summer in January card!

I used the older Ice Cream Parade die from Simon Says Stamp for the main image and coloured the cones and ice cream sections using my distress inks.

To complete my card, I added a Memory Box sentiment.

My team mates have come up with some beautiful cards which are on the AAA Cards challenge blog. We are also joined a previous challenge winner, Stephanie, who has some great cards on her blog.

Hope you can play along with us!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

AAA Cards One layer challenge with hobby twist

Hi there!

It’s time for another challenge at AAA Cards!  This fortnight we’d like you to create a one-layer CAS card. Our optional twist this time is ‘my other hobby’. Joy Clair Designs is our sponsor.

One of my other hobbies is gardening – but I don’t do any baskets or pots of annuals and it’s been a few years since I went to Hampton Court Flower Show… so I guess gardening for me tends to be more like what I think our friends in the US call ‘yard work’ – you know, landscaping projects, weeding, pruning, shrub planting, mowing and watering. Oh my word, the watering this year….. I can’t be the only garden owner who is relieved that our heat wave finally broke at the end of the week!

Anyway, on to my card for this challenge! For AAA, one layer means just the card base, no additional die cuts unless it is inlaid into the card base. A one-layer challenge is mainly a stamping or stencilling challenge for me really. I’ve actually used clear stamp sets for a couple of gardening cards whilst I’ve been blogging (here and here), so I turned to my old wood-mounted rubber stamp collection this week! I used an old Funstamps stamp called Gardening Shelf which I felt was a good reflection of my yard work type of gardening!! I coloured the image with my Twinkling H2O paints… and yes, I do have purple gloves for gardening!! The sentiment is by Mama Elephant.

My team mates have come up with some beautiful cards which are on the AAA Cards challenge blog. We are also joined by a previous challenge winner, Coni, who has some fun inspiration on her blog!

Hope you can play along with us!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

 

Sunshiny Day

Hi there!

It’s time for a new challenge at AAA Cards! This fortnight we’re challenging you to use one edge of your card only and the optional twist is ‘inspired by a song’. Our sponsor is CASual Fridays

When I saw the optional twist, I thought of a set, called My Sunshine, that I bought on sale from Simon Says Stamp. It contains quite a few song lyrics  and I thought this lyric from ‘I can see clearly now’ would work well along the edge of my card. Who remembers that song? I know the Jimmy Cliff version and remember when it came out over 25 years ago!

I decided to use a light blue card base and inked up the large sun image from the set using a couple of Distress Oxide inks (Squeezed Lemonade and Wild Honey). I was so pleased with the ink coverage – the colours seem to be pretty vibrant and yellow, even though I didn’t use a white card base.

This card is super simple and came together so quickly! Once I stamped the image and sentiment, I added some sequins to help guide the eye along the edge! A few understated embellishments are fine, as long as they support a CAS design!

My team mates have come up with some beautiful cards which are on the AAA Cards challenge blog. We are also joined by the talented Angie from Cimba Creative Fun – I love her card – you must check them out!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.