Summer

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.

It’s summer!

Happy Friyay everyone!

Today I’m celebrating the return of British summer as I know it (ie rain, chilly etc). The heatwave lasted a little too long for me and the garden and I’m very happy that temperatures are much more bearable.

I’m also celebrating the three-week adoptoptoversary of my mum and dad’s new cat, Oscar. Their resident cat, Minnie, is adapting well and less feisty than we all expected her to be! To mark this occasion, I inked up my latest Newton’s Nook purchase and tried to replicate Minnie and Oscar. It’s fair to say Oscar has a VERY healthy appetite so guess which cat he is!!

I’m entering this into the current Inky Paws challenge which has the a summer/beach theme!

Have a great weekend!

LucieG.

Find Your Paradise

Happy Saturday everyone. Although looking at my card, maybe that should be Happy Caterday!

I finally managed to get my hands on some Distress blending brushes and couldn’t wait to use them on my more intricate stencils. I love that I was able to get great coverage without getting the brush caught in the plastic. Yep, I think I’m going to enjoy using these!

To create the background, I added a layer of Antique Linen distress oxide ink on my base card, applying it slightly heavier in the bottom right corner, near where I planned to stamp the image. Then I splattered some ink using a paint brush. After stamping Newton, I lifted the Antique Linen colour from the image and then coloured it in using regular distress ink.

I then use an Echo Park Paper Co stencil to create the palm tree background, applying regular distress in with the distress brush. I didn’t bother masking the image off as it was easy to avoid stencilling in that area – thanks to the precision of the brushes!

Anyway, I’m entering my one-layer card into the current Timeout Challenge. The theme is ‘holidays’ which really means ‘vacation’ to me (one layer is the optional twist)!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.