Technique – die cutting

Featuring die cutting

Merry Making – Day 1 Holiday Backgrounds

Hi everyone!

Online Card Classes’ Merry Maker class kicked off yesterday and I tried all three of the techniques from the class.

First up, Kristina Werner’s Holiday Bokeh Background. When I saw this video, I thought I would try this first. It has all the elements I love – blending, ink lifting, embossing. I blended three distress oxide inks – Cracked Pistachio, Peacock Feathers and Vintage Photo and after lifting some of it, I embossed almost all the snowflakes from the Simon Says Stamp Lots of Snowflakes set. Finally I added a sentiment also from Simon Says Stamp.

I’m going to enter this into the Simon Says Stamp Flickr Challenge – ‘Anything Goes’ and the Simon Says Stamp Work it Wednesday challenge.

 

Next, Jennifer McGuire’s Snow Flurry Background. OK so you know how sometimes, you’re a bit… reluctant… to try something new and you end up loving it? Well, that’s what happened to me with this card!! In fact, I wasn’t even sure I would try this when I first watched the video. ButI decided this class is all about stretching yourself and learning new techniques so I tried it – and I am so glad I did!

Wow! Just wow!

Watching the blue powder melt into the silver brought back all those memories of heat embossing for the first time! It’s so magical! When I started crafting, my mum and I bought lots of different coloured embossing powders to share. They’ve been at the back of our cupboards for a LONG time but I pulled mine out yesterday… and after this, well let’s just say, I will be seeing a lot more of those coloured powders! The background stamp is by Penny Black and I used a Savvy Stamps sentiment die stuck on vellum to finish it off.

Finally, Cathy Zielske’s Cover plate die background/non-traditional colours. This was such a quick and easy card to make! I took on the challenge to use non-traditional colours and blended three distress oxide inks (Broken China, Picked Raspberry and Spiced Marmalade) for my background.  I tried so hard to avoid making a rainbow, but it looks like I didn’t really succeed, doesn’t it? Anyway, I used a Lawn Fawn cover plate and an Avery Elle sentiment die, which I cut using some glitter paper which I thought I would NEVER use. It was in a DCWV paper pad and I thought it was just too bright for me! Ha! Honestly, it is too bright for me, but worked well for this card.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Merry Geo Tree

Hi there!

I must say that the inspiration board for September’s Pin-sights Challenge is absolutely gorgeous. In my view the best I’ve seen!  So many possibilities….

In the end, I went with something totally outside my comfort zone – I created a watercolour background using a number of colours from the board.

When I was happy with how that was looking, I added some gold watercolour – love how this turned out!

I cut out the tree using the Ellen Hutson/Essentials by Ellen Geo tree die set and used it to cover a section of my finished background. Finally, I added an Essentials by Ellen sentiment to complete the card. I was toying with adding a few stars to the background, but decided to keep it CAS.

And the added bonus? I still have enough of my background left to use in more cards, so don’t be surprised if you see it make a reappearance here before Christmas!

I’m also entering this into this week’s Less is More challenge as the theme is ‘watercolour’.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Autumn colour

Hi everyone!

The Color Throwdown challenge has another fabulous colour combination this week – rust, green, orange and aqua! They were such fun to play with and I ended up creating two cards!

I used Impression Obsession’s background fancy leaf stamp with distress inks for both cards. For the first card, I trimmed down the background to fit a card base and simply added a rectangle of vellum and a Memory Box sentiment die. I added a few sequins to finish it off.

For the second card, I embossed a piece of cardstock using a Spellbinders embossing folder. I cut my stamped panel with an Essentials by Ellen die and then added a Concord and 9th sentiment.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Striped birthday

Hi everyone!

There’s another eye-catching sketch for this week’s Case This Sketch challenge. For my CAS take, I used some double-sided tape and gilding flakes to create the silver strip and then added a few strips of coloured cardstock either side. The Happy Birthday strip was cut using a @lilinkerdesigns die. I added a few silver nailheads to finish off the card. Super quick and simple!

I’m also going to enter this into the current Simon Says Stamp Monday challenge – add metal.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Think Big!

The cue word for this week’s Casology challenge is ‘big’ and I thought it would be a great opportunity to play with my fabulous Cityscape dies from Altenew. Alas, EVERYTHING went wrong with this card, and it took me ages to create. I should’ve known it wasn’t going to be easy when the dies weren’t where they should’ve been…. the packaging was, just no dies!

I was sorely tempted to enter yesterday’s HUGE card into the challenge, but I persevered and I’m glad I did! The dies are fun to play with!

I created my own shimmer paper for the buildings using some Tonic Studios Embellishment Mousse. Unfortunately, it had dried up, but I added some water and it seemed to be fine! I also used my Prismacolor pencils to create the background – really unusual for me as I usually rely on my distress inks for that. It was good to practice with my pencils!

I feel I need to add a sentiment to the top right – like I did the first time I used this die set. I’ve seen the ‘perfect’ stamp and it will be going in my basket the next time I place an order!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

First galaxy card

Hi everyone!

The theme for this week’s Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge is ‘Written in the stars’. I thought this would be a great opportunity for me to attempt my first galaxy background. There are some amazing galaxy cards on Instagram and I have been itching to give it a go.

It turned out to be super easy and incredibly quick!

Step 1

I used a few bright distress inks to create my first layer. I didn’t worry too much about smoothing out the blending as I knew any uneven patches would be hidden by the next layer.

 

 

 

 

 

Step 2

 Next, I added a layer of dark ink – I chose to use Black Soot Distress Oxide. On reflection, maybe this could have been a bit darker. I’ll see what that’s like next time I do a galaxy background.

 

 

 

 

 

Step 3

I added some splashes of water to give the impression of distant light. I decided that OI wouldn’t add any white splatters to this background as I was going to be adding a busy die cut to the foreground. Otherwise, I would definitely add them!

 

 

 

 

 

To finish the card, I added a Technique Tuesday die cut, a Dienamics frame and a sentiment from Hero Arts.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.