Technique – Stamping

Featuring stamping

Snowdrops for you

Hi everyone!

Today I’m playing along with the current Simon Says Stamp Monday challenge using products kindly sent to me by Penny Black.

Do you have a stamp you reach for year after year? I have a few, especially this beautiful Wintry Whites stamp (30-634) which I reach for when I see the snowdrops appearing in my garden. You can see the other cards I’ve made with it in previous years: 2021, 2022 and 2023.

For today’s card, I stamped, coloured and fussy cut the snowdrop image, cutting off the vase outline to leave just the stems. I then used the largest die from the Heart Balloons die set (51-493) to cut white cardstock that I spritzed with Wonderland Distress Mica Stain and lightly sponged with Frayed Burlap distress ink.

I cut the fabulous YOU die (51-760) from some speciality paper and adhered it to a panel on my cardbase. I stamped part of a sentiment from the Fragrant Friends stamp set (30-807) and arranged the die cut elements. Finally I added the tiny bow from the Little Ornaments die set (51-090), butterflies from the Flourish and Butterflies die set (51-198) and a few gems.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Beyond words

Hello everyone!

Today I’m playing along with the Hand Stamped Sentiments inspiration challenge using products kindly sent to me by Penny Black.

I’ve loved the effect of brushstroke stamps since my early stamping days but found it difficult to get it ‘right’ with wood-mounted stamps. Fortunately we now have cling stamps and the misti, which makes things so much easier!

I chose the beautiful Brilliant Berries stamp (40-911) which I coloured using distress inks and markers. I masked off a frame and lightly blended some distress ink over the background before splattering some dark green paint across the image. After removing the mask, I added some glitter to the berries, stamped a couple of sentiments from the Ever Thanks set (30-813) and added a twine bow.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Love yoga

Hello everyone!

Today I’m paying tribute to my yoga journey with a card using products kindly sent to me by Penny Black.

In late 2020, a post popped up on my instagram feed about Adriene’s 30 day yoga programme and in January 2021 I rolled out my old, seldom-used mat with zero expectations… I had no intention to practice daily beyond January! Yet that is exactly what has happened! Today, we had our first day of yoga for this year’s 30 day programme and I had my 1,095th consecutive day of practice. Some days my practice has been short, other days I’ve done a long practice or even two sessions… but the important thing is that I made time for it EVERY SINGLE DAY. I love it and feel much better because of it!

So onto the card… This one certainly evolved and what started as a CAS card ended up using a lot of fun products. I stamped, coloured and fussy cut one of my favourite images from the New Adventures set (30-902) and then I just went wild with dies!! I used: Immense Love (51-757), Border Collection (51-717), Cloudy (51-728), Flourish and Butterflies (51-198) and Nestlings (51-755). I almost didn’t add that little bird because the robins are driving me wild at the moment – constant chirping, even at 2am!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

One wood block stamp, two New Year cards

Hi there!

It’s that short time of year when my cardmaking attention turns to New Year cards. Ordinarily I use a lot of die cuts but today I wanted to use a pretty wood-mounted stamp that I’ve had for AGES plus some newer products kindly sent to me by Penny Black.

The stamp du jour is called Falling Stars (3890H) – mine is dated 2008 (I think I may have bought it in 2010) and is still available online at the Penny Black store. I know many people are nervous about stamping with wood-mounted stamps, but they leave a beautiful impression – I will always love all mine! I do a few practice impressions when I’m stamping multiples of the same image, like I did with these cards.

My first card uses minimal supplies – the stamp, a sentiment from the Smile All Season stamp set (30-516), some versamark ink and glitzy embossing powder. I also used a frame from the Stitched Frames die set (51-709).

It’s a product explosion on my second card! I used the same stamps from my first card, plus a tag die from the Tagged set (51-007) and dies from the Peaceful Pines set (51-705) and Little Ornaments set (51-090) (bow) plus a tiny bit of branch from the On A Limb set (51-749). The beautiful embossing folder is from the most recent colllection and is called Filigree (65-010).

I’m going to enter these into Amy’s December Woodblock Wednesday challenge.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Sparkle and Twinkle

Hi there!

Today I’m finally using a beautiful cling stamp called ‘Snowed In’ (40-916) that was kindly sent to me by Penny Black.

I sometimes feel intimidated by landscape stamps and I had originally planned to colour this stamp with different Tombow markers. But then I stamped it with Speckled Egg distress oxide ink as a practice and loved how it turned out – so I ended up working with that! I masked off the image and blended Tumbled Glass and Stormy Sky distress ink for the sky. I then cut the Snowman Joy die (51- 272) from white glitter card and added some colour using my alcohol markers.

I cut into the landscape and tucked the base of the snowman between the card and adhered the image to my card base. I added a sentiment from the Song of Peace mini set (30-999) and lots of glitter, which I hope you can see in this photo!

I still felt the card needed something else… first I tried to lift some of the ink from the sky but it wasn’t successful (this was due to the cardstock which is different from my usual card). So I adhered some small snowflakes from the Snow Family die set (51-395) cut from different colour holographic card – it was only when I was photographing the card that I realised that the smaller flakes from the Snow Shimmer Stick and Shine sheets would have worked just as well!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Flurry of festive wishes

Hi everyone!

Today I’m playing along with this week’s challenge at Freshly Made Sketches using products kindly sent to me by Penny Black.

I’ve been wanting to use the beautiful Winged Pair cling stamp (40-908) for a while and when I saw this week’s sketch, I knew it would be perfect! I coloured the image with my Twinkling H2O paints and masked off the birds as I sponged a little distress ink across the background and added some splatters.

I used my new Blizzard embossing folder (65-013) for the background strip and sponged a little white ink to highlight the snowflakes – they are so pretty! (I’m not sure why my cards are appearing darker at the bottom – it must be the lighting – I need to look at my set up… maybe I’ll do this over the Christmas break!)