Technique – stencilling

Featuring stencilling

Springtime Snowdrops

Hi there!

I was very pleased when I saw the sketch for this week’s challenge at Freshly Made Sketches as I knew I had the perfect stencil to replicate the three panels. So I grabbed my inks, the fabulous Pinkfresh 1″ blending brushes and got busy!

I love snowdrops – it always amazes me that something so delicate is so hardy and the first flower to emerge from the depths of my winter garden. My snowdrops are almost completely finished now but I’m so happy to celebrate them with this card!

The sentiment is from an older Memory Box set.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Glittery Mod Blossoms

Hello again everyone!

Next up today is my entry for the second February Color Throwdown challenge – an interesting combo of pink, lime and teal.

Quite a challenging combo for me but I decided to use my new Waffle Flower Mod Blossoms stencil set and coordinating die with some fabulous Pinkfresh Studio Glitter card.

The sentiment is by Spellbinders and cut from some mirror card that by sheer chance coordinates perfectly with the glitter card!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Pinkfresh Studio Create and Connect February 2025

Hi everyone!

Last weekend, I took part in the Pinkfresh Studio Create and Connect ‘Cards by Theme’ event. I signed up for this event back in November after watching the unboxing video, knowing that it would be nice to have something to look forward to after Christmas – and it was such a happy January day when the box arrived at my door!

Class One – Birthday Balloons product suite

Yana Smakula’s class was up first and her theme was happy birthday. There was only one birthday stamp in the whole kit, but I have plenty of birthday stamps already! I love the balloons and the delicate coordinating die. I thought it was very clever to include floral stamps/die cuts separately as the balloons can be used with or without flowers. I switched up my colours to make it more me.

I also used the set for my interpretation of Dawn Woleslage’s Make and Take press plate/foil card. I just used the stamp with an older daisy Pinkfresh coverplate that I’ve had for a while. but still love!

 

 

Class Two – Altenew Briar Blossoms product suite

 

Next up was Bridget Casey for the guest company, Altenew. It’s been a long while since I bought Altenew stamps and I loved using the product suite they provided, which included an embossing folder. I ‘went rogue’ with my first card! The inspiration was delicate peach/pastel tones, with these amazing gold gel pen centres. I thought they would really stand out if I used vibrant colours and a black background! For the second card, I learnt a new-to-me technique to trap ink colour on vellum using adhesive sheets – I’ve already tried it out on another card.

Class Three – Pretty Blooms product suite

 

 

The theme of the final class of the day was ‘hello’ and Heather Hoffman used a fabulous floral product suite that included washi tape! I love these products as I have the ‘quick and easy’ route with washi or I can really put my own spin on it with the stamp and stencil combo.

 

 

 

 

Class Four – Majestic Swan product suite

 

 

First up on Day 2 was one of my favourite cardmakers, Raquel Arribas. We used my favourite product suite from the event, called Majestic Swan. So versatile and easy to use! I’ve already used it on other cards. I did another Make and Take with this set using Isha Gupta’s press plate/foil card as inspiration. Isha also designed this product suite.

 

 

 

 

Class Five – Butterflies in a Cloche product suite

 

 

Lea Lawson was up next with the ‘hello’ theme using the Butterflies in a Cloche set. I love how quickly I could create with this set! Another very versatile set! Once again I used Isha Gupta’s press plate/foil card as inspiration for my Make & Take card.

 

 

 

Class Six – Mix It all up!!

 

 

Final class of the day, and always the most involved, was Jennifer Maguire who focusses on ‘stretching’ our kits. I’m not an interactive cardmaker but I could be converted after making the amazing pop up balloon card. The second card was simpler, using that wonderful Majestic Swan product suite.

I’m not sure if I will sign up for the next class which is ‘Cards for Him’ but I will definitely be hitting that ‘buy’ button when registration for the August event opens up!

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Amazing Swan

Hi there!

I spent a wonderful weekend crafting along with Pinkfresh Studio and hundreds of cardmakers across the world! It’s a full-on event which starts mid afternoon and ends close to midnight for me, but totally worth it! The inspiration was amazing, the teachers were fabulous and I learnt new tips and tricks too! I’ll share my makes later this week.

In the meantime, here is my card for this week’s challenge at Freshly Made Sketches. I used the Majestic Swan product suite that we used this weekend. The super-talented Raquel Arribas taught a class using this and it may well have been my favourite one! I love how easy it is to colour and cut so many images in one go…. and the red rubber cling stamp gives such beautiful crisp lines. N0thing beats red rubber stamps in my view. The background circle was created with a Carabelle Studios folder and the sentiment is by Sugar Pea Designs.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Heart Week 2025 – Day 5

Happy Friyay everyone!

Welcome to Day 5 of Heart Week 2025!

What do you do when a crafty order lands on your doormat and you want to use it straightaway but it doesn’t contain any heart items? You use it anyway! I loved Waffle Flower Crafts’ February release and could’ve bought all of it… but I restrained myself and bought a few items… for now! Many thanks to Tracy at Dies to Die For for the incredibly fast shipping! My purchases included the Mod Blossom die and coordinating stencil – I was so inspired by how the DT had used them – so versatile.

I created a panel with the stencil and various distress inks and then used an old Ellen Hutson heart die to cut it. I adhered it to a base that I had embossed with a WRMK Next Level embossing folder that I got back in 2015. Who remembers those? I consider them to be the founding father of the amazing 3D embossing folders we have today!

The sentiment is an old wood-mounted stamp (don’t you just love the little heart above the ‘i’?) and I added a few clear heart gems to complete my card.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.

Pastel Always Smiling

Hello Everyone!

Last year I attended a few Pinkfresh Studio Create and Connect events and really enjoyed them. Since then I’ve been slowly growing my Pinkfresh collection and over Christmas, I picked up the beautiful Always Smiling stamp set and coordinating stencil and die sets.

The layered stencils mean that you can colour the image very quickly but of course I chose to do something different here! I loved how Raquel Arribas used different colours on different stencilled flowers so I had to try it! It was actually pretty straightforward and wasn’t as time consuming as I feared!

I used a sentiment from the set plus the largest dies from the Nested Elongated Ovals Blanket Stitched die set to create the frame. The base is the Honey Bee Stamps Dogwood Blooms 3D embossing folder.

Thanks for stopping by!

LucieG.