CAS Poinsettia Trio Merry Christmas Card - 52 {C}CT May Colour Challenge

This week at 52 {C}CT we have a fab colour combo challenge for you.  We want to see just those two colours this week so red and white only in your entries please!

 

I love red and white together, it's so crisp! I went with a CAS, no layers, card design.  It may be a CAS design but it certainly wasn't quick, there was a lot of stamping, heat embossing and fussy cutting involved!  I inked the poinsettia with VersaMark, stamped several times onto Bo Bunny red Double Dot papers, heat embossed with white powder and got busy fussy cutting.  I attached the layers of each poinsettia together with a white brad in the flower centre.  I masked the sentiment before inking and stamping as I only wanted part of it on the card front.  I attached the poinsettias to the card front with large glue dots to finish the front. 

I masked the sentiment again and stamped just the portion I wanted inside the card and stamped more poinsettias.

Yet more poinsettias on the front of the envelope!

I hope you'll add yet another Christmas card to your stash by playing along with our colour challenge at 52 {C}CT this week.  Remember to check out the other DT member's cards as they'll have lots to inspire you!  I'm looking forward to seeing your festive red and white cards!

Supplies:
Stamps: Poinsettia from Personal Impressions, Hero Arts 'Holiday Cheer' clear set
CS: PaperMania white square card blank
Patterned paper:  Bo Bunny 'Wild Berry' & 'Harvest' Double Dot papers
Ink: VersaMark, SU! Real Red
Tools: heat tool, paper piercer
Embellishments & accessories: white embossing powder, white brads, glue dots

Blooms & French Foliage Note Card

We're spending the rest of the day out with our wonderful friends Debs and Mike and I gave them this card as a thank you for my birthday gift.  I've been meaning to give this card to them for ages but I keep forgetting - I'm at that age you know!

I stamped the French Script stamp in Crumb Cake ink onto the Very Vanilla panel and then stamped the flower from the Blooming with Kindness set in Rose Red ink three times without re-inking.  I stamped the postmark and a few splatters, sponged the edges and added the Rose Red seam binding ribbon and antique brad.  I layered the Very Vanilla panel onto Rose Red and Soft Suede mats, added brads at the corners and mounted the whole layer onto a 5 1/4" square Crumb Cake card base.  I stamped three leaves, inking first with Crumb Cake ink and then adding some Rose Red ink with a sponge dauber.  I fussy cut the leaves, sponged the edges with Soft Suede ink and popped them up, tucking the bottom of the leaves behind the ribbon.  Lastly I spritzed the entire card front with Perfect Pearls Cappuccino mist.

Here's the inside and envelope with more blooms and French Foliage stamped images.  Hmmm, I may have overdone the splatters on the inside, aside from that, I'm happy how this card turned out!  Debs and Mike loved the card so that's good!  Apart from a paper piercer for the brads I didn't use any tools, there was just lots of stamping.  It's good to do just the basics sometimes!

Supplies:
Stamps: SU! 'French Script' background stamp, 'Blooming with Kindness' & 'French Foliage' sets
CS: SU! Crumb Cake, Rose Red, Soft Suede & Very Vanilla
Ink: SU! Crumb Cake, Rose Red & Soft Suede
Tools: paper piercer
Embellishments & accessories: SU! Rose Red seam binding ribbon, antique brad, vintage brads, Dimensionals, Perfect Pearls Cappuccino mist

Punch Art Teddy Bear Congratulations Card

This congratulations card is for Zoe who recently became Mum to baby Jack.  I thought a punch art teddy bear would be great for a baby card - thanks so much to Joanne for the instructions!

I used the Owl Builder, 3/4" circle and 1/2" circle punches to make the bear.  I inked the edges of all the Crumb Cake pieces with Soft Suede ink and then assembled teddy.  I stamped the border from the Summer Silhouettes set onto Pool Party CS with Pool Party ink.  The border wasn't long enough so I used my Stamp-a-ma-jig and stamped twice in order to extend the border.  I stamped the sentiment, glued the Pool Party panel to the Very Vanilla panel, added a narrow Early Espresso CS strip and layered onto an Espresso mat.  I tucked the bottom of the teddy behind the Pool Party panel and used Dimensionals to pop up his body and head.  I added the ribbon and buttons and glued the Espresso panel to the 4 3/4" square Crumb Cake card base.  I applied Crystal Effects to the eyes and heart so they're raised and glossy.

Here's the inside of the card with an oldie but goodie baby card sentiment, some dotty Pool Party paper and a couple of glossy hearts.

I decided to make an envelope from Crumb Cake CS to match the card.  To make a 5" square envelope I cut the CS 8" square and used the Simply Scored and Diagonal Plate to score on all four sides at 3 5/8".  I glued a stamped and punched label to the front of the envelope.

Here's the back of the envelope with Pool Party dotty paper on the flap and an office envelope type closure made with punched circles, brads and linen thread.

My very sweet friend and neighbour Kath is always knitting baby clothes and I asked if I could commission her to make something for Zoe's baby.  Kath knitted a jumper from a pattern I chose, oh my word, the wool is SO soft and fluffy, I just kept picking the jumper up and feeling it!  In the end I had to wrap it up as it's white and I didn't want to risk getting it grubby before I'd handed it over to Zoe!     

Supplies:
Stamps: SU! 'Sweet Essentials', 'Summer Silhouettes' & 'Four Frames' sets, inside sentiment from Stampendous
CS: SU! Crumb Cake, Pool Party, Early Espresso & Very Vanilla
Patterned paper:  SU! In Color DSP stack
Ink: SU! Pool Party, Soft Suede & Early Espresso, Early Espresso marker
Tools: SU! Owl Builder, 3/4" circle, 1/2" circle, Itty Bitty circle, Decorative Label & Heart to Heart punches,  Simply Scored & Diagonal Plate, Stamp-a-ma-jig, sponge dauber
Embellishments & accessories:  SU! Pool Party satin ribbon, Crystal Effects, Neutrals Brads, Linen Thread, buttons, Dimensionals

Hot Air Balloons Birthday Shadow Box Card, Choc Chip Ginger Nuts & A Cake

It was our fabulous friend Mike's birthday on Sunday and he and Debs came over for the afternoon and we cooked dinner in the evening.  I made Mike a hot air balloons shadow box card - and I also made a batch of Delia Smith recipe chocolate chip ginger nuts which I gave him in a jar.

I used Real Red CS for the card base, die cut an oval aperture in the front and added a Bashful Blue frame.  I stamped the clouds in Bashful Blue ink onto Whisper White CS, cut the panel to size and glued  it to the back panel.  I then stamped and fussy cut three hot air balloons, popped two up on the back panel and popped one up on the front.  I stamped some birds onto the sky and then die cut some clouds.  I sponged the edges of the clouds with Bashful Blue ink and popped them up.  I stamped and cut out the sentiment banner and popped that up too.

Here's another view of the card.  Shadow box cards have the wow factor but are easy to put together - I like that in a card!  Another plus is that they fold flat to go inside an envelope.  There's a tutorial here on Splitcoast Stampers if you want to try a shadow box card for yourself.  This card fits into a C6 envelope, I started by cutting a piece of A4 CS in half to get an A5 sized piece and then cut that in half to get the 2 pieces needed for the card base.  I scored both ends of both pieces at 1/2" and 1" to form the box shape.  You can make them to fit into square envelopes too, for example for a 6" square envelope, I'd cut two 5 3/4" CS squares and still score the ends at 1/2" and 1".

Here's the back of the card. 

Here's the front of the envelope.

Here's the jar of home made chocolate chip ginger nuts with a tag tied to the jar.  I was happy to finally ink up the 'Deliciously Made for You' stamp!  Mike absolutely loves ginger but I'm not quite as keen.  I made a batch on Saturday to try them out as I hadn't made them before - yum!  Then I whipped up this batch for Mike on Sunday morning and I added a bit more ground ginger to his batch.

The back of the tag.

I was definitely a domestic goddess this weekend - not only did I make the choc chip ginger nut biscuits, I made Mike a cake to celebrate his birthday  - an Austrian Coffee and Walnut cake!  I should have taken a photo when it was whole but I forgot until after we'd tucked in!  I gave Mike some to take home and we have this left.  It is soooooo good, it won't last long!  You can't go wrong with Delia recipes, they're always delicious!  Mike gave it 10 out of 10 and said mine looked better than the photo in Delia's book - high praise indeed!  We sat in the garden, drank Pimm's, enjoyed the sunshine, chatted, laughed and ate - perfect!

Supplies for card:
Stamps: SU! 'Up, Up & Away' & 'Itty Bitty Banners' sets, Hero Arts 'Clouds' background stamp, birds from Hobby Art, fantastic day sentiment from Hero Arts
CS: SU! Real Red, Bashful Blue & Whisper White
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, SU! Real Red, Bashful Blue, Daffodil Delight & Pacific Point
Tools: Oval Nestabilities dies, Memory Box 'Puffy Clouds' die, SU! Simply Scored, sponge dauber
Embellishments & accessories: SU! Dimensionals

Supplies for tag:
Stamps: SU! 'Creatively Yours' set, 'S.W.A.K.' & 'Dot, Dot, Dot' stamps. 'With Love' from SU! Field Flowers set
CS: SU! Early Espresso & Very Vanilla
Ink: SU! Crumb Cake, Early Espresso & Real Red
Tools: SU! 2 3/8" scallop circle & 2 1/2" plain circle punches, Heart to Heart punch
Embellishments & accessories: SU! Dimensionals

Trio Of Trees Merry Christmas Card - 52 {C}CT May Sketch Challenge

It's Mynette's turn to host the challenges at 52 {C}CT during May and she's given us this sketch to work with this week.  A wonderfully versatile but nice and easy sketch it is too!  It would work well in portrait orientation and for a square card too I think.

I was in the mood to make a card using black, white and one other bold colour and I plumped for lime green.  I love black, white and green together and I've made cards with this combo before but not a Christmas card.  I wasn't sure how it would pan out but I have to say I'm quite happy with the end result!

So I had a layout to work with and I'd chosen a colour combo, the next thing was to choose stamps.  I had a rootle in my Christmas stamp stash and reached for a retired SU! set called Patterned Pines as I haven't used that in a while and I love it.  That is just one of the great things about being on the 52 {C}CT Design Team and making a Christmas card each week, it gets me to use some of my older stash items!  I made a black A6 card base, added a Lucky Limeade mat layer and stamped the sentiment.  I glued a white Nestie Labels Four shape on top of a black strip and added two punched snowflakes.  I stamped the trio of trees stamp twice, once using black ink and a second time using Lucky Limeade ink.  I cut out three trees and popped them up on the label shape using thinner 3d foam tape for the green trees and thicker foam tape for the black tree.  I added three black gems to the top left corner to balance the sentiment and added green gems to the snowflake centres.

The snowflake stamp that is in the Patterned Pines set is such a gorgeous shape so I was very happy to get that inky for the inside of the card and the envelope!  I stamped another Limeade tree, fussy cut it and glued that to the white panel to finish off. 

Another Christmas card added to the box, it's starting to fill up nicely!  You can add to your stash of Christmas cards too if you take part in our 52 {C}CT challenge this week and make a card with this fab layout.  The other gals on the DT will have made great cards to inspire you so go and check those out before you go off and get inky!
 

Supplies:
Stamps: SU! 'Patterned Pines' & 'Four the Holidays' sets, Hero Arts 'Very Merry Christmas' clear set
CS: SU! Lucky Limeade, Basic Black & Whisper White
Ink: SU! Lucky Limeade, Memento Tuxedo Black
Tools: Nestabilities Labels Four die, Woodware snowflake punch, 1 3/4" & 2" circle punches
Embellishments & accessories: PaperMania black gems, green Swarovski crystals, 1mm & 2mm 3d foam tapes

May 2013 Card Group Projects

We had our monthly card group meeting today and a good time was had by all!  I've been chipping away at my ladies and I finally wore them down enough for them to agree to make a dress card, yay!

So this is the first card I designed for today's meeting.  The patterned paper for the dress is from the SU! Spice Cake retired DSP pack.  I was never a fan of More Mustard but I really liked the Spice Cake papers.  More Mustard with Pool Party, Soft Suede and Very Vanilla is a good combo I think so I stuck to those colours for the card. I sandwiched the patterned paper and Very Vanilla CS with  double sided sticky sheet between them and then I die cut the sleeved dress.  I die cut just the top of the sleeveless dress from Pool Party CS to add a little bodice detail.  I added a Pool Party satin ribbon sash and an Itty Bitty punched Pool Party flower with a rhinestone centre and glued the dress to the mannequin.  I stamped the sentiment onto the Very Vanilla panel and added a stamped and cut out Pool Party lace strip - I love the Viola's Lace stamp, it means I can have lace in any colour!  I popped the mannequin up onto the Very Vanilla panel but glued the bottom part flat to the card so that the shape doesn't get tangled up when the card is slid in and out of the envelope.

Onto card two now which features two-step stamping which means the use of the dreaded Stamp-a-ma-jig.  I wouldn't be without this fabulous tool, I use it often and in two-step stamping it's a necessity.  Some of my card group ladies don't share my enthusiasm for the Stamp-a-ma-jig though - I don't know why, I give them enough practise with it LOL!  The beautiful finished result of two-step flower stamping is so worth the effort of wrangling with the Stamp-a-ma-jig in my view!

I made a Baja Breeze side opening A6 card and trimmed a tad off the right hand side.  I die cut a large scalloped border from Not Quite Navy CS, embossed it with a Delicate Designs folder, cut it to size and glued it to the card front so the card now has a fancy edge.  I pierced along the border using a template from the Essentials Piercing Pack.  I stamped the stem in Certainly Celery ink onto Whisper White CS, cut out the Apothecary Accents die shape and stamped the sentiment.  I glued this to the card base, trimmed off the excess at the top and bottom and then pierced the outline using another template from the Essentials Piercing Pack.  I then stamped the solid flowers in Baja Breeze ink, stamped the outline flowers in Not Quite Navy ink, fussy cut the flowers and popped them up.  A note about piercing on card fronts - remember to ensure you have the card open before piercing - yes, I have forgotten once or twice and got piercing inside the card as well!

The final card is this 4 3/4" square, simple CAS number.  I went outside my colour comfort zone for this one and used grey along with the white and Riding Hood Red.  I think the design and colours make this a useful unisex card.  I stamped the Inkadinkado bird bath image with Memento Gray Flannel ink and used square Nestie dies to cut the panel and mat layers.  I stamped the sentiment and then went to glue the image layer to the card front.  Hmmm, the design was lacking something I thought but I wasn't sure what.  I remembered a design tip Susan Raihala (a true CAS queen) gave on this Simplicity blog post - angles love curves and curves love angles.  So I hit upon the idea of tucking punched circles behind the square to add a bit of interest.  I then placed the image at a jaunty angle and the card was done. 

Pia S left a comment on my April card group projects post.
"You did all these cards in one afternoon? I think my record is a card made within 3 hours! LOL."

I thought I'd take some time to share some info on how I do things for the card group.  Firstly, I must say I am not a speedy crafter at all, I enjoy the process and don't want to rush - plus if I do rush I tend to make mistakes.  Anyway, I make up a card kit for each person for each card.  There are 10 ladies in the group so I make up 30 kits beforehand.  I will have cut and scored all the card bases and I'll often cut mat layers to size as well.  So they do the stamping, punching, die cutting and assembling during the afternoon.  We have to spend some time having a good old chat and a few laughs too!  For me, one of the most time consuming aspects of making a card is the design itself, that can take me ages.  As that part has already been done before my card group afternoon, the ladies can just concentrate on getting their cards put together.  Not everyone works on the same card at the same time so there's not too much waiting around for supplies.  I keep a die cutting machine at the venue but if there's a fair bit of die cutting and/or embossing involved over the three cards I take along my Big Shot from home as well. 

If I sense that it's likely that not everyone will get all their three cards made then I help out during the afternoon wherever I can.  I'm not a good judge on how long each card takes to make!  I always try to have one fairly simple and fast design along with two more involved, time consuming cards. So, if any of you were at all curious, now you know!

Supplies for dress birthday card:
Stamps: SU! 'Beautiful Birthday' & 'Viola's Lace'
CS: SU! More Mustard, Pool Party, Soft Suede & Very Vanilla
Patterned paper:  SU! Spice Cake DSP
Ink: SU! Pool Party & Soft Suede
Tools: SU! 'Dress Up' Framelits dies, SU! Itty Bitty Flower punch
Embellishments & accessories: SU! Pool Party satin ribbon, Rhinestone Jewels, Dimensionals

Supplies for flowers especially for you card:
Stamps: SU! 'Field Flowers' & 'Made for You' sets
CS: SU! Baja Breeze, Not Quite Navy & Whisper White
Ink: SU! Certainly Celery, Baja Breeze & Not Quite Navy
Tools: SU! Large Scallop Edgelits die, Delicate Designs embossing folder, Apothecary Accents Framelits die, Essentials Paper Piercing Pack, Piercing Tool & Mat, Stamp-a-ma-jig
Embellishments & accessories: SU! Dimensionals

Supplies for bird bath birthday card:
Stamps: Inkadinkado 'Utopiary' clear set, Hobby Art 'Happy Birthday'
CS: SU! Basic Gray, Riding Hood Red & Whisper White
Ink:  Memento Gray Flannel, SU! Riding Hood Red
Tools: Square Nestabilities dies, SU! 3/4" circle punch
 

Summer Silhouettes Warmest Wishes Birthday Card - Inkpirational Challenge #18

It's a new month so we're starting our challenge rotation all over again at Inkspirational which means  we're kicking May off with a colour combo challenge.

Tammy from Creatively Me is our sponsor for May and here is the fab prize that's she's very kindly giving away to our May monthly winner.

I have to be honest and say I didn't really fancy the colours together when I first saw the challenge prompt picture but as I worked on the card I realised what a striking combo it makes! I've used the SU! colours Elegant Eggplant, Old Olive and Peach Parfait with Very Vanilla as a neutral.  I dug out the Peach Parfait paper that came from the SU! Everyday Enchantment pack and glued that to the front of my 5 3/4" square Old Olive card base.  I stamped the leaves, flowers and sentiment onto a Very Vanilla panel and layered onto Peach and Eggplant mats.  I punched the butterflies and fixed them together with a brad that matches the patterned paper and attached the butterfly element to a strip of Eggplant ribbon.  I taped a strip of the ribbon to the bottom part of the card and added a bow to complete the card front.

Here's the inside and envelope.

The other DT members will have made great creations to inspire you so please check them out before joining in with this colour combo challenge - I can't wait to see what you make!

Supplies:
Stamps: SU! 'Summer Silhouettes' & 'Blooming with Kindness' sets, inside sentiment from Penny Black
CS: SU! Elegant Eggplant, Old Olive, Peach Parfait & Very Vanilla
Patterned paper:  SU! Everyday Enchantment DSP
Ink: SU! Elegant Eggplant & Old Olive
Tools: SU! Elegant Butterfly & Bitty Butterfly punches, piercing tool, Perfect Layers, Stamp-a-ma-jig
Embellishments & accessories: SU! Elegant Eggplant grosgrain ribbon, Everyday Enchantment brad