Card Swap Group

This is my Card Swap for July and, hopefully, it should have reached Ann by now.
I'm reliably informed that Ann's favourite colour is Pink Pirouette so, despite personally finding pink a very difficult colour to work with (mainly because I don't like it!!) this is the card I've come up with.
The challenge for this month is to make a very small card but definitely no bigger than 4" square and that is exactly what this is.
I embossed a frame using one of the Designer Frames and cut out the centre rectangle using a craft knife. I stuck a piece of Whisper White behind the aperture and stamped a sentiment from Friendly Phrases (retired) in Blushing Bride. The rest is self-explanatory really so I will just give you a list of supplies used rather than bore you to death :0)

Supplies: Pink Pirouette cardstock, ink and Taffeta Ribbon, Blushing Bride ink, Papillon Potpourri and Friendly Phrases stamps, Bitty Butterfly Punch, Designer Frames Embossing Folder, Basic Pearls

New Baby

 A work colleague has just welcomed her first Granddaughter into the world so this is the congratulations card I have made for her. I find working with pink extremely difficult as it's not a colour I like so by no means the best card I've ever made but it's the thought that counts :0) I used the retired All in the Family for the image, along with some Pretty in Pink DSP, (both diecut with the Labels Collection Framelits), Pink Pirouette cardstock and taffeta ribbon and the sentiment is from Friendly Phrases. I did a bit of paper piercing around the diecuts, using a template from the Essentials pack and added a couple of Basic Pearls.

Notecard

You may remember last week I set myself a challenge to design some notecards for my next class, well this is another one I've come up with!
I started with a piece of Whisper White cardstock cut to C6 size and matted this onto a very slightly larger piece of Lucky Limeade. I used a stamp from Circle Circus inked with Lucky Limeade and stamped off before stamping twice onto the Whisper White to give me two lighter shades. The band across was made with one of the Apothecary Accents Framelits which I extended but, if you haven't got this set (and if not, WHY not?), you could use just a rectangle of card with a circle punch at either end or just a rectangle of card. The sentiment on the band is from Friendly Phrases. For the actual notelet I cut a piece of Whisper White cardstock wide enough to slip in the band and slightly shorter than the 'holder', inked around the edges with Lucky Limeade and added the stamp 'with love' from Field Flowers at the bottom.

Thank you for stopping by and I'll be back soon x

Beads and cards with a difference!!

When I saw the Less is More challenge this week was 'Use Beads' I decided this wasn't the week for me. I don't even own any beads, let alone use them (or so I thought!) so I took myself off to my craftroom to have a go at making another 'notecard' for my class next month. You can see that one below. After making that I decided I would make a wedding version, for a friend of my daughters who is getting married in a couple of weeks, and I suddenly remembered that somewhere I had an old SU Pretties Kit lurking (never used might I add!) Perfect - a card 'with a difference' made and an entry into LIM!!! I made an open top envelope and used one of the Apothecary Accents Framelits to cut the shape in the top. The insert was made from Brushed Silver and Whisper White and the sentiment silver embossed. The outside was decorated with two punched butterflies, Basic Rhinestones, Whisper White Taffeta ribbon and a stick pin with BEADS!!!! Both of these 'cards' fit into a standard C6 envelope.

This is my original version made in the same way, using Pool Party and Whisper White for the colour scheme along with Basic Pearls. The sentiment is from Friendly Phrases. Can you see how the size of the sentiment framelit has been reduced? Well there's a brilliant tutorial on YouTube, by a demo named Tanya Bell showing you how to do it - take a look here

And just to finish - this is what I woke up to this morning and it's still snowing. Did someone say it was Spring????

LIM Spots and Stripes

Saturday again and that means another Less is More challenge which, this week, is Spots and Stripes. Easy - that is until you find out it's a One Layer card as well!!!!

This called for a bit of masking and sponging so I took one of the frame dies from Apothecary Accents and cut a mask in a piece of copy paper, placed this on my card blank and stamped the spots from Confetti before lightly sponging with Crumb Cake. When this was done I stamped a sentiment from Friendly Phrases and removed the mask. I then used the other piece of die cut copy paper to place over the image and drew three stripes with Crumb Cake and Early Espresso markers. Unfortunately drawing straight lines only served to show up the fact that the sentiment is wonky but you get the general idea.
Certainly another challenge this week ladies but I could well be back!!

Before I go I would like to thank Chrissie and Jen for picking one of my paper pierced cards to showcase this week (bottom right) and also to the people who have sent me messages of congratulations. Thank you all, it's really appreciated x