"bee"-lieve

more "bee" puns!!
Moira from happy daze challenged me to use Jo's bee stamp from stampotique to make a christmas card... how could I resist!
This is what I came up with. The little Santa hat is hand drawn. I have also used Jo's honeycomb stamp and french text on this simple collage card.

This fits perfectly with this month's holiday happenings at Gingersnaps which is "things with wings"

OLW25: "bee"lated birthday

The challenge at one layer wednesday this week is birds and bees and flowers and trees. Which was very handy when I suddenly remembered yesterday that I had forgotten yet another birthday!!! so I made this "bee"lated card using the bee and swirl stalks from Jo Capper Sandon's range at stampotique, available from Happy Daze. The quote is from a SeeDs set and just one of the most useful stamps I own, lol. The background is done from another of the masks from Clevercut

p.s. I did add an insert to this card that I just printed in word that said Happy "Bee"-lated Birthday.

Hanging Hearts

Continuing the pink theme for breast cancer awareness on the frantic stamper blog. I have made this very pink card. The design of this card actually came about by accident. it was originally mounted on a white card blank, but then I went and got ink on the white border, so I trimmed it down to square and then sat and wondered what to do with it...

I decided to make it into a book style card. I think I'll be doing this again.

A pretty good rescue, don't you think.

For details of all the materials and techniques please visit the frantic stamper blog. I'd love it if you'd leave me a comment over there

faux handmade paper tutorial on Gingersnap

On the gingersnap Creations blog today I have a tutorial for making faux handmade paper. I hope that you enjoy it and I would love to see other people's results. I didn't invent this technique, but I have no idea where I learned it, it's one of those techniques that I did when I first started cardmaking, but have just revisited. I have used it to make this card, the stamp is by Paperartsy and I have stamped with versamark and used judikins embossing poweder.
I also used a scrap of it on this card that I have previously blogged.

Daphne and Delilah

You know when you find one of those projects that just puts EVERYTHING else on hold, this is one of those.

I blame the Never Not Knitting Podcast and blog, for creating this desire. The pattern is from the wonderful Rebecca Danger (or as I think of her "the bunny nugget lady"

I have made these for my eight year old son, who just loves this kind of thing. He helped me chose the colours

gingersnap arches

This week at Gingersnap the new challenge is arches. I made this arch shaped card using all stamps from PaperArtsy's hotpicks range.

forever friends recipe challenge

On the forever friends challenge this week we challenge you to use 2 Papers, 3 flowers and 1 button with your forever friends creations.

The challenge is sponsored by I am Roses, and you can see some of their flowers on this piece (and surrounding it) There is a fabulous prize up for grabs.

I was messing about seeing if I could turn a 5x5 card into a simple gift bag. The bear is coloured with pencils and blended with a blender pencil.

Scary Fairy!!

I love this theme at sunday postcard art, and as soon as I saw it I knew exactly what image I wanted to use. This fairy from scrolls work is about as non-scary as you can get, but I thought I'd Hallowe'en her up a bit!
I have coloured her with with Coloursoft pencils and a blender pencil.
The crows, Shaylee, and Netting are all Scrollswork stamps available from Happy Daze. Old English Hallowe'en is one of Jo Capper-Sandon's Stamps from Stampotique, als0 available from Happy Daze.

inspiration from a couple of challenges

The inspiration for this card came from the Wednesday Stamper challenge (faces) and the theme thursday challenge (pink). All of the stamps are from The Paperartsy Hotpick range, and the gem is from poundland.

I have used my blender pencil again to colour the face. I'm still learning, and each time I use it I can see how to improve the technique.

Gingersnap Challenge :versamark

The new challenge at Gingersnap Creations is to use Versamark (or other clear ink pad). I used mine to make a watermark background. All the stamps (including the music script on the embellishment) are by Scrolls Work. Even though I have finished my term on the Scrolls Work DT, I still expect I'll be using the stamps loads, 'cos I love 'em!!

some of the stamps are also available at Happy Daze

a sweet day

In honour of Breast Cancer awareness the Frantic Stamper are having a pink month, where all the projects have a pink theme. This is the first of my pink projects this month.
The instructions and stamp credits can be found on the frantic stamper blog. I would love it if you could pop over there and leave me a comment

I'm in pencil heaven!!

If you have visited my blog before you may know that I like to use pencils to colour. my favourite at the moment being Derwent coloursoft. I have tried sansodor to blend the pencils in the past and although I love the effect, just find the whole thing a bit messy, and the drying time is forEVER!!
so I have generally just gone for a non-blended look, which I do love.

However today I tried.... fanfare..... a blender pencil!!!!! Why did I not know about these before? The image on this card was coloured in very roughly and then just blended! simple as that!! and this is only the first time I've used it, so I am expecting to get better at it.... ooh the ideas that are forming in my head!!!

anyway, the stamps: Jasmin and swirl stalks are both from Jo's range from stampotique available at Happy Daze

I am entering this for wednesday stamper's "we love purple" theme. And indeed I do love purple!!

Forever friends: Home Decor

This week at the forever friends challenge, We challenge you to make a "home decor" item with your forever friends images. I decided to make this dry-wipe board. These are so simple to make. all you need is some book covering film (sticky back plastic to the Blue Peter fans). of course, you could also use a laminator.

The little journalling block is a mini from PaperArtsy

Going dotty!

I bought a few of these masks from Clevercut recently. I think the dotty one is my favourite so far (proably because it's the only one I've played with) the dots are well spaced out as shown on the "chocolate chip" card. (quote from PaperArsty Hotpicks) Which I really like as it makes it a bit different to using sequin waste.

but as the masks are a little bit see-through, you can reposition them to create more dots, in different colours, as shown in this simple card. The flowers are from Stampotique (available from Happy Daze)

Stampsmith Challenge

Just a quickie for the new stampsmith "all dressed up" challenge
This was an experiment in picking up the first two random patterned papers I found and seeing if I could make them work together.