Sparkle and shine

It's challenge day on Daring Cardmakers - today's challenge has been set by Nat and she wants us to make our cards sparkle and shine this week - glitter, gems, metallic paints, sequins, anything with some shiny glitz!

This is one of those cards that looks a whole lot better in real life, for some reason I couldn't make a photo of it look terribly coherent!

I stamped a leaf with Flitter Glue on dark brown cardstock and used metal leaf in autumn colours once the glue was tacky. I did make two leaves but decided I only wanted one so I  used the second one to punch out some circles to use as dots around the leaf on the finished card.

The glitter strips are just double sided tape sheet trimmed to the widths I wanted with gold and copper glitters burnished onto the tape.

Tiny nail art gems have been my "go to" for years - two slightly different sizes and colours got used here. Keeping the sheen thing going, the sentiment is stamped in a pearlescent ink.

Although I've gone down the birthday route, shine and sparkle would give you a great starting point for a Christmas card or two so why not join in with the dare this week and add to your Christmas stash?!

Stamps:
Falling Leaves (Tim Holtz/Stampers Anonymous)
Say It Loud (Waltzingmouse Stamps - retired)

Ink: Brilliance by Tsukineko (Pearlescent Chocolate)

Other:
Flitter Glue by Indigo Blu
Easy Metal by Eberhard Faber
Fine glitter (copper and gold)
Nail art gems
Corner Chomper

Thanks for stopping by!

Tag it

Today's challenge on Daring Cardmakers has been set by Purvi and she's asking us to use a tag on our cards.

I tend to think of tags on gifts so I ended up making my card look like the front of a present with satin ribbon wrapped round a crisp white square. It looked a wee bit stark so I would probably have stitched round the edge to frame it but I've lent my sewing machine to a friend so a good old-fashioned pin and ruler came into play for a pierced border instead!

I cut the tag with a die and matted it using the 1/16" Perfect Layers ruler - easy with a shape that only has straight edges!

The berries for the holly are little circles made with a regular office hole punch, domed out on a foam mat with an embossing stylus.

Stamps:
Festive Foliage (Waltzingmouse Stamps - now available from Gina K)
Christmas Expressions (Cornish Heritage Farms, retired)

Ink:
Delicata by Tsukineko (Golden Glitz)
Brilliance by Tsukineko (Pearlescent Ivy)

Cardstock: white, ribbed kraft, red

Other:
Stitched tags dies by Waltzingmouse Stamps (retired)
Satin ribbon
Coloursoft pencil (Grass green)
Hole punch
Perfect Layers ruler

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True colours

It's Friday which can only mean one thing: a new dare from the Daring Cardmakers! Svenja's "True colours" dare is asking us to go monochromatic with our cards.

I decided to try the "hidden sentiment" thing with a word die, combining it with a loose watercolour swoosh and a stamped image.

If the hidden inlaid sentiment is new to you too, I used this video tutorial to make sure my imagining of the process was actually what I needed to do to get the sentiment right!

This could be a Christmas card or just a wintery greeting, I think.

Also new to me - I've finally caved in and got a MISTI so I had a first play with it here by first stamping the trees in Distress ink and spreading it out, stamping again and spreading to intensify the colour and then stamping a third time on the wet paper for a slightly blurry image. Once dry, I over stamped with Versafine which gives a sharper image on top.

I die cut the sentiment from the image panel and then layered onto a couple more cut from cardstock. It's a bit fiddly but I think it's a nice effect.

Stamps:
Lovely As a Tree by Stampin' Up!

Paper: 
Hot press watercolour

Ink:
Tim Holtz Distress ink by Ranger (Peacock Feathers) 
Versafine by Tsukineko (Deep Lagoon)

Other: 
Sizzlets die by Sizzix (Serenity set, retired) 
MISTI
Corner Chomper

Thanks for stopping by!

Autumn inspiration

I'm delighted to be guest designing with the Daring Cardmakers for October - the original cardmakers' challenge blog, still going strong after 10 years!

The first dare of the month means an inspiration photo and a challenge to choose at least three elements from it to kick start a creation. The lovely Gez has chosen this month's picture - pop over to the DCM blog to see it or check out the bottom of this post!

I dithered wildly and finally settled on making an autumnal birthday card for my brother. From the picture I chose the vivid leaves against a black background, the horse's mane (embroidery thread combed out to a fringe) and the silver rings of the bridle (the big eyelet).

Various Distress reinkers, Brushos and lots of water made a lovely multi-coloured mess all over a sheet of mixed media paper. Once dry I die cut a load of leaves and added a touch of clear Wink of Stella to some of them (probably clearer in the close up shot). For the base layer I drew a scribbly circle on black card with a glue pen and covered with gilding flake once tacky.

The eyelet holds the embroidery thread in place and the scribbled circle forms the basis of a partial wreath shape. I spent ages fiddling with leaf position and still ended up not entirely happy with the composition! A die cut circle with a stamped sentiment, inked edges and faux stitching finished it off.

Supplies:
Black and white cardstock
Mixed media paper by Hahnemuhle
Various Distress reinkers
Brushos
Leaves dies by Impression Obsession
Circle Nestabilities by Spellbinder
Sentiment from Big Day Today stamp set (Waltzingmouse Stamps, retired)
Versafine ink by Tsukineko (Onyx Black)
Distress ink by Ranger (Antique Linen)
Clear Wink of Stella pen
Skeleton leaves
Jumbo eyelet
Black embroidery thread 
Zig two way adhesive pen
Mega Flake by Indigo Blu (Chariot of Fire)
Black Fineline marker

The inspiration photo chosen by Gez

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(A bit too?) Clean and simple

I couldn't quite convince myself that I liked this having made it but hubby did and as it was destined for one of his sons (who runs and cycles, sometimes with a competitive element) we went with it. I was aiming for monochrome and graphic but I ended up thinking perhaps it was just a bit too plain!

I thought afterwards that since the bike and the pocket watch are vintage maybe I should have used sepia tones for the monochrome look rather than black and grey but I'm not sure that would have convinced me, either!

What do you think?

Stamps:
Bicycles (Cornish Heritage Farms)
Clocks Plate 6 (PaperArtsy)
Say it All (Hero Arts)

Paper: smooth white

Ink:
Versafine Onyx Black by Tsukineko
Soft Granite by Hero Arts

Other:
Charcoal pencil
Copic maker - Cool Grey 1
Corner Chomper

Thanks for stopping by!