A woodland Christmas

The current challenge at Christmas Kickstart has us coming Out of the Woods. As soon as I saw the theme I knew I wanted to christen this stamp set and in particular this handsome stag. When I then saw We Love Stamping has a wildlife theme I knew it was meant to be.

This is very nearly a one layer card, just the sentiment strip is separate. I stamped and masked the stag, used a circle mask and stamped the pine bough and berry sprig then inked over with some Bundled Sage Distress ink. I remember seeing somebody (not sure if it was a member of the Katzelkraft DT) use the pine and berry stamps to make a sort of designer paper. It looked lovely so I took the same sort of approach here. I stamped in red and then went over the stems with a dark brown fineliner, intensified the berry colour with a Copic and added tiny white paint pen highlights. 

I then swapped to a circle stencil and added some blue around the stag. Everything is coloured with a mixture of Copics and pencils. I used a copper gel pen to doodle and give the circle some definition and also used it along the edges of the sentiment strip.

Stamps:
Out of the Wild (Katzelkraft, no longer with us)
Vintage Christmas Expressions (Cornish Heritage Farms, no longer with us)

Paper:
Bristol board

Ink:
Versafine by Tsukineko (Onyx Black)
Tim Holtz Distress ink by Ranger (Tumbled Glass, Bundled Sage)
Adirondack by Ranger (Red Pepper)
Brilliance by Tsukineko (Pearlescent Ivy)

Other:
Coloured pencils
Copic markers
Spica glitter pen (green)
Copper gel pen
White paint pen (Posca)
Black fineliner

Here are the challenges if anyone would like to play along too!

 

 

Cold toes?

I had a plan for joining in at the current Lost Coast Designs challenge where the team would like us to make it funny. Then I saw the current Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers challenge theme of Cold and this idea popped into my head and refused to go away until an attempt at making it had happened! The original idea might still get a look in before the month ends, we’ll see.

It’s a version of an age old joke but I thought the expression on the dog’s face fit it perfectly, poor wee thing! Wording is computer generated, it’s a bit situation-specific for anyone to make a stamp, I reckon! Torn paper snow, paint pen dots (I probably should have splattered but I didn’t think of that in time!) and my usual rounded corner finish it off.

Stamps:
Pointy Hat Gnome (Lost Coast Designs)
Les Chiens (Katzelkraft, no longer with us)

Paper:
Kraft, scrap of white

Ink:
Versafine by Tsukineko (Onyx Black)

Other:
Coloured pencils
White paint pen (Posca)
Corner Chomper
Black fineliner

Spring is in the air

The northern hemisphere has entered meteorological spring and the Die Cut Divas would like to see some signs of the new season in our projects this month.The challenge provided a perfect starting point for a birthday card I needed to make.

A couple of months back I bought a bundle of Lisa Horton products on eBay which included a pretty buttercup set. As they generally start flowering in March I thought that might be a good place to start. I’m still enjoying playing with some dark backgrounds so I added my stencilled, die cut and embossed spray of buttercups to a black card base with a white heat embossed sentiment and a frame drawn with a white paint pen and given some smudgy, chalkboard sort of corners with a white pencil.

I only used two ink colours on the stencilling, one yellow and one green, which sort of made up for the amount of other stuff taking up real estate on my desk! The camera hasn't picked up the shading details of the green leaves very well but it's the best I could manage.

Paper: Bristol board, smooth black

Ink: Adirondack by Ranger (Sunshine Yellow), Memento by Tsukineko (New Sprout)

Other:
Buttercup Bloom bundle (3D folder, outline die, layering stencils — Lisa Horton Crafts)
Sentiment from Enjoy Quotes (Katzelkraft, no longer with us)
Bright white embossing powder (Wow!)
White Posca paint pen
White pencil
Corner Chomper

Thanks for stopping by! 

Link in the chain - February

I've finally managed to reach a state where I felt I could join in again at Card Chain Challenge — hooray! My card for February has gone to Brenda. Stylistically this is a total contrast to what Brenda tends to make herself but I figured that's part of what CCC is about!

From the options on offer I chose the theme (On the Farm) and the colours (indigo, lime, violet). I did use a die but as it's a plain square I think I'd be pushing it to claim the technique option of dies/fussy cutting!

There was a lot more lime showing on the first version of this but nothing else was quite right so it got framed for a sort of Polaroid effect, selecting the bit of the image I was happiest with. In an attempt to get closer to indigo than anything in my ink stash, I stamped the sentiment with both Blueprint Sketch and Dusty Concord - thank goodness for stamp positioners, eh? For some reason the colour balance went to pot in the photo and in a way that resisted adjustment — the sentiment is a bit darker in real life and the violet is a bit lighter!

I think this cow has probably just spotted something tasty so the sentiment seemed appropriate! 

Stamps:
Cow Selfie and Enjoy Quotes (Katzelkraft, no longer with us)

Paper:
Bristol board

Ink:
Tim Holtz Distress Oxides (Wilted Violet, Twisted Citron)
Tim Holtz Distress (Blueprint Sketch, Dusty Concord)
Brilliance

Other:
Square Nestabilities
Copic markers

Thanks for stopping by. There are a few more days to sign up for the next exchange if you fancy making and receiving a hand made card.