Runway Case

It has been 10 days since my last blog entry! Well, we have been very busy since Easter due to a wedding with guests coming from overseas. It feels so good to get back into the craft room again! I could not resist the current combined RIC58 and CAS(E) this Sketch #73 challenge. I'm also adding this card to the Hero Arts April sketch challenge - Sketch #1 and Simon Says Stamp Wednesday - Anything goes challenge.. Here is my card and thanks for dropping by!

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Ingredients

Card - Via Vellum Kraft

Paper - Kaisercraft Curiosity, Collectables - Miss Match

Stamp - Hero Arts CL574

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black

Others - True Hemp from Hemtique, MME enamel dots

Hero Arts April Sketch #2

I love sketches! Hero Arts's April challenge is a set of three sketches, I tackled this one with ease. I got out the HA Big Postcard and my new Hydrangea stamp and inked on patterned paper, fussy cut, paper pieced, added stickles and inked the edges... Voila! Done! I'm also adding this card to PCS April Gallery Challenge and A Blog Named Hero's Layer Cake challenge. Now off to do the other two!!

Ingredients
Card - Neenah Desert Storm
Stamps - Hero Arts CG455, S5685, K5376, CL574
Die - Simon Says Stamp Folded Banner
Inks - Ranger Archival Jet Black, Tim Holtz Vintage Photo
Others - Stickles, dimensional paint

Happy Easter

Wishing everyone a great Easter weekend!

For Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge - Animal Antics

A Blog Named Hero - Layer Cake

Pandamonium!

OK, I don't make a lot of cutesy cards.... but, again, I could not resist this cute panda from Mama Elephant! This is card made at our Craft Retreat using borrowed stamp sets from Lyndal. I may be tempted to buy this set (they are both out of stock on SSS and ME)!! I'm adding this to Simon Says Stamp's Wednesday challenge - Animal Antics.

Ingredients:

Neenah Solar White, Mama Elephant Pandamonium and Up and Away, Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic Markers and Colourless Blender.

Another Card for Virginia's View Challenge

Some good news to share - my baby Kingsley card for CASE Study #186 challenge got Top 3! Yay!

I normally don't jump into a new Craft trend so easily. During our craft retreat, I got to try out a few stencils and I'm starting to embrace this new trend! When I came back, I realised I don't have many stencils at all until I went through the goodies bag Joy gave me and found a butterfly stencil in there. So here is my first inking with this stencil. After sponging with distress inks, I overstamped with Hero Arts Leafy Vines in black before removing the stencil. I added the sentiment in black, matted with a black card stock, added some accents with a gel pen and matching sequins. I'm adding this card to Virginia's View Challenge #2 Stencil.

Ingredients:
Card - Neenah Solar White, black cardstock
Stencil - Heidi Swapp
Stamp - Hero Arts CG509 Leafy Vines, CL498
Inks - Tim Holtz Tumbled Glass, Shaded Lilac and Picked Raspberry, Ranger Archival Jet Black
Others - The Twinery Twine, Sequins, white gel pen

Tall Poppy

This card was started at our Craft Retreat. It took me a long tine to finally finish it. I had coloured the poppy with Copic markers and highlighted with a white gel pen. The card was trimmed with the flower partially fussy cut and mounted onto the card base with dimensional foam. The sentiment fitted well on the bottom of the card. This card will be submitted to CASE Study's DT Call Challenge. I had enjoyed learning about colouring with Copic markers from Kathy Racoosin, she was the CASE Study in September last year and I've been following her blog ever since. This card is certainly inspired by Kathy, the Queen of Markers! I'm also adding this card to PCS April Gallery Challenge. Thanks for dropping by!



Ingredients
Cards -  Neenah Solar White, Express Copic blending card
Colours - Copic markers, white gel pen, Ranger Archival Jet Black
Stamps - Penny Black Poppy Time, Hero Arts CL574 Say It All
Others - sequins

Baby Kingsley

I took great pleasure in making this baby card for close friends of mine. I got out my favourite go-to patterned paper for baby cards - Fancy Pants Park Bench. The colours in this pad are just perfect. I wanted to combine this week's Cas(e) This Sketch and Case Study Challenge - Jaclyn Miller. I couldn't fit a sentiment to the card and I thought it really didn't need one. Did anyone see that I got another Retro Sketch Shout Out this week for this card? Thanks for dropping by!

Kingsley - 3 days old!

Ingredients
Card - Neenah Solar White, Fancy Pants Park Bench
Dies- Lil Inkers stitched squares, MFT alphabets, Simon Says Stamp hearts
Others - MME enamel dots

MIM - No Sew Quilted Card and CTD287

Here is my take on Dawn McVey's PTI Make It Monday challenge on a quilted card. I've used this technique in the past using Washi Tape and now I've used Patterned Paper. One good thing about going to a Retreat with Joy Taylor, apart from meeting her for the first time, was getting her Studio Calico hand-me-downs! I picked some lovely colours from her stash to match the colours of the current Color Throwdown #287 challenge. I had a very productive night making cards last night, after a very busy (no Crafting time) week! Thanks for dropping by!

Ingredients
Neenah Solar White, Studio Calico 6x6, PTI Luxe Letterpress Kit, MME Enamel dots and Kaisercraft rhinestone, Ranger Archival Jet Black.

Another Bunny for Easter

My last Easter card was so well received on Pinterest and it encouraged me to make another one! The stamp set was from Mama Elephant which I borrowed at our Craft Retreat and finished off later. I was inspired by the photo posted by the Mama Elephant Challenge to make this card.

Ingredients:

Neenah Solar White, Hero Arts Cardstock,  Mama Elephant Honey Bunny, Basic Grey Mint Julep and Ranger Archival Jet Black.

Muse 61 - Jacquie Southas

When I saw Jacquie as the Muse this week on Muse Challenge #61, I had a birthday card in mind to do. At our Craft Retreat two weekends ago, each of us were given a little gift bag of goodies from Joy Taylor. We were given so much stuff that weekend, I did not have a proper chance to look at what she gave us. Inside the bag was an assortment of Hero Arts cards and the colours were so yummy, I could not waste an entire card on one card. I decided to die cut them to make them into a birthday card. Of course, I couldn't stop at one card, I made another one at the same time! The colours were based on this week's Color Countdown colours. Thanks for dropping by!

CARD 1

CARD 2

Muse #61 - Jacquie Southas

Challenges:
Muse Card Challenge #61
Color Throwdown #286
Paper Smooches Sparks Challenge - Anything Goes (Card 2)
Paper Smooches May Guest Designer (Card 2)
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge - Happy Birthday

Ingredients
Neenah Solar white card, Hero Arts cards, PTI Happy liner die, MFT DieNamics tall alphabet dies, Paper Smooches Digits dies and stamp set.

CASE Study 185 - Jaclyn Miller

Another great CASE study this week with Jaclyn Miller. This is a very interesting CAS card - simple yet elegant. During our retreat, Chupa had a lot of stamp sets to give away and one of the stamps I picked up was used for this card for the very first time! Thanks for dropping by. I'm also adding this to Simon Says Stamp Wednesday - Happy Birthday challenge.

Ingredients

Neenah Solar White card, Hero Arts CG194 Stencil Flower, CL574 Say it all and Soft Granite, Copic markers, Ranger Archival Jet Black, Lil Inkers Stitched square die and Francheville rhinestones.

A Birthday Flower

This is a card made with generation stamping using a small heart from one of my stamp sets. The flower is first stamped onto masking paper and the negative was used to mask off the flower. The heart stamps were stamped off without re-inking at least 2-3 times randomly. The big flower and sentiment stamps were then stamped in black and some rhinestones added. I'm adding this card to A Blog Named Hero's Build a Background and Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Happy Birthday challenges. Thanks for dropping by!

Ingredients
Neenah Solar White, Red card stock, Hero Arts CG255 CL497, Pale Tomato Ink, Ranger Archival Jet Black and Kaisercraft rhinestones.

A Card for Mum

This card is made with the current Retro Sketch and the Runway Inspired photo. I used Basic Grey products for this card with Simon Says Stamp stamp set. A little bit of washi tape and sequins finished off the card nicely. This is a birthday/Mother's Day card for my Mum as her birthday is on Mother's day eve! I'm also adding this card to Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge - Happy Birthday. Thanks for dropping by!

RIC#57 Markus Lupfer

Ingredients

Neenah Solar White, Basic Grey Fact and Fiction, Simon Says Stamp Mom's the Word, Ranger Archival Jet Black, sequins, thread and decorative tapes from MME.

A Canvas from our Retreat

During our Craft Retreat in Bright last weekend, Lyndal gave everyone a small canvas to try mixed media. I really wanted to try using Gelatos and she had a whole boxful for me to use! I applied three colours on the canvas, starting with the sides (just in case) and working my way to the front of the canvas. I used a baby wipe to work all the colours into the canvas and left it to dry. I then borrowed one of Joy's stencil and applied Impasto paste over the canvas. This was left to air dry. The background was stamped with some stamps from Joy's Darkroom Door collection. The sentiment was from Lyndal's collection, stamped on kraft card stock and inked with distress inks. The wooden butterfly was stamped with French Script using Joy's Simon Says Stamp Black Ink (this stamped very well on wood) and inked with distress inks. This was where I got up to on the last day of the retreat. I finished it off tonight by adding layers of die cuts to the butterfly with gold card (from Michelle) and vellum and a blingy heart to go with the sentiment. If you would like to see what the others made, check out Lyndal and Michelle's blogs. A big thanks to Lyndal and Joy for helping me with this little project! Imagine our delights when we found out that the second Virginia's View challenge is Stencils! I'm also linking this up to the Simon Says Stamp Monday Anything Goes challenge and Moxie Fab World's Styling with Stencil challenge.

A close up of my layered butterfly

Aussie Craft Retreat Group, Bright, Victoria (27th-30th March 2014)
Back Row: Teresa Xanthos, Jenny Dix, Debbie Pamment, Joy Taylor.
Front Row: Michelle Lupton, Sue Kohler, Jenny Martin Rawling, Iwona Palamountain (Chupa)(in front), Lyndal Higgins, Angelique Kelly and Me!
Photo courtesy of Michelle

Ingredients

Canvas, Vellum, Gold card stock, Neenah Desert Storm, Hero Arts large lotus pattern stencil, Gelatos, Impasto Paste, Darkroom Door Tick Tock and French Script, Dylusions Sentiment, Studio Calico wooden butterfly, Tim Holtz Distress Inks Spiced Marmalade and Vintage Photo, Simon Says Stamp black ink, MFT DieNamics butterfly die, Hemp from Hemptique and Kaisercraft sparklet.