keeping it simple part 2.

Hello everyone.

a little later than promised.. but that's because I made a card, took all the pictures then decided it wasn't good enough.  This was a really tough challenge for me, but it's always good to try different things!

It has however given me the opportunity to blow the dust off some old Christmas stamps.  The black stamped image and sentiment on the card below was from an old collection I almost gave away.  I think its a penny black set. 

To make this card, I stamped the background using inkadinkado stamp, and embossed using WOW sparkling snow embossing glitter.  I then stamped the penny black image onto white card before die cutting out and dusting with iridescent glitter..  finally I stamped a sentiment in the bottom corner, and repeated without reinking to get the faded look.

I would like to enter this into

Keep it simple - challenge #34 - all is white
Less is more - white on white

Thanks for taking the time to stop by - its appreciated, please leave me a message so I know you've been

Rachael
x

PS. while I was playing with the stamps - I also made these... they could be the simplest design I've ever made and may well be the mass produced Christmas card to send to my family and friends this year. What do you think?

 This one was made with stamps from chloe

this was the penny black ones again with the same triple stamped sentiment technique but using a splash of red to give some colour.

Keeping it simple!

Good evening everyone!

Its that time of the week again - the end of a lovely weekend, with the prospect of work for another five days!

So while I was blog hopping yesterday - and might I add there are some lovely ones out there! I came across a couple of clean and simple ones.  I do like this style but I'm not brave enough to do it often, as I always feel that it needs something else and I do have to stop myself from adding extra's!

I want to enter this card into CAS-ual Fridays for chevron and sequins. CFC 116

In my stash I actually found sequins with chevrons on!  It's amazing what you find when you dig hard enough.  I made this in preparation for my little (although now not so little) brother, so I hope he doesn't sneak a peak.  I love this typewriter font - it was from a free font website I've used it on a few things since finding it!  The photo doesn't really show how striking this is, but now the nights are drawing in, its difficult to get any great photos.  HINT for Christmas present Hubby - I need a daylight bulb lamp and white box!!! (let's see if he bothers reading my blog eh!)

I have some finishing touches to a white on white Christmas card - and will post this separately as soon as its finished!

 

Thanks for stopping by - oh and welcome to the new members to my blog - thank you for signing up, it makes my day each time i see a new person joining, and all of your comments keep me going!

 

See you in a while

 

Love

Rachael 

 

Halloween invite

Good evening all.

I've made this little invite to send to my friend for a Halloween party.  Every year we get together as two families and have a fancy dress Halloween party - and this year will be no exception!  Its our turn to host so I thought I'd send her this as a nice surprise in the post.  It also just so happens to fit into some of the challenges on my usual blogs (funny that!)

I'd like to enter:

• Papertake weekly - anything goes with a Halloween treat holder (the treat is a whole party!)
• Passion for promarkers - lots of legs
• I love promarkers - #187 make your own flowers (the roses are cut with scalloped scissors and rolled and the others are punched from white card and coloured with distress inks and stickles)
• 613 Avenue Create - create your own challenge (image, paper punch, stickles, flowers, ribbon)
• Crafty little fairies - Autumn colours (I'm hoping you'll allow with dark green, orange, and brown but forgive the bit of purple.. if not please delete)

The image was a free digi stamp from http://freedeariedollsdigistamps.blogspot.co.uk/  Thank you to this site for the freebie!  The background papers were from a Nitwit digi kit, printed and distressed.  (its difficult to read the background paper but it says cute things like boo, candy, eerie, bats etc)

The image was a little small and fiddly to colour and I've also realised I need to buy more orange promarkers as I only have one shade! (oh dear what a shame, more crafty goodies for me then!)

Thanks so much for stopping by leave me a comment so I know you've been!

Love
Rachael
x

Two for the boys

Good evening everyone. (well looking at the time that should say good 'very early' morning!)

I have just spent an amazing weekend with some real quality time with my little one - Harrison.  We went to the scarecrow festival at Belbroughton yesterday, and today had a pyjama day watching Disney movies and catching up on housework.

After all that I've also had some me time in my craft room this evening, ready for the working week ahead. yawnnnnn!

I've made two cards both for little boys. (please scroll down for challenges at 'here come the boys' and 'passion for promarkers!) The first is dedicated to my little one who has a love of pirates.  This LoTV stamp always reminds me of Harrison, especially with the little dog!

I want to enter this challenge into

• sketch and stash challenge 122.
• Papertake weekly - Sketchie free for all (Sketch 45)

I stamped the image and coloured with watercolour paint.  I printed the backgrounds from a Kay Miller digikit and added glitter.  It was from the same kit (high seas) I printed the pirate related sentiments.  I used my new Tim Holtz distress tool to distress the edges before adding net and gems to finish.

My second creation was made using Cuddlybuddy digi stamps.  I'm really liking the digi stamps - if you haven't tried them - please do.  I just typed 'digi stamp' into google and loads of great sites came up.  I cant believe I haven't thought of this before!!

Anyway - this is what I made and I want to enter it into:

Here come the boys challenge #61 baby boy
Passion 4 promarkers - one for the boys
Bearly-mine challenge - anything goes
7 kids college fund - Challenge #83 (Optional twist of promarkers)

for this I printed all the stamps I wanted onto card stock and coloured using promarkers
Vanilla, Tan, Sandstone, Denim, Blue pearl, blue grey, cool grey 1 and 3. blush and sunkissed pink

I then inked the edges using tumbled glass Tim Holtz distress ink, sprayed the sentiment with iridescent spray and sparkle from crafters companion and assembled using ribbon, and net

Thank you so much for stopping by - please leave me a comment so I know you've been!
hugs
Rachael
x

Love and Marriage

Hello to all...

Well this post is a took a little longer to compose than I would have liked, but I've been rather busy over the last few days.

Hubby is currently making us a lovely fireplace with a log burner, just in time for those wintery nights that are drawing in, but with this goes all the mess! 

I also went to a wedding on Saturday - it was a Goth Wedding complete with undertaker at the front of the reception.  My band played a few numbers then we boogied on down for the rest of the night.  I made them wedding card, but forgot to get a picture of it, so instead I'm posting this one.  Made for an order.

The challenge was they wanted a big A4 card for lots of people to sign.  A big card mean lots of filling, so I opted for a digi stamp (from Tiddly inks) and coloured it to match the wedding colours but opted for a simple minimal look with no lace, or ribbon (although I couldn't go without glitter and pearls for a wedding!).  I loved doing this bigger image - it makes a change from tiny dots of colour - I got to use the chisel end of my promarkers! 

I want to enter this into

Papertake weekly  - Make it sparkle (the wedding dress)
Addicted to cards - Marriage

 

 

 

 

Thanks for dropping by

x

Two colours, two occasions, lots of challenges!

Hello to all my visitors, both old and new.   

I said the challenge cards were coming - so here they are..

The first card a I want to enter the following card in challenges:

Papertake weekly - Child's play
Passion for promarkers - Perfect pets
ABC challenge - V for very cute

I made this using a Kanban stamp, coloured with promarkers (cool grey 1 to 4, pale blossom, blossom, pastel pink, blush, oatmeal, caramel, cocoa, vanilla and tan).  Printed the back ground sentiment and backing paper from Craft artist 2 onto pearlised card (this is difficult to see in the photos unfortunately), used a swirly die to cut a flourish from the same backing paper, then added a ribbon affixed flowers and glittered.

The second card is to enter:

Sketch and stash - challenge 121 (old ribbon, stamp and swirl, new colours in promarkers)
Here come the boys - #60 Blue Christmas

For this I used a crafter companion Mulberry wood stamp, coloured with promarkers (denim, ivory, vanilla, almond, tan, caramel, cocoa, henna, lime green, forest green, cool grey 3, cool grey 1, blue grey, aquamarine), the papers were a combination of some free ones from a magazine and Trimcraft Silent night paper pad. I used some webbing behind, coloured in demin promarker, embossed the edges with aged aqua frontage and matted and layered for the sketch.  I then added embellishments to mirror the Christmas lights on the reindeers antler, by punching two different size circles, colouring in Denim promarkers with shading, adding glossy accent on the top, then drawing on the connecting wire

As ever I hope you like them, and thank you for all your comments, I appreciate the time you take to look and give feedback!
Thanks for dropping in

Rachael
x

Gorjuss stamps!

Good Evening all.

If your checking the time and date this was posted - you're right I have absolutely nothing better to do on a Friday evening! 

I've got a sore back, aching arms, but my house is now sparkly clean after a good spring clean (or Autumn judging by todays miserable weather).  As a treat for doing this on my day off, I decided that after Harrison had gone to bed I would have a whole evening (and late night) in my spotless craft room.  I finally tidied it up, but after only 3 hours, it looks the same as it did before, with glitter and off cuts everywhere. On a positive note I have made some pretty things for some of the challenges - which I'll post this weekend when I get can some daylight to take some decent photos.

But in the meantime, here are a few things I made last week with my new Gorjuss stamps, brought from The Range.  I've had my eye on these for a while so while my husband was buying home brew things I snuck them into our basket!

The last one - if you're wondering how I got the effect - I stamped in Momento London fog (Grey) and then shaded using two different hardness pencils, so it looks like a sketch.
I'm still trying to perfect hair colouring, although haven't quite got it right yet so if anyone has any tips... I'd love to hear them!

Hope you like!

Love
Rachael
x

Two christmas cards

Good evening to everyone.  Hope you are all well.  I went back to work today after a lovely few days off - much of which was sent doing housework and such like, however I have managed to cram in some 'me time' in the craft room too, hence more posts this week than usual, and some more entries to some of the challenges.

I've made two separate ones - the first is to enter the Friday Sketch challenge sketch #51.  A nice simple card stamped with a Chloe stamp back ground, and embossed with Wow blue blast embossing glitter.  The picture doesn't do it justice it sparkles beautifully in the light.

this is for Friday sketch challenge, please scroll down for other challenges.

The second is a pink Christmas card.  I found some really old papers I had in a docraft goody bag a few years ago, that were perfect for this. I combined with two LOTV stamps, ribbons, lace and pearls.  coloured the image with promarkers.  I then used some snow that puffs up with the heat gun and sprinkled with glitter before heating.  Added 25th Dec as a tag, and a wooden embellishment that I covered with Versamark before using Stampendous frontage aged rose embossing enamel to colour.

This card is to enter in several challenges:

Papertake weekly - Anything goes but optional extra for Christmas theme
Passion for promarkers - pink and pearly.  I used both pearl embellishments and a pink pearlised paper to matt and layer
Cutie pie challenge#52 - cute Christmas in September
Ribbon girl - use numbers.
613 Avenue create - Anything goes
I love promarkers - use more than one image (I used two different LOTV stamps but cut one up to leave only the penguin)
LOTV - ribbons and lace

I hope you like them, and thanks for visiting and leaving your comments

Rachael
x

Happy 6th Anniversary Matty!

This is a quick post to wish my lovely (and very tolerant) Husband Matt a happy anniversary.  It was on Sunday, but I couldn't post the picture of the card until he'd received it!

Here it is.  Made using Craft Artist professional 2, I uploaded three photos of us and typed a sentiment.  Then I stamped the film/negative image onto acetate with a Stazon ink pad, and played around until I got the photo size and position right.  I then attached the acetate behind the topper and stuck it together - really simple but very effective!

Thanks for dropping by!

Rachael

Musical notes

Good morning all - and what a lovely sunny morning it is!  I've just returned from a mini camping trip with my lovely hubby and son, and our good friends Tris and Clare with their little boy Blake.  To recover from this, today is a non stop craft day (well apart from an hourly break to hang out the washing generated from afore mentioned camping trip!) as I try out some new goodies purchased from The Range yesterday.

Thank you to everyone that commented last week, and especially for all the good wishes sent for Harrison.  He has now fully recovered from his Chicken Pox and is a right as rain again (and causing much mischief as ever!).

Apologies to all about the word verification tool, I didn't even realise it was switched on.  I think I've now turned it off, but I'd appreciate whoever is first to comment if you could let me know if its worked. Thanks for letting me know!

So onto this weeks creation.  I made this to enter:

Sketch and Stash challenge 120. and
Lili's little fairies - No flowers.

I used some old music sheets for the background, printed some musical notes from the internet and cut them out.  I then stamped my Lili of the valley image using stazon and water-coloured it  (a change from my usual promarkers!)  I then matted and layered using red and black card, added a sentiment and ribbon and stuck everything together - et voila, another card finished!

Hope you like!

Rachael