Weekend away and a birthday

Yesterday was my good friend, Alison's birthday and here is a picture of the card that I made for her.



As with all my Magnolia cards, I had great fun making it. The images are Sweet Tilda, Tree Corner, Open Gate, Tilda's Butterflies and Bees. It has all been coloured with Copics, which I won't list for you because you'd simply be reading for too long - I seemed to have nearly all my pens out on the table by the time I'd finished!

With 20/20 hindsight (always a major benefit! Lol!) I would have watercoloured the background I created with the various stamps, simply because I think it would have been quicker and easier but I'm happy with the result I achieved. Not so happy with the dull photos taken on a dull day. Here's another one of the inside of the card.



Anyway, since it has a summery feel to it, I thought I'd enter it for the Lili of the Valley Challenge. Also, because it has butterflies and flowers on it, I'm entering it for the Sir Stampalot Challenge

The weekend away? Alison and I went to an Art from the Heart Journalling 1 weekend. It started on Friday evening and finished on Sunday afternoon and was packed with information and fun. Dyan taught us all so much and stretched us all into producing work of a type that virtually all of us had not tried before. If you haven't tried Art Journalling before, I heartily recommend it (sorry about the pun!!) Anyway, I know we'll both be going back for more.

When I feel a bit more confident about what I'm producing, I'll upload some journal pages for you all to see.

Just like buses

After no posts for weeks, I make 2 in 2 days so, just like buses, there are either none at all or they all come along at once!

This is a card I made simply to illustrate the fold for a group I'm in. The steps look a little wonky in this photo, which they're not, but I obviously didn't arrange the card very well before taking its picture. I think I'll have to secure it with a hidden ribbon before I send it to anyone. I've found that if you attach a fine ribbon underneath the front fold and then attach it under the rear fold, the card stands well on a level surface without gradually sinking into a flat nothing! I actually coloured the image with my Copics ages ago so I can't remember which colours I used but the papers are Blueberry Hill from Papermania and the flowers are from my stash. Unfortunately the colours of the flowers don't seem to be true in the photgraph but I can assure you that all the colours blend well together 'in the flesh'.

I hope you like this one and maybe I'll even have another one to post in the not too distant future! Have a happy Wednesday!

Mo's Dream Team Guest Designer spot

It's been such a long time since I posted anything, I didn't realise what a bad blogger I've been!

Anyway, I saw that Mo Manning (Digital Pencil Too)was looking for a guest designer and, since I love her images, I thought I'd give it a try. I absolutely fell in love with this little girl peddling off into the great wide world on her tricycle. The image is called Bye Bye, which says it all.

I coloured her with my Copics and added Glossy Accents to the tricycle frame and Sakura Stardust pen to the handlebar streamers. The DPs are from my stash and the flowers are from Wild Orchid Crafts. I created the leaves with my McGill 'Pine' punch.

I hope you like it.

Something a little different

I've been wanting to try out the watercolour stamps from Art Impressions for some time and I finally got around to it yesterday. I hope you like the result. Incidentally. Sir Stampalot stock them in the UK and offer a remarkable efficient online order service.

I used a watercolour postcard as the base for the picture and I think that I'll try a different watercolour paper next time. Being me, I also have to mess so I've also used some artists' watercolours on the stamps and free hand to try and improve the results, mainly because I find the colours of the Marvy Le Plume a little harsh. Maybe I just need to but a slightly wider selection.

A Fairy Happy Birthday.....

....for someone who loves fairies!

As soon as I saw this image used on Suzanne Dean's blog, I knew exactly who I needed it for. The image is called Danni - she's designed by Elizabeth Bell and it's from SCACD sold in the UK by Quixotic Paperie, who have very efficient service.

I just love these Bloom and Grow papers, it's such a lovely selection so I've used them again. The granddaughter who'll be the happy (I hope!) recipient of this card loves bling and you can just about see in my usual poor picture where I've added some on the sdges of the almond blossom and gypsophilla petals with Crystal Stickles. I also sprayed all the flowers (except the white one's, of course) with Golden Terracotta Glimmer Mist but that's not showing up so well. If you click on the picture to mke it bigger, you can see the clear stardust Gelly Roll that I put over the Danni's wings and the butterfly wings just to give then some shimmer.

The little silver heart says 'made with love' on it - which it was. I hope you like it - if I was making it again, I'd do it differently but that's what the learning process is all about, I think.

Video Girl

February is a real bumper birthday month in our family and this card is for one of my granddaughters, so I hope she likes it - the colours are really appropriate for her.

The image is from Mo's digital pencil and is my first venture into 'digital stamping' but she was great fun to colour with my Copics. The sentiment was computer generated, the leaves were punched with my McGill pine punch and everything else was from my stash - you know, all that stuff you bought because you knew it would come in useful one day!

I've scanned the image using instructions from Susie Jefferson. I don't know why it never occurred to me before that you don't have to squash the card down by closing the lid on the scanner, you can just cover the card with sheets of white paper to block out the light.....duh!!

Hope you like it.

Tilda with Lamb

I made this card for a special person in the family whose birthday is next month so that's really well organised for me!
I thought it would be good to look forward to spring - that's why I chose this particular image. However, the snow's affecting the light so the colours in this image aren't so good. I think that the purchase of a light tent is looming ever closer. This card has travelled to many locations in the apartment today in an effort to get my poor photography skills to make it look halfway decent!
The DPs are from Basic Grey 'Porcelain', MME 'Wild Asparagus' and Papermania 'Exquisite' and I coloured it with my Copics although the shading isn't showing as well as I would have liked. I hope you enjoy it!