Circle Step Card

Good afternoon, peeps!
You know how sometimes you see a card and you think 'Oh, yes- I've GOT to make one of those!'? Well this was one such card. I first saw it here on the lovely Jacquie Dennis's blog who in turn had found it on the talented Marlene Ashby's blog here. So now it's come full circle (groan, groan!) and now you're looking at my effort!

I must say that with 20/20 hindsight (a wonderful thing) I wish that I'd used stronger colours than peach and white but maybe it'll be a good excuse to make another and try again.
Well, I'm glad that Mr Blogger seems to be back to health and behaving himself - it definitely is not good when he goes AWOL! I'll also be glad when I get back to full health because I'm still croaking like a warbling chipmunk but at least I've found the energy to make a card and a blog post. Who knows, I may soon get around to visiting all you lovely people again soon.
Anyhoo, I'll be teaching peeps how to make this little flowery concoction at Samuel Taylor, Brighouse on the 31st of this month but, in the meantime there's another Clarity Stamp show on Create and Craft TV on 5th June for which to prepare cards - lots of work to do with that!
Card recipe
Image: Nellie Snellen 'Dawn with flowers'
Sentiment: Penny Black
Colouring: Copics and Prisma pencils (sorry no numbers!)
Flowers: EK Success Retro flower punches medium and small
Butterflies: Martha Stewart Monarch Butterfly punch
Flourishes: Sizzix Decorative Flourishes Set
Pearls: The Hobby House
Ribbon from stash
Hugs


EDIT A friend has emailed me to say that she cannot leave comments on this post. The problem may be Internet Explorer 9 which is apparently incompatible with Blogger. I've changed my web browser to Firefox in the hope of a cure but I'm sorry if anyone else out there is having the same problem.

A new challenge and an apology

Good morning, peeps!
Well, I can't believe that it's 2 weeks since I last posted anything to my blog so I'd like to apologise to all my lovely followers that there's been nothing new to see here. Excuses? Well I've had a really heavy, flu-y cold that's totally wiped a week from my life when I've been unable to do anything much and I don't 'do' ill so that's been a bit of a shock to the system! I'm still not good but better than I was. Then there was the Clarity DT work, which I must confess tends to absorb me totally so I need to be more organised about that and not neglect my blog - watch this space!
OK, moan over and let's get on to the challenge:

The challenge over at Fussy and Fancy Friday Challenge this week is a sketch from my talented teamie Mindy. Here it is:

As always with Mindy's sketches it was great fun and easy to work with and I've echoed the design on the inside of my card, as you can see here:


I do like the insides of my cards to be properly finished but I must confess that too often lately I've just completed the outside to meet a deadline and I now have a whole box full of cards that are waiting for the insides to be prettied up and have a box to live in. Hey ho! That sounds like a little occupational therapy for when there's nothing else pressing!
Anyhoo, on to the card - the recipe is at the end of this post although it doesn't have the Copic numbers with it I'm afraid. The image was coloured some time ago (if it hadn't been I don't think there would have been a card this week!) and there was no note of the numbers with it.
Thank you so much lovely followers and visitors for looking today. I do hope that you'll join us at Fussy and Fancy Friday Challenge this week where there's a great prize up for grabs from our generous sponsor Simply Betty Stamps.
I'm teaching a Copic/Promarker/Prisma Pencils colouring class tomorrow at Samuel Taylor in Brighouse and I've still got lots of prep to do. My lovely son tells me I sound like a warbling chipmunk so I hope all the students manage to hear me OK! At least I'm no longer infectious!
Supplies:
Images: Magnolia on the front and Penny Black 'Scrolling Along' on the jotting panel inside
Sentiment: Hero Arts
Colouring: Copics and Prisma pencils
DPs: Basic Grey 'Kioshi' and a Freebie from Making Cards magazine ages ago!
Dies: Spellbinder Nesties and Magnolia Doohickey Swirls and leaves
Flowers: Wild Orchid Crafts
Ribbon: from my stash
Pearls: The Hobby House
See you again soon!
Hugs

Wonderful Springtime!

Good morning, peeps on this wonderful Good Friday morning!
Well, it's time for a new challenge over at Fussy and Fancy Friday Challenge and for the next two weeks we'd like you to create a project with Springtime colours, images or both. Our wonderful sponsor is Digis with Attitude and the winner will receive a generous $10 voucher to spend in the store so we'd love to see your entries!
Here is my DT sample:

So is this flower overkill or what?!! Having said that, I do like the effect but it took me ages to get it right for me. I have five plastic drawers full (and I don't mean half full!) of flowers and I had every one out and stacked up around me. Anyhoo, I achieved what I wanted, which was to make it look like Tilda is walking in a leafy, flowery dell - having picked some flowers on the way, as you can see! I've recently bought the Stone Path image that forms the background and was itching to use it. To create the Springtime fluffy, cloudy sky behind Tilda I used the technique shown by the uber talented Annika Ryan and if you click the link you'll be taken to the video tutorial on her blog. When you see it, you'll know that I definitely need to practice more! I also need to buy the B0000 and C00 Copic markers to make the effect better so those are on the (never ending) shopping list now.
To help with the colouring generally, I also used Promarkers and Prismas and I remembered to make a note of the colours - wooo hooo! (In the recipe below.)
Whatever you have planned for the Easter break, I hope you have a wonderful, happy time of celebration. I shall have to spend part of it on Clarity DT work, but that's OK because it's crafting, right?! If you're a fan of all things Clarity, Barbara's on TV on Sunday morning from 9 - 10 a.m. UK time or you can watch the show online on the Create and Craft TV site.

Recipe:
Copic colours:
Skin: E000, E00, E01, E02, E11, R11, R20
Hair: E50, E51, E53, E55, E33
Dress and socks: RV00, RV10, Promarkers Pink Carnation and Blossom + Raspberry and 50% Cool Grey Prismas
Shoes: BV31, BV23, 0 (blender) + 50% Cool Grey Prisma
Tilda's flowers: Y000, Y02, Y06, Y08
Basket: E40, E41, E42, E43
Stone path: E40, E41, W1, W3 and Promarker Umber
Flowers: V000, V01, V12, V15
Leaves and grass: YG01, YG05, G20, YG93 and Promarkers Olive Green and Pear Green + Marine Green Prisma
Sky: B000, B91, C0, 0 (blender)
Shapes: Spellbinder Nestabilites Classic Circle and Classic Scalloped Circle
Doily: from my stash
Sentiment: Whimsy ticket stamp and die but the 'happy' word is from LOTV
Flowers: Wild Orchid Crafts
DP: Crafty Individuals 'Springtime' pad
Tall leaves: Marianne D Die
Small leaves: Leonie Em punch
Butterfly: Martha Stewart punch decorated with Star Dust Stickles
Phew! Lots of ingredients in this one!
See you after the holidays, peeps - have a good one!
Hugs

A bookmark card

Good morning, peeps!
Just a quick post this morning to show you a bookmark card I taught in a class last Tuesday.

This is the card when it's closed and you can see that the bookmark itself forms the right-hand part of the front. The beautiful geisha and the wonderful sentiment are from Clarity Stamps and I thought that the geisha teamed beautifully with these gorgeous Basic Grey Kioshi papers. They've been around for a while now but I still love the colours and designs in them. The geisha's kimono is paper pieced with DP from the Prima 'Sparkling Spring' collection. I thought it would be rather nice to give her a patterned kimono rather than a plain one just cooured with Copics, my usual medium.
Here is the inside of the card:

More Clarity Stamps in the cherry blossom and the verse. I just added a little colour with water colour pencils to add interest and a butterfly punched, like the one on the front, with a Martha Stewart Monarch Butterfly punch. The bling was added with Glamour Dust.
One final peek at the bookmark itself:

This card is really easy to make, it's basically a gate fold card with the fold off centre and then the bookmark is held in place with bands of ribbon (from my stash). Having said that, it did take me a while to work out how it was going to be put together. It's one thing organising a bookmark card class and another actually designing the card itself, methinks!!
Thank you so much for your visit and your comments if you leave one - I really do love to read them.
I'll be back tomorrow with the next challenge card.
Hugs

A card for a child

Good morning, peeps! Yep, that's the title of the current challenge over at Fussy and Fancy Friday Challenge at the moment. I couldn't get my card ready in time for the first DT group so one of my kind teamies stepped in for me and I'm part of the second week's team for this challenge. Anyhoo, it got me thinking about what appealed to me as a small child and it was definitely a fantasy word of fairies and fairytales - so what's changed I hear you say!! Here she is surrounded by her fairytale land(provided via a bit of masking):

I think this could be a Fairy Godmother Tilda .... in my imagination anyway. She's coloured with Copics and Prismas and the rest of the 'recipe' is below. I hope you have a wonderful day whatever you decide to do with it. I have a sample card for next week's class to finish then, later on, I'm assisting in the moving of (some of) my hubby's office from the dining room table to a proper office. Whoop, whoop - I may even see it's (sometimes) polished surface again and not have to move piles of paper every evening to eat supper! I live in hope!

Recipe:

DP: First Edition 'Spring Feast' Flowers: Wild Orchid Crafts Die cut leaves: Marianne Creatables Forest Branch Punches: EK Success small Retro Flower punch and Leonie Em Maidenhair Fern Pearls and other bling: The Hobby House Sentiment: LOTV Hugs

Gift pocket card

Good afternoon, peeps! Well, did you think I'd got lost again? No, this bad blogger is back again with a new project. This card was inspired by an tutorial by Mary in the 'Midsummer Night's Dream' issue. I've changed the measurements slightly but it's still recognisable as the same project. I do love cards like this becasue you can send a gift and a card in one package. This is how the card looks closed with Tilda looking adorably cute as usual! I've decided to place the card 'recipe' at the end of my posts so, for those who prefer not to read my ramblings, they can cut to the chase and find the ingredients in one place. Here is how the card looks when it's open: You'll see that the ubiquitous mini Easter eggs are in evidence again - they keep travelling from one card with a container to another! I must confess though that this is the second bag - the first one disappeared on a bad afternoon (hangs head in shame)!! I forgot to take a photo of the back but the same shape is repeated for a jotting panel. I hope you like this one, peeps - I shall be teaching a class how to make it at Samuel Taylor, Brighouse in June, so many thanks go to Mary for the inspiration.

Recipe:

Stamps: 'Be my valentine' Tilda from the 'You're So Sweet' collection. Penny Black 'Scrolling Along'. Hero Arts 'Smile Moments'. 'Just for You' from LOTV.

Colouring: Copics and Prisma pencils (sorry but I didn't keep anote of the numbers!)

DPs: Magniolia and Prima 'Fairy Flora'.

Embellishments: Magnolia Doo Hickey die 'Doily flowers'. McGill punch 'Leaves'. Pearl brads from The Hobby House.

Ribbons: from my stash.

Shapes: Nesties Labels Six and Fancy Tags

Hugs

.... and those that didn't

Good morning, peeps! and a fine sunny one it is too here in Yorkshire so I'm torn between getting some fresh air and working on a DT project. My guess is that the DT project will win hands down! I thought I'd show you some more of the cards that I made for the Clarity Stamps show on Create and Craft TV last Sunday. These are the Cinderellas - the ones that didn't appear on TV: This is a really simple card, I just eliminated the crook part of the stamp and placed the two images at 90 degrees to one another to make the corner image. It was stamped with Adirondack Latte and coloured with Copics. I then simply distressed the edges of the card with Bundled Sage Distress Ink. I must say that I was fairly surprised that this was the image that sold out first on the show. If I'd been making a prediction on sell outs, it would have been for the Dandelion Fairy below: This was a set of 3 stamps, the fairy herself, a leaf and the verse. I stamped and embossed the fairy and the verse in detail silver and coloured the fairy with Copics. With 20/20 hindsight, I should have used watercolour because the alcohol markers didn't do the silver embossing any favours - duh! Sometimes it's hard to think straight when the pressure is on! I then used Adirondack Juniper to place partial images of the leaves in two of the corners of the shape, which was cut with a Go Kreate frilly die. I then stamped the leaf with Versamark and used clear embossing on the basic card for background. The pearls are from The Hobby House and the fibres, which I thought gave the feeling of dandelion seeds, were from my stash. Last one! This is a montage of the Stampstamps all with images that have a Scottish theme image placed within them. I always think that this type of work looks very complicated but, of course, it's simply an exercise in masking. Having made it sound simple like that, can you believe that this was my 11th attempt to get it right! The other 10 had smudges, unclear images or some fault or other - I was getting ready to tear my hair out I can tell you! Anyway, it came right in the end and I gave a great sigh of relief. To assemble the card, I simply cut around the edges of the stamp collection with some Fiskars Paper Edgers to give the look of stamp perforations and mounted it on black card. The french script DP was from my stash, the Clarity 'with love' stamp was used on shrink plastic and I used blue ribbon in an effort to make it look like love letters tied in a bundle. However, I thought I would refrain from calling it 'French Letters' because, if it had been picked out by Dean on the show it would have been before the watershed! I hope you enjoyed looking at a few more Clarity cards and I'll see you all again soon. In the meantime, enjoy the sunshine if you have it! Hugs