C.A.S

 

It's my turn over on Clare Curds Craft DT page today and I came up with this very clean and simple, but stylish card.

 

 

I used some Flitter Glu and Mega Flakes, love these products! to create the substrate to cut my die from.

Then layered up my card base and sentiment on white card, keeping everything very clean.

 

 



Simply does it

Oh my how close is Christmas now!! And if you are anything like me then you are rushing round trying to get everything bought, wrapped and delivered and there just isn't enough hours in the day, and then to find out you've missed out on making a couple of cards.....disaster. So with that in mind I thought I'd do a quick and simple, but stylish card this week for Clare Curd Crafts.

 

I used a circle card blank and cut a layer from another card blank, using a set of nesting dies and my good old Cuttlebug to give a bit of depth to the card.

 

I then stamped the quote from the Here Comes Santa stamp sheet, by IndigoBlu, and cut this out using  a smaller die.

 

I then took a sheet of card that I had covered in Mega flakes, both the Flakes and FlitterGlu are available here, and punched out a few snowflakes to embellish the card.

 

Add a single gem to the top snowflake and you are done.   

 

 

I think in total this card took maybe 10 minutes!

 

 

Lots of lovely layers

It's coming to that time of year again, and no matter how much I want to bury my head in the sand and pretend that Christmas isn't just under 5 weeks away I need to put on my big girl pants and face facts. Now I stopped making all my Christmas cards years ago as I found it was too much pressure to make them all and I wasn't prepared to start making Christmas cards while I was still thinking of summer holidays, so now I only make a handful of cards for very special people and that allows me to put more time and effort into each one.

 

For this card I used  Here Comes Santa from IndigoBlu, available from Clare Curd Crafts.

I also used FlitterGlu and Mega Flakes.

 

I applied the FlitterGlu to the edges of the base card and then got a good layer of the flakes to cover the glue.

Then edged some black card, one of which I embossed, with silver embossing powder and layered these up.

 

 

 

Next I stamped the snowflake border in the FlitterGlu and covered it in the flakes, and mounted that onto a strip of black card and applied off to one side.

The tree was stamped and embossed in silver and mounted onto 3D pad, and the sentiment was tucked behind.

 

 

 

I'm sharing this card on the following challenge blog ~ http://scribbleandscrapcrafts.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/challenge-5-always-anything-goes.html



Bits and bobs

I hate waste, any kind of waste, food, time, crafting materials. So with this in mind I have a box that I drop all my bits of left over paper into. They do come in useful for those little bits we all need from time to time, but today I thought I would share a couple of ideas that just use little scraps of paper.

 

The best way to start with this kind of project is to pull out a nice pile of contrasting papers, most of mine came from the Well Travelled paper pad

 

 

I then got together a collection of embellishments and ribbons that would work with the papers I'd chosen. You won't use everything you've got out but having them to hand will make decisions easier.

 

The first thing I made from this pile was a pendant, using a wooden tile as a base, you could use a domino, mount board, anything as long as it wont warp when glue is applied.

 

 

I chose my scrap of paper which I then glued to the base

 

file the edges of the paper to get a nice smooth finish

 

pick a couple of other contrasting papers and layer them on your base.

 

Now coat this in Mod Podge to seal all the edges.

Pick your embellishment and glue to the base.

 I stamped and added a word to mine, from the Crafty Impression Explore stamp set.

If you want to make a pendant, make a hole to thread a cord through. You could use this as an embellishment for a card, a Christmas tree decoration, or even add a magnet to the back.

 

 

The second thing I made was a quick card Embellishment, which could also be made into many other items.

 

I started out by cutting three different sized circles using my Cuttlebug.

 

I layered them up and added some ribbon,

 

I chose an embellishment

 

 

and there you have a finished embellishment to use in whatever way you want

 

It's my turn over on the Clare Curd Crafts DT blog today, stop by and say Hi x

 

 



Mixed media on acetate

This week I thought I'd visit a love a had years back, acetate! I have made many things in the past using acetate as the base, I just love the look of it.

 

I had the urge to make something girly and pretty so that's exactly what I did.

 

 

 

 

I started out with a piece of acetate, 4x12 inches folded in half (4x6), which I then put the right hand side through my cuttlebug to emboss, bare in mind this will then be the front of your card

 

 

once embossed this is what you will have.

 

Now to start working on the elements for your card. I used some Dylusion sprays to colour my card,

put some of your chosen colour into a pallet and use as paint

 

 

remember to use varying amounts of white to vary your shades.

 

with any paint left cover a sheet of card or paper, you'll need it later if you want to die cut elements to add to your card.

 

Now for stamping, pick your main image stamp and also a few smaller stamps with which to make a background. I used the postage mark stamp from the Crafty Impressions Explore stamp set , as well as a couple of others from my stash.

 

 

cut you background piece about an inch smaller all round than your card base and after edging the sides with some brown ink apply it to the inside of your card. Don't worry about being able to see the glue as you'll cover this up later.

 

Now for the front of the card, place your main focal image where you would like it to be and using decorative elements play around until you like what you see. Clare carries some lovely

elements you could use. Some great items to use are sequin waste, ribbons, lace, paper flowers and die cuts ( this is where your painted sheet of paper comes in handy) ( metal dies )

 

 

My altered die cuts ready to add to my card.

 

Once I was happy with the layout of the elements I glued them all in place.

 

 

Once the front of your card looks pretty you need to pay a little attention to the back and inside as all the glue/double sided tape that you've is visible, so cut a piece of card the same size as the background you stuck inside the card and attach this to the vary back of your card, this also gives you somewhere to write your sentiment.

And do the same to hide the sticky stuff from the front.

 

 



 

 

Slow, slow, quick, quick, slow

Hello lovelies, it's Thursday again and that means it's my turn over on Clare Curd Crafts blog.

 

The title of this post kind of sums my life up at the moment, nothing happens for ages then a whole load of stuff all at once. This week is a whole load at once one as my youngest is off to Uni on Saturday so it's all hands on deck getting all the last minute bits and pieces together for him. With this in mind crafting time has been very limited, but I got stuck in and in under 30 minutes put together two cards, both quite different from my usual style but they show the versatility in the products I was talking about here.

 

First up is a little pink and black number I put together using the papers from the Carta Bella - Well Travelled 6x6 pad and some well loved dies I rediscovered in a box

 

 

I used a 5x5 black card blank and covered it with a sheet of paper from the paper pad, then cut the circles using dies and my Cuttlebug.

 

The words and butterfly are also dies. To bring the pink over onto the butterfly I applied some micro beads down the body.

 

The second card I made was even faster than the first

for this card I started out with a 5x5 white card base which I sprayed with Dylusions spray in Dirty Martini. When this was dry I over stamped it with the sentiment from the Crafty Impressions Explore stamp set. I then cut three banners from different sheets of paper from the paper pad and using a paint brush edged them in the green spray ink.

 

When I stuck the banners down I curled the edges a little to give some movement and dimension to the card

 

If your in the market for some new dies take a look here at the selection Clare carries in the shop.

 

 

Up, up and away

It's Thursday, so that means it's my turn again over on Clare Curd Crafts I can't believe how quick these weeks are flying by!!

 

I made a mixed media panel to share with you today, not sure what I'm going to do with it yet, I may mount it and hang it or I may just add it into my art journal, who knows :)

 

I've used the Carta Bella - Well Travelled Collection 6x6 paper pad and the Crafty Impressions stamp set both available from Clare's store.

 

The background was run through my Cuttlebug to get the embossed texture and then I layered up the acrylic paints and papers from the pack, decorated some tape and applied that and then mounted up my stamped image and quote.

 

 

The hot air balloon was great fun to make. I started off cutting a balloon shape from card then built up the depth I wanted in layers of tissue and masking tape. I then added the ropes by using a length of suede cord I had in my stash, over the top of this I applied another couple of layers of tissue, covering it in home made Mod Podge ( mix equals parts of white PVA glue and water) and making sure the tissue moulded around the 'ropes' 

 

Once the glue was all dry I painted the balloon and added the basket.

 

If you are stuck for inspiration pop over to the Clare Curd Crafts DT blog, someone is posting inspirational stuff on there every day.