Christmas in July? Colour Q #252

Hello again!

Christmas in July seems to be featuring a lot around blog land at the moment - it's quite a big thing here in Australia, particularly in the Blue Mountains where it supposedly originated.  We non-Australians find it very strange to celebrate Christmas in the blistering heat of December so some Europeans take advantage of the cold weather and have a celebration in the mountains in July instead.  

This week's Colour Q challenge has a particularly festive theme:

For those of you who don't know, I'm not a fan of making Christmas cards - particularly when it's the wrong time of year!  I think it's because I make so many in November, that it puts me off for the rest of the year.  So, there isn't a hint of Christmas cheer on my card I'm afraid. Instead I reached for the Hero Arts set called Missing You - I coloured in the moose with a combination of SU markers and Copics, cut the grass using my Cameo and added a sprinkling of love with the W Plus 9 borders and background 3 set. He's quite sweet isn't he...although his eyes are a little wonky - maybe he's just drunk on love.

Hope you get the chance to join in, thanks for popping over,

Claire x

Tic Tac Toe

Hello folks!

Time for another card, this time using the colours at The Card Concept and the Tic Tac Toe challenge over at CASual Fridays:

Colour challenges are always that bit harder when you haven't got any inks in the chosen hues aren't they? So I reached for the patterned papers for this one, together with a scrap of lime bazzil I had in my stash. I went for the diagonal line in tic tac toe - chevrons , white and twine.  The chevrons were cut with my Cameo - I stuck them on jac paper and then cut the hello using MFT's Happy Hellos.  The sentiment is from CASual Friday's WTF set.

I'll put this one in the Clean and Simple basket I think....

Happy stamping!

Claire x

Scrumptious Sunflower - Freshly Made Sketches #146

Good morning bloggers!

I've been lusting after this little sunflower die for weeks now and finally found it at my local craft store - it just so happened that it fit in perfectly for sketch #146 over at Freshly Made Sketches:

I used a heap of MME papers for this (surprise, surprise) and the leaves were cut using my Cameo.

Short but sweet today...it's Saturday so almost soccer time. Somehow I have to find some enthusiasm to cheer along in the pouring rain!

Thanks for popping by,

Claire x

Papertrey July Blog Hop Challenge

Hello folks!

It's Papertrey Ink's July Blog Hop and for once I actually realised this before the date and not  24 hours after the event!

Inspired by the photo, I wanted to create a banner using Heart Prints - they are such pretty patterns so I kept it very CAS and simply layered them against the embossed background.

Since the theme for the Wednesday challenge at Simon Says Stamp is embossing I'm going to whack my card over there too.

Wish I'd had the time to create some more PTI cards for this but life has got in the way this week - I've had a little hospital visit this morning for a routine procedure. I've been given the all clear but I wish they could have given me just a little bit more anaesthetic so I could have had a longer sleep!

Looking forward to being inspired by everyone else's beautiful creations!

Thanks for stopping,

Claire x

Colour Q #251

Good evening blogging friends!

It's Tuesday so it must be time for a another Colour Q challenge. And such a pretty, feminine combo we have for you this week:

The dreaded purple normally throws me when it's included in the colour palette, but for some reason it didn't this time. The nearest I have to Calypso Coral is Cameo Coral which is slightly more pink than orange. I've inked up Waltzingmouse's Asian Gardens which is definitely one of my most favourite sets...so much you can do with it (although I always seem to reach for the same stamps...isn't that always the way?)  I used the pretty sketch (#160) over at The Deconstructed Sketch for some inspiration and I'm entering it into Curtain Call's 'Anything Goes' challenge too.

Hope you get inspired by the gorgeous creations from the rest of the DT - go over and give them some love won't you?

Thanks for stopping,

Claire x

Throwing Colour at Freshly Made

G'day bloggers!

Hope your week started well.   Here's a quick peek at the card I've done using the latest sketch at Freshly Made Sketches and the pretty colours at Colour Throwdown:

I haven't got Calypso Coral so I've used Cameo Coral which is more pink than orange.  In Darnell's words I have some 'never before used schtuff' on this one -  a Heartfelt Creations stamp called Moments With You.  I was lucky enough to do a class with the owner of Heartfelt Creations a few months ago - I won this stamp set but haven't got round to using it yet.  I'm glad I've actually given it some ink now!  The little cupcake is Waltzingmouse and the flags are Stampin' Up.

Well that's all folks - have a great day!

Claire x

Card Concept Colour Challenge

Hello folks!

I seem to have a bit of an obsession with black at the moment - the last few cards have all had a black background...maybe it's an indication of my mood! This one's no exception for the colour challenge over at The Card Concept:

I never seem to know quite which style to put my Card Concept cards in - classy and elegant I guess I'd call this.  What do you think?

Thanks for looking,

Claire x

Feeling Bold? Colour Q #250

Evening all!

Tuesday has rolled around once again so time for the latest Colour Q combo. Check out that dress! If only I was 20 years younger (and had a tan.....)

This week you have a choice - either use black and white plus one of the spot colours or use all five of them.  I opted to use all of them, although in very small amounts.  The white embossed doile is from the Waltzingmouse Dainty Doiles (small) set and the butterfly is Stampin' Up's Papillon Potpourri.

Hope you manage to find your crafty mojo this week - happy stamping!

Claire

Things that Glow

Happy weekend folks!

Just a super quick card for the Casology challenge:

The idea for this one came to me at about 3am this morning....no wonder I was having trouble sleeping.  I started thinking about 'cat's eyes' in the centre of roads and then I thought of a pair of creepy eyes glowing in the dark.  It's not the best execution or photo I'm afraid - I wish I'd had more time to think about how to incorporate the eyes into a better card but I like the idea. I used the Cameo to cut them and added a couple of drops of dimensional magic to make them glow more. The Halloween die cut is also from Cameo Silhouette and the 'happy' is from a set by PTI.

Thanks for looking,

Claire x

The Cutting Edge/Virginia's View/Paper Smooches Sparks

G'day bloggers!

How's your Thursday going?

I've kind of been against the clock for this next card. I've had my eye on the new Cutting Edge Challenge for a few days and suddenly realised that Mr Linky closes in about 2 hours. So here's the gorgeous inspiration pic and my card, together with the inspiration pic for the Virginia's View die cut challenge:

I absolutely love the Cutting Edge inspiration card and was very tempted to copy it completely but I guess that's just not the idea of a challenge is it? So I sprayed some watercolour paper with some mists and ink, added a light dusting of black glimmer mist  and cut some flowers using a Paper Smooches flower die. The background die is a file from Waltzingmouse, the flourish is a Silhouette cut and it's all been put on a Nestie classic rectangle.  I'm really enjoying seeing what people are doing for this challenge as I don't make use of my Cameo anywhere near as much as I should. There's some amazing projects out there.

Over at Paper Smooches Sparks  there's an Anything goes challenge so since I've used their stand alone flowers dies I'm entering my card over there too.  You can find the die I used here at the Paper Smooches shop:

Anyway, thanks for popping by and taking a peek!

Claire x

Colour Q #249

Hello again!

Another day, another card - this time for our latest challenge over at Colour Q.  There were some absolute stunners linked up last week with the red, white, blue and kraft combo. This week you may need your sunglasses with this bright and cheerful palette:

Being in a floral kind of mood, I reached for Stampin' Up's Flower Shop set - I thought the print style flower would look good with the bright hues.   The chevron stamp is from a little set by American Crafts - believe it or not I picked this up on my recent trip to Singapore in a bookshop for the bargain price of 7 bucks.  Who goes to Singapore to buy stamps? Well, me as a matter of fact - I couldn't afford anything else!

Make sure you get your project linked up by next Monday and check out the gorgeous stuff that the rest of the DT have produced!

Thanks for saying hi,

Claire x

Watercolour Delights

G'day folks!

I've been playing around with watercolour pencils for the AAA Card Challenge - make a card using watercolour techniques.  Since I've used the lovely Summery colours over at Curtain Call I'm going to link up my card over there too - it is a birthday card, despite not actually saying 'happy birthday' - you can still send love and hugs on someone's special day can't you?

I used Mama Elephant's Sweet Havana set for this one. I die cut the flowers from watercolour paper  and used a mixture of inks and watercolour pencils to stamp and colour them. I edged the frame with a pencil, then softened it with some water.  There's a great tutorial by Nichol Magourik on how to achieve the watercolour effect using distress inks on the Mama Elephant blog - you can find it here if you want some good tips!

Happy stamping!

Claire x

Love Floats

Hello again,

I've got a clean and simple card today for a couple of challenges - Casology and Addicted to CAS:

There's a cute little balloon in Mama Elephant's new 'Around we Go' set and I started the card with the intention of having that silhouetted in front of the floating moon. It didn't really have the required effect though - the balloon was just too tiny. Looking at the carousel I thought I could maybe do a night scene - I guess when they're not being used, the seats kind of float in the air. Or am I taking this float thing too far?

It needed a bit of brightening up with some twine and enamel dots - empty fairgrounds can look very creepy in the dark can't they? Since I sponged the sky I'm also entering it into Addicted to CAS.

Thanks for popping by - have a great weekend!

Claire x

Summer Love

G'day folks,

Just a quickie for the latest CAS-ual Friday challenge - and it was done even more quickly as I used the sketch from Case This Sketch:

The theme for CAS-ual Fridays is to use hearts in Summer colours.  Thought I'd get on the watercolour bandwagon (six months too late as usual) and partially stamped a background using W Plus 9's Defining Words. I die cut a heart and coloured this in using watercolour pencils, then stuck it back down with dimensional tape. Took about 10 minutes....don't you just love that!

Have a great day!

Claire x

Bright and Breezy - Colour Q #248/The Card Concept

Hello blogging friends!

Tuesday has rolled around once again so it's time for another Colour Q challenge and this one's perfect for those of you who will be celebrating July 4th later in the week:

I do wish there was a point in me making Independence Day cards - I see so many wonderful stamp sets specifically for this holiday but they'd be entirely wasted on me unfortunately.  So instead I'm celebrating the birth of a third baby for a couple of friends of mine with Mama Elephant's Nursery Deco set. The teddy's been stamped on some beautiful suede-like paper I've had lurking for years in my stash...not quite Sahara Sand but close enough.

I totally forgot but realised 24 hours after posting that I'd also made this for the current Card Concept challenge which is to make a baby card. Oops - mother brain strikes again.  I guess it's a combo of clean and simple and clean and layered...are you allowed to pick two different styles?!

If you're celebrating over in the old US of A this week, have a fabulous holiday - hope you get the time to join in with the challenge!

Thanks for popping over,

Claire x