Addicted to CAS - Water

Hello inkers,

Still not much craftiness going on in this household but here's a quick card I made for Addicted to CAS where the code word is 'water:'

 

I made a watery background with alcohol inks and added some sparkly bubbles. The cute little fish is from an older YNS set in my stash. 

I'm also popping it over to AAA Cards who have an 'anything CAS goes' challenge - without the optional twist!

Happy stamping!

Claire

CAS Flowers

Hello bloggers,

The cards are very few and far between in this house unfortunately. I've strained my neck by card making which is the saddest reason to strain your neck isn't it? It would sound so much more impressive if I'd done it rock climbing or jumping out of a plane!

So this is a very simple card for AAA Cards colour challenge and Seize the Birthday where the birthday topping is flowers.  I used a die from Altenew as a stencil to colour the flowers, then popped a clean die cut over the top. The die is quite intricate so it took longer than I thought and quite frankly wasn't worth the effort (or the dodgy neck)! Next time I'll use paper die cuts to colour in the bloom I think!

Happy stamping!

Claire

CAS Cat

Hello again,

This week's AAA Cards challenge intrigued me - it's a very simple version of Tic Tac Toe using the central theme of silhouettes with one of the other prompts. I chose pets: 

 

This is a simplified version of a couple of cards I made for last months's Lavinia Stamps creative challenge. I also tried to make it a little more masculine by using a masculine font for the sentiment and sticking to neutral colours. Having said that I asked my husband if he thought it was a masculine card - to which he replied a resounding no! I'm still going to enter it into Addicted to CAS's masculine challenge though.  I'm sure there are plenty of men out there who love cats...I just need to find one to send it to!

Happy stamping!

Claire

AAA Cards - Anything CAS Goes: Guest Designer

Hello folks!

I'm thrilled be guest designing again over at AAA Cards Challenge - for the next couple of weeks, anything CAS goes with the optional twist of Christmas-Winter:

I saw these pretty cards from Jo Rice using the shadow stamping technique and had to have a go. I used Gina K's Holiday Silhouettes - not quite as pretty as Jo's but I like how it turned out and it was very quick! Perfect for making a heap of cards in no time at all. 

Head over to the talented design team blogs for some inspiration, then get your CAS brains in gear to be in with a chance of being a future guest designer!

Happy stamping!

Claire

Autumn Hues

Hello folks!

It's that time of year - the leaves are turning, the temperature is getting crisp and the nights are drawing in. Except they're not - Down Under the very opposite is happening having just gone into Spring! That hasn't stopped me from making a few Autumnal themed cards though:

 

There's quite a few Autumnal challenges in the world of ink at the moment - AAA Cards 'anything goes with the optional twist of Autumn colours', Time Out's 'inspired by words' and CAS on Friday's theme of 'leaves.'

I made a very CAS card using a tiny maple stamp with a trio of maple leaves from Lavinia Stamps and each cluster has been stamped in a different coloured ink. The sentiment's from PTI and I dotted some gold pen around the wreath so it's actually quite sparkly IRL.  Who knew I had so many autumnal hues in my ink stash? 

Thanks for popping by,

Claire

AAA Card Challenge - Anything CAS Goes: Guest Designer

Hello inkers,

I'm delighted to be guest designing again over at AAA Cards Challenge - they have a brand new challenge for the start of September: anything CAS goes with the optional twist of sympathy/get well.

Sympathy cards aren't the easiest to make but I think it's the words that are most important - this Altenew set,  Say it With Love, has some lovely sentiments for all sorts of occasions. 

 

I blended a panel with various distress inks, then cut a floral border with Altenew's Floral in 'N' Out Die.

 

Make sure you pop over to the DT's blogs and check out what they've been doing - their cards always amazing and are bound to inspire you to get the inks out!

Claire

 

AAA Cards Challenge #272: Sketch - Guest Designer

Hello inkers!

I'm delighted to be guest designer this week for AAA Cards - it's a sketch challenge so here's my take on it:

This Grunge Me Papertrey Ink set is so old and so well used! The stamps all need a really good wash - you know when you try and stick them to your Misti or acrylic block and they fall off? It's a great set for playing around with so after a few random stamps on some scrap paper I settled on this.  I coloured some of the circle centres with Copics but otherwise left the stamps alone.

The challenge runs until 31st August and you could be in with the chance of being a future guest designer. Make sure you pop over to the DT to say hello - they alway provide heaps of inspiration!

Happy stamping!

Claire

MFT Card Cue Challenge

Hello inkers,

There's a new challenge over at My Favourite Things called Card Cue - this month, the cue is Flower Power: 

These are MFT's Upsy-Daisy Die-namics from the first time round - did you know they've just released them from the MFT vault? Definitely worth buying if you're thinking of it! 

I kept it very CAS and used the sketch from AAA Card  Challenge. I coloured the leaves with Copics and the sentiment is from Essential Sentiments. 

Happy stamping!

Claire

The Paper Players - Spring Flowers

Hello again,

Here's a very quick clean and simple card for the current CAS Paper Players challenge with a Spring flowers theme:

 

I used the colours from the soon to close colour challenge at MFT - the bloom is from long retired Funky Flowers with an Itty Bitty Basics sentiment.  The stencil is from Memory Box.

It's also going over to CAS on Friday for their Spring challenge and AAA Cards Anything CAS Goes (without the anniversary twist!)

Happy stamping!

Claire

Four Challenges in One Card

Hello Inkers,

There's so many CAS Christmas challenges out there I managed to fit them all on the one card! Just Us Girls are challenging us to make a CAS card with the image in a circle, AAA Cards to use black, gold and white, Less is More is to use D, as in Deck the Halls and CAS on Friday is to make a Christmas card:

 

I used this sweet dove silhouette and sentiment from Gina K's Christmas Silhouettes - I figured as she's carrying a piece of mistletoe it will fit with the LIM challenge! It's gold embossed along with the circle stamp from Winnie and Walter - I cut a smaller circle in the middle and matted it on white, then mounted it with dimensional tape. 

I love the simple sentiment - hoping 2024 brings a lot more peace, love and joy for the world!

Happy stamping!

Claire

AAA Card Challenge - Colourful Ink Blending

Hello again!

Playing along with AAA Cards for this one - they have an ink blending challenge happening so it was the perfect excuse to crack open some new Lavinia Stamps images. I've always loved their stamps but never actually bought any - my local craft shop stocked them but closed down a few years ago. Then lo and behold they opened a pop up shop recently in their old premises so what could I do? It would have been rude not to buy anything....

I blended 3 colours - Bundled Sage, Antique Linen and Faded jeans. As I always do when ink blending, I stuffed it up so my one layer card became a panel. I stamped the sweet, fairy image over the top and then added a tiny Altenew sentiment.  I'm happy with how it turned out but you must check out the Lavinia Stamps website and see what the DT can do - they create such amazing, whimsical scenes using nothing but stamps and ink!

Thanks for popping by,

Claire

MFT Colour Challenge 192

Hello inkers,

Very quick post with a card using MFT's latest challenge colours.  I'm not at home at the moment so have very limited materials - add to that no camera except my i-phone and no lightbox and it's one very bad photo!

 

I've used Santa's Elves and Selfie Square Die-namics. 

This one's also popping over to AAA Cards for their Anything Goes challenge - I've done half the twist and made a Christmas card without the pets!

Happy stamping!

Claire

AAA Cards Birthday Challenge

 Hello inkers,

AAA are celebrating their 8th birthday with a Moodboard inspiration challenge

I kept it to a minimum, using the colours from the ink blends on the top right pic and the image of a balloon from the pic below. I blended a trio of blue/green distress inks, stamped and die cut a balloon from Whimsy Stamps Happy Everything then covered them with a very liberal sprinkling of holographic embossing powder. The sentiment's from Waltzingmouse. 

Happy stamping!

Claire

CAS Christmas Card

Hello folks,

There's always  a rush of last cards isn't there? Either for people you'd forgotten or for people who you weren't expecting to get a card from! 

I've made a very CAS card for 3 challenges - AAA Cards with an 'along the edge' challenge and optional snowy theme, Colour Throwdown and CAS on Friday's Winter themed challenge:

 

I used Ink to Paper's It's a Sign: Holiday Sentiments with some CAS-ual Fridays snowflake die cuts from sparkly white paper. A scattering of bling and it was done. 

We're on tenterhooks here as my in-laws are booked to fly over to Australia for Christmas. We haven't seen them for 6 years and if they have to cancel because of this new Covid variant we'll all be devastated. Such horrible, uncertain times we live in. 

Fingers crossed Christmas goes ahead without a hitch for everyone!

Happy stamping!

Claire

CAS Birthday

Hello again,

Here's a very CAS card for AAA Cards 200th birthday challenge using stamps from two different Winnie and Walter sets and a sentiment from Waltzingmouse.  

I used the gorgeous colours from Sunday Stamps - they always have such great colour combos - and the theme from CAS on Friday which is  Circles. 

It's such a simple design - I might use it for some Christmas cards too!

Happy stamping!

Claire 

Christmas in July

 Hello bloggers,

I've never made a 'twinchie' card before so I've had a bash at AAA Cards' latest challenge to create a card where everything has to be contained in a 2 inch area:

I chose to do the optional twist of Christmas in July. The problem wasn't the image but the sentiment and finding one small enough to fit! 

This one's also going over to Less is More's Christmas in July challenge.

Happy stamping!

Claire

Dotty Birthday

Hi folks,

Here's a CAS card for 4 different challenges - AAA Cards birthday challenge, combined with the gorgeous colours over at Sunday Stamps, using the sketch at Less is More and the polka dot theme at The Paper Players. 

I started off by stencilling a rectangle, then stamped the polka dots over the top with Mama Elephant's Basic Border stamp. I wasn't thinking of having the sentiment in the corner, but since the dots were difficult to line up, it was perfect for covering up the error in my alignment. The added bonus was that the sentiment fitted perfectly. Don't you just love it when that happens? The stamped bloom and sentiment are from Ink to Paper's It's a Sign: Birthday Sentiments.

Thanks for calling by!

Claire