Thursday Thoughts 2

The second card is my entry for this week's Less is More challenge to use three colours.

A clean and simple card which I made with the birthday of one of my grandson's in mind. His favourite colours influenced my choices and as he's past the stage of little boy cards now I'm hoping he will think this card is 'cool'.

For our colour challenge this month we have decided to give you a choice.

Either

Three Colours

or 

Three Shades of One Colour

You may use any combination of colours you wish!

Supplies:

Stamps: Clearly Besotted, Geometric Style; Uniko Studio, All Occasion Sentiments #2

Inks: Memento, tangelo, pear tart, danube blue, tuxedo black

It will soon be the weekend and I'm planning on lots of indulgence time with my grandsons as they're over for a few days.  YES!!!

Thanks for looking today, your visit is appreciated.

Jane

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Wednesday Words

Monochromatic Purple! How about that for a card challenge? Well that's one that I just had to try.

I've been watching the challenges over at The Card Concept ever since its beginnings back in November, but could never work out which category my cards fitted. So I suppose the purple challenge was the push I needed.  I'm hoping I've got my style right and think it best fits their definition of Clean & Simple. So here's my first entry to one of their challenges:

Out came my long neglected Lavinia stamps and a circular masking card I made many moons ago.  I love using purple with Lavinia stamps - it seems such a magical mystical colour so suited to their beautifully enchanting images.

I used a washi tape border on two sides and some mini pearls to add impact. Oh and of course a little sparkle using Wink of Stella.

Supplies:
Stamps: Lavinia
Inks: Ranger distress, dusty concord, milled lavender; Memento, grape jelly
Punch: Xcut corner rounder
Embellishments: Washi tape; doodlebug mini pearls, Spring assortment; Kuretake Wink of Stella, clear

Now I couldn't just put all that purple away without making another card and as I said the other day I knew it wouldn't be long before I repeated this card in a different colourway. And that's what I've done:

I'm thinking this card is also Clean & Simple, but I'd be really happy to be corrected if I've got it wrong.

Supplies:
Stamps: Clearly Besotted, In The Frame & matching die
Inks: Memento, grape jelly, tuxedo black
Washi tape 

And then while I was in the purple mood I remembered this:

Now I don't think this fits any of The Card Concept's styles and is so far away from how I've been creating recently, but I adore Lavinia stamps.  I'd actually forgotten all about this card and am so pleased it didn't find its way to the bin.  I still love inky creations and this beauty is now being displayed on my workroom wall.

Supplies:
Stamps: mostly Lavinia
Inks: Ranger distress ink, dusty concord, chipped sapphire; Versafine, onyx black

Thanks for looking today.

Jane
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Tuesday Talk

So what did you think of the AAA Cards challenge? Hope you're planning on joining in and keeping me busy visiting all your blogs to see what you've created!

Today I've a couple of things to share. A card for CAS Colours & Sketches and a look at my envelope calendar pocket for April. (I made the top three last week, thank you!)

I needed to make a card for my middle son and his wife for their wedding anniversary coming up in June and as she particularly likes turquoise I thought I'd get a head start and make use of the colours in their challenge this week. (By the way those who know me will realise I always get things done way ahead of time, I'm just not a last minute person.)

Out came my Clearly Besotted box, never far from my desk anyway, and the lovely bicycle stamp and die with a basket full of love got itself inked up.  I used the tiny heart stamps from a different set to continue the line of love and a sentiment and triple hearts from Uniko Studio that also matched the theme.  A strip of washi to represent the road and a Wink of Stella sparkle on some of the hearts and my card was done.

 

Supplies:

Stamps: Clearly Besotted, Good Times & Design A Tree; Uniko Studio, Flower Power #3

Inks: Memento, London fog, dandelion, bahama blue

Embellishments: washi tape; Kuretake, Wink of Stella, clear

And now for my April envelope calendar.  The theme this month just had to be opportunities and most of them were centred around my blog.  This time last year my blog was still a 'maybe one day' idea and I never thought I'd travel so far in my blogging journey. Just shows you should always give things a whirl!

So here's the whole pocket:

The weather photo:

The monthly quote:

 

And my journalling:

 

I'm excited about what may happen in May and looking forward to learning even more new skills.

Thanks for looking today, hope you've found it interesting.

Jane

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Magical Momentous Monday

So it's here at last!! The launch of the first game at AAA Cards.  I'll be racing you to get a glimpse of my cards over there - just so looking forward to seeing my first ever contributions to a challenge blog as a proper member of a design team.  Don't think anything will ever come close to this again!!

Here's Game 1:

It's a goodie, but it did get me thinking about what constitutes a two layer card. So working on the premise that a one layer card is just the card base I eventually came up with this card:

So my second layer was the yellow card that the happy cat is stamped on. I chose these rather bold colours, not at all typical of me, because they are bright and sunny and that to me means happy. I coloured the balloon with promarkers and sparkled it up with stickles. Lastly I added a be happy sentiment just to underline the happy element of the challenge. A simple, clean card that I hope you like.

Supplies:
Stamps: Penny Black, purrfect day; Clearly Besotted, sentiment from Good Times
Inks: Memento, tuxedo black, lady bug
Promarkers: poppy
Glitter: Stickles, diamond

My second card was actually the first one I made and then wondered about whether it had more than two layers.  I'd be interested to hear your opinion, I think it's probably a bit of a grey area and open to interpretation, but that's what makes life interesting.

I still chose bright happy colours, but this time used a patterned paper.  I glittered the edges by applying double sided tape round the outside of the square before sprinkling with loose glitter - makes for a lovely straight line of glitter. The happy sentiment is coloured and glittered too.

Supplies:
Stamp: Whimsy, birthday letter seals
Ink: Memento, tuxedo black
Ppaer: doodlebug, take note
Die: Xcut, spiro circle
Glitter: Deco Art, Glamour Dust; Stickles, star dust 

And there you have it, my first ever creations as part of a design team.  Did I mention I'm mega-excited about this? Hope you'll find time to join in, here's the link, can't wait to see what you all come up with.

If you found me from AAA Cards and you're new to my blog WELCOME, hope you like what you see.  If you're a regular THANK YOU for your continued support.

I'm off to check out AAA Cards to see if the post is up yet - there is an eight hour time difference between me here in the UK and Victoria in the US.

Jane
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Sunday Slot

Just need to share a card and my 1st of the month pages today before everything goes bonkers with the release of the first game at AAA Cards tomorrow.

My card is for The Male Room's current challenge - Give Us A Giggle.  I went searching on the web for a suitable digital image as all my male themed stamps were not quite what I wanted. I knew as soon as I saw this image it was perfect, reminds me so much of how my boys used to tease each other when they were small.  Who am I kidding? It's how they still torment each other now!! Some things never change.  Anyway it makes me giggle when I think about it, so I'm hoping it will you too.

 

Supplies:

Image: freedeariedollsdigistamps.blogspot.co.uk

Promarkers: cool grey 5, leaf green, poppy, azure

Flexmarkers: blush, dusky pink, tea rose, nutmeg

Paper: doodlebug, kraft in color 

Die: Lil'inker, anytime tags

Embellishments: doodlebug sprinkles, day to day assortment

A day in my life - 1st May 

This month I decided to just go with the day and see what it had to offer. It may seem mundane at the moment, but maybe some time in the future a descendent of mine might find it fascinating to see what people got up to in the long ago distant time of 2014.  Also I find it quite fun to look back on myself, helps me appreciate and be grateful for my life.

Here's my pages:

And here's a close up of the butterfly button embellishment. This is a format I keep returning to in both scrapbooking and card making. 

Oh and in case you're wondering about the sheep each month I'm using the pictures from last year's Thomas Joseph calendar - far too cute to throw away!

Thanks for dropping by my blog today, your visit is very welcome.  Enjoy what's left of your weekend.

Jane
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Saturday Special

So exciting today!! My first card as a guest designer goes live this afternoon at Unscripted Sketches.

I'm going ahead and sharing my card here although you'll have to wait until later to see all the DT's interpretations over at Unscripted. Just means you get a bit of a heads up on the sketch.

 

So I used my go to colours and favourite Clearly Besotted stamp - mind you all their stamps are my favourites! I also added a few of my other never off my desk items - the Lil'inker stitched die, doodlebug embellishments and a hint of Wink of Stella on the flower.

This was such a pleasure to make, just about came together in seconds. Unscripted have such clear sketches and I always count down the time until their new challenge goes live - usually about 3:30pm GMT.

 

Supplies:

Stamps: Clearly Besotted, Pretty Petals Plus & Pretty Petals; Uniko Studio, Background Builders SQUARED

Inks: Memento, grape jelly, rose bud, pear tart

Die: Lil'inker, stitched mats rectangles

Embellishments: doodlebug mini pearls, Spring assortment; Kuretake, Wink of Stella clear; twine from my stash

Thanks for visiting my blog today. Hope you'll have fun with the sketch! Have a great weekend.

Jane

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Friday Focus

A trio of cards to share today all of them in response to Uniko Studio's ninth challenge which has a colour pallette and an Easter theme as starting points.

Now what I really love about Uniko Studio's challenges is that they say it's ok to use their themes as a starting point to inspire and to quote them "aren't sticklers when it comes to our rules".  So I took advantage of this and let the Easter bit go by the wayside and used other sentiments.

Judging by the number of attempts that landed in my bin I think I would have liked to have ignored the colours too.  I really stuggled with the yellows, greens and brown and would have loved to have added some purple, but obviously this would have been a step too far!  And besides it is supposed to be a challenge and left to my own devices every card would contain purple, so to work out of my comfort zone is no bad thing.

So I surprised myself and made two cards that I really like - and one that I actually love.  Here they are:

Supplies: 
Stamps: Uniko Studio, Flower Power #4
Inks: Memento, rich cocoa, bamboo leaves
Promarkers: buttercup, tulip yellow
Die: Lil'inker, stitched mats rectangles
Embellishments: glossy accents, button & thread

 

Supplies:

Stamps: Uniko Studio, Background Builders Vines, Natures Treasures 1, A sentiment from Flower Power #2

Inks: Memento, dandelion, rich cocoa, bamboo leaves

Die: Lil'inker, stitched mats rectangles & anytime tags

Embellishments: Hobby House pearls chocoalte heaven; twine; Kuretake, Wink of Stella clear

And my favourite:

 

Supplies:

Stamps: Unikos Studio, Background Builders Vines & a sentiment from Flower Power #1

Inks: Memento, rich cocoa, dandelion, bamboo leaves

Die: Clearly Besotted, Tag Along

Paper from my stash

Embellishments: doodlebug, sprinkles bumblebee collection; Kuretake, Wink of Stella clear 

So what do you think? Would love to hear your opinion.

Thanks for looking today.

Jane

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