CAS(E) This Sketch # 183 - Take two

Happy weekend my lovelies!  Today, I have another card for the CAS(E) This Sketch Challenge of yesterday.  If you remember, the sketch looked like this.

As ever, photos first, details later.

First, I took a plain, white card base and a front panel in the same card-stock.  I cut the panel smaller than the card front and hand debossed the stripes across the front.

Next, I took some pre-stamped flowers and die cut vellum leaves and arranged them on the panel.  I used 'Press and Seal' to lift the arrangement, turned it over, put glue on the back of the flowers (except the top one that I wanted to foam mount), turned the 'Press and Seal' over with the arrangement in place and pressed it all down.  Then I carefully removed the 'Press and Seal' and mounted the last one on foam tape.

I finished off by cutting a sentiment from gold foil card and added sequins to match the colours in my design!

I hope you all have a truly wonderful weekend!

Thank you so much for your visit today and especially if you have left a comment.  You are all appreciated more than you know!

CAS(E) This Sketch #183

Hello lovely crafty friends.  I hope this finds you all well.  Today's post is for the CAS(E) This Sketch #183 Challenge, which is the lovely sketch below by Chrissy Larson, which looks like this.

I don't have any single bird dies, but as soon as I saw it, I thought that I could finally use a hitherto unused Spellbinders 'Bird On A Wire Die', that I have had for ages!  As usual, I will post the pictures first, and then those who are in a hurry can get off.  Then, for those who are interested I will post the supplies and details below.

First I took a plain white card base and a plain white panel and cut the panel with a stitched rectangle die.

Next, I got four different blues of Imagination Crafts 'Starlight' paints - the shimmer is incredible - and mixed a tiny drop of each with some water in a sectioned painters palette and painted the four stripes, going from lightest blue to the darkest blue and let that dry.

Whilst the paint was drying, I cut the birds and sentiment out of black card-stock.

Once my panel was dry I adhered the birds and the sentiment and stamped the hugs & kisses and called it done!

Thank you so much for your visit today and especially if you have left a comment.  You are all appreciated more than you know!  Have a wonderful weekend folks!

My First Group Crafting

Hello everyone, I hope all is well with you.  You may remember that when we met up with the lovely Darnell, I also met Linda - who, it turned out, lives not far from me in our very own home town - small world.  Well, Linda contacted me a few days later and said that she had been shopping with her friend Moya and had asked her if she minded me going along to their regular, crafty meet at Moya's house on Wednesdays.  I'm delighted to say that Moya was kind enough to let me, a complete stranger, join them in their crafting evening!

I wasn't entirely sure what to expect, what crafts, what space and so on, so I took a compact amount of supplies, some images I'd coloured whilst in Spain, some scissors, glue, small trimmer, card bases, plain card panels, an adult colouring book (not that kind, so stop smirking in the back there) that I had as a gift for Christmas from my step-son and my watercolour pencils and a water-brush of water.

Linda kindly picked me up and when we turned up at Moya's beautiful home, there were other ladies there and a ninety year old gentleman (sorry everyone, I am really bad with names and it takes me a while to remember them).  It was a really lovely gathering, everyone was warm and friendly (I can be a little shy when meeting new people), but they all made me feel like part of the group from the off.  There were a number of different crafts  going on, crochet, colouring, cutting out, cross-stitch and making up 3D items.

When it was time to leave, I thanked Moya for her kind hospitality and she asked if I would like to go again next week!  I said that would be lovely!

On the way home, Linda and I found out that we had quite a bit in common, besides crafting, and so, a new friendship is born!  With thanks to Darnell for the facilitation!  Besides some colouring I did - the images are so intricate, it will take me months to finish just one - I fussy-cut some SSS roses and leaves that I had stamped and coloured whilst in Spain.

You will be seeing some cards made with these in the future!  In the meantime, have a great day!

Thank you so much for your visit today and especially if you have left a comment.  You are all appreciated more than you know!

A Bit Of Spanish Colouring

Hello crafty friends!  I hope you have been having a wonderful weekend . . . ours is grey and dismal, but hey ho, it is what it is.

I'm sorry for my sporadic posting of late, but there has been a lot to sort out lately - I will not bore you all with the details, heck, I'm bored enough for all of us - I'm hoping things will be back to 'normal' (whatever that is), after the 29th, but I'm not holding my breath!  However, all's well health wise and that's the main thing.

Today, I used one of the panels I took with me to Spain to colour.  I do this because I don't like to carry huge amounts of crafting gear with me, so I just stamp and print some panels and take a handful of pencils with me and just colour them in to make cards with when I return.  This is one of those panels.

Self explanatory I think.  It is one of the printed panels.

Thank you so much for your visit today and especially if you have left a comment.  You are all appreciated more than you know!

Meeting New Friends

Hello lovely friends!  As a lot of you will know, the famous Darnell is over here in dear old blighty for a visit with some of us UK blogging buddies and yesterday it was I, Linda and Pat

Here is a picture of all of us.  From left to right, Pat's DH, Darnell, Linda, Linda's DH, Pat, Me and my DH was taking the picture.

It turned out that Linda and I live, not only in the same city, but only about ten minutes drive from each other and we had never even met in blog-land - what a truly small world it is - we all spent a wonderful five hours in each other's company and laughed and talked non-stop for all the time we were there.

We were sorry to have to break the happy gathering up when it was obvious that the staff were waiting to throw us out!  Our time together seemed way too short, but what little time we had was very very sweet!  Darnell is as warm, funny and generous in real life as she is on her wonderful blog.

I will leave you with just one picture of myself with Darnell, as I know that Darnell will want to tell you all more about it on her own blog. 

It just leaves me to say, thank you so much Darnell for coming all this way to meet up with us and I hope the rest of your stay is as wonderful as our time together and have a safe journey home, you lovely, funny lady!

 
Thank you so much for your visit today and especially if you have left a comment.  You are all appreciated more than you know!

CAS Mix Up July Challenge

Hello my lovelies.  I hope you are having a wonderful day so far.  Today I have a card for my good friends' Loll and Bonnie's CAS Mix Up Challenge and this month they want to see, stamping, markers and your choice.

For my choice I used a vellum die cut.  First I will show you my card and then, for those interested, I will explain what I did below.  Here it is then.

First, I made a plain card base, then I cut a slightly smaller, scalloped rectangle with a Tonic set and a plain, smaller rectangle again from the same Tonic set.

Next, I scribbled markers on to my Penny Black 'Passionate' rubber stamp and spritzed with water a few times and stamped it down on to the smallest rectangle.  While that was drying, I adhered the scalloped vellum panel on to the card base.  Then, once my focal panel was dry, I adhered it on to the front of my card.

I finished by stamping the sentiment from Hero Arts 'Hello Sunshine' stamp set and added a few sparkling clear sequins.

**TIP**

I couldn't decide which sentiment to use, so I stamped a selection from the set on to acetate and tried them on the card to see which looked best, that way, you can see in advance whether the sentiment you choose is right for your design and you have no mistakes to try and redeem!

Have a truly wonderful day my friends, until the next time, happy crafting!
 
Thank you so much for your visit today and especially if you have left a comment.  You are all appreciated more than you know!

Cards Seven & Eight of Eight - Plus Bonus

Hello all my lovely friends.  I do hope you are all having a lovely weekend - better than mine anyway!  Today, I have the final instalment of  'One Die Set, Many Ways'.  It's been great fun, but it's time to move on - although, I do know that it won't be the end for this die set!  I have done something completely different with the last two and not just changed the layout!  In the first, I have used the die to dry emboss the card and in the second, I have used it as a stencil.  Which brings me to the bonus, a card I made with the die cut I used as a stencil!  Without further ado, here are the final cards *warning - picture heavy post*

Card #7

Card #8

I don't know if you can see it in the post, but I embossed the black strip with matte black embossing paste through a stencil.

Bonus card.

All together.

Thank you so much for your visit today and especially if you have left a comment.  You are all appreciated more than you know!

Cards Five & Six Of Eight

Cards five and six my lovelies.  I've tried to show the shimmer I sprayed lightly on to the background in the close up.  I hope you can see it.

This next one also has a little shimmer to add texture and shine to the plain card base.

Thank you so much for your visit today and especially if you have left a comment.  You are all appreciated more than you know!