UK Scrappers 52 Card Challenge 2014 - Week 15

Week 15 - All creatures great and small,  was the challenge for that particular week.  Not really a clever interpretation, but at least a bird is an animal!

 

It was Lily's 3rd birthday on Sunday and here is her card. 

 

 

Before leaving the UK, I stamped out lots of these images from a freebie set of stamps Tara acquired - they are adorable,and stamp really well for a free set of magazine stamps. 

 

I got out my Promarkers and coloured in the bird, the border of the journalling plate, and the flowers.  Lots of glitter over the flowers and the bird. 

 

Supplies:

Miss Nelly patterned paper - Kaisercraft

Promarkers

Freebie magazine stamps, "Curly Cute" Stampin' Up!, alphabet and number stamps by Image Tree

Doodlebug Fancy Frills glitter hearts

Lagoon ink - Close to My Heart

 

Hope you had a wonderful birthday, Lily. x

 

 

 



Name Picture

We were invited to go to a christening yesterday, and I was scratching my head about what to give as a gift. 

I thought the traditional items (you know - a silver item, or a china dining set, for example) were, well - too traditional - and not really useful in this day and age. 

We were only invited one week before the event, and I didn't have a great deal of time to think about it.  When a friend suggested a name picture, that was the very thing and off I went! 

The images I found on the internet didn't really inspire me and I wasn't tempted to buy anything I saw.  So I decided that as I happened to have a *few* materials around, I would make a picture myself! 

Making more than a few amendments along the way, here is the final version. 



I happened to have a frame around the house (from an intended project some years ago!) and decided to use it here.  I used my Cricut alphabet (Opposites Attract) with the shadows for the letters.  The shadows were coloured using Promarkers, as were most of the animals. 

I originally kept the letters white, but it was too minimalist and not bright enough for a 6 month old boy, so I used scraps of patterned paper for each letter.  The grass was cut with a Sizzlits decorative strip die.  Handily enough, I had recently purchased the Cuttlebug baby animals set of dies when they were half price in the Papermaze fire sale - they proved more than their money's worth in this project!

I started off by colouring in the animals with the Promarkers - but if I were to do another similar project, then I would cut everything out using the individual coloured card.  It would make the project much more laborious, but I think worth it in terms of the quality of finish.  The Promarkers are great, but when the item is quite small, you are reliant on the quality of your colouring in - and it is very easy for my hand to slip when colouring in detail.  The eyes pop using Ranger black enamel accents - it is great stuff, but very hard to control the amount of enamel that comes from the bottle!  I had to redo several of the animals when they ended up with black all over their heads, rather than just the eyes.  I had to sit up late several nights in order to get it finished, but I hope the recipient's family like the picture and appreciate that it was handmade especially for their son.  In my mind, not bad for a first attempt I think! 

Scrapology November card

This month, the card designer who set our monthly challenge is Joanna Sheen.  She challenged the Design Team to use a mouse image on their cards.  Bearing in mind the time of the year, I decided to try and incorporate the mouse with Christmas in the cheesiest way possible - get it!   (Hee hee hee .... )



Thanks to Linda for sending me some images as this is not really my normal style of card. 

I dug out an ancient piece of patterned paper for the background and made sure that I coloured in the image to match accordingly. 

I made it more "Christmassy" by sticking some felt snowflakes over the top and then stickled them to make them glitter.  I also glittered on the patterned paper on top of the stars to pull the card together. 

I then stamped out my Christmouse message using my PSX Playful alphabet stamps - I have several sets of small alphabet stamps.  I still consider them to be an essential part of my scrapbooking/ cardmaking tools, even though I don't use them nearly as often as I used to.  Great to get out these things from time to time and dust them off!

I then "enamelled" the outline of the flower using the Ranger white enamel accents.  It was my first time using these - they add a considerable dimension to the card, and hopefully look like snow!  The liquid flowed out of the nozzle faster than I thought it would, so I would recommend caution if using them for the first time.  Hope you join us in the challenge, and have lots of fun playing along! 

Supplies:
Patterned paper:  Colorbok Starry Sky
Ranger white enamel accents
Diamond Stickles
Make It Yourself Furry white snowflakes
PSX Alphabet stamps - Playful
Promarkers

Scrapology October Layout

Welcome to October!  This month we are scraplifting one of Georgia K Keay's layouts, with the theme being "B for Borders". 

I was quite intimidated when I saw Georgia's layout because I knew I wanted to scrapbook my boys, but didn't want to splatter paint or ink or make it quite as eclectic as she did, even though I greatly admire the finished product.  In the end, I went with these photos as I knew I wanted to scrapbook them, even though they weren't marvellous, and thought that I could eventually make them work on a layout. 

Here is my layout:

Technique:

The layout is all about the bibs my mum bought the boys from Brisbane Airport when she flew over to be with us for the first month after the boys were born.  One bib had a picture of a pirate kangaroo and was emblazoned with "The Wild Ride" whilst the other was called the "Happy Turtle", depicted in the aboriginal art style.   The bibs are so cute and I wanted to remember their provenance so I decided to incorporate their design into the layout.  So I picked up the aboriginal art theme and thought that the Basic Grey Archaic papers were very suitably earthy.  I traced the kangaroo and turtle outlines onto acetate with a permanent marker and filled in the detail with Promarkers.  Then once the various patterned papers were stuck on, I decided to use the dot imagery for a border around the page to fit in with the Scrapology theme this month and also use the same principle to surround the journalling shape.  I liked the naive lettering on the bibs so just scribbled out my title and coloured in the letters using the same colour scheme.  After all, I can't cut up every item of clothing the boys have ever worn (as I did with their first baby grows)!  The splotches from Georgia's page are emulated with the dots in the border to look like air bubbles from the turtle and also the same with the fish. 

I outlined the patterned paper with my black Promarker to save on black cardstock, but did matt the photos on black Bazzill to give them more stability. 

My journalling reads " Grandma Brierley bought these bibs for you from Brisbane Airport because she said she couldn't resist them.  If you were crying a lot I would say to you "come on, my wild koalas, I want you to be happy turtles".  I don't know why you were called wild koalas where the picture was clearly a pirate kangaroo... @ 9 days old.  15-07-11".

Supplies:

Bazzill Basics cardstock

Patterned Papers:  Basic Grey - Archaic collection "Passe", "Fossil"

                               Crate Paper - Crate Avenue collection "Style"

                               Scenic Route - "Background Blue Grid Worn"

1/2" circle punch

Promarkers

As usual, Jill from Cardinal Colours is putting up a prize for the challenge.  Come on and join in!

Happy birthday, Mum!

It was Mum's birthday yesterday - and it is the first time she has celebrated her special day overseas.  A very kind friend shouted us to a Thai lunch - whilst Paul was left at home (at his own suggestion) to mind the babies. 

So with the best intentions, I made Mum a chocolate cake from a mix and a special birthday card, too.  I am very pleased to say that the card turned out better than the cake - I tried to take a few short cuts which backfired!  So whilst the cake is not up to presentation, it still washes down well with a cup of tea - but here is the card, which I am happy to show. 

Mum likes receiving my cards as a present, as she has lots of people to send them to and they are a relatively compact thing to post to Australia.  As she had already sorted through the cards I had here and chosen what she wanted, I decided to make her something new and a bit special. 

I started by using the freebie stamp from the cover of this month's (August 2011) "Craft Stamper" magazine by Polka Doodles - I usually do like the stamps, but admit that this is probably the first one that I have actually used!  I used a lot of the masking technique, to repeat the pattern to emulate a garden.  In a recent "Papercraft Essentials" magazine, there was a free stack of 6 x 6 paper called "Sweet Wishes" so I matched my Promarker colours to the background patterned paper.  I mitred the corners of the patterned paper, and tried to match up the stripes, so the patterns would meld smoothly. 

I had just finished stamping the banner (American Crafts "Birthday" stamp collection, bought in a bundle from QVC) when I smudged the black ink.  Major bummer!  So I then covered this and created daisy embellishments using my "Jane's Script" stamps by Woodware.  These clear stamps mostly consist of card messages, but they had these cute daisies to flesh out the mix of stamps. 

So lots of colouring in - but I really like the end result (even though it took me three days to do, grabbing spare snippets of time whenever I could).  It seems like that will be my way of crafting for the years to come!  All worth it though, it has to be said. I think the finished card is fresh and pretty.  Mum said it was a lot of work, but I know she likes it, too.  Only thing that matters in the end, isn't it?

Grace at Caruso's

In response to our latest Sketch and Scrap challenge, we used this sketch below. 



I created this layout to fit two challenge criteria - one the sketch above, and the other set by Karen - to use papers from at least three different manufacturers, black and white, and some edging.


Here is my layout - and it is of my niece, Grace.  The photo was by one of those photographers who stroll amongst the tables whilst our family was dining in this stunning restaurant in Sorrento called "Caruso's", which is a tribute to Enrico Caruso, the famous tenor from Naples.



I considered this photo well worth buying, at 5 euros from the photographer, and thought he captured my niece very well - goodness me, so grown up here!

This meal was a highlight of our holiday and was just stunning!

I was very proud that I used all scraps, apart from cutting into one paper. I cut into the Crate Paper for the journalling block, but I used some ancient Scenic Route, Chatterbox, DCWV (Taj Mahal stack), Urban Lily and two lots of Basic Grey from my various scraps bags. I even rescued that left hand bracket from my scraps bag which was left over from a previous layout.

Two lots of edging down the left side and underneath the journalling at the bottom right. Black and white in the Urban Lily paper.

I really like how this layout turned out, considering I grabbed random scraps - I think the really funky colours of the Prima flowers help to bring it together. We were also challenged to use eyelets - so I used all the large red eyelets I had left on this page. I covered my wonky bashing of them with the Cropadile by using them as an extra layer for the flowers, and then sticking blue pearls on top! I used American Crafts Sixth Avenue stickers for the title, once again coordinating the colour by using my Promarkers, and then Glossy Accenting over the top to seal in the colour.

Must really be time for Christmas cards next, I think.  Thanks for stopping by!