Are you ready for Easter?

Today sees the beginning of Easter week so it's time to think about finishing off those Easter projects and getting those cards posted :)

There are chocolate eggs of various shapes and sizes hidden away around our house ready to be cracked open on Sunday :)

We're also making preparations for our family meal on Easter Sunday (everyone is making a different part of the meal so we're all looking at recipes and finding ingredients).  I'm lucky to just be making part of the starter because I'll be working.

What do you have left to do for Easter?

Gayle xx

Inky cards

So I'm giving you all a break from the tags this week.... cos I know I'll be back on them in next week's post!  lol!

I worked on a few cards this week, this first one in my favourite sunset colours uses Andy Skinner's Nature stamp set (been using this a lot lately, loving!!) and Distress Inks in mustard seed, spiced marmalade, fired brick and worn lipstick.  I went around the outside of the card with a black Posca pen to frame it.

The second card is a little more messy! I'm thinking of hanging this one on a string instead of mounting it onto a card blank so I can hang it up somewhere; the recent Friday 13th we had got me thinking about good luck and appreciating it when it comes your way :)
I stuck a scrap of card with white crackle on it across the bottom of the card and then stamped the background randomly with a Tim Holtz bingo stamp in poppy red Impress Ink and black StazOn.  I also stamped some Inkadinkado flourishes in red around the edges.  I added a small bottle cap from my stash with a small circle of red paper inside, which I sealed in with Glossy Accents and gold Stickles.

I added lots of small Prima flowers by folding them and shaping them around the bottle cap, and added some Crate Paper Random alphas from the February Scrapagogo kit.  I did a bit of doodling around the letters and the edge of the card with black and white Posca pens too :)

I'd just like to signpost you to yesterday's post by Julie if you missed it (you can see it here) - it's a great cause and certainly worth finding out more about :)

Thanks for visiting today!  Have a great weekend :)

Gayle xx

Collage cards

This week I have some collage style cards to share with you - this is a great way of using up leftover scraps of paper, especially if you can use a common colour to pull it all together.

For the first card I used a Tim Holtz die cut candlebra layered on top of a doily and some scraps of papers, with some tissue tape and a few small oddments from my stash.  I wanted to use white/cream with browns and reds here.

For the second card I used cream and green with some orange accents; I also stamped some swirls in gold ink on both cards as this seemed to fill out the background a little more.

I am very much loving butterflies on my cards at the moment!  It seems to add a little something extra that they stand out from the page like they just fluttered out of a book and onto the card :)

Happy scrapping everyone!

Gayle xx

Thank you Mickey!

 I was looking for a simple design to repeat on several thank you cards to send out to our family and friends after our wedding, and really liked the circular patterns on this button mask by Creative Expressions.

which I felt matched well with the roundness of the Mickey shape (our wedding was at Disneyworld so the invites also had this shape on them).  I sponged Poppy Red Impress ink onto the card through the mask and punched out circles of black card in two different sizes for the Mickey shape.

When I also found a curved 'thank you' stamp in my stash I loved the way it seemed to curve around Mickey's ear!  I stamped the words using black StazOn.

I added some gold Stickles to the buttonholes to give it some sparkle and I'm ready to go!  It was easy to do a batch of these to send off quite quickly and I just had to leave the Stickles to dry.  Now I just have to pick a nice picture of the wedding to pop in the card for our guests that weren't able to share our special day - that'll be the hard part! :)

Happy scrapping

Gayle xx

Card Set

 Hello, Diana here to share a card set I made on NSD, I was on a roll making cards that day.

 

The design is very simple; I used craft cards and rounded the corners

The doilies are from Maya Road, also craft. To make the flowers I used my Heart Punch, and added an American Crafts Flair to the middle.

And to finish I tied some twine and added the sentiment decorated with a pearl or gem.

Best Wishes for the week, till next time.

=Di

World Card Making Day

Saturday was World Card Making Day and I got some inspiration from the Pink Paislee DT, unfortunately all my pink paislee paper is already packed in boxes because we are moving soon, so I was not able to participate in the challenges, but I decided to play along anyway because I liked what the talented DT made.

This was inspired on a color challenge by Danielle.

Like that Chevron pattern? She posted a tutorial HERE

My next card was for the stitching challenge by Roree. I used a Maya road Kraft Doilies and chipboard shapes from October Afternoon 5 & Dime.

Karola shared two templates to make Shaped Cards. The paper is from Basic Grey’s Out of Print collection and the butterfly from Tattered Angel.

This card has a beautiful Color Combo that I would have never thought of putting together, posted by Michelle from an image she found on Pinterest.

Where did you spend WCD? link your cards here so we can go see :)

Hope you all have a great day!

=Di

Two Cards

Hello, today I am sharing two cards I made using Melissa Frances Flashcards.


For the first card I used a tag and papers from 7 Gypsies Avignon and Washi Tape from Hambly Studio.

The second one is a birthday card; I used papers and embellishments from October Afternoon’s 5 & Dime.

I hope you all have a great week, till next time!

=Di

August birthdays

It seems that I know a lot of people with birthdays in August, including my own! The Wizard of Oz is one of my favourite favourite films (since I was 3 years old apparently!) and for a little while now I've had a pad of the new Graphic 45 Wizard of Oz paper (8x8) burning a hole in my scrappy supplies!

As this card is for a friend I loved this image of the Scarecrow and Tinman together, and the gorgeous warm yellows in the main image and the background paper so I accented this with some Jillibean Soup 'Beanstalks' twine and some Prima Essentials 'Jack and Jill' flowers (believe it or not I didn't see the names of the designs until after I had put the card together!).

I added some Mustard Seed Distress Ink around the edges, a Dymo caption and some brads from my stash and felt this was a perfect summer birthday card :) happy birthday to all those celebrating in August! :)

Gayle

A little gift for the man in your life...

This is actually a father's day gift but I couldn't share with you earlier due to some camera problems! I think something like this would make a cute gift for a birthday, father's day, or even a thank you gift (change text as appropriate!).

The journal has a grungeboard cover, coloured with Distress inks and sealed with Mod Podge; I added some travel-themed stickers from my stash (I think they're by SEI). I also added part of a card clockface (Tim Holtz) just because I like it!

The card was also made using a Tim Holtz die-cut for the black cog silhouettes, with cogs stamped in gold ink on the background and the caption added using a Dymo label-maker.

I do sometimes find it hard to make something masculine that I'm happy with (I am addicted to adding flowers to most things!) but was quite happy with this, although when I find my black StazOn I want to grunge up that cover a little ;)

Happy Friday!!

Gayle xx

Ssh! Can you keep a secret?

I hope you don't mind, but my project to share with you today is... my wedding invitations! I know that with summer coming there will be a lot of weddings coming up, and mine is no exception! Ours will be more towards the end of the summer (beginning of September) but as we'll be going to Disneyworld in Florida I've got my fingers crossed for some great weather (in the morning at least!).

I've been working on these off and on for some time now, and although they may look quite simple I can guarantee you that it was suggested several times by my nearest and dearest that they should have been simpler!

I'll start with the invites themselves (I also made RSVP cards although at this point I already know most of my guests will be coming!).

I chose cream for the background card as it seemed more bridal (and less stark than the white) and embossed with a Tim Holtz/Sizzix swirls embossing folder. I cut out a background shape in red cardstock, and the words 'Happily Ever After' on plain cardstock, using the Storybook Cricut cartridge. I wanted the words 'Happily Ever After' to be written in gold but couldn't find card or paper that I was happy with the colour of, so ended up painting each one twice in gold acrylic paint (with the help of a very generous friend!). I cut out one big circle and two smaller ones from black cardstock using hole punches, and stuck these together into the shape of Mickey Mouse, with a trail of gold Stickles to make it look like a balloon. I tied the inner sheets into the card using red ribbon and tied a bow to make it look more decorative. If you like Disney, there are lots of Disney fonts available to download for free on the internet (I wrote mine in red and black ink!).

And here's the finished article!

The RSVP cards were much simpler! I had a circular RSVP stamp which was about the same size as one of Mickey's 'ears' so decided it would be just perfect to use this as the other 'ear'! I stamped the RSVP in black StazOn ink and then added a larger black cardstock circle and a smaller one to make it look like Mickey. I used small scalloped cards in the same cream colour as the main invitations.

And here are the two together! If you're tempted to try making your own my advice would be to play with a few designs until you find something simple that you really love! On reflection it would have been easier to theme the invites along the design of my RSVP cards, but I didn't start working on them until after I completed the invites, so maybe start there! Also, enlist the help of friends if you can - it was taking me forever to paint things in the shade of gold that I wanted and it was no end of help when a friend offered to help me out ;)

I'm hoping to get as many hand delivered as possible but will certainly be enlisting the groom's help as I'm doing some long shifts at the moment ;) hope you like them! Please excuse the photos, I haven't managed to be home much during daylight hours(!) but I hope you can see the idea :)

Happy Friday and happy scrapping ;)

Gayle xx