Challenge time

Sunday means a new challenge at One Stitch At A Time and this week it's one of our most popular themes - Use a Digi. So easy to enter and play along - just use a digi element (stamp, paper, whatever) in your creation. :)

 

This week I am using this sweet yet sassy I'm Know Im Cute image by Reece's Scrap Pieces:

 

 

I coloured her with my Promarkers and cut her out and then I was (again! :D) inspired by this week's doodling challenge at Passion for Promarkers.

 

 

So I decided to doodle a background scene for her. I went with a city street scene:

 

I drew it with a fineliner pen straight onto a plain white card blank. To add a bit of interest to the background, and link it with the image, I included a few little butterflies and coloured them pink to match her clothing:

 

 

When I was happy with the background, I attached my cut-out image using foam pads to make her pop from the background a bit. :)

 

 

You don't have to use a Stitchy Bear product to enter the challenge but if you do you'll be in with a chance of winning our main prize for the week. Entries not using a Stitchy Bear product will be entered into the draw to win a $3 gift voucher for the Stitchy Bear Digi Outlet. :)

 

I'm also entering this card into the following challenges:

Passion for Promarkers - Doodlelicious

One Stop Craft - Anything Goes

Our Creative Corner - Anything Goes

Speedy and Friends - Window

Sweet Stampin' - Doodles

Simply Create Too - Anything Goes

Sister Act Card Challenge - Anything Goes

Wags n Whiskers - Anything Goes

Creatalicious Challenges - For The Girls

Little Blue Button Stamps Blog - Create a Scene

My Heart Pieces - Anything Goes

 

Getting Krafty

I've been seeing quite a lot of white embossing on coloured card in the online crafty-verse lately and it's a technique I was keen to try. I made this card (itself based off a card I found on Pinterest) and loved the effect and had the idea that white embossing might look lovely on a kraft-coloured card, with perhaps some delicate colouring of the image.

 

So that's exactly what I did:

 

 

I thought this striking Repose image by Brigid Ashwood would be perfect for this technique and I love how she looks embossed and coloured this way.

 

 

I stamped her using Versamark ink and heat embossed with white embossing powder and then added some delicate colouring using Prismacolor pencils. I kept things fairly simple with my card (I seem to be on a bit of a simple, unfussy kick at the moment), deciding the image would look best layered against cardstock of the same colour - I dry embossed this piece of card with an embossing folder and then layered that onto a card blank made from blue card.

 

 

I finished things off with some small flowers punched from blue card, decorating the centres with Enamel Accents and tiny metal cogs. I think the overall effect, with the contrast of the kraft and blue and the bright white of the embossing, is quite striking. :)

 

 

You can buy this stamp in red rubber format from the Sweet Pea Stamps store.

 

Think Pink

It's an Anything Goes challenge at the Dilly Beans challenge blog this week but with a twist... you have to use a Dilly Beans image. Fine by me cos I looove Megan's fabulous digi stamps. :D

 

 

I went with a wee bit of a pink theme, as you may have noticed. ;)

 

I chose to use this adorable Flower Girl image and coloured her with my Promarkers in pretty shades of pink, with a bit of blue for contrast:

 

 

I kept the card fairly simple with a panel of pink card embossed with a dotty pattern. I cut out the image and framed it with a pretty die-cut frame:

 

 

I finished things off with layered lace and satin ribbon and a few gemstones:

 

 

Pretty in pink, I think? :)

 

In the Moodle for a Doodle

I was really quite taken with this week's "doodlelicious" challenge theme at Passion for Promarkers. I do like to doodle and draw, and doodling on a card can look fabulous.

 

I decided to combine the doodling challenge with the new "Anything Goes" challenge at A Day for Daisies and used this stunning ADFD digi stamp:

 

 

I coloured the image with my Promarkers and fussy cut around it:

 

I then cut a piece of white card slightly smaller than my card blank and used fineliner pens to outline sections and then filled them in with flowery doodles:

 

 

I attached my doodled background to the card blank using foam tape, for a bit of added dimension...

 

 

...and then attached my cut-out image using foam pads to make it stand out that bit more from the background:

 

 

I'm really pleased with this. I think the doodled black and white background works really well with the colourful splash of the striking image. Am definitely going to be doing more doodled cards. :)

 

I've just realised....

...it's Friday already and I completely and utterly forgot about WOYWW this week. :/

 

It's been a crazy busy time lately. I've had a houseguest for most of the week (one of my best friends who had to move away to Scotland for her hubby's work a few years ago but who is now - hurrah!! - moving back to Yorkshire... in fact, that was the reason for her visit - househunting! :D) so I've had company in the evenings... which has been lovely,, but it's meant my craft room has been sorely neglected.

 

Not only that but I seem to have been running around like a mad thing every single day this week, dealing with not only the usual kiddy classes and pre-school run but deliveries of DD1's new bed and mattress, engineer appointments (to fix the suddenly noisy fridge-freezer), phone calls to chase DD2's hospital appointment that we'd still not received 6 months after she was referred, and the joys - oh, the inexpressible joys! - of having to deal with HMRC to get the year end completed and filed. Eep.

 

I'd say thank goodness it's nearly the weekend but hubby and I have got to build DD1's bed this weekend and I've planned to finish the redecoration of her room that I started months ago (including painting a princess mural on her wall!). Oh yeah, that reminds me, I've also had to fit in trips to B&Q this week for supplies.

 

And then, just to finish the week off perfectly, today is 5 years since my sister died. I know they say time heals all wounds but 5 years on it hurts as much as ever and, if anything, I miss her more than ever. :(

Think I'll try and get in the craft room tonight. It might do me some good.

Shabby Chic Little Curls

It's Variations Week again at Sweet Pea Stamps and all the Design Team are creating projects with the same image - this time around is this adorable Little Curls stamp by Elisabeth Bell.

 

 

I loved colouring this image. It's so sweet and it's looks just lovely when coloured in. I used my Prismacolor pencils to colour it - I'm enjoying these pencils more and more and feel like I'm starting to get the hang of them. They give such a soft, pretty effect when colouring an image like this.

 

 

I went for a kind of shabby chic vibe with this card. I started with a kraft card blank and ended up keeping things quite simple as I felt it worked really well with the image. I splatted some white Distress Stains onto the card front and let it dribble across the card before drying it. I then added a pretty white doily and layered a delicate die-cut frame over it.

 

 

I fussy-cut out the image and attached it with foam tape over the die-cut frame and finished things off with some pretty flowers.

 

 

This was a really quite quick and simple card but I think it's quite effective. You can buy this image in red rubber format from the Sweet Pea Stamps store.

 

Summer Sun

That's the theme this week at One Stitch At A Time so we want to see your bright, sunny colours and summery images. :)

 

My card features Hope Jacare's Bowl of Strawberries - and what could be a more summery image than a bowl of strawberries? It conjures images of sunny days, Pimms and Wimbledon. :)

 

 

I coloured the image with my Promarkers in sunny reds and greens and added highlights with a white gel pen.

 

 

I decorated my card with bright yellow and green papers and warm red cardstock, using a Sizzix Framelits die to cut the ornate frame. This die is a recent acquisition and I just love it - can't stop using it! :lol:

 

I attached the image on foam tape for a bit of added dimension and finished things off with some layered flowers...

 

 

...and layered butterflies (using my favourite and much, much, much-used Beautiful Wings embosslit die from Stampin' Up!):

 

 

You can enter the challenge using any products you like but if you enter using a Stitchy Bear product you will be entered into the draw to win our top prize of 3 Promarkers from our sponsor Creative Craft World. Entries not using a Stitchy Bear product have the chance to win a $3 gift voucher for the Stitchy Bear Digi Outlet.

 

I'm entering this card into the following challenges:

Colour Me Creative - Anything Goes
Crafty Calendar - Blooms and Blossoms
Our Creative Corner - Anything Goes
Crafty Catz - Anything Goes
Simply Create Too - Anything Goes
As You Like It Challenge - Favourite Die or Punch
My Heart Pieces - Anything Goes
Paper Crafting Journey - Anything Goes
Divas by Design - Anything Goes
Flutterby Wednesdays - Open
Penny's Paper-Crafty - Diecuts/Punches