Bear Hugs

Good morning all, today is my very special nephew's 23rd birthday. Yes Jude's youngest is now 23. Gosh that must make her really really old 😜. Anyway, this is the card I am sending him, as hugs, especially Panda hugs, play a very special part of Joe's childhood, so he will appreciate it. 

The cute Panda and Koala are from the Simon Says Stamp Cuddly Critters Set. I heat embossed them with white embossing powder and then shaded them slightly with a white pencil, a Versamark pen and clear Wink of Stella.

I cut them out with their matching dies, and used an MFT background die to cut the yellow 'sun and rays' layer.

I then went for a plain white backing card and a black note card.

As I couldn't find a stamp to say what I wanted, I whipped this one up on the PC. Very simple, a black circle with white text and then cut it out with a 1 1/4 inch EK Success circle punch.

I raised the bears and the sentiment on foam pads, and then added a few black and silver sparkle enamel dots to finish it off.

Hope you like it, and Happy, Happy Birthday Joe.

Take care and I'll see you soon.

xxx

In full bloom

Can you believe it's Thursday already?

I'm back with another Mother's Day card but I didn't send this one to my Mum. I might save it for next year ;)

I saw a similar card on Altenew and loved the idea, so had to replicate it.

My version uses the Dahlia Blossom set.  

I stamped it in Versamark onto pale kraft card and clear embossed.

I love the tonal look this achieves.

The bloom sentiment is from the same set but the Mother's Day one is from Avery Elle.

I cut my panel with a stitched rectangle die and added it to a standard note card.

Hope you like it.  TTFN Jude xx

Bunny Love

Good morning all, I hope you are having a good week. Today's card is another that I made for Mother's Day at the weekend. I tried a new technique that Jennifer McGuire had released a video about last week, and it worked out OK.

That cute bunny is from the Some Bunny set from Uniko stamps. This was another of the sets that I was lucky enough to win in an Instagram giveaway. 

I stamped the image with Versamark ink and then heat embossed it with white embossing powder, on to a dark purple card. Then I used my Spectrum Noir white pencil, a Versamark ink pen and Wink of Stella Clear sparkle pen to add the accents to the image.

I'm certainly no artist, but I do think it ended up OK, but if you have the Prismacolor pencils, it may blend a little better for you.

The panels and sentiment were cut out with Tonic Studios Scalloped Rectangle dies, and the sentiment is from the Avery Elle City Celebrations set. I again stamped it with Versamark and heat embossed in white.

I used a plain white note card and added the image by raising it up with fun foam. Then I added a darker border around the image using my Versamark and Wink of Stella pens.

Hope you like it, take care and I'll see you soon.

xxx

Purple Dahlias

Hello again.

Today I have the first of the cards I made for Mother's Day.

The stamp is Altenew's Dahlia Blossom.  This is a layering stamp and I used just the first 2 layers.

The colours are lavender fields and deep iris for the flowers with forest glades and evergreen on the leaves.

The sentiment is from a set Jen bought recently - City Celebrations from Avery Elle - which I white heat embossed on purple card stock.

I used the same card to make a 4.25 x 5.5 blank for my panel.  I finished off the card with some clear drops.

Hope you like it.  TTFN Jude xx

Mothers Day Flowers

Good morning all, I hope you had a lovely weekend, and for those of you that are mums, mummies, moms, mothers, mamma's or whatever other name you are known by - I hope you had a very happy mothers day. 

I had a lovely weekend and was very spoilt. On Saturday the 'mummies' in our family were treated to a delicious afternoon tea by my son and daughter-in-law, who arranged it all the way from Cambodia! Then on Sunday, everyone gathered at ours for a delicious Sunday lunch cooked by my husband Alan. 😋 Needless to say a thoroughly enjoyable but not exactly slimming friendly weekend lol. 😉

Anyway, on to the card. As you can see this card is using that gorgeous Fresh Freesia stamp again from Altenew. Apologies that the pics look a little hazy, but can you believe that is sunshine??? I know, in March. I only realised how hazy they were when I uploaded them to the PC !!!!

I stamped the image using Archival ink and then watercoloured with Zig Clean Colour markers. This time trying to replicate the lovely soft purple freesia that has the hint of yellow in the middle, which I think is the colour that mum had in her bridal bouquet.

I stamped one of the sentiments from the Freesia set directly on to the card panel. Then I stamped the Mothers Day greeting using the Avery Elle City Celebrations set, and Grape Jelly Memento ink, on to a plain piece of card and cut it out using an MFT Stamps Stitched Banner die.

I used stitched rectangle dies by Crealies, to cut out the white panel, and the purple background and then mounted the front with fun foam to raise it up.

Then I added the whole thing to a mid-green card base and it was all finished.

Hope you like it, mum did. Take care and I'll see you soon.

xxx

Sweet Treats

Happy Friday!!  

I've got the last of the SSS February card kit makes to share with you today.

This was the simplest card of all to make.  It is literally one sheet from the paper pack, cut to size and added to a kraft card blank!

As the card was so easy I decided to add some shimmer pen to all the little cakes and drinks.

I also added glossy accents to the glass domes and milk bottle.

I thought this made it a little more interesting.  What do you think?

I'm hoping to get some crafting time this weekend, but with two Mother's Day celebrations and losing an hour with the clock change, I'm not sure it will happen!

Fingers crossed I'll be back next week with something nice to share with you.  

Until then, TTFN Jude xx

You are amazing

Good morning all, I hope you are having a good week. I'm off to have the root touch up today, you know to cover the twinkly bits that I'm still in denial about. Thinking about going grey all over so that it just blends in lol.

Anyway, today's card was an experiment with a new stamp set and some of those new  Distress Oxide Inks by the very clever Tim Holtz.

I was very lucky to win an incredibly generous giveaway on Instagram from the lovely Beverley at Uniko stamps, 6 stamp sets!!! So today's card is made using one of those.

I stamped the Fun Flowers set from Uniko, randomly on a piece of Kraft card. Then I blended, Wilted Violet, Spiced Marmalade, Fossilized Amber, Broken China, Cracked Pistachio and Worn Lipstick distress inks all over the top.

These inks blend so easily, they are absolutely gorgeous, and beautiful colours too. Then I went all over the design with my Spectrum Noir Glitter Shimmer pen in clear. I'm not sure the camera has picked up the sparkle all that well but believe me it does look lovely.

The sentiment is from a WPlus9 set called That is All, and I finished it off by sticking the panel to a deep purple card blank.

Hope you like it, take care and I'll see you soon.

xxx

Latte love

Hello again.

I'm back with another simple card made with February's SSS card kit.

One of the good things about these kits is that the papers can do a lot of the work for you.

In this instance  I used a background paper, a strip from a sheet containing lots of sentiments and just one stamped image.

I coloured the image with Copic markers in colours to match the papers.

I then added some shimmer pen to the coffee cup and popped it up on foam squares.

I cut a fish tail in the end of the sentiment strip and added that with foam squares also.

Hope you like it.  TTFN Jude xx

Fresh Freesia

Good morning all, I hope you are having a good week. Well after weeks of missing mojo, I finally think I am getting a spark back. I did manage to complete 2 cards this weekend, with the help of a new Altenew stamp set called Fresh Freesia.

I love how simple and pretty this stamp is, and it comes with a few different sentiments so you can use whichever is most appropriate.

For this card I stamped the flower and greeting on watercolour card and then coloured it with Zig Clean Colour markers. I brought up pictures of freesia on line to get some colour combos from, and I loved the red and yellow ones, and I think the watercolour gives them a nice soft look.

I added a piece of seldom used Washi tape down one side and mounted the panel onto a deep red card blank.

Then I just added a few orange and red sequins to finish it off. 

Hope you like it, take care and I'll see you soon.

xxx

SSS February card kit

Monday again.  Where is the time going?

This weekend I finally got around to using the February card kit from Simon Says Stamp.

This month it features lots of tea and coffee themed papers, stamps and embellishments

I decided to use this fabulous quote from Eleanor Roosevelt, paired with the tea bag image.

I used MFT blueprints set 13 to cut the patterned paper and the two banners, before stamping my image and sentiment.  I coloured these with Copic markers.

I think this would be great encouragement for a girl friend who's having a tough time.  What do you think?

TTFN Jude xx