Purple Star

Hello from NY C! Just remembered that I needed to post this card forThe Male Room and I went on holiday without doing it. So, this is going to be short! The theme for our new challenge is Stars and of course it needs to be for a male. I made this card with my son, Fred, in mind. He just passed his A Levels, the final exams in school, and has been accepted to study Bioveterinary Science at Liverpool University. It was touch and go as he has not been well for the last six months or so and I am so happy for him, that he has achieved the next stage of his goal, so the sentiment is perfect.

The idea for the card comes from a fellow DT member at 52 CCT and you can see it as a Christmas card. I thought it would work well for this occasion and so this is unashamedly cased from Patricia, at Thinking Of Inking with permission, of course.

Mistletoe and Wine

Remember the Christmas song by Cliff Richard, Mistletoe and Wine? well, that's the inspiration for our cards at 52 {Christmas} Card Throwdown, chosen by Gill, hop over to her blog and she will explain why.
For my card I combined two mistletoe images in a square design, keeping the card monochromatic by using lucky Limeade for all the stamping. One image is from Easy Events stamp set, the other is a freebie. I used a darker shade of green for the mat, and scored a frame around the two white squares. I added pearl berries to one of the sprigs.

"So, where is the wine?"  I hear you say. 

Well, I left it for the inside of my card. Using the same ink and a masking technique I stamped a couple of glasses and a sentiment from the set Happy Hour.

Do have a look at the cards on the challenge blog, and now we are into August, remember Christmas is only four months away. better get started on those cards!

Foaming Horse

Same stamp, different card, this time a CAS card for the sketch challenge at CAS Colours and Sketches.  Here is the sketch for this week





And my card.....

I used Work of Art stamps from Stampin Up, teamed with the horse from the Revolution set from Visible Image Stamps and Lost Lagoon ink to make the background, ensured a pin sharp image with Stayzon black ink and used Matt silver and Lost lagoon card stock for the matting and layering. The border on the horizontal panel is some black lacey washi tape.

Come to the Circus

Roll up, roll up! I had some inspiration this morning, kindly provided by Make My Monday, to create a card based on a circus theme. I don't own any circus stamps but I recently found a new (to me) stamp company called Visible Image. They are based quite close to me, in South Wales and I've been blown away by their Inkcognito  range of stamps. I saw them at my trip to the Great British Craft Festival at Stoneleigh at the weekend. I had a great time there, browsing and of course buying a few 'essential' items! Using the colour palette from The Paper Players,

which fits with the theme perfectly, I think, I made this card

I used two DPs from Stampin' Up that reminded me of circus and were in Calypso Coral and yellow, near to Hello Honey. I used the two inks to blend the background for my Inkcognito Revolution horses, which I masked and stamped off in black, as is I don't have a grey ink. I love the 'ticket' stamped onto pink Blushing Bride card, so much that I made a spare and popped it up. The horses could be jumping through fire, very circus, although this is not the theme for the stamp set they come from. The sentiment is another from Stampin Up. There are a few small pink gems to add glitz along with the fleur de lys image which tie in nicely. I was fun to craft for a few challenges today.

Soft and Creamy

Week two of Christmas in August and at 52 {Christmas} Card Throwdown we have a soft and creamy colour challenge for you to play with

I almost never combine cream and white, neither do I like mixing metallics so this was a difficult challenge for me to get my head around, but I am really pleased with the way it turned out, once I got started (with a little help from a friend!)

This is not a holiday stamp at all, but heat embossed in white on a cream card it takes on a frosty feeling, highlighted with tiny dashes of gold and silver glitter, The sentiment is a silver peel-off, which I also used last week, as are the tiny gold stars. I'm going to link up to Completely Christmas where anything goes.

Hearts and Stripes

It's August, and I will be taking my annual trip to the USA soon. I was reminded of this when I saw the colours for this week's challenge at CAS Colours and Sketches

I had in mind to do a Stars and Stripes card, as I've pinned a few lately, but it just didn't happen. This did..

Although I have stuck to the two colours, I have stamped off to create lighter shades. The Work Of Art stamp set is going to be my new BFF, I think. I cut out the hearts and have popped them up on foam pads at different heights. The DP I've used had cream hearts and so I coloured those in with my marker pen to keep with the colour palette. Not added a sentiment yet, as I'm not quite sure what occasion I will use it for.

Pink for Men!

A new challenge at The Male Room this morning and it's a colour challenge, with a difference. This fortnight we want to see masculine projects with pink....yes, pink!
I hope that noone will be offended by my sunny days inspired card. I asked my husband and my oldest son, who is 18, if they would be happy to receive a card like this and they both said an emphatic yes, so for me it passed the masculine test. It is a double sided card, as you can see

Once freestyling the shaped card and cutting out the bikini, I stamped a couple of tattoos on my beach babe and added a sentiment in the form of a necklace. Very quick and easy to make, certainly attention-grabbing and, I think, loads of fun. Must admit to seeing the idea on the internet, so it is not original, but my take is all my own.
Have a go yourself at making a card featuring pink for a male relative or friend. Can't wait to see if there are any more bikini cards out there!

Using papers

I do hope you enjoyed the blog hop, last month at 52 { Christmas } Card Throwdown, it was lovely to have so many visitors to my blog and lots of people made cards for a chance to win a prize. Back to normal now, with our weekly challenges and as ever we start the month with a sketch. All of August's challenges have been set by Gill  and here is the first one

For me, the sketch made me want to play with some of my newest papers, all beautifully colour coordinated , from a set called Jewels...such gorgeous colours. I have also used silver mirri card for the matting and my snowflakes are polymer stickers. I have moved the sentiment to along the longest banner because it was too busy in amongst the spots.