Happy New Year Take 2

I have taken a few weeks break from crafting to celebrate first Christmas and then the New Year with family and friends, back to work this week and so I just managed to squeeze in some crafting at the weekend. It always takes a while to get back into the swing of things, I find, but I knew what I wanted to craft and this card is already winging its way to its recipient...hope she likes it! It's for the first challenge of 2016 at CAS Colours and Sketches

I found a template for this fold in my crafting stash, which got a good clear out over the holiday. It is made from one sheet of A4, folded into quarters, then two of the edges are folded over again and a cut made half way up the centre fold. The card cleverly folds over to create the three layers in the corner, hope you can see what I mean in the bottom photograph.

I used my Pennant punch and some coordinating papers to make a banner, to which I have stuck some 3D numbers. I layered up the large Nd small pennants from the punch to add depth to my bunting and used grey and white twine to make the string.

In one corner I have added more DP and I finished the card with a row of "hello" stamped in the three challenge colours

I hope I can remember how to make this card again, it's such a clever fold which can still stay true to the idea of clean and simple. 

Butterflies And Grunge

Five weeks in July means that it's the double challenge at CAS Colours and Sketches. I've scheduled this post since I am on holiday this week with my other half, at the coast in Morocco, but I had fun with this one before I left, such a classic CAaS design

I don't very often use butterflies, not sure why, but this time I went all out, using a couple of stamp sets, Papillon Potpourri and Backyard Basics, to which I added Gorgeous Grunge and Pennant Parade. As you can see I have turned the sketch and used a square card blank and I moved the sentiment to the banner. I was going to add a sentiment in the bottom corner but it looked too busy, I guess because my butterflies and grunge are larger than the sketch suggests.

A close up shows that the one banner is stamped whilst the other was stamped and cut out before being popped up on foam pads. I have to confess that my green, ink and mat, are Gumball Green, not Wild Wasabi as I don't own the latter, but I think it matches the challenge close enough, after all we don't insist on Stampin Up colours at all, 

Tumbling Leaves

Lots of you out there have already discovered the card sketch challenges at Mojo Monday but it wasn't until yesterday that I visited their blog for the first time and immediately became a follower! So, I'm entering in my first Mojo Monday sketch challenge, and I'm certain it won't be my last.  Here is this week's sketch

 I've also used a little bit of inspiration from the DT over at Addicted To CAS, as I loved their cue word

So, here's my card

I usually make square cards, but I have been playing around with other formats recently and I though this sketch would look best kept in it's original rectangular form. You can't see so well but the circle is embossed with Stampn' Up's cloud embossing folder. The leaves, which re the most gorgeous stickers I've ever seen, are 'tumbling' down on the acetate banner, which I've edged with red glitter. The dotty theme of the clouds is picked up by the DP and the red twine bow complements the autumn feel.  The sentiment was the hardest decision, as I didn't want anything too big to detract from my acetate banner, so I finally chose the small Thank U from Pennant Parade

Baby Pink Silk

It's a new month and it's Tuesday so here's a new challenge for you from the DT at Technique Time Tuesday. It's called Faux silk and it is really easy and fun to do.  There is an easy to follow video tutorial here and you can use it with a whole range of styles, as you will see from the DT samples.  I chose clean and simple ( no surprise there then!) and a baby card.  Here are a couple of pictures

I used the faux silk technique to create the banners, using the pennant Punch, I really like the crinkly look you get with this effect.  I stamped the gold butterflies and added a twine ribbon. I always think that these Swiss dots, embossed, are perfect for a baby card, and the 'Congratulations' is from Sassy Salutations.
Four little baby pink gems,a 'baby' pennant and a baby pink mat complete my card.

Fish

It's really nice to see Make My Monday challenge blog back again after their break for the Christmas holidays.  Their first challenge for 2013 asks for  work featuring dry embossing and I was stuck thinking what embossing folder to use.  Then I had a bit of a brainwave and decided to make my own! I used the die cut I wanted to feature and cut it out of cereal box card several times.  I stuck all of these down onto another piece of card from the cereal box, layering up one or two to get different thicknesses,  and made my own folder! In case you don't believe me, here it is!

homemade embossing folder

 This little chap is a Cuttlebug die, simply called Fish. I then used it in the normal way through my BigShot machine. I matted and layered the embossed panel onto two colours of CS and then cut out more fish in the same colours, sticking them over the embossed ones. It's difficult to make fish look cute but I think the addition of the little one helps.The ABC Challenge is also featuring E for Embossing so I have popped it in the challenge there too

The other fish have little pale green pearl eyes and I thought it was an appropriate sentiment (it's from Pennant Parade)! I couldn't wait to take the photo in day light so the embossing is kind of hard to see. It is, I am sure you will agree, very CAS, possibly LIM so I am going to enter it in the  challenge at 'abc' challenge for a clean and simple card.

Sun

I just found a new challenge blog- Casology where they put up a cue card and off you go! The cue card for this week said 'Sun'.Well, we've seen so little of it I was inspired to make this warm, jungle/oriental one layer card. I stamped and coloured the parakeets and then masked them whilst I brushed in the sun, using my Big and Juicy Sunset ink pad.  The bamboo is made with my Promarkers, leaving each stroke on for a second to make the joints in the stems. A little Hello sentiment from the SU Pennant parade set and it's all finished, very quickly! A true 5 minute card.

Midsummer Night's Dream

A fairy among the dragonflies is my take on this week's Make My Monday theme.  I have had this beautiful paper from K and Company in my stash for a while but the fairy stamp was a recent impulse buy. I have made a tent fold card, cutting the aperture to recess the fairy, who I stamped and coloured and added glitter to her wings .  I cut out some of the dragonflies so they look like they are flying around the fairy, adding some Glossy accents to make them a little bit more dimensional (although you can't tell from the photograph -typical!). The  sentiment comes from SU's Pennant Parade. The tiny dragonflies are brads.

Jubilee?

This card may look like a Jubilee card but it's actually for my sister-in-law, who is celebrating a big birthday next week (no prizes for guessing which one!).  She lives in the Netherlands so I thought she would like a bit of British cheer for her special day. I used Real Red and Indigo Island to ink the panel and then stamped and embossed the London images when the panel was dry. I made the bunting using Pennant Parade stamps and punch combo. The twine is from my stash and is a bit 'hairy' but I think it does the job nicely. The sentiment is also Stampin' Up- Outline Occasions.  The border is washi tape, something which I recently discovered whilst blog-hopping.

I would like to enter my card in Dynamic Duos challenge and the one stop craft challenge this week. I hope that you all have a fabulous time celebrating the Jubilee and that your street party or fete is not washed out!