It's Thursday and time for a new challenge over at TicTacToe! It's the turn of Team X to host this week and the lovely Vicky is our featured designer this week. This is the fun board that we are playing along with: 

So many lovely seasonal elements on Vicky's board this week! I went down the first column with leaves, autumn colours and twine and used the beautiful autumnal colour palette over at TGIF Challenges to create a clean and simple card with a little 'something old, something new' this week - take a look:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

Blended Autumn Colour - The TGIF colour palette so reminded me of autumn leaves and I thought this trio of colours would be perfect to create a simple blended ink background using the leafy stencil in the Abundant Beauty Decorative Masks - so I'm also sharing my card with AAA Cards this week. I applied each of the colours across my stencil randomly, being careful to blend them to avoid any harsh lines. I love the finished effect! These stencils are such great value for money - with 4 different creative options in each pack, they really can be used in so many different ways.

Envelope Detail - I am no stranger to a decorated envelope; my regular readers will be familiar with lots of different ways that I've shared to easily spruce-up the outside of your envelopes so I just had to play along with the current Inkspirational challenge to decorate your envelope to co-ordinate with your card. For today's envelope, I simply repeated the background stencilled pattern across the outer flap of my envelope - you can see it beneath my card in the photo above. So simple and a lovely hint of the detail inside too.

A Seasonal Saying - I chose to make the centrepiece of my card this beautiful quote from the retired 'Beauty of Tomorrow' stamp set - my 'something old' for today. This quote seemed to fit with the ombre blended background perfectly. I stamped it onto a label diecut with the largest of the rounded rectangles in the Nested Essential Dies set and added a twine bow and retired wooden leaf embellishment as a final decoration:

This card doesn't have as much 'white space' as I would like for a super-CAS card, but using a stencil is a great way to add a quick pop of colour to a card base. A larger sentiment panel might have allowed for a little extra white space, albeit resulting in me covering up some of that lovely ombre colour - you see my dilemma, right?!

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my Product and 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

A tictactoe board offers so many creative possibilities - how does this week's board inspire you? Why not have a go? We would love to see you in the gallery and who knows - you might be selected for Designer's Choice and be eligible to be a guest designer on a future challenge. 

Enjoy your day; the unexpected warmth at the start of the week has reverted now to temperatures more typical of this time of year, along with lots of rain in recent days and I am definitely starting to see more autumnal colour on the foliage as I'm driving around and about. I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

ABUNDANT BEAUTY DECORATIVE MASKS (10.00)	NESTED ESSENTIALS DIES (32.00)	BLENDING BRUSHES (13.00)	EARLY ESPRESSO CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (8.50)	CAJUN CRAZE CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (8.50)	PUMPKIN PIE CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (8.50)
LINEN THREAD (4.75)	VERY VANILLA C6 ENVELOPES (8.00)	VERY VANILLA A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (8.50)

It's Tuesday and time for a new challenge over at CAS Colours & Sketches. Vicky is hosting this month and for her last challenge of the month she has a great sketch challenge for us: 

Feel free to flip or rotate the sketch when making your card. For my card today I decided to pair the sketch with the colours over at Hand Stamped Sentiments to create a 'thinking of you' card, but must confess it wasn't entirely plain sailing! Initially I had created a completely different card for this challenge - then when I went to upload it on our Design Team page realised I had missed Vicky's reference to 'any non-geometric shape' - I will share that card another day - and back to the drawing board I went! I eventually came up with the following clean and simple card:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

Beauty Of Tomorrow - I reached for the 'Beauty of Tomorrow' stamp set as it has a collection of images in a variety of sizes, including the larger, feathery grass stem that I used on my Smoky Slate card base as the start of my design. I cut a label using my Seasonal Labels dies to which I added my sentiment and some ink splats, then added another seed stem and a bird, which I popped up on a dimensional for extra lift:

 I also used the same set to add a little decoration to the inside of my card:

A Lesson In CAS - I ended up making two cards today and thought I would share the reasons for that here with you, not least because we have a design team call out over at CAS Colours & Sketches this week so for anyone thinking they might like to join the team, it might prove useful! My regular readers will know that my 'go-to' style is generally clean and layered and one of the reasons I initially joined this team was with a view to honing my 'clean and simple' card making skills. I initially laid out the card you see above, but thought it looked a little plain, so I made another card - the one you can see below. Once complete, I no longer felt like it met the CAS brief; whilst there was still lots of 'white space', the additional layering, the coloured gems and diecut detail took this card beyond it. I still love it - and this is the card I'm sharing over at HSS - but I ended up making another card to my original design, the one you see above, and funnily enough once finished I decided I liked it much better than I had the first time around now that I had something else to compare it to - go figure! 

Take Two - Here is that second card! I added in an additional couple of layers, cutting up one of the large leaves from the die set to add interest to the border, along with more splats and coloured gems:

And here's another photo so you can see the extra colour that my subtle changes add: 

I hope you found reading about my trials in card making interesting and useful - our challenge is all about the 'clean and simple', although it can be easy to get carried away with the colours or sketch and forget this. You can see a photo of both cards together below - do you prefer one more than the other? Do leave me a comment - I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

As a reminder, for our colour challenges, you must use all of the stated challenge colours. You may also use neutral colours; however, the challenge colours should be the most noticeable ones featured on your card. We use Stampin' Up! color names for reference, but you are welcome to use any other companies' products as long as you match the challenge colours as closely as possible.

Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

BEAUTY OF TOMORROW BUNDLE (ENGLISH) (£46.75)	SEASONAL LABELS DIES (£35.00)	SMOKY SLATE A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	BASIC WHITE A4 CARDSTOCK (£9.00)	SMOKY SLATE CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)
RICH RAZZLEBERRY CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	MISTY MOONLIGHT CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	RHINESTONE BASIC JEWELS (£4.75)

Today I'm sharing a card using Jacqui's layout over at Freshly Made Sketches and the photo inspiration over at Just Add Ink:

Jacqui's sketch has a lovely open space and the colours on the leaves in the JAI inspiration photo are just beautiful! They were the very inspiration I needed to create a project I've been wanting to get to since my last card class - take a look:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

Merriest Frames - I'm such a fan of the Merriest Frames Embossing Folder and die set; whilst designed for Christmas, by changing up the colours and using a non-festive sentiment gives this frame a completely different look that stretches it across the seasons. It was also the perfect centrepiece for Jacqui's sketch! I also used it to add a touch of glamour to my envelope too.

Blended Autumn Leaves - I used a blending brush to add a collection of autumnal colours to my leafy frame and added a few small raindrop clear enamel dots in a nod to the photo. 

Beauty of Tomorrow - I showcased my favourite autumnal sentiment from the 'Beauty of Tomorrow' stamp set in the centre of my frame and added a small twine-tied diecut leaf embellishment to complete my card:

I really love this card! The frame is so lovely - a riot of blended autumnal colour.

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

MERRIEST FRAMES HYBRID EMBOSSING FOLDER (£36.00)	INTRICATE LEAVES DIES (£26.00)	BEAUTY OF TOMORROW CLING STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£20.00)	MERRY MERLOT A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	REGALS 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 CM) DESIGNER SERIES PAPER (£10.75)
VERY VANILLA A4 CARDSTOCK (£9.00)	MERRY MERLOT CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	RICH RAZZLEBERRY CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	PUMPKIN PIE CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	CRUSHED CURRY CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)
OLD OLIVE CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	SIMPLY ELEGANT TRIM (£7.00)

It's Thursday and time for a new challenge over at TicTacToe! It's the turn of Team X to host this week and I am the featured designer this week. This is the fun board that we are playing along with: 

I decided to go across the middle of the grid with leaves/thanks/shades of brown for a clean and simple card. I used the layout and layering idea from the CASE The Designer challenge over at Global Design Project and the colours over at Color Throwdown that are perfect for Autumn. I will also be linking up over at Addicted to CAS, having finally managed to create something suitably clean and simple befitting their Autumn codeword - take a look:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

Beauty Of Tomorrow - I love the large sentiment in the 'Beauty of Tomorrow' stamp set which sums up the changing seasons and advent of autumn beautifully I think so I had to feature this on the front of my card. Since this doesn't directly have anything to do with my middle square of 'thanks', I added one of my favourite stamps from the 'Well Defined' set to the inside of my card:

I love the idea of sending a card to someone thanking them for being part of my world, rather than as a show of gratitude for something someone did and this sentiment is so perfect for that.

Giving Gifts Autumn Leaves - I created a cascade of falling autumn leaves that I diecut from a piece of cardstock onto which I blended a selection of oranges and browns (see below) using the leaf die in the Giving Gifts Dies set. One of my blogging friends, the lovely Kim Singdahlsen of Joyful Creations with Kim, has made some fabulous cards with the dies in this set and was a total enabler when it cam to me puchasing these dies - I could resist no longer!  I particularly love the diecut detail on each leaf; I glued each of them on one half only, so that they could be gently folded upwards to add to the sensation of falling leaves - slightly easier to see on the angled photo below:

A Surprise Find - Finally, to add a little extra autumn-inspired detail to my card, I added some Grey Granite ink using a blending brush and an old stencil I found in my stash with a large knit pattern and faded it out from opposing corners. I am seeing some wonderful stencilling in the blogosphere lately, none more so than from my fellow Paper Player designer and CAS supremo the lovely Jaydee of Stampin! With Jaydee. She has a beautiful fine-knit stencil from The Greetery that she has been using lots lately and when I found this in my stash I thought it would be a good stencil to create a similar look and feel. This was also a good way to incorporate the soft, warm grey tones of the Color Throwdown palette. 

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my Product and 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

This is one of those cards that for all its simplicity seemed to take forever; it took a truck load of inspiration to get me there, but I must say I love the result and ended up making a few of these to send out to friends.

A tictactoe board offers so many creative possibilities - how does this week's board inspire you? Why not have a go? We would love to see you in the gallery and who knows - you might be selected for Designer's Choice and be eligible to be a guest designer on a future challenge. 

Enjoy your day; I do not know where this week has disappeared! I am still busy harvesting produce and I made another batch of raspberry jam yesterday. Today is oddly warm for this time of year, but still rather grey and it certainly doesn't feel like the return of summer that the weather forecasters promised! I'll be back soon with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

BEAUTY OF TOMORROW CLING STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£20.00)	GIVING GIFTS DIES (£29.00)	WELL DEFINED CLING STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£20.00)	BLENDING BRUSHES (£11.25)	VERY VANILLA A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (£7.75)
EARLY ESPRESSO CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	CAJUN CRAZE CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	PUMPKIN PIE CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	CINNAMON CIDER CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	GRAY GRANITE CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)

It's Tuesday and time for a new challenge over at CAS Colours & Sketches. Jenny's final challenge this month is a sketch challenge: 

Feel free to flip or rotate the sketch when making your card.

For my card today I decided to feature some designer series paper and went on the hunt for a pattern that lent itself to being split across three panels and accommodating a sentiment. This is where I ended up:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

This design in the Blackberry Beauty specialty designer series paper pack is one of my favourite designs and since all of the pattern is along the outer edges of the paper, it was perfect to cut down for a blank piece behind my sentiment and then two rectangles with pattern below. This paper has beautiful foil detailing, so I decided to add some gold foil mats to my rectangles and behind my sentiment. My 'thanks' is from the Word Wishes die for 'Thanksgiving' where I cut the 'giving' off the end. The dies aren't layered, so I created a gold mat for my diecut by gluing the Early Espresso diecut to gold foil, then carefully trimming around it with my paper snips to leave a layered border: 

The front of my card is stamp-free, so I added some stamping to the inside of my card to remedy that:

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

BLACKBERRY BEAUTY 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 CM) SPECIALTY DESIGNER SERIES PAPER (£14.00)

WORD WISHES DIES (EN) (£33.00)

BEAUTY OF TOMORROW CLING STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£20.00)

GOLD FOIL SHEETS (£4.75)

EARLY ESPRESSO A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)

Today it's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's the turn of the fabulous Ann to host this week and she has a fun colour challenge for you to work with:

Ann's colour palette this week is a wonderful palette of pinks and purples. I paired them with the current TGIF Challenges sketch layout and some of the most gorgeous papers from the seasonal catalogue - take a look:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

I couldn't wait to use the Blackberry beauty papers for today's card as it features all of Ann's chosen colours. I added Cinnamon Cider as my colour of choice and chose the really busy pattern that features owls and leaves for my central panel, with a trio of strips of the pattern that features on the reverse added to my Rich Razzleberry card base. I stamped my sentiment from the 'Beauty of Tomorrow' stamp set onto a label and added some gold shimmer ribbon and some gold enamel dots to finish:

The foil detailing on these papers really is beautiful. I also added some further decoration to the inside:

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my Product and 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Before you reach for your ink and papers, check out what our amazing team has created to inspire you this week:

You can see all of my 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Enjoy your day; I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

BEAUTY OF TOMORROW CLING STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£20.00)	BLACKBERRY BEAUTY 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 CM) SPECIALTY DESIGNER SERIES PAPER (£14.00)	GOLD 3/8" (1 CM) SHIMMER RIBBON (£7.50)	GILDED GEMS (£6.50)	RICH RAZZLEBERRY A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)
CINNAMON CIDER A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	BLACKBERRY BLISS CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	TASTEFUL LABELS DIES (£29.00)	GOLD FOIL SHEETS (£4.75)

Hurrah - my new laptop has arrived - normal blogging can now resume! Today I'm sharing a quick card that uses Jen B's fabulous sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches this week:

I'm also linking up over at Inkspirational and the Alphabet Challenge who are all about leaves, and autumn leaves in particular. I took Jen's layout and used that panel to feature one whole large sentiment, from the 'Beauty of Tomorrow' stamp set - take a look:

I covered my card front with some retired Nature's Poem designer series paper - I love those almost skeletal leaves in colours that change from green to rust. I added a piece of folded gingham ribbon tied with twine below my sentiment, along with a sponged embossed leaf trio as an accent:

I love the clean and fresh feel of this card, even though the colours are definitely reminiscent of cooler days and changing seasons.

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Enjoy your evening and I'll be back tomorrow with my project for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

BEAUTY OF TOMORROW CLING STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£20.00)	CAJUN CRAZE A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	CAJUN CRAZE CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£7.00)	PALE PAPAYA A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)	BASIC WHITE A4 THICK CARDSTOCK (£7.75)
FLOWERS FOR EVERY SEASON RIBBON COMBO PACK (£9.25)	BAKER'S TWINE ESSENTIALS PACK (£10.25)

Happy Monday everyone! Today I'm sharing a super clean and simple card for the following challenges:

The sketch over at InspireCreate was perfect for a clean and simple (CAS) card so I decided to grab a quick 10 minutes to create a card also inspired by the Addicted to CAS challenge of 'Nature' inspired by autumn colour and foliage - take a look:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

Now I know here in the UK we are enjoying the second day of what looks to be a 4 day mini heatwave, but I couldn't resist the rich blackberry tones of the Blackberry Beauty designer paper on my card today. I just love the jewelled tones of this paper and I paired it with one of my current favourite generic sentiments from the 'Beauty of Tomorrow' stamp set, which finishes on the inside of my card:

Isn't that just the nicest sentiment? I debated whether to reverse the paper and 'white space' on my card, but decided that the strip on the sketch was perfect for really highlighting the beauty of the paper and its gold foil detail - just look at those pretty acorns and oak leaves: 

This is a great standby design if your pressed for time and a good way to use up those leftover strips of paper we all have in our craft room too.

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Enjoy your day; mine's been a busy one, with pre-season football training this morning and a trip to buy new hiking boots in readiness for the next Duke of Edinburgh expedition amongst other things! At the rate at which teenage boys grow (or is it just mine?!) these have to be left until a few weeks before the hike; enough time to break them in, but not enough time to grow out of them!! I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

BLACKBERRY BEAUTY 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 CM) SPECIALTY DESIGNER SERIES PAPER (£14.00)

BEAUTY OF TOMORROW CLING STAMP SET (ENGLISH) (£20.00)

GOLD FOIL SHEETS (£4.75)

VERSAMARK PAD (£8.75)

METALLICS EMBOSSING POWDERS (£17.00)

BLACKBERRY BLISS A4 CARDSTOCK (£8.25)