Happy hump day everyone! Lots to do today so today's card is a quick one using this week's CAS(E) This Sketch:

I went super-simple on this one and more graphic than the loose lines of the sketch to make a simple notecard using the long pattern from the Flourish Dies paired with a simple sentiment from the co-ordinating Flourishing Phrases stamp set:

You know how much I will miss these dies and the Flourishing Phrases stamp set; they have had a good innings though, so I really can't complain too much. Great for simple cards like this though. I used colours from three different colour families but you could just use one colour family pack; this simple design is perfect for using up offcut scraps of card that you have lying around in any 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: 

Flourish Dies

Flourishing Phrases Cling-Mount Stamp Set

Night Of Navy Classic Stampin' Pad

Night Of Navy A4 Cardstock

Melon Mambo A4 Cardstock

Mint Macaron A4 Cardstock

Whisper White A4 Thick Cardstock

Today I have an extra card for you in addition to my Paper Players Design Team card (you can see that card here) as I'm sharing a card I made yesterday afternoon for the current Global Design Project challenge where they are doing a 'CASE The Designer' with this pretty tulip card by Janneke de Jong:

I loved the layout on Janneke's card and wanted to use it as the basis for a CASE'd card - here's what I came up with:

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

A Lesson in CASE - There are a number of different definitions in the crafting world for the term 'CASE' and the one that the GDP team uses is 'Copy and Selectively Edit'. So if you look at my card, it has a number of similarities to Janneke's card: yellow and white are the dominant colours, I used the same sketch layout along with a single floral stem and no sentiment. There are a number of differences though too - things I have changed to make this card my own. 

A Yellow Flourish - The first of these is my choice of florals. I went full-on yellow with my card and used the single stemmed floral from the Flourish Dies for my floral. I cut it twice from Daffodil Delight cardstock and glued them together to make a stronger floral as I was using it as my uppermost layer. I used the co-ordinating stampset, Flourishing Phrases, to decorate the envelope and inside of my card too; there are lots of great sentiments in this set so when I've decided what I am going to use this card for, I will add one to the inside if needs be. Here's a quick photo of the inside:

Ornate Florals - I kept the central Stitched Nested Label as per Janneke's original card and the yellow sponging around the edge on the layer beneath - this was probably my favourite thing about this card, I love the effect - and I embossed the white label too. I chose to use the new Ornate Floral 3D embossing folder for my detail - those little flowers compliment any kind of floral I think. Here's a closeup of the detail showing the layering and texture:

 I love yellow, especially on cards and flowers - this is the kind of card that makes me happy! 

 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. I'm also linking this card up with the team over at SUO Challenges where embossing is the theme - this time with dry embossing as my focus. 

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Whisper White A4 Cardstock	Flourish Dies	Daffodil Delight A4 Cardstock	Daffodil Delight Classic Stampin' Pad	Stitched Nested Labels Dies
Ornate Floral 3D Embossing Folder	Rhinestone Basic Jewels	Flourishing Phrases Cling-Mount Stamp Set

Good morning and happy Monday everyone! I am up and about and blogging nice and early today as I have a busy day and evening so need to be organised! Today I'm sharing a card using this week's colour challenge over at CAS Colours and Sketches that would also be perfect for our current challenge over at The Paper Players too:

As I had the 'Remarkable You' stamp set out on my desk for the second of my cards yesterday, it struck me that the above colour combo was perfect for those lovely arum lilies so I set about making today's card - take a look:

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

Making 'White Space' Blue - One of the principles of clean and simple design is to have plenty of 'white space' visible on your card. White space doesn't have to be white in colour though; in order for my design to work today, I wanted my white lilies to stand out and what better way than to place them against a bright blue Pacific Point coloured background? The blue plays a central role on my card with the other two colours adding just the merest hint of colour, whilst still allowing my card to feel CAS. 

Clean and Simple Paper Piecing - I stamped my lilies directly onto my card base and again onto Whisper White cardstock. I then fussy cut my white lilies, and after colouring the stems in Pear Pizzazz and adding some So Saffron highlights to my blooms with a blender pen, I paper-pieced them in place onto my card base. This is a great way to get all of the detail of the sketch-like outline whilst also ensuring the flowers stood out adequately against the blue background. A simple white embossed sentiment finishes the front of my card.

Words of Sympathy - These lilies make a beautiful sympathy card; one of my go-to sentiment sets for this type of card is 'Flourishing Phrases' -  this set has some wonderful and thoughtful sentiments, and no more so than for those sometimes tricky cards where words are never really enough. Here's the inside of my card - I love how the words fit with the shape of the flowers too:

I always find sympathy cards difficult to make to order so like to have a few on standby for when the need arises. I particularly like to use colour on my sympathy cards too, so this one definitely ticks all the boxes for me and will head to my card box for future use.

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:

Remarkable You Clear-Mount Stamp Set (£23.00)	Flourishing Phrases Clear-Mount Stamp Set (£33.00)	Pacific Point A4 Cardstock (£7.25)	So Saffron Classic Stampin' Pad (£6.00)	Pear Pizzazz Classic Stampin' Pad (£6.00)
Blender Pens (£10.75)	Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad (£5.50)	Whisper White A4 Cardstock (£8.25)	Versamark Pad (£7.75)	White Stampin' Emboss Powder (£4.50)

Happy Monday everyone, and for those of you in the UK a Bank Holiday too! Lots happening today - first things first, I'm sharing a card for the current Fusion challenge (photo inspiration) using this week's sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches:

I loved the look of the rainbow watercolouring of the inspiration photo so thought I'd have a go at this fun technique - take a look at my finished card:

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

Watercolour Rainbow - I masked off the circle shape in the sketch using a round post it on a piece of retired music note paper that I had in my stash and then using my aquapainter, allowed the colours to flow and bleed into one another and away from the masked area. It really wasn't tricky; the most important thing is to not over-blend the colours so that they remain true and don't end up all brown and muddy. The paper did warp a little, but I used Fast Fuse liberally to adhere it to my mat when dry and this seemed to do the trick.

A Sparkly Butterfly - I used my Butterfly Thinlits to cut out a simple butterfly in Basic Black cardstock and brushed it liberally with clear Wink of Stella. You can see a little of the shine in the photogragh, but believe me in real life this is super sparkly and looks great against the rainbow coloured background.

Just A Note - My sentiment is from the Flourishing Phrases stamp set - it seemed appropriate with the musical background paper! I added a Pumpkin Pie enamel shape heart for an added pop of colour against the black.

So a fun card that wasn't overly difficult to create and looks so very pretty in real life.

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. 

This is one of two posts today - you can read my second post regarding the early release of some great new Annual Catalogue product - the Eastern Palace Suite - here. 

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

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Butterflies Thinlits Dies	Basic Black A4 Cardstock	Very Vanilla A4 Cardstock	Aqua Painters	Clear Wink Of Stella Glitter Brush
Real Red Classic Stampin' Pad	Pumpkin Pie Classic Stampin' Pad	Crushed Curry Classic Stampin' Pad	Cucumber Crush Classic Stampin' Pad	Pacific Point Classic Stampin' Pad
Elegant Eggplant Classic Stampin' Pad	Bermuda Bay Classic Stampin' Pad	Flourishing Phrases Clear-Mount Stamp Set

Today I'm sharing a card for this week's new challenge over at CAS Colours and Sketches where I am the guest designer for the month of April. I shall be joining the lovely ladies on the CAS Colours and Sketches team and each Tuesday at 1pm GMT I will be publishing my post for the new challenge for the week. It's also perfect for the current SUO Challenge, where the theme is 'Sympathy and Caring'. This week it's a sketch challenge, my favourite:

 I decided to go with florals again this week and turned the sketch through 90 degrees as it fitted my sentiment better - take a look:

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

My card today features both the Flourishing Phrases stamps and co-ordinating Flourish Thinlits - I heat embossed the large flower with clear embossing powder onto my Basic Black background and added a framed sentiment, layered flower and border piece to ground them. A tricky one to photograph, but the shiny embossed background looks lovely in real life. I wouldn't usually choose black for a sympathy card, but it was perfect to allow my bright flower and border to 'pop'; the colour combination was inspired by a dress a friend of mine was wearing when I met up with her last week and I couldn't wait to use it on a card; sometimes inspiration strikes in the funniest places.

The Flourishing Phrases/Flourish Thinlits set is a great bundle that contains a little of everything: stamps, decorative and floral framelits and a whole bunch of sentiments suitable for many different occasions that work for both the outside and inside of your card. The good news is both the stamp set and framelits are on carryover into the new 2017-2018 annual catalogue; the 10% discounted bundle price however, is not. So if you want to benefit from this, you need to place your order for the bundle using the bundle code 142323 (clear mount) or 142322 (wood mount) before 31st May.

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. 

Before you reach for your ink and papers, check out what the rest of the team has created to inspire you this week. Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Flourishing Phrases Clear-Mount Bundle	Basic Black A4 Cardstock	Pumpkin Pie A4 Cardstock	Tempting Turquoise A4 Cardstock	White Perfect Accents
Basic Black Archival Stampin’ Pad	Whisper White A4 Cardstock	Versamark Pad	Clear Stampin' Emboss Powder	Embossing Buddy

Today I'm sharing a card for this week's challenge over at CAS(E) This Sketch which is also my second entry over at Less Is More this week:

Here's my card:

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

Diecuts and Layers - When designing my card, I couldn't decide whether to stamp my base layer and diecut the sentiment, as suggested by the sketch, or whether to work it the other way around. The great thing about a sketch is that it's a starting point and always open to interpretation. I eventually opted for the latter, stamping my sentiment on my absolute base layer of Smoky Slate and heat embossing it in white, then creating a diecut oval in my top layers to frame my sentiment and then decorate this with my Flourish Thinlit diecut flowers. 

A Heartfelt Sentiment - Stampin' Up! sells some great stamp sets that have religious sentiment at the heart of their design and whilst they aren't for everyone there are a number that have a good mix and can be appreciated whatever your preference. Flourishing Phrases is one of those sets: some wonderful words of sympathy and marriage congratulation alongside some of general greeting and thanks. They also come in two parts: the inside of today's card is stamped with the second part of the one shown above, which reads "so he made you" - perfectly appropriate for the intended recipient of today's card.

A Flirt With 'That' Pink - When choosing my colour combination today, I started knowing that I wanted to use white for my floral diecut and so needed to choose a colour for my base that would highlight my embossed sentiment and another that would both compliment it and show off my white florals. I decided to go with Flirty Flamingo for my card front 'white space'; this is one of those colours that I find can be a little harsh when stamped, especially on white (you can see if on the envelope beneath my card in the photo above) yet the cardstock has a wonderful rich, yet soft warm pink tone and compliments Smoky Slate beautifully. Feel free to save this colour combination if it's one that appeals to you 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 the rest of your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Flourish Thinlits Dies	Flourishing Phrases Clear-Mount Stamp Set	Flourishing Phrases Clear-Mount Bundle	Layering Ovals Framelits Dies	Flirty Flamingo A4 Cardstock
Smoky Slate A4 Cardstock	Whisper White A4 Thick Cardstock	Pearl Basic Jewels	Embossing Buddy	Versamark Pad
White Stampin' Emboss Powder

It's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's the turn of the super-sweet and talented Nance to host this week and she has a fun colour challenge for us to work with:

I absolutely love Nance's colour combination this week - so unusual! I considered a variety of things to do with my card - mostly floral - but decided to be brave and try something different: hot glue embossing. I used this week's sketch over at CAS(E) This Sketch as it had a perfect vertical panel for my design - take a look:

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

Hot glue embossing is a fun technique to combine with watercolouring. The idea is simply that you take your hot glue gun and 'draw' a pattern onto a piece of watercolour paper. Once set, you reheat the glue with your heat tool, sprinkle with embossing powder then reheat to set. I decided that I would draw a sunset with my glue gun, by creating the sun on the horizon and then some reflection and I heat embossed this with copper embossing powder.

I then used my aquapainter and Blushing Bride and Smoky Slate reinkers to colour my sky and water. I finished my card with a sentiment  from Flourishing Phrases, which I also heat embossed in copper. Finally I used a piece of copper foil to border my sentiment and watercoloured panel. 

This card is rather abstract for me, yet such fun to create and I think it makes a lovely sympathy card - I've been needing a few too many of these lately. So what do you think? Is this a technique you would like to try?

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:

I look forward to seeing what you create with this week's colour palette. Enjoy the rest of your weekend as it will be over all too quickly; we are attending a basketball match this afternoon with Ben captaining his team (hopefully to victory!) I'll be back tomorrow with another project; until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used: 

Copper Stampin' Emboss Powder	Whisper White A4 Thick Cardstock	Copper Foil Sheets	Watercolor Paper	Blushing Bride Classic Stampin' Ink Refill
Smoky Slate Classic Stampin' Ink Refill	Flourishing Phrases Clear-Mount Stamp Set

Today it's time for a new challenge over at Create With Connie and Mary and this week we have a colour combination for you:

I decided it was time to break out my Flourish Thinlits for my card today - take a look:

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

Frame With a Flourish - The Flourish Thinlits were on my 'must have' list when I saw the new catalogue - I think they are just lovely and you can create so many leaf and flower combinations with them, with or without the co-ordinating Flourishing Phrases stamp set. What's more, their detail can provide a great centrepiece, with not a lot else required. Here I cut mine in Mint Macaron and paper-pieced the flower heads in Rich Razzleberry, adding some clear Wink of Stella for shimmer.

Just a Note - I stamped my sentiment, from the Flourishing Phrases stamp set, in Rich Razzleberry in a 2" punched circle. There isn't much of this bright purple on my card, but where it appears it plays an important role: the sentiment, to highlight the flower petals and to create a border for my base. With two strong purple colours, less is definitely more in my book!

Pearls A Plenty - I added some doily behind my sentiment and a piece of Sweet Sugarplum ribbon, with an abundance of large pearls as 'berries' on my flourish. For some reason I rarely use this size of pearl and have an excess of them; luckily for me, they fit the circular berry spots perfectly.

A simple card where the sentiment could be switched out for lots of different occasions. 

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. 

Do visit the other Design Team members to see what they did with this week's colours; there's lots of inspiration over on their blogs too!

Enjoy your day; I'm going swimming and then to the park for some outdoor fun! I'll be back tomorrow with another project; until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

Flourishing Phrases Clear-Mount Bundle	Clear Wink Of Stella Glitter Brush	Mint Macaron A4 Cardstock	Sweet Sugarplum A4 Cardstock	Sweet Sugarplum 3/8" (1 Cm) Ruched Ribbon
Rich Razzleberry A4 Cardstock	Rich Razzlebberry Classic Stampin' Pad	2" (5.1 Cm) Circle Punch	Pearl Basic Jewels	Delicate White Doilies