Picture Perfect Photo Cards

Hello, Tallie here today with a set of cards featuring the MFT Picture Perfect set. Combined with the Lawn Fawn Say Cheese, Again die, these cards are a great way to practice your alcohol marker colouring and put a smile on the recipient's face!

I started off by stamping out four of the images in the MFT Picture Perfect set onto some blending cardstock with MFT Extreme Black Ink.

I coloured these in with my alcohol markers, sticking to bright, bold colours. I cut these out with the Lawn Fawn Say Cheese, Again die, keeping both parts.

I stamped out the 'HAPPY BIRTHDAY' sentiment from the MFT Sweet Birthday Wishes set on the bottom of the photo frames in some Nocturne Versafine Clair Ink Pad, which is a fabulous ink for stamping crisp sentiments!

To create the background panels, I used two different backgrounds - MFT All Lined Up and MFT Happy Birthday - stamped in Versamark Ink, along with some different coloured Lawn Fawn cardstock.

The final step was to add them to some A6 top-folding card bases.

Which one is your favourite? Mine has got to be Slomo (bonus points to you if you get that reference!) the sloth! Just look at that cute face. :)

Thanks for reading, catch you next week!

Tallie

 

 

24 Carrot Friend

Hello, it's Liz here. As well as super cute characters I do love a punny sentiment! This 'Rooting For You' set by My Favorite Things ticks both those boxes. There's 'I Carrot About You', 'I Dig You', 'Thanks Bunches', 'I'm Rooting For You', 'I Love You A Whole Bunch' and, of course, the one I used. All perfect for a fun card.

The background papers are from the 'Simple Vintage Botanicals' pad, I love this pad so much. I think it might be the first time ever I will use up a whole paper pad! The aperture was die cut using the 'Garden Fancy' die by Hero Arts. I was tempted to ink a little colour round the edges but decided the white looked good against the papers.  I simply did some wonky stitching to add interest instead. I coloured the cute character with alcohol markers, the matching die for the stamp set is available here, and popped him on the card using foam pads.

Oh, and I happen to know this stamp set and matching die is on special offer at the mo', a real bargain! Thanks for stopping by today, happy crafting! 

Autumn Wreath

As Tara mentioned yesterday, September marks the start of the Autumn 

months and its my favourite time of the year too, my 

card today reflects that with this fabulous leafy wreath from Avery Elle...

What's lovely about this set is that the two main images are separate so you don't have 

to make a wreath at all but that's what I decided to go with on a square card. 

I water-coloured the images and trimmed them out, although coordinating dies are 

available here. I added two of the small images to the wreath and 

adhered it to a square panel of the Lawn Fawn Speckled Eggshell card stock 

which goes so well with the 'not so white' watercolour card I used.

I've used the All Lined Up background to add a subtle check and 

stamped the sentiment inside the wreath.

 I love it, it makes me quite excited for some Autumn crafting :)

  

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

A Whole Lotta Foiling Going On

Good morning, hope you had a wonderful summer - today is officially the first day of meteorological autumn, my favourite season, particularly for the abundance of my favourite foods and the fact that its not too hot to walk around but still pleasant.  Love it.   It's also when thoughts drift towards Christmas so today I have 4 Christmas cards to share - all featuring foiling (without the need for a foiling machine) and lots of new items from the Hero Arts Winter Catalogue that is now live in store.

Firstly I have a crisp snow themed card - quite a quick one to make and could be sped up even more if you didn't ink blend the background (just switch out that technique for some blue cardstock and splatter some white paint to get a similar effect)

I used 3 shades of blue oxides and after blending out from the centre from the darkest to lightest shades and sprayed with water and blotted off with a paper towel to get a soft snowstorm effect.  My foiling on this card is very subtle, but it does add a nice touch which shows up better irl.  I used stick-it glue over teal cardstock and then rubbed aqua foil onto it before die cutting the Altenew Crystal Frame Die from it.   The snowflake cluster die from Hero Arts was cut from Lawn Fawn Pearlescent Vellum (again shows up more shimmery irl but is impossible to photograph) which was glued to white card with more stick-it (then you don't see any of the glue!    Finished with a white embossed sentiment also from Hero Arts and a few teal gems.


Next up, I took the die cut foiling technique to the next level with the new Poinsettia Ornament die from Hero Arts and with the aid of stick-it, gave it a full-on two-tone foil finish which I just love and its really easy and fun to do!

I started with cranberry card from Hero Arts and covered it with a layer of stick-it - and after running it through the die cutting machine with the stick-it side up DID NOT REMOVE the release paper - this is the key to this two colour technique.  I took my craft knife and carefully trimmed through the release paper where the bits I wanted in gold joined the bits I wanted in red.  Removing them one at a time, I could then gold foil the berries and flower centres whilst the release paper was still in place on the red areas.  (see the top two photos below)

Once all the gold is foiled, remove the "waste" areas and then removed the release paper from all the remaining areas and then pop a piece of red foil over the top and rub the foil over with your finger (or a bone folder is a great tool for this technique too) and then you get a perfectly foiled ornament!  Simply added to a card with a heat embossed sentiment from Hero Arts Winter Holiday Messages (tip  - I stamped with the ornament in place but NOT adhered, then removed it before applying heat so I didn't damage the foiling, that way the sentiment is where I wanted it and its easy to just adhere the ornament around it afterwards)  I drew a border with a fine liner to finish.

Next I did some tiny bits of foiling just using wet glue - it you apply a really thin layer of glue and wait until it's tacky but NOT wet, then you can apply foil that way too!  I used it as accents within the new Layering Snow Globe die from Hero Arts.

I used the same technique as from the snowflake to layer the pearlescent vellum onto white card so I could cut each "layer" and know my glue wouldn't show through.  I then applied wet glue to the trees, house roof, snowman and applied the foil once tacky.  Perfect little highlights of foil.  The missnow globe itself I cut from silver mirri card and the background in the globe is from Lawn Fawn's Snow Day Remix paper pad which is my all time favourite pad for Christmas backgrounds so I am so glad they brought it back as I used my old one up!   The sentiment again comes from Winter Holiday Messages.

I have one final card to share, which had a couple of mishaps, but I managed to rescue it enough that I could still share it even if it could be better (will make sure I do better on the next version!)   For this one I used a brand new stencil from Simple Stories with Altenew Embossing Paste as that is another easy way to get foiling without a machine!

I started with a piece of navy card stock and applied a thin layer of paste through the stencil, lifted it off and washed the stencil straight away so the paste didn't dry on it and ruin it.   This is where my error came - as the stencil has solid letter centres, the paste in those letters wasn't as thin as it should have been, so even though I left my foil to dry over night, when I lifted it off this morning, the centres were still wet and therefore the foil hadn't stuck there.   The technique is to lay the foil gently onto the paste, leave it for about 30 mins so it starts to dry a little, and then gently rub it over the paste so it catches the edges, then leave it overnight to fully dry.

So rather than bin it, I took craft knife and carved out the centres, there is a little white edge of paste showing, but I can live with that for this one, and on the next one I know to make sure to check the paste is thinner in those larger areas (or to remove it if you want the letter centres to not be there)

The starry background is from another new stencil which will be in store tomorrow, check out the Echo Park section to find it and lots of new Autumn/Christmas themed papers, stencils, embossing folders and washi tapes.

Hopefully that gives you a few ideas of how to work with foil as its definitely the season for it!

NEWS FROM THE STORE

As I said above, we'll have a few new collections from Echo Park/Carta Bella in store tomorrow

We will have the new MFT release on Tuesday when it goes live in the USA

The new Waffle Flower release is in transit and will go live on release day or as soon as we get it.

We've got the collaborative Hero Arts stamps on order and expect them at some point this month.

We have a new collection from Colorado Craft Company in transit with a fun spooky theme, and that will be in store as soon as we get it after they release it on Tuesday.

We have new Sugar Pea Designs, Concord and 9th and Altenew releases on order, all due mid-September or earlier customs willing.

We have a very large Lawn Fawn restock order in, but we are waiting to see what they have available from the new release and have asked to wait til they get it back before it ships if it is out of stock but we've not heard back form them as yet.  A few items that were on back order (like the notebooks) have already been shipped to us but they went USPS by mistake so will take a couple of weeks to arrive.

We are bringing Flora and Fauna back for their Christmas release, and have added a small quantity of the releases from this year we missed to go with them.  We are waiting on them to ship.

As Neat & Tangled are now only releasing 3 products a month, we are still going to carry them, but will only order every couple of months to make ordering cost effective so the latest release will be coming later this month with their September release.

Our servers are being moved to a new facility by our hosts this month - we have influence over the date so please note that the store will not be online at all from 6pm on 13th September until the early hours of 14th September (there is no finish time as it will just happen as quickly as possible) but if you can't see the store during that time, that's why and it will hopefully reappear on Saturday morning without issue.

That's all for today - catch you later.

Tara

Persian Happy Birthday

Hey stampers, Anni here!

I tend to use the same colour scheme on every card! I have my go to colours that I feel comfortable with and that I reach to often. But from time to time I want to try something new and then Pinterest is my friend. I search fro colour combos and for this card actually flower colour combos and you get thousands and thousands of beautiful results. That is how I came up with this colour scheme: a dark red, an orangy red and a pink, combined with grey leafes.

I started my card by stamping Altenew's Persian Motifs - the very first Altenew set that I bought! And I still love it. Again I wanted to do some no line colouring. So I stamped with a pale ink. Then I coloured the flowers using watercolours.

For the sentiment I used Concord and 9th's Birthday Die. The birthday part I die cut several times from grey cardstock and stacked the letters up to achieve some dimension. For the word happy I chose some dark red cardstock matching the flowers. I love the combination of printed letters and script in this die set.
I added a layer of vellum under the die cuts to make it stand out more.

All there was left to do was to glue down the panel to the cardbase.

Thanks for stopping by and have a crafty weekend!
Anni

   

Found on Friday August Part 2

It's time to share more of the fabulous projects made by our customers and shared over in our VIP group over on Facebook.

Kicking us off this time we have this fun interactive card from Silvia Galloni using Lawn Fawn's Be Hap-pea stamps and their Pivot Pop-Up Die.  The two combine to make such a fun card and you get to lots of stamping fun by filling 3 sides of your card rather than just the normal outside front with this design.

Next up we have this really cool summer card from Linda van Wely using the Hey Summer stamps from Sugar Pea Designs - what a great card for all the dudes in your life!

Whilst we are on the summer theme, we have these fun interactive cards from Michele Seifert using Sunshine and Friendship from MFT.  How much fun would these be for kids who I find often show no interest in cards (well when the come with presents who can blame them) but having an element they can play with makes cards so much more interesting!

Next up we have another MFT based card - I love this little hedgie from Mirella Rogan - the sun ray back ground really makes him pop and the panel design is a great device for making a small image into a big feature!   The stamp is from MFT's Happy Hedgehogs and the rays are MFT's Radiating Rays stencil

Next up I wanted to share this fabulous card from Karen Breen - she made this for one of her instagram friends so using the insta-camera die in the background adds a really personal touch and Mama Elephant's Little Panda's are just the perfect accent.  The dies are Mama Elephant's Instalove.

I loved this tone-on-tone leafy stamping from Vanessa Reed Hodgson - the tonal shading around it make for such a classy design - you could do a set in different colours with different sentiments to make a fabulous gift set!   She used Altenew's Leaf Cluster stamp but we have several different leaf sets that could be used in a similar way - just pop "leaf" in the search box ;-)

This floral card also jumped out at me -  just look at all the gorgeous detail Vivien Hodge got into the petals and leaves - looks like a real pressed flower!  The soft striped background picking up the same colours makes for such a coherent design too.  The large flower is from Altenew's Beautiful Day and the other smaller elements from Remember This and the background is their watercolor stencil.

I'll finish this issue with this super cute gift tag from Claudia Emme - how adorable is that little monkey?   The tiny clouds really frame him well and make him stand out from the ink blended backgound too.  The monkey is from Mama Elephant's Little Agenda Monkey set and there are soooo many cute monkeys to choose from (and so many fun Little Agenda sets to mix and match them with!)

If you shop with us, then you too can join our VIP group - just head over to Facebook and provide an order number to gain access to this closed group.  It's a fun place where customers share makes and chat crafts (and get insider gossip on the store too!)   We'll be back with two more Found-on-Friday blog posts in September (and every month thereafter!)

Tara

Live life to the fullest.

Hello lovely people.

 I'm back with another card. This time I'm playing with Flora & Fauna Live Life Wildflowers stamp set.

My first step was to stamp almost all the images from the set on to my watercolour panel with waterproof black ink.
I chose to colour them all with watercolour markers and shimmer pen to add a little bit of interest to this almost one-layer card.

After the colouring was done, I've used Altenew Halftone Circles Nesting Dies to cut out the centre of my card panel. I decided to stamp the sentiment on to my card base.
 Before adhering notecard in place, I went and gold heat embossed along the edges and added shadows behind the flowers.

I decided to use foam tape to adhere my card panel to the card base. I also did make sure that my already stamped greeting was in perfect place inside the circle.
My last step was to add a few Nuvo drops.

Thank you for stopping by.
 Please leave a comment to let us know if you like my card.

See you soon!
Anna

Out of this World Spaceship Scene

Hello all, Tallie here. For today's card I needed something more masculine, spaced themed with a birthday greeting. I've never done a galaxy background with my alcohol markers before so I thought it was time to give it a try!

I started out by stamping the spaceman and a bunch of the planets from the Lawn Fawn Out of this World set in some alcohol marker friendly MFT Extreme Black Ink onto some blending cardstock. I coloured these in with my alcohol markers and cut them out with the coordinating dies.

The foreground spaceship wall scene was easy - just scribble some cool grey markers over and over until a smooth blend is achieved. The galaxy background was a little more work - starting with some deep, dark blues and violets, followed by a light pink and blue-green. A little white, gold and silver gel pen finished off that starry look.

I cut the silver panel with an MFT Inside & Out Stitched Circle die, using two more of the circle dies to create a frame from some bluejay cardstock. I adhered some acetate to the back of the grey panel and popped it up over the galaxy background with some foam tape to make it seem like a porthole looking out into space.

I stamped the sentiment from the Lawn Fawn Out of this World set onto some cream cardstock and adhered it towards the bottom of the main panel.

Thanks for reading, catch you next week.

Tallie