Otterly in love.

Hi everybody,

Jill here, and this week I am going 'otterly nuts'...

...for the brand spanking new Otterly Adorable from Mama Elephant.

I love otters, they are one of my particular favourite animals, the way they swim on their backs holding hands...gaaaah!  They are just such beautiful, gorgeous creatures.  So seeing them take centre stage in this new set...oh be still my beating heart!

I started by colouring a few different sheets of vellum using Distress Inks, (I only learnt yesterday this would work.  HOW did I not know?!).  In any case, I coloured my vellum in various blue/greens, and also covered a sheet in white pigment ink.  I then cut them, at varying heights, into waves using the cloud border from Mama Elephant's Landscape Trio Dies, by simply turning the die upside down.

I then cut a frame from a piece of card using Lawn Fawn's Cross Stitched Rectangles and layered up my vellum waves behind.

I stamped out and coloured my favourite image in the set, which is obviously the little guys on their backs, and the little heart also included, then fussy cut everything.

I cut Mama Elephant's Friend word die from a piece of black card adhered to some black foam using Stick it, and began to build my scene. adding the little heart to my sweet swimming otters.

I finished off my sentiment by stamping straight onto the vellum along the bottom of my scene, and clear heat embossing.

I cut the smallest rectangle that makes up my frame, from my card blank to allow the light to shine through, and mounted my panel onto it using foam tape.

I embellished with a scattering of clear sequins and there you have it.

I really hope you like it, and hope you love the new Mama Elephant release as much as I do!

As always, everything I have used is linked below so be sure to check it out.

See you next week.

Jillx

Soak up the fun in a sea of vellum.

Hi everybody,

Jill here, and this week, I'm making a splash in a sea of vellum...

...using My Favourite Thing's 'Soak Up The Fun'.

I started with an idea to create a circle aperture of coloured vellum waves with these cute sea critters swimming in amongst them, but when I was looking through my circle dies, I came across this absolute beaut, 'Hoop Die', form Neat and Tangled that I hadn't used in a while, and thought it would add a nice little twist on the scene, so opted for that.

I started by cutting a panel using Lawn Fawn's Stitched Rectangles, then cutting the hoop die from it.  I then cut the hoop die again to build the frame up, and in-laid it back in.  I cut strips of vellum using Mama Elephant's Landscape Trio cloud die upside down to create waves and coloured using alcohol markers.  I then adhered these to the back of my hoop aperture, creating pretty layers.  I stamped out my critters, coloured using Copics, fussy-cut, and adhered in place, bobbing about on the ocean!

My sentiment is from the same Soak up the Fun set, and is stamped out onto the banner from Avery Elle's Woodland Wonders set, and fussy-cut.  To add a little more interest to my background, I stamped out a load of the little bubbles that come in the set, and filled them with Glossy Accents.

I then mounted my finished panel onto a cream card blank, and there you have it.

I really hope you like it, as always, everything I used is linked below.

See you next week.

Jillx

Soft and simple, sweet little Pix in the spotlight.

Hi everybody,

Jill here, and this week, I've gone soft and simple with a bit of design spotlighting...

...putting Mama Elephant's Pix's Favourite's in the spotlight!

Such a gorgeous set, it just seems to go hand in hand with a delicate design.

I started with a piece of watercolour card cut down to a panel using Lawn Fawn's Stitched rectangles.  I die-cut an off-centre circle, so that it edged off my card; to that circle, I cut Lawn Fawn's Forest Border and the cloud from Mama Elephant's Landscape Trio.  I then watercolour washed my background and my elements using Distress Inks.  I really wanted my background to be the softest of soft washes, so really watered down my inks and blotted the back as soon as I'd put the colour down to the point it's barely visible in the pictures, but looks really lovely and subtle in real life.

Once everything was dry, I added a sun die-cut from Lawn Fawn's Spring Showers and in-lad all my pieces back in place.  At this point I thought my spotlight circle was getting lost in the pale expanse of the background, and it wasn't really 'popping' like I wanted it to, so I added a border of grey patterned paper behind to help it stand out.

I then stamped out my main focal image, this delightful little bunny (Pix, I assume?), and little tree stump from Pix's Favourite's.  You get a load of different designs in this set, each one as adorable as the next, but with her little butterfly, I felt this one would work perfect with my design.  I coloured her using Zig Clean Colour Real Brush Pens, again, keeping it as light and gentle as I possibly could by adding a lot of water to my ink, and blotting often.  I then fussy-cut my image and mounted on top of my spotlight using foam tape.

I then stamped out my sentiment from the same Pix's Favourite set onto vellum in black ink, heat embossed, and adhered with just the teeniest bit of wet glue along the top, masked by the crosses from the stitched rectangle borders.

I added a few little bits of ribbon to embellish, cut into flags and banners and tucked into a little label, and finished off with a couple of black enamel hearts to tie the whole design together.

I really hope you like it, and as always, everything I used is linked blow.

see you next week.

Jillx

Swim Team Scene.

Hi everybody,

Jill here, and this week, I've got a sweet little sea scene for you...

Using Avery Elle's Swim Team.

If you caught my post last week, I created a soft ink blended sky using the cloud die from Mama Elephant's Landscape Trio Creative Cuts.  Well this week, I created some gentle waves in the exact same way, with a mask from the same cloud die, just simply turned upside down, and blending over in a light blue ink.  Two masks for the price of one...can't go wromg with that, right?

I used a circle die to create a spot light for my waves to be inked within.  I then stamped out all my cute little sea creatures from Avery Elle's Swim Team in grey ink for a softer look, coloured them all using colour pencils, and fussy-cut.  I added a few little wisps of seaweed form the same set to my spotlight, and adhered my scene in place using foam tape for dimension.

My sentiment is built-up from the same Swim Team set, with a little help from Lawn Fawn's Life is Good set, as I wanted it to be a card of encouragment, and again, stamped in grey ink.

I created a matching background paper by blending ink over the same mask to tie everything together and mounted onto an Avery Elle notecard.

I added a scattering of enamel dots to embellish, and there you have it.

I hope you like it, as always, everything I used is linked below so be sure to check them out.

See you next week.

Jillx

Gentle colouring with soft ink blending.

Hi everybody,

Jill here, and this week, I'm going for soft, sweet, and simple...

...by colouring with only a gentle ink blend.

I have used Lawn Fawn's Hello Sunshine for my main image and sentiment.  This set is one of those I continue to go back to again and again.  I just love the simplicity of it and thought it would work perfect with the gentle ink blending I had in mind.

I started by creating my background.  I used the cloud shape from Mama Elephant's Landscape Trio Creative Cut dies to create a mask, and softly, softly blended a pretty sky line, starting with a soft orange, moving onto a light pink, and finishing with some pastel blue greens.  

On a seperate piece of card, I stamped out these lovely little birdies from Hello Sunshine, and these cute balloons from Mama Elephant's Woodland Gifts and, using the same colours as my skyline, gently blended ink over my images taking special care to create a faded effect, so stronger colour at the bottom, fading off to almost nothing at the top.  I then fussy-cut my wee elements, chopping off (yikes) the tails from my balloons.

I stamped my wire and sentiment straight onto my inked background, and cut using one of Lawn Fawn's Stitched Rectangle dies to add a nice finish.   I then glued my balloons and birdies in place (I actually stamped my birds out again onto the wire so their little feet would show without me having to fussy cut them), and tied some bits black string from my balloons to my birds beaks, glueing in place.

I created another gently inked skyline background in the exact same way but using a soft purple, and matted my panel onto it using foam adhesive for dimension.

  I wanted to keep this card really soft and simple, so skipped any embellishing and left it there.

I really hope you like it, as always, everything I have used is linked below so be sure to click and peek!

See you next week.

Jillx