Happy Happy Happy Birthday To You

Today I have a bold sentiment card to share, using panels of colour and a classic alphabet die set.

An alphabet die set is something that I think everyone needs in their crafty stash. The Altenew Simple Alpha set is perfect as it’s a good size for building custom sentiments on cards or scrapbook layouts.

To begin, I chose 5 colours of distress oxide inks - squeezed lemonade, twisted citron, mowed lawn, evergreen bough and peacock feathers.

I used masking tape to section the card base, then blended on ink to create the panels of colour. I added water droplet details, then put the card base aside to dry.

Next, I die cut from white card all the letters needed for my sentiment. I glued two layers together for dimension. I then adhered them to my card base.

To finish, I added some Wink of Stella clear glitter to the letters.

Have a lovely day,

Gemma

Photo Booth Gang!

I've been combining new products with older ones for today's 

project which is a colourful birthday card....

As soon as I received the Photo Booth Strip die I knew these images from Mama Elephants

Photo Bomb set would be perfect to put in the square spaces. The top two pictures are the 

small squares in the set and the bottom is just a section from the larger image in the set.

I coloured the gang with Copics and then assembled the photo strip adding an embossed 

sentiment at the bottom. For the card base, I blended ink through various sized circles on

the MFT circle stencil and added sparkle patterns to each using a Simple Stories 

stencil called Diamond Sparkle.

I love the background, so colourful and perfect for the fun Photo Strip :)

 

  

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Popcorn Tubs

I've made something a little different today using the new dies and embossing folders we got in store from Echo Park.  The die I've used looks like a mini popcorn box and would be great for parties (it measures 5.5cm at the bottom, 6.5cm at the top by 11cm tall when made up) but I actually wanted a little tub to store my blending stumps in which was prettier than the loo roll with washi tape over the bottom I had been using!

The die includes 3 elements - the box sides (you cut 4) the stitched decorative side panels and a banner die which I didn't use but would be perfect to put names on if you were using them for parties.   I used a really thick (350gsm) navy card for the box itself and cut it 4 times - trimming off the "tabs" from 2 so you get nice flat corners when you stick it together.

I then die cut 4 panels using the stitched die from aqua card stock and ran those through the Ride the Wave embossing folder after die cutting to get some extra decoration - embossing folders aren't so trendy these days but they provide so much detail so quickly I still love them!

To add something extra to the front, I used another new Echo Park die - their gorgeous flamingo which is a 3 part die but it cuts 5 different elements for you to layer up - the bird, the beak, the flash behind the beak, the eye and the legs.   I die cut it from pink glitter card but then went over it with a couple of copics to get some shading.

I do love a flamingo, especially in glitter!

Tara

 
NEWS FROM THE STORE

• This week we will have the latest stamp and die release from Altenew in store along with 7 boxes bull of restocks!   We will not have the new washi tapes - they were released after we ordered so will be coming with a future delivery.

• We should also get the latest release from Sugar Pea Designs this week customs willing.

• We will also have a restock on Ranger alcohol inks and we will also be stocking Versafine Clair ink pads.

• There will also be 3 brand new lovely legs stamps on the 3 May (they release 3 designs on the 3rd of each month)

Catch you later

Tara

Shopping Therapy

Hey stampers, Anni here!

I am sure you already noticed that Seven Hills stocked a new stamp company: Colorado Craft Company. And that adds a whole new style of stamps to the shop.
I played with the set called Shopping Therapy and it is so much fun. There are so many funny sentiments in this set and the image is perfect for improving your colouring skills - no matter which medium you choose.

For today's card I decided to go with watercolours in rainbow order. I started by die cutting the second biggest rectangle from Lil'Inker Designs' Stitched Mats: Rectangles from watercolour cardstock.

I stamped the image using black pigment ink and heat embossed it in clear. That makes watercolouring so much easier I think. For the first round of colouring I mixed the colours with a lot of water and painted loosely over the lines. Then I added another layer, this time with less water and only in the lines to deepen the colours.

When the colouring was finished I stamped the sentiment, again with blackpigment ink and clear embossing powder.
Then I adhered the rectangle onto a panel of black cardstock with just a narrow border and added that to a card base.

That finished up an easy and quick to make card! These stamp sets make card making easy because the images are big.

Thanks for stopping by and have a crafty weekend!
Anni

   

Found On Friday

It's time for another edition of inspiration curtesy of our customers makes posted  in our SHC VIPs group on Facebook.   There are links in the text to the main elements used by each designer if you're inspired and want to check out what they used.

We're kicking off this issue with this stunning floral number from Vanessa Hodgson using Altenews's Beautiful Peony   I love the added details of the stamped leaves on the kraft circle die cut and the newsprint background really makes the focal element pop.

Sticking with the floral theme, Anne Marie Wilson created this beautiful little scene using Altenew's Garden Grow set.  A really clean and simple design that really caught my eye.

Michelle Hammond's "you passed" card really caught my eye too - really clever design using the little lawn fawn car to create a repeat background and the Caps Bold Alpha from Altenew to create the humorous torn in half L plate!

Solance Poole's dramatic cloud background really stood out too - I've seen the cloud stencil used many, many time but never in black before and it was the perfect backdrop to make her elephant and his friend really pop!

Justine Pearman created this gorgeous border (and another card with the bit she die cut from the middle - great way to get 2 cards from one design) using Altenew's little butterfly stamp and a range of their inks to get the lovely tonal colours.  It's a really affective way to frame a sentiment.

Finally in this issue we have Laura Volpes' inside and outside card - I think we often forget that we can design the insides of our cards too.  Here Laura used acetate behind the large friend die cut so you can get a peep at the continued design inside using the gorgeous Tweet Friends from MFT stamps.

Hope you find these as inspiring as we did.  If you are a customer, you can join the group and upload your makes for future editions - only customers can get in though and you need to provide a valid invoice number when prompted so grab one before trying to join the group.

If you didn't make it this issue - watch out for future editions of Found on Friday.

Tara

Gnomes go Swimming

Sometimes my brain goes on a tangent when I sleep, and the other day I woke up with this idea in my head so had to create this scene using a mix of stamps from Stamping Bella.  I imagined that someone had left a cup of coffee at the bottom of the garden and the gnomes were like - woohoo - heated pool!   (Yes I need to get out more!)

 It's a one layer card, so I did a little masking to get all my characters in place.  I forget how useful masking is as a technique and must do it more.   Just remember to start at the front and work your way to the back.

Here I stamped the smiling gnome from Gnomes Have Feelings Too, and then stamped him again onto post it tape and cut him out to create my mask.  Once that was in place I stamped the Swimming Gnomes over the top and again masked those off (my tape wasn't wide enough but that doesn't matter as the background stamp won't touch the bottom of the cup).  Finally I stamped the Gnome Background stamp over both masks - and as my card is wider that the stamp and split it to get a wider image - I just inked up one half and stamped that, then inked up the other half and drew a line to join them up in the middle where the gap is.

I love taking the masks off and seeing the magic of the scene revealed.

From that point on it was just a case of sitting watching TV and colouring it all in.  I used my polychromos pencils and sansoder with blending stumps to colour it all in.  I like using pencils on one layer cards as it doesn't bleed onto the inside - blending out with stumps and a solvent gives a smoother look and is particularly useful for large background areas like the sky and path.  I used the same on the smaller images like the toadstools but then added more solid detail over the top.

If you've not tried masking to create a scene I hope this will encourage you to give it a go.

Tara

Whale of a Time

Hello, Tallie here. Today I have a fun card inspired by a little spring cleaning. I found this older Floral Mermaid set from Flora and Fauna in my stash so I paired this with a sentiment from the Lawn Fawn Critters in the Sea set.

On an A6 panel of watercolour cardstock I painted on a loose wash of blue. To get some more texture I used the waves pattern from the Floral Mermaid set with some Distress Oxide ink in Broken China.

I stamped out two sets of the whale and narwhal, along with three of the flowers, in some MFT Extreme Black ink. I again used my watercolours to add some colour to them before cutting them out. I foam mounted these onto the background panel.

I finished up by stamping the sentiment strip from the Lawn Fawn Critters in the Sea set.

It's good to get some use out of your older sets so my challenge to you this week is to use an older set in your crafting!

Tallie

 

Little Agenda Fairies

Today I’m sharing a card featuring the sweet Little Agenda Fairies from Mama Elephant. I love the Little Agenda stamps as they are quick to colour and you can feature lots of a card together.

I coloured my images with alcohol markers, then used the coordinating dies to cut them out.

For the background, I used the MFT Circle Stencil to add circles of distress oxide inks in squeezed lemonade, dried marigold and spun sugar.

I stamped two sentiments from the Mama Elephant Birthday Messages, then added the fairies to the card with foam tape.

Have a lovely day,

Gemma