Wedding bells are ringing

 Good afternoon, hope everyone is safe and well. We are now fully vaccinated and hoping to enjoy a bit more freedom. 

Talking of which we are so excited to be planning a wedding. Our son, James, gets married in the summer and we are so happy he chose to hold it here at our home. 

This has also given me more crafting time I have just complete the invites for the occasion. They didn't come without problems my die cutter decided it was too old to cope and my printer was haunted and started ghost printing. 

New equipment was installed in the craft room and I was good to go! 

James of course is from England and Liz is from here in the US so I decided to  make the invitations from cardstock from the 2 different countries. The cream pearl cardstock I brought with me when we moved and the purple was bought here.

I die cut the front panel and an inner pocket using the cream cardstock and Crafter's Companion dies. 

The card bases were cut to size and adhered so I had a card with a double fold. I used the edger die from the die set to cut the front flap so the lattice piece would fit perfectly over it.

Ribbon was added to the lattice piece and it was adhered on the card base. 

Inside I added the lattice pocket and matted the center with a lilac card stock

A separate piece of lilac cardstock was cut to fit in the pocket.

I then typed up the details of the wedding and  RSVP information, these were cut to size and added to the lilac panels.

Finally I added a chocolate box bow and a tiny cream rose to the front of each card.

I needed something to put them all in so I repurposed a shoe box, I covered it in cardstock and added decoration to match the front of the invite. Inside the lid  I matted it with the wedding details. This way they have a box to keep memories of their special day

I didn't get to take a great photo but this is the outside lid.

I have more crafts related to the wedding to do and will share them as the time gets nearer!

Thanks for reading and if you love what you see please let me know in the comments.

Aim High

 Good Morning! we are on week 3 of virtual school and all I can say is it's an experience!

Aside from that it's Tuesday again!!! So welcome to my Digi Choosday inspiration for joining our challenge. The design team today are showing you "for the boys" designs made with a shaped card. I have used Little Dude School/Student:

What I did:

I arranged the digital design paper, Little Dude and sentiment in my graphics program and then printed the design.

As the theme was shaped card I used a nesting die to cut my card base, mat and image into the tag shape. I then glued these all together. Finally I added some wooden stars to complement the design

What I Used:

Digital Stamp: Polkadoodles - Pre-colored Little Dude, Student/School

Digital Design Paper: Polkadoodles - Sticks and Bones Textured Dinosaur Paper 4

Digital Sentiment: Polkadoodles Winnie Specials Moments Quotes

Die for Card base and Mats: Crafter's Companion

Stars: From my stash

Glue: Zip Dry

The Digi Choosday Challenge runs for 2 weeks, it is always anything goes so there is no reason not to enter and you never know you may just win!

 Looking for more inspiration? Then check out my teamies designs over on the Facebook page, you can also post your own Polkadoodles' designs on the Craft Stamp and Colour with Polkadoodles Facebook group

Thanks for stopping by, now go join the challenge!

Just for Fun

Good evening! I wanted to play this evening, no reason for making a card I just wanted to play with stash I've not used yet.

I pulled out my Flower forming foam from Crafter's Companion and the Peony dies that came with it:

I made 3 flowers so then needed a card to put them on. I used Tonic Studios Petal Pattern stencil and Altenew ink and made a lace effect background. This was layered on to 2 different shades of purple cardstock and a white card base.

I arranged my flowers and adhered with hot glue to my card. I then used Crafter's Companion Stamp and Die Thankful for You collection, die cutting the thankful in the same purple as my layers

I love how it turned out now to decide who to give it to...............

Thank you for stopping by and if you love what you see let me know in the comments.

Best Wishes in Pretty Lilac

Good afternoon! the temperature here is currently 18 degrees Fahrenheit - soooo cold!  I'm tucked up inside with my fur babies and don't plan on venturing far today!

My design today was for a colleague of my husband, I have posted before about the card club he runs at work. I make a mixture of male and female cards for this and it challenges me because of the larger size needed. They have to be 8x8in cards so there is plenty of room for colleagues to write their birthday wishes to the recipient.
This card main feature is Crafter's Companion's Blossoming Lilacs Layering stamps. I love the effect you get from the layering, it gives such a realistic look to the flowers. I chose muted papers so that the stamped flowers really do pop.

Supply List:
8x8in card base - Craft UK
Blossoming Lilacs Stamps - Crafter's Companion
Stamping Card: Solar White - Neenah Classic Crest
Glacier Caves Inks - Altenew
Green Meadows Inks - Altenew
Rustic Cottage Chic Butterflies Dies - Sara's Signature Collection
Design Paper: Fresh Petal - Lili of The Valley
Blue Card Stock - Paper Studio


Thank you for stopping by and if you like what you see please let me know in the comments.

Thanksgiving For A Special Friend

Good afternoon, we went to spend Thanksgiving with friends and as always I have to share my cards. Now that she has received her card I can share it on here.

Once again I got to use my new Susan's Garden Club dies from Tonic Studio:

I chose a muted red card for my background, I cut shaped, embossed the Gathering Basket die from Kraft cardstock and used gold gilding wax to color it.

I then used the Spider Mum dies to cut my petals from white card. I colored them with a pinky-purple Copic marker before shaping the petals and assembling the flower on the card. The leaves were cut from green card, tinted with ink and shaped.

I then cut both of the Japanese Painted Leaves from a sage green card and shaded these with oil pastels. I cut the smaller leaf down and arranged both of them in my basket.

The Pompom Dahlia was also cut with white card and colored with a copic markers. I shaped the petals and built up the layers on the card adding the leaves once the flower was formed.

I used a Crafter's Companion Special Friend sentiment die, this does not have an offset but I was able to make one by tracing around the die and fussy cutting it. The words were cut twice from mirror card and stacked to give the sentiment more dimension.

I matted a 7x5 inch white card base with the same mirror card as my sentiment and added my topper.

Lastly I made a box for the card so as not to crush the flowers, I forgot to photograph this before giving the card to it's recipient.

Thanks you for stopping by and if you like what you see please don't forget to leave me some love in the comments.

New Home

Good morning, we are expecting more winter storms today and we are heading out to a birthday party so I am hoping that they aren't that bad!

Today's card is a new home card using my favorite CAS style:

I started with a white piece of card and masked the top and bottom of it. I then used a blending brush to blend 2 shades of purple dye ink in the center of the card. I then used stamps from 4 Crafter's Companion sets. Using fine black ink I stamped the little toadstool village from Fairy Magic along the bottom edge of my blended section. The stamp was a little short so I lined it up again and stamped it again filling the lower edge of the purple section, I love stamps that you can do this with.

My little fairy is from Fairy Door stamp set and I gave her fairy dust from the Sparkle Garden set.

Once this was all dry I stamped Home Sweet Home sentiment from Love Blooms.

I made a 5x7 inch card base from white card and matted this with purple and black card. I then added my stamped card.

I few little purple glitter dots just balanced the card.

Thank you for stopping by and if you like what you see please leave me some love in the comments.

Happy Birthday Mollie

Good afternoon, it's another gorgeous Michigan summer day here, I've just bathed the dogs much to their disgust and am now chilling with an ice cold glass of water so thought I do some catching up on my blog.

Sunday was Mollie's 8th birthday - she is growing up way too quickly! She started ballet classes last Fall and is loving them so I thought I'd make a her cute little ballerina card

Isn't she just the sweetest little stamp? She is called 'warming Up' and is from the girlie collection at Lili of The Valley They have a few little ballet dancers and they all look like our Miss Mollie. 

I colored her with Copic Markers, making her outfit blue as that is the color Mollie wears. I then deepened the shading on the image with Spectrum Noir ColorBlend pencils that work really well over the top of alcohol markers.

I made a 6x6in card blank from centura pearl card matted with blue card. I used Crafter's Companion Floral Frenzy embossing folder on some pink card and wrapped this with wide crushed satin blue ribbon. 

My image was die cut using Gina Marie Designs Stained Glass Oval Border dies and adhered to the card using foam tape. I then made a bow from the same ribbon and added this and a glitter gem to the side of the card. I didn't add a sentiment as I wrote a personal verse for inside of the card.

Mollie had a great birthday, instead of having a party she chose to have a spa day at my hair salon her and 2 of her closest friends had manicures and pedicures and were very spoiled by the lovely ladies at The Hair Station 

          

I am entering this card into the following challenge:

Color Inspiration Mondays - Anything goes with a colored image

Gabbie Frangipani Mermaid

Good afternoon - Wow time is flying!!! I don't know where all my days go - Easter is almost upon us - where did the beginning of this year go????

I'm here today to showcase one of March's new release from Fairy Ink

Meet Gabbie Frangipani Mermaid:

Such a sweet image! She was a delight to color. 

I love flowers so I first did a google search to find out about the Frangipani flowers that circle her head. Of course it is also known as the Hawaiian Lei flower and is native to warm tropical areas. It is a delicate white color with bright yellow centers and edged with rose pink and is highly fragrant at night making it an ideal flower for bouquets and the Leis that Hawaiian's can often be seen wearing!

OK so now I had the colors out came my Spectrum Noir Markers:

I used a stippling technique on her tail to try and get the textured look of scales which I think has worked. I then used a clear Spectrum Noir Sparkle pen to add shine this was difficult to capture in the photo so I have a close up here:

Doesn't the pen just make her tail pop?

Once colored I matted Gabbie onto Kraft card. I chose some design paper with a water effect and matted this with Kraft card before adhering to a white card base.

I added an ocean creature die cut which was colored using the same color as the rock Gabbie is laid across.

I chose the sentiment from a Crafter's Companion collection - I thought it was very apt for an image of a mermaid!

You can find Gabbie along with all the other March new releases here in the Faery Ink store, if you are looking for more inspiration then my teamies are showcasing their designs over on the Faery Ink Facebook page so call by and see us!

Thanks for stopping by 

 I would love to know your thoughts on my card in the comments below :)