March, the busiest month of the year when it comes to birthdays among my friends and family. I feel I’ve started strong this year by making two cards and it’s still February! Not sure I’ll use the second card but it’s always good to have some backup cards.
For the first card I followed this week’s mojo monday challenge #333
For the second card I followed the sketch from freshly made sketches #124
My mom asked me to make her another card for another friend who just turned 50.
I decided to use this stamp which I haven’t really got to use yet, I’ve just been practicing coloring and waiting for the perfect moment to use it!
The pink paper was one of the first things I decided to use for this card and my plan was to use it as a background or at least use it for a large piece, I wanted it to be a main part of the card. Today when I assembled the card it was just too much with the pattern and all the colors (I decided to go for the I love promarkers challenge this week which is the color combo blue and pink). I wanted more white space. So I decided to just keep a stripe at the bottom and some decorations in blue and pink. All the flowers and the butterfly are sprayed with pearl mist and some color mist or distress stain to make them more interesting, plain colored flowers are often quite boring and the nuance wasn’t what I was looking for either. Luckily my distress stain broken china and spun sugar was just perfect together with the Plain Jane simply sheer spray Rosey. I also added some stickles on the stamp and the butterfly and a few too many rhinestones. These are, however, just taking up space in my stash so I was very happy to use them! And since the theme of the daring cardmakers challenge this week is forgotten treasures, I just had to add a few more and some paper flowers too!
I’m not completely satisfied with the card, I find it a bit too much. I should have left more white space and skipped the tag plus some of the bling, but you live and you learn, next time!
My mom asked me to make a card for her old friend who turned 50 the other day. Here’s the result which was based on a sketch challenge but I was too slow entering so it’s closed. But it doesn’t matter, I like the card anyway and it was fun to make!
I wanted to use something close to nature or cows as she is a farmer who has a lot of beef cows (?). Unfortunately I had no fitting stamps for that nor did I have cow patterned paper or anything like that. Instead I went for pale natural colors and my mom got to choose the patterned background paper!
Still practicing on coloring blonde hair, it’s so much easier when you know which colors to use and how. Thank you youtube!
I recently purchased a new cutting tool, a guillotine cutter from Tonic Studios and I haven’t really used it yet until last Friday when I decided to cut my 12×12 papers into 6×6 instead. I never make any layouts, it’s just cards and other smaller projects and I very rarely use 12 inch papers for that, it kind of scares me to cut a tiny piece from one of them.
I started by sorting out all the simple patterned papers and those with smaller images that were meant to be cut out (I suppose?). This pile is like 1/3 of my collection, those I kept are more basic paper, great for card bases and backgrounds. I found no need to cut these too.
Here’s the pile after my cutting spree (I had a few copies of some of the papers which I kept in original size among a few weird patterned ones)
This almost doubled my existing collection of 6×6 and I realized I need a few projects badly.
I managed to make two cards this weekend and I got to use a few of my newly cut 12 inch papers and other stuff in my stash, a few new ones I got from a sell out. Awesome!
I made this card inspired by this week’s Mojo Monday challenge #291
This morning I made another card inspired by one of my cut papers, it’s a transparent/vellum like paper with some flowers and fruit and I got to think of my new magnolia stamps.
I got to use one of my new prima flowers and wooden embellishments. I also used another piece of one of the border stickers I purchased. I’m such a mindless shopper!
I made the card for the current Magnolia challenge which was to use a Magnolia stamp and vellum, perfect for my rediscovered paper!
So yesterday we went to our aunt to celebrate Easter with the family and to celebrate her youngest daughter who turns 14 on Tuesday.
My two youngest cousins were there too and I made them Easter bags with some chocolate and soft bubble bottles, I’m trying not to give them too much candy as their parents try to keep them away from sugar. I gave them handmade bags last year too with a small treasure hunting quest for the older boy. This year I made a trail with chocolate eggs for them to follow. They were super happy!
The bags are something I got from some kits and they’ve been lying around for a while now.. happy to get to use them and some other stuff in my stash!
I found some fun challenges to enter with these bags too!
The Ladybug crafts challenge: Anything goes
Alota rubber stamps #103: Springtime
Crafty creations #215: Easter
Magnolialicious challenge: All about spring
I love promarkers: Spring is in the air
A few of the items from my stash: the shaped buttons (helicopter and police car), bubble stickers and a butterfly sticker I found in Berlin at Karstadt I believe.
The buttons were a part of the Christmas calendar I got from my mother last Christmas, they have this ring on the backside which I cut off and that caused the button to fall apart! Glued it all together again and adhered it with some glue dots.
A closeup on the bunny, colored with pro- and flexmarkers. I colored the bow with a darker blue first and added a brighter shade on top, gives a nice touch!
And here is the birthday card for my other cousin who turns 14. Inspired by the Sweet stop sketch #204
So happy I got to use both some alphabet stickers and a few brads from my stash.
Least but not last I also finished off some cards to go with a few angels my other aunt ordered.
This weekend left very little time for crafting and when I had the time I just couldn’t get the inspiration or peace in order to get something done. Forced and slow, that’s how this weekend’s crafting went.
I managed to create one Easter card, it feels like something’s missing, I just can’t figure out what so I’ll just leave it as it is. Inspired by the I love promarker challenge #158: Anything but square I made this egg shaped card.
Maybe a few butterflies would do it, I might take another look before sending it, there’s still time to make improvements!
This card was inspired by the Fab Friday Challenge #13.
I do feel more pleased with this one, maybe it’s the familiar shape and bold colors. Or the fact that it’s a small card, a creation fit for this lack of inspiration I’m suffering from at the moment.
Another thing I’m happy about is the fact that I managed to use two of my cardboard decorations I’ve somehow collected over the years. It was one thing I thought I could go for as a goal this weekend (if everything else fails).
When I found these brackets in my forgotten drawer, I thought they were extremely boring, pale and.. cheap. While looking at them I just kept hearing Jennie telling me “you can always emboss or color boring things, I do that with brads sometimes. And use color/mists on boring papers!” I gazed at my color shelf, imagined them all, one by one on my black brackets.. And suddenly my I found it; my black diamond stickles! I looked at the brackets, back to the stickles tube, grabbed it and went nuts. Love it!
And as usual I manage to take the worst pictures.. I just have to get that lightning right.