Thursday 19 September 2013

A Christmas card

Hello Crafters out there,

I've been pretty busy lately and didn't get to craft much, but I DID place a way too large order for card making supplies, including the envelop punch board, three embossing folders and a few stencils. I also got my own basic set of Gelatos. Would you believe it, Faber Castell - a very old traditional German company - don't produce them for the German market! How could they do that to me? It took me a year to decide I wanted them after all, even if they had to be imported from the USA.

I also got a whole bunch of distress inkpads. Would you believe it, until that order arrived last week, I owned exactly one: Peeled Paint.

So to try them out, I did a very quick card today. I'm sad to say, that it was not my own idea, I took my inspiration from Mia's card.

However I turned it into a Christmas card, using christmasy colors and stars, snowflakes and little trees instead of hearts.

I sponged the white card base with red distress ink and the edges with just a little brown ink, because it seemed too bright. Then I splotted some water on, just to try it out. To make the black cardstock look more like chalkboard, I treated it with a little baby powder, then I stamped and heat embossed the sentiment and added faux stiching. To stick on the punched shapes, I used the tiniest bits of foam adhesive, with a tiny gap in the middle, for the string.





 I am pretty happy with my card, so I do hope you'll like it too.

As it fits this week's SSS challenge (use a product from the Simon Says Stamp Store) I'll upload it there. The distress inks can be had at Simon's, and also my favorite gel pen. 


Happy crafting
Ela



Supplies:
Heyda cardstock (black and white)
White embossing powder
Signo Uniball broad white gel pen
Distress ink Festive Berries, Gathered Twigs and Mowed Lawn (envelop)
2 little stars from a Christmas stampset (envelop)
Simple Stories Patterned Paper (handmade holiday 6x6)
Twine
Punches
black fine liner (envelop)

(Sorry, whenever I don't mention the exact details, I don't know them)

Friday 6 September 2013

Water

Hello Crafters,

I simply loved Kristina's Birthday Fishes card, when I first saw it. The blue and turqoise is a great color combination, and the stampset is so adorable. So I tried to re-create the look for this challenge at Keep it simple:



 However, as I don't own, the stamps or any distress inks or a whole lot of copics, I had to improvise a lot, so my card looks a quite bit different.




 Supplies:
 Stampin' Up Build a Blosson
Heyda "Alles Gute"
Watercolor pencils and crayons
Watercolor paper
Black fine marker
VersaColor Royal Blue
VersaMagic Turqoise Gem
ColorBox Robin's Egg
Top Boss Watermark
Black fine embossing powder
Uniball Signo broad white gel pen
Waterbrush

I used the Build a Blosson solid stamps to create the fish, coloring them with watercolor "crayons" (not sure if this is, they are called Woody 3 in 1, by Stabilo). I traced the outlines and drew in the details with the black marker, freehanded and colored the party hats.

For  the background I tried my best to coax the non-distress inks into distress behaviour, which didn't work to well. Something elso an my Christmas wishlist...
The sentiment stamp has a swirl on it, which I didn't like, so I covered it with washi before inking it up.


Wishing you all a great week-end
Ela

Animal Antics

Hello Crafters out there,


I did get around some stamping last night. Inspired by the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge Animal Antics and this Sketch by Freshly made Sketches, I created a Halloween card.






Supplies:
Paper:
DCWV Textured Card - orange
Heyda black cardstock
white watercolor paper

Colors/Inks:
VersaColor black
ColorBox Frostwhite
Top Boss watermark
Tsukineko Emboss dual pen
Uniball Signo broad white gel pen 
Watercolor pencils

Stamps:
Stampin' Up "Kleine Wünsche"
Unity Stamp Company "SHEart Doodles"
Artemio background stamp (handwriting) <- the set seems to have no name
Free digital bat stamp from the Alley Way

Others:
Clear embossing powder
Black fine embossing powder
Foam dots, Taperunner


What a list, I was never aware I was using so many different things...

Once again, I had to (clear) emboss the printed image, to keep the ink from running, but with the lines rather bold, that works nicely. I also embossed the sentiment and stiching in black.
As usual I used my daughters' watercolor pencils, to color the bat. "My" Inktense pencils are already on my wishlist for Christmas. Like so many other things...

For example black ribbon, of which I seem to own not a single inch. So for the ribbon in the sketch I had to make do with a slim piece of black cardstock and three white gel pen dots. But I have to admit, for this image I like the simplicity better, than I would have liked a ribbon and bow.

 To pop up the wings so much, I used 3 foam dots on each side, one close to the body and two on top of each other towards the outside. This makes the card a bit bulky, but I will probably never send it anyway. Halloween is not greatly celebrated in Germany, and I really don't know anyone to send it to.


Wishing you a very early Happy Halloween
Ela

Thursday 5 September 2013

Autum is coming

Hello to everyone,

the Paper Players are challanging us this week to create fall themed cards:


So as there are a few autumn birthdays coming up in my family, I decided for a fall birthday card.




I used my newest stampset "French Foliage" by Stampin' up and inked each stamp with two earthy colors to achieve a color blending.

I hope you like it.

And something entriely differnet: Katharina is offering a cute bundle of flowers and embellishments as a blog candy this week, on her blog. Have a look, isn't that cute?




Happy fall
Ela

Wednesday 4 September 2013

STAMPtember

Hello crafters,

no card today, I wanted to craft a little today, but it took me all evening to read all the blogs from the Simon Says Stamp bloghop. I love how all of you are sooo creative, but if STAMPtember keeps up this  pace, I won't get around to do any stamping myself.


Have a great day
Ela