What Sherlock Said.

....as in "It's Elementary my Dear Watson"

It's Nat's turn to set the Daring Cardmakers challenge this week and she's found a fab  "mood board" Inspiration Photo full of trinkets,  ideas and colours - the idea is that you choose at least three of the elements from the photo to use on a card - with the colour combo being just one of the three should you choose to use them - ie you can't get away with saying "I've used pink, green and blue so that's my 3 things" - sneaky, eh?

Actually, we were spoiled for choice as there are so many usable elements on the photo.  I managed to get a fair few onto this card:

 

Here's Nat's photo - can you see which things I chose to use?

It did take 3 attempts before I got everything I wanted to use on there in a way I was happy with.
 I seem to have lost the knack of using backgrounds - whenever I add papers, or inkiness the finished project looks a right old mess.  

So rejecting a card with a paper background, and then one with an inky background I just bunged all the bits onto a plain white card instead!

It's vaguely based on the April LO from The Sketch File - there's a bit of license used, but it's my sketch and I'm not offended at myself for giving it a tweak.  haha

Materials and Tools

Fancy Pants "Simplicity" pack for flower, butterfly, "label" and monogram sticker

(the grid on the label is supposed to  echo the graph paper on the Insp. photo)

Ribbon and braids from stash - the green seam binding is twisted around

 like some of those on the photo

Red Bazzill for heart (cut on Silhouette Cameo)

Buttons and Thread 

Handmade Flower created using SU Blossom Punch

Butterfly and Leaf Swirl die cuts are both Spellbinders

I had a lot of fun putting this together - OK, so it wasn't much fun when the first two were binned, or torn apart, but I did enjoy checking out the photo and spotting all the things I could use - and of course, when you finally get it to work, it's always good....or at least, a relief!

Check out the DCM BLOG to see how the rest of the team used the picture, and please join in - it would be great to see what you make

Bend Me, Fold Me

On the Daring Cardmakers blog this week, it's my turn to set the challenge:

Another Dimension 

  not Time Warps, Little Green Men from Mars, or anything else "other-world"

  I just don't want to see any flat, regular sort of cards this week - instead I'd like to see lots of interesting folds and shapes; Stepper cards, Card in a Box, Pyramids, Flip-it type cards..... Anything goes as long as the finished, standing-up card is more 3D than 2D. 

This is your chance to try out all those techniques and tutorials for unusually shaped and folded cards that you've been saving!  Yes. we all do it, don't we?

My first thought was to do another "card in a box", but I had a feeling someone else might go down that route (and I was right) so then I was all set to do a pyramid card - but I've done those before and although they are fun to make and I've not done one for ages, what I really wanted was to try something new.
So, searching through my "must try this sometime" list I came across a Bendy-fold" tutorial from Splitcoaststampers.
I love cards that stand out all over the place when on display but will fold at least relatively flat to go in an envelope - it makes it so much more fun, doesn't it? The card-in-a-box, and the pyramid ones do that, and this curvy card does it too - although how flat depends on how much "stuff" you stick on hehe
The magic bit is all done with slits and tabs.

I used a whole raft of odds and ends of card and paper for this so I'm not even going to try and list that sort of stuff
The little summerhouse is all just hand cut,with the "wood" planks drawn on - it's supposed to look a bit ramshackle, honestly!
The bushes, some bits of grass and stems were also hand-cut
For the flowers I used a few ready-made flowers plus quite a lot of punches  (Tonic) and dies from Spellbinders, MFT Die-Namics, Memory Box and Marion Smith. The tree is by Memory Box
Also used: Stickles, Card Candy, Liquid Pearls

You can find the tutorial for making a bendy-card HERE

This took far longer to make than it should - I got a bit carried away with the flowers - not helped because the little flower-shaping gadget and new dies from Marion Smith arrived on Wednesday and were screaming "play with me....NOW"  so, some of the flowers were made with those.
Anyway, that's my card for this week and you can see some fantastic fancy folds and dimensional cards over on the BLOG

That's all for this time - except to wish you a Happy Easter
Thanks for visiting

Up the Flagpole!

Soooo, Lythan came up with a fascinating idea of the Daring Cardmakers to play with this week - Although simple on one level, which was just to use a National Flag as inspiration, when you get to thinking about it there are LOADS of possibilities!
Anyway, here's Lythan's Intro: 

Flag it up!

By which I mean I want you to make a card inspired by a national flag. You can use the flag elements as a sketch, or the colours or a motif (stars and stripes for example) You can be patriotic and use your own flag or show your love for all nations by choosing the flag of a different country.

One of these days I'm going to hunt out a really good website for National Flags and see what I can steal from their layout. colours, images etc, but I found myself short of time this week so kept my card simple.  Plan A was to do something based around the English flag and our Patron Saint as St George's Fay comes up later this month - but the phrase "An Englishman's Home is his Castle" popped into my head, and with it the image of adding little flags to sandcastles on the beach - so that's the story of my card for this week

I used masking tape to keep the lower section white, then used a couple of Distress Inks directly onto the card blank to make the background, the words on the little flag were pc generated then the flag shape cut by hand, but otherwise pit was the Silhouette Cameo that did the rest of the work

Th sandcastle template is one I made for another project so that was a result.  I used clip-art to create the two kinds of flags - straight ones for those on the border and a "fluttery" shape and flagpole for the one on the sandcastle.
The big black sentiment is also SC cut - the font is called "Hobo medium" and is one of my go-to favourites 
So the materials list is pretty simple this week, all I used was ink and card!

I really hope you'll head over to the DCM BLOG and check out what the others have done - they were far more creative in their thinking than I was!
Thanks for visiting

Spwllbinders Nesties Gift Box tutorial

Spwllbinders Nesties Gift Box tutorial 
 

I've made a few of these little boxes now and they are quite simple to make. For this one I've used Spellbinders Nesties Label 26 for the top and base sections of my box, and the Square Nesties set for the actual box section.

 There are lots of photos, which I hope will make it nice and easy to follow

For this version I've used some digital papers printed on both sides of some white card.  I like to use a basic textured Bazzill type card (cut to A4), but just printing onto any white card would be fine.

I've used a few different designs as you'll see in the photos, but you could just make the box using one or two designs.  You''ll need a couple of sheets of printed card - or just use plain card in your chosen shades - you can always add some pretty paper to decorate later.

You'll also need some thicker card - I use card cut from an empty cereal packet

From the printed card

*Cut a 6cm wide strip from the long side.  Crease at 4cm as shown in the photo above

*Cut 4 of the 2nd largest Spellbinders Nesties Labels 26 die. Ink the edges and adhere 2 of each (if using different designs) together - be as accurate as possible. These will be the base and top of your box

* Cut 2 pieces measuring  9cm square, or use plain square Nesties

From the cereal packet

* Cut 6 or 7 (depending on thickness)  pieces measuring 6.5cm square

* Glue just 2 of the card squares together and set aside for the base section

* Trim a tiny fraction (1 - 1.5mm only) from 2 adjoining sides (not opposite ones - you need to keep the shape square) of each of the other squares and then glue them together. It's important not to trim away too much or the lid will be too loose at the end

Cover the card squares with the 9cm squares, wrapping around and making the corners as neat as you can.  Set the thicker of the squares aside for now

Using the thinner covered cereal packet piece, line up and mark the long strip as shown so that it will wrap around all 4 sides and have an overlap at the end. Make creases and cut slits up to the 2cm fold line

* Adhere the square piece to the side strip starting with the second section along.  Next glue the third and fourth sections under, and then the overlap.  Apply glue to the outside of the overlap piece and then glue the first section in place to cover it, and end up neatly at the corner of the box

 

 The underneath should look like this

Now apply glue to the box you've created and centre over one of the die cut pieces.  If you've done as I did and used 2 different designs, you'll need to decide which will be on the "inside" edges and which will be the outer ones

Finally adhere the thicker cereal packet piece to the 2nd of the die cut sections.

Trimming those tiny slivers from the card squares should mean that the lid will fit nicely into the top edge of the box - have a quick check before the glue has dried completely, then if you find the fit isn't snug enough, take the cereal packet piece off quickly and cover with another square of paper - that might just be enough to make it work

 It looks a bit dull and boring at the moment, doesn't it? 

But the fun can begin now because it's time to decorate!

Then you just have to make it look pretty!  Go mad and add flowers, ribbon, pretty flourishes etc to your hearts content! 

They are fun to make and easy too

 I hope you'll have a go - and if you do I would soooo love to see your boxes, so please don't forget to let me know

Happy Crafting

Red Flowers

I'm not sure how I managed to forget to do my blog post for Friday's Daring Cardmakers' challenge, but I did - and then I forgot all over the w/e too. So it's a case of better-late-than-never and apologies to Lythan for being so tardy
As it was the first Friday of the month it was our usual Colour Combo Challenge week and as I mentioned, it was Lythan's turn to choose the palette for us to work with. 
I wasn't sure what to do at first, but in the end it had to be flowers.

I chose a couple of different red card shades, some plain and patterned grey paper and cards, and the best shade of green that I could find for the leaves to match up with the inspiration photo

Materials and Tools

Patterned Grey panel is from an old Hot of the Press pad

Oval doily and plain oval on top are cut in two shades of grey card

Red card, Red and Silver pearls, Red and Clear Dewdrops

2x Camellia flowers

Red petals Die'Sire Camellia (small) Quilling flower from Crafters Companion

Yellow inner petals Die'Sire "Lace" Quilling flower from Crafters Companion

2x Medium Roses

Created using own flower template cut on Silhouette Cameo

2x Rolled Roses

Hand-cut from scraps

Leaves cut with  Die'Sire "Leaf 2" Die and embossed with Tumbling Leaves A4 folder, 

both from Crafters Companion

Plain oval cut on Silhouette Cameo

Oval Doily die by MFT Die'Namics (Dainty Doily Duo)

Apart from just missing the grey background piece when the lid of my Tacky Glue pot fell off and the contents globbed over my desk and other stuff on it.....this went together quite well in the end.
There's a fab mix of cards on the BLOG this week, all so different in style, but sharing this lovely colour palette

Thanks for visiting, please leave a message ;)

Sketchy Scraps

I've used oddments of papers left over from making my card for last week's "Forgotten Funky" to make my first Sketch File April project.  It's always quite a surprise when I find that, "yes, there is enough in that little pile of left-over bits to make another card!"  Even if, as in this case I had to patch a couple of strips together - but you can't see that because the joins are under other parts of the sketch hehe

This is the April Sketch from The Sketch File - I've stuck pretty close this time

Materials and Tools

Papers: Funky Hand 'Retro Fun Wordbook' download.

Memory Box Fabulous Phlox die set, Dewdrops, home-made decal sentiment

That's it, thanks for visiting, I hope you'll pop back soon