Shaky - In More Ways than One

I've never had much luck with Shaker cards, so my heart sank when Sharon issued the latest challenge for The Daring Cardmakers.
But a challenge is a challenge!

Hi, it's Sharon here with this week's dare and I've chosen:

Shake it Off

I want to see shaker cards this week, and I'd really love to see some creative ways to fill them.

To get you thinking,t here are some ideas from the design team HERE

Tools and Materials

Papers: Simple Stories 6x6 pads

Glitter card, Gold card

Memory Bos Snowflake Wreath die

Sweet Dixie tree die

Spellbinders Circle die

Tiny snowflakes and stars left over from other projects

Glitter, Gems,

Plastic packaging for shaker front (I can't find my acetate sheets) 

As usual when I try to make this kind of card it's a bit of a dog's breakfast and I think it looks more like fog than a starry, snowy scene behind the acetate! 

 It would be too easy to say, "I'm useless at these things so I'll just sit this one out" wouldn't it?.  What I like about being involved with the DCM is the variety of things we are asked to do, and how some weeks' dares will stretch some of us, but not others - we are all different and we all bring different likes. dislikes, skills, styles and techniques to the party - which is probably why we still enjoy doing it every week!
So if you've never made a shaker card before, or if like me they are not something you feel super-confident about - go on, have a go - I dare you!

Thanks for visiting

Sketch File Snowflake panel

I rather liked the effect from using all those tiny snowflakes on my Daring card last Friday, so I thought I'd try using them in another way and incorporate them into a card using the December sketch from The Sketch File Blog  

To keep the snowflakes and stars in the confines of the rectangular panel I washi-taped a rectangular frame die in place then just filled the "hole" with the tiny die cuts.  it's not as fiddly as you'd think - I put a blob of glue on the lid of my glue pot, then use a mini spatula which is just a piece of card (a few cms long)  with one end trimmed to a bit of a point.  Dip the point into the glue, use it to pick up and set the small item in place and repeat till the space is filled.  You don't need to cover the whole of the die cut with glue, just a tiny spot will keep it in place.
When you can't fit any more snowflakes in, use tiny stars, circles, gems, tiny blobs of glitter glue or whatever else you have at hand to fill any gaps. 

Remove the tape and the frame die and finish the card however you fancy. 

 This the sketch:

The Sketch File Blog 

I cut a few larger snowflakes and layered them up to make my card.  On a bit of a roll, and with more snowflakes ans stars still to use I made these too

Now, I reckon this would look fab using other shapes - I'm thinking a nice big star, but whether I'll get round to giving that a go is another thing!

Hope you like these, anyway.  Thanks for visiting

Red and Blue

It's Dawn's first time setting a dare for the Daring Cardnakers this week and to ease her in gently she's chose the colour palette for our last Colour Combo of the year.

The challenge is very simple - just to use any shades of Red and Blue on our cards

"I really do love seeing red and blue on Christmas cards or as a theme for your Christmas tree.  Something a little non traditional.  Hope this weeks challenge kick starts your creativeness ready for the festive season."

My growing snowflake die collection got another workout this week!

 

The papers are from an old Fancy Pants winter collection, along with some glitter card and pearlised card
The dies are from various manufacturers including memory Box, Poppystamps, Crafters Companion and Sweet Dixie.  The small ones are cut using a fabulous 10x10cm plate die by Cheery Lynn - I really use this one loads!


Dawn gave us this photo as a starting point but it was a good job she said any Blue would do!

The snowflake and star "swirl" was originally going to be a simple circle but I got a bit carried away, didn't I? hehe 
Gaps are filled in with tiny stars (EK Success punch), and a few dots which are the "waste"that falls when you use some of the border punches - though in this case it was the waste bits I wanted.

 

I absolutely LOVE the effect of all the tiny snowflakes and stars, even if it was a bit accidental!  I'm going to try and use this idea some more, so "watch this space" to see if I actually get round to it!

Thanks for popping by

Nice and Easy Sketch

I've used the new LO from The Sketch File Blog to make this card,  When I'm so behind with my card-making, a simple and straightforward plan is exactly what I need!

 
The script background is just a scanned piece from "The Night Before Christmas", printed onto some white Bazzill card which I'd previously tinted a very pale grey shade using Paint Shop Pro - because I didn't have a pale enough ready-made piece.
The sentiment with the little snowflakes was printed directly onto the card blank
I've a growing collection of snowflake dies in different sizes so I cut a big batch of them in various colours and papers,  then just do an assembly job until I run out.
Here's the sketch:

The Sketch File December LO

 Oh well, best get back to it then, thanks for looking in

I Forgot my Forgotten Funky

The last Friday of the month is the day all the Funkettes post something on the Get Funky and Craft blog, all of us using the same Funky Hand CD or Download - so how come I nearly always forget to have something ready?

On Thursday afternoon when Anice issued a friendly reminder of the date I had a little panic, but found some pieces of the right papers actually in one of the piles of stuff on my desk, because I used the "Sleigh Ride" a while back  to make a gift bag.

I grabbed them and made a quick card to add to the blog post.  It was a bit of a pig's ear to be honest, so when OH rang to say he was going to be a bit late home I went back to my desk and had another go.
Well, that didn't go well either!
So the card I put  on the blog on Thursday night had to do for the Friday morning launch.

Well, with a little more time and feeling a bit less frazzled I sat down at my desk this morning and made something I like much more - and it gave me the chance to try out another of my "home made" sentiment panels = you can see another on my Daring Cardmakers card if you scroll down to the post before this one

I really love the "Sleigh Ride" download and often use it for my projects as the colours and lots of the designs are just great for all year round crafting

Funky Hand "Sleigh Ride"

The sentiment panel is created using Paint Shop Pro using fonts and dingbats. For this card I added colours to the dingbats to match the colours in the papers before printing out.

The stars were cut with some of the dies from a nested die set (Taylored Expressions) using  more designs from the  "Sleigh Ride" collection along with a few in glitter paper for a bit of festive bling

I'm going to have a look at the two rejected cards to see if I can save them, so watch this space!

Thanks for looking. please leave a message.....

Cottoning On....

Another Friday another Daring Cardmakers day and this time it's Jo setting the challenge

It's Jo here with this week's dare;

Cottoning On!
This week, I'd like to see some cotton on your cards, cotton thread, cotton wool, cotton yarn...
The DT have created some beautiful cards to inspire you; and you can see them all by clicking HERE

A couple of years ago I bought a pack of beautiful fabric "trims" which were part of a Websters Pages Christmas range.  I will admit that I've not really used much of them so this challenge was a great opportunity to hunt them out.
With the lovely, quite wide and rather opulent piece of fabric as a starting point there didn't seem much point in half measures, so I threw all my favourite card-making "excesses" at this one - ribbon, lace, a big flower, some glitter and lovely rich shades - this was fun to put together

 
I've been playing around with Paint Shop Pro on the pc using different fonts and quotations etc to make some sentiments for my cards.  This is one of those I've made - having worked out the layout and which font to use for the words I then added the little holly motifs which are from a Christmas dingbat font (found on DaFont) - I just "coloured" them in later with the "fill" tool.  
What you end up with is something along the lines of a stamped sentiment, but with the added bonus of being able to resize it, or even change the font or icons if you want

Tools and Materials:

Cream, ribbed card blank

Cream card, lightly inked for printing sentiment panel

Dark red glitter card,  Dark red Stickles glitter glue

Red, Yellow and Green Bazzill card for flower

Gold card

Wide Christmas fabric "ribbon" (Websters Pages)

Cream cotton lace (Charmed Cards and Craft)

Very narrow Red stain ribbon

Gold lurex ribbon (under the lace)

Border punch (Martha Stewart)

Poinsettia die (MFT DieNamics) 

Tiny Holly die (Memory Box) 

Although there's lots going on in this card and quite a few "processes" involved this all went together really easily.  Funny how things do that sometime

Thanks for coming by, I hope you like my card

Something Old, Something New

It is Lythan's turn to set the challenge for the Daring Cardmakers this week:

"I have gone for one that allows for "seasonal" choices but is also something fun if you have either smugly made all your cards or are still in denial about what happens near the end of December...
Something Old, Something New
Most paper crafters have something in their stash that they have bought but never got round to using. If that isn't you - well done! But you can still play along as the idea of this dare is to combine a new and unused/ fresh out of the packet and only used a little product with something that has been hanging round in your craft space for a while."

You can see all the cards we've made using our Old and New stash by visiting the BLOG, here.

OK so I may have indulged myself a little and bought a few new dies in the lead up to the Festive Season, but I've already used some of those for cards I've shown on here, so in the spirit of the dare, I actually chose to use the brand new, as yet unopened pack of nesting star dies to make my card this week. 
My "Something Old" is pretty much everything else, but especially the papers, which I bought a couple of years ago but haven't really used much at all

Tools and Materials

Kraft Square card blank

Papers: Bazzill "Believe" 6x6 paper pack

Strip of  Dark Red Bazzill card

Dark Red and Gold Glitter card

Gold Vellum

Gold cord

Decal sticker sentiment

Ink: Rhubarb Stalk dewdrop (Memento)

Nested Stars Die set (Taylored Expressions)

Tiny Stars punch - punches 6 at once (EK Success)

At first I only had the glitter card and "music paper stars, but it looked very dull, so I added another star cut from gold vellum and it's amazing the difference it made in brightening up the whole thing
The small stars are hanging loose on the cord strands so there's a bit of movement in the finished card too.  I hope you like it

 Thanks for visiting, please leave a comment

In a Flap for November

With hardly any Christmas cards made yet I'm definitely in a bit of a flap in that regard!
"In a Flap" is the name of the November LO idea on The Sketch File Blog and I've used it to make a couple of  cards so far - Christmas cards, so that's at least 2 in the box!
The sketch actually went live a couple of weeks ago but I completely forgot to blog my cards here

 For my first card I used the sketch the "right" way up and used my new star die

 Tools and Materials:

Cream card, Red card

Red and Gold Glitter card

Gold ribbon

Homemade sticker sentiment

Dies: Spellbinder scalloped circle

Sweet Dixie star

Various star punches

The little hearts around the scalloped edge are waste from the 2 star die cuts

Here is the sketch:

For this week's card I turned the sketch upside down to make a snow "hill" for the tree to stand on

 Tools and Materials:

White card

Dark Blue card embossed with "Petite Dots" (Crafters Companion)

Green and Silver Glitter card

Silver cord

Homemade sticker sentiment

Dies: Spellbinder plain circle, Sweet Dixie Tree, Cheery Lynn snowflake plate

Small and tiny star punches

Well, that's it for this time
Thanks for looking

Light a Candle

It's my turn to set the challenge for the Daring Cardmakers this week:

 "Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared."    ~Buddha
So this week I'd simply like to see some candles on your cards, whether its just one candle or lots of them - and for any reason you want.

It always takes me a while to get into "Christmas card mode", and I try to keep the bulk of my Christmas cards fairly simple to put together (which isn't usually the case with my cards). so it's nice to use the DCM challenges to have a bit more fun with embellishments, dimension and lots of layers!

The main trouble this week was that it's my challenge - and most of the team will tell you that making something for your own challenge is the hardest of all.  Why that should be the case is a mystery, but that's the way it is!
Thus, it shouldn't have been a surprise when  this one took most of the day to make - and  I'm not happy because I wanted to use red ribbon  but didn't have enough of the right shade to do it. maybe  I should have planned ahead....haha, that'll be the day!

This one involved lots of die-cutting, making and cutting templates for the Silhouette and some ridiculously fiddly sticking of tiny berries which I could have done much more quickly and easily with blobs of Stickles....but by that time my brain was frazzled!
I bought the holly border last year and find it quite handy as because the very fine strand that joins the leaves  allows it to be quite pliable for bending into different shapes - like a circle for instance....

Tools and Materials

Cream card blank

Papers: Sleigh Ride download by Funky Hand

Bazzill card: white (for printing papers on to), dark green for larger holly

Dark Red Glitter paper (Best Creations)

Green ribbon, Srickles (yellow, dark red)

Candles and flames are handcut

Sentiment is pc generated

 Silhouette Cameo:

Frame with circle in it, plus the turquoise mat behind it

Petals for the poinsettia

Dies: 

Large holly; Crafters Companion

Holly border die (Memory Box), I've used 3 of the strands to go around the circle and to make the wreath and add some extra strands to fill it out, plus a 4th  on the side panel at the right

Mini Holly Leaves and Berries ( Memory Box) for extra leaves

Slellbinders Labels 34 to make backing for sentiment 

Snowflakes cut using a Cheery Lynn plate of tiny snowflakes

There  are some fantastic ideas on ways to use candles on cards from our fab Design Team over on the blog, so please check them out HERE
I hope you'll join in and play along this week
Thanks for visiting

Forgetful

I'm not sure how it happened but I've completely forgot to update my blog for the last couple of weeks - I even forgot to add the card I made for last week's Daring Cardmakers challenge - which is really bad as DCM Fridays are usually the ones I remember to blog, even if I don't add anything else during the week.

So today I've a Daring Double to share

First up is this week's challenge, set by Leo and as it's the First Friday of the Month it's our November Colour Palette Challenge.
Leo chose Gold, Rose-Gold, Silver and Linen White as the colour combo and I made this card

I didn't have anything I felt met the "Rose Gold" shade, so I opened a new document in Paint Shop Pro,  hovered my mouse over the Rose Gold squares on Leo's inspiration board to get the RGB colour match and used the "fill" tool to cover the page.  I then printed it onto an A5 piece of Bazzill Bling in  "Diamond White" which meant the printed piece of card has texture and a lovely soft sheen.
Here's a screenshot of how to get the RGB codes, just in case you are interested

Here is Leo's inspiration picture

Tools and Materials:

Smooth White square card blank, plus scrap for snowflakes

Bazzill Bling Diamond White card for printing with colour

Bazzill Bling Diamond White card left white for embossed panel

Plain Gold card for sentiment

Silver and Gold glitter card (Best Creations)

Pearls and tiny silver gems

"Christmas" cut from my own Silhouette Cameo template 

Baubles cut with a Memory Box die, Snowflakes with a Cheery Lynn die plate of small snowflakes

Last week, Bat asked us to use some googly or whacky eyes on our cards - this was such a fun challenge and I absolutely loved seeing the cards the team made - so may inspiring ideas on how to use them!
I used a template I made for my old Craft Robo a few years ago and now cut with the Silhouette

Tools and Materials:

Smooth White square card blank

Deep Blue card (Bazzill)

Snowflake background is a digital design printed onto Diamond White (Bazzill Bling)

Blue-grey and Green glitter card (Best Creations)

Red, white, peach card scraps

Googly Eyes, Stickles Ice crystal glitter glue

Father Christmas cut from my own  template using Silhouette Cameo

Holly die (Crafters Companion)

Fancy Scalloped Circle die (Spellbinders)

Last week was Dare 52 of Year 8 for the Daring Cardmakers - a full 8 years of setting challenges - which is amazing.  Leo's colour choice for this week is perfect for celebrating  Dare 1 of Year 9 and  the start of a whole new year for us.   I hope you'll pop across and see what the team have made this week.

Thank you for coming by today

Twisted Tube Treats

My post on the Get Funky and Craft blog today is a Twisted Tube Treats Box which might come in handy for Halloween, or Christmas or whatever other reasons you can think of for giving someone a little treat.

The great thing about this one is that you can make it in whatever size you like as the starting point is simply a rectangle of thick paper or thin card.

 Twisted Tube Treat Box

Because of the shape of these boxes, the easiest way to work out what size box you need is to have a "dry run" using a sheet of ordinary A4 paper first.  For instance even using a quarter of a sheet of A4 will produce a box big enough to hold a lot of small sweets like Smarties or Jelly Tots - if you want to make tiny boxes to hang on your Christmas Tree, consider making them even smaller.

So just cut a sheet of scrap A4 into half to start with and  follow these instructions to get the idea first on how it works, and work out whether you need a smaller or larger rectangle to create the size box you need

For this Halloween themed treat box, I started with a rectangle that is a quarter of a sheet of A4.  I've used Funky Hand's Spookie Dookie download for this one

 Turn to the "wrong" side and from one edge, fold in about 1cm and make a crease.  Apply glue or tape down the folded piece

Now,bring the other edge over to line up with the crease and stick down to form a tube - just like the card  inner tube from a loo roll!

 Now, flatten one end of the tube - keep the join at one side of the flattened end, use glue or tape to stick these two edges together. I find glue is a bit easier to apply on the inside edge.  You may find it useful to have a supply of mini bulldog clips handy to hold all the edges in place while they dry

For the next crease you need to flatten the top end of the box in the other direction - this time, make the crease but don't do any sticking as your box needs to be filled first! You should end up with a box with 4 triangular "faces"

At this point you need to decide what to put in it and how to close it.

You could just add glue as before and maybe make a sticker to decorate the box with

If you want little boxes to hang on the Christmas Tree you could simply fill with goodies, then add the glue as before, but remembering to tuck in a loop of Bakers Twine to hang it with.

Or if you've made a larger box,  punch some holes and thread ribbon through to hold the opening together - this is nicer for a gift box, I think. 

Or punch a medium sized circle and stick half down on each side of the box opening - it would be simple then to open with scissors

How about making 24 of these in some  of Funky Hand's Christmas designs (such as these form Funky Hand's Yule Be Funky CDrom)- add a number to each , hang them on a branch or display in a big bowl and you've got a unique and stylish Advent Calendar. 

That's it for this time, I hope you like these little boxes and will have ago at making some. Thank you for visiting

Getting Sentimental

Gez is the challenge setter over at the Daring Cardmakers this week and she wants to see our favourite sentiments and quotes on our cards...plus a little "side" challenge of using a new technique, or revisiting some old favourites.

This is definitely one of my favourite quotations  - from that well known scribe "Anon" ;)

I use this one a lot and have it saved on the pc so that I can just change to different fonts and colours to print out and use.  Sometimes it takes a while to get the format exactly right if I want to use a particular die to cut it out.
In this case I just wanted to print it in a single colour on a simple panel, so that bit was fairly easy.  
My "try something new" plan was to do the whole background piece, using a couple of different paper designs and the sentiment so that it would all print in a single layer and just need an embellishment of some sort to finish it off.  Whilst the printing bit worked OK, the"adding an embellishment" part was a disaster and the card was a total write-off!  
In the end I used the sentiment panel as one piece then printed a couple of pieces of extra paper to make the coloured sections of the background - all were printed on a lovely Bazzill Basics  Diamond - White Shimmer Cardstock- I've not used this stuff for printing on before and I do love the slight sheen you get
To finish the card I decided to use some lovely ready made flowers for a change - I really should do this more often ans I appear to have boxes and boxes of them!

Materials and Tools

Cream cardstock for card base and embossed layer

Digital Download papers: "Wash it All Away" by Funky Hand

Bazzill Basics  Diamond - White Shimmer Cardstock

Mulberry paper flowers and leaf

Gems and Pearls 

EK Success border punch

Petite Dots embossing folder by Crafters' Companion

The team have, as always created some gorgeous cards, so pop over HERE to see them all

Thank you for visiting, please leave a comment ;)

Scripted

It's Beckie's turn to set the challenge for the Daring Cardmakers this week:

"With the nights drawing in there is nothing better than cosying up 

with a good book! For The Love Of A Good Book

So this week I would like to see a page from an old book used on your card. This can be taken from an old book or if you have a stamp with a script on it you can use that too."

 For once I had an idea of what I wanted to do - a couple of different ideas, in fact - which made a nice change from pushing paper around the desk! One idea was for a Christmas card using script patterned paper, the other for a "regular" card and making a flower from old book pages

First though I needed to find my Christmas stash - which proved the most difficult bit.  The funny thing was though that although I thought there was at least one "script" style paper in every paper set, it turned out there wasn't.  In the end I used a right old hotchpotch of 6x6 pads and dies to make this card

Tools and Materials:

Smooth, Cream card blank

Dark red Bazzill card, Gold card scraps

Papers from MME, Simple Stories, Carta Bella, all 6x6 pads

Glitter card in gold and dark red

Gold twine, red and white Baker's twine

Snowflake dies: Sweet Dixie, Spellbinders, Crafters Companion, Memory Box

Snowflake Punces: EK Success, Martha Stewart

For the next card I used some old book pages from my "might come in useful one day" box to make a flower - then used the off-cut from the first card to make a scrapling.

Tools and Materials:

Smooth, Cream card blank

Papers MME "Lost and Found" 6x6

Seam Binding, Black card for swirl

Card Candy, Pearls and Gems

Ink

Old book pages for flower

SU Punches for flower 

The flower is made with 5 large punched shapes and 2 smaller ones.  I damped them then added some colour with pinky peach ink. I blotted the paper with kitchen paper to remove excess water then crumple each petal and left to dry (well a bit, as I'm too impatient to wait longer), while I made the background for the card.

Once uncrumpled I just glued the petals together using the smaller ones at the top of the stack, and crumpled them up again to get a shape I liked

As always the design team have come up with lots of inspiring ways to use script papers, stamps and book pages, so I hope you'll click HERE to check them all out

Thanks for visiting