Blue bouquet on green

Hi, we had some much needed rain here over the last 24 hours, hopefully our water tanks have had a nice top up! 

I needed a card for a friend's birthday and was inspired by the colour challenge at Just us girls.

The flower heads were diecut from snippets of watercolor paper, so I'm visiting the snippets playground

 at Pixie's Crafty Workshop.

 I tried an old set of watercolor paints my sister gave me years ago but I wasn't very happy with the result!

So, I spritzed over the top with blue patina perfect pearls mixed with water to blend the colours a bit better.

I'm also linking up to the challenge at Seize the Birthday where it's anything goes,

and to Simon Says Wednesday Challenge where the theme is Summer.

Materials used:

Memory Box bella bouquet die; distress inks; watercolor paint; blue patina perfect pearls;

Scrollwork frame embossing folder; sentiment sticker.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend,

thanks for visiting, Cathy x

Blue wedding flowers

Hi, it's mid week or hump day as they say here, so I'm looking forward to the weekend (again!)

These vellum flowers are quite shiny in real life as they are painted with twinkling H2O's.

I'm linking up to the challenge at The Card Concept where it's a wedding theme with this gorgeous inspiration pic. My card is in the clean and layered category.

I've used snippets of white card to diecut my leaves so I'm visiting the playground again at 

Pixie's Crafty Workshop.

I had cut away most of the embossed card front to use on another card and was left with a small strip attached to the back of the card.

By opening it up and embossing the other edge of the base I got a new front panel. 

So I guess that's another snippet!

Materials used:

Sizzix embossing folder (swirls and waves); Memory Box fresh foliage die; Annabelle Stamps Wedding Medallion sentiment with silver ink and embossing powder; Stampin Up flower stamp; vellum; twinkling H2Os; silver shimmer paper and pearl bling.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Summer Flowers

Hi again, I'm back with another snippets card.

This time I used up some of the gloss card scraps from the fern frond card I made a few days ago.

I touched up the existing colours with some indigo alcohol ink and cut pieces to fit over the flowers in this die. There's still a few pieces left that might come in handy for something!

I'm visiting the playground again at Pixie's Crafty Workshop.

I added a couple of butterflies as the theme at Mrs A's butterfly challenge is summertime butterflies.

I used wink of stella to add some sparkle to the yellow flower centres and the butterflies are cut from gold shimmer paper, so I'm linking up to the challenge at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday

where the theme is make it sparkle.

Materials used:

Memory Box bella bouquet and butterfly delight dies; Sizzix swirls with waves embossing folder;

gloss card scraps coloured with alcohol ink; distress ink on the stems and leaves; sentiment sticker.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Sparkly presents

Hi, I've spent today making a few of these cards in a range of colours, and 

my snippets box supplied all the bits and pieces!

So I'm visiting the playground at Pixie's Crafty Workshop.

I added some sparkle to the bows with a clear wink of stella pen,

 so I'm also linking up to the challenge at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday

where the theme is to make it sparkle.

Materials used:

Spellbinders square die; Memory Box crisp bows die; bling and sentiment sticker.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Golden stars and sequins

Hi, hope you're enjoying your weekend, or at least getting close to doing so!

These stars are diecut  from metal sheet and coloured with alcohol inks.
(gold metallic,caramel, butterscotch and pitch black)

I scored some lines to create a panel, added some sequins and a sentiment sticker.

I definitely struggle with photographing shiny surfaces, here's a laid back view.

I'm linking up to the challenges at Addicted to CAS

where the theme is gold.

At Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge the theme is to make it sparkle.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Fern Fronds

Hi, I've been playing with some new dies and alcohol inks.

The bottom frond is inlaid into the base to reduce bulk. I glued the right half of the top fern down and popped the lower fronds on the left hand side up with small foam dots for dimension.

I'm linking up to the challenge at Less is More where it's a colour theme.

I used stream, lettuce, citrus and clover alcohol inks. The only colour not used is grey, so I hope this is representative enough of the colours to meet the rules.

Materials used:

Memory Box delicate fern die; alcohol inks on glossy card stock; sentiment sticker.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Fairy tale anniversary

Hi, I'm back with a card that was very quick to make.

I diecut the Fairy tale border in gold paper and glued it onto a white diecut for dimension. It was a bit tricky getting the tendrils to sit on top of each other! Scored a couple of lines to create a panel and popped on some bling with glossy accents.

I'm linking up to the challenge at Addicted to CAS where its a gold theme.

I'm popping a last entry into Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge 

where it's anything goes.

Sister Act Card Challenge also has an anything goes theme.

Enjoy the rest of your week, 

thanks for visiting, Cathy x

Baby Ducks

Hi, one of my nieces had a new baby boy recently,

 and I wanted to make her a card that was a bit different.

I had seen this gorgeous card by Sue T on the Outside the Box blog and thought I'd create some colourful ducks on the water.

I'm linking up to the colour challenge at Less is More.

I'm adding another entry to the anything goes challenge at 

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday.

At Simon Says Stamp Monday the theme is family.

Materials used:

 Memory Box Mama and baby ducks die and texture wave stencil; Memento Bahama blue ink; distress ink for the duck and yellow flock for the fuzzy yellow ducklings; Annabelle Stamps All things grow reed stamp; white gel pen; a dot of black enamel accents for the eyes; sentiment sticker.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

More inky butterflies

Hi, I've diecut the rest of the glossy card that I used alcohol inks on.

It made 8 butterflies and they all look different! The earlier card used a brownish one and most of the others have more of the cranberry in them.

I've succumbed to ordering more of the inks too. I thought if I bought alcohol inks instead of alcohol for a while I'd be better off! So the red wine will have to be postponed for now LOL!

I'm linking up again to the challenge at Allsorts. The theme is to use your favourite things.

So, I'm back with more diecuts.

The flourishes are cut from snippets of pink cardstock.

 I managed to position scraps over the part of the flourish I wanted to use so didn't have to waste a larger piece of card.

So, I'm visiting the snippets playground at Pixie's Crafty Workshop to see what's been happening.

I'm also putting another entry into Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge where the theme is anything goes.

Materials used:

Memory Box Darla butterfly and MFT fancy flourish dies: alcohol inks - cranberry, pebble and butterscotch; gloss card; Stately embossing folder; sentiment sticker and bling.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Flowery Flourish

Hi, I seem to be alternating a bit between flowers and butterflies in my cards.

I'll have to try and stretch my creativity a bit more!

I stamped and fussy cut these flowers ages ago at my sisters. The stamp belongs to her so it is maybe a Stampin Up one, not sure.

I've coloured it with inktense pencils so I'm visiting the challenge at

Inkspirational where the theme is to use pencils or markers.

At Addicted to Stamps & More it's an anything goes challenge.

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge also has an anything goes challenge.

At Allsorts the challenge theme is to use your favourite things. Dies are one of my top favourites as are distress inks. I do have a long list though!

There's lots of fabulous DT inspiration on all of these challenges.

Materials used:

Stamp unknown; inktense pencils; MFT leaf filled flourish; distress inks; sentiment sticker.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend and thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Alcohol Ink Butterfly

Hi, I'm scraping in to the challenge at Scrapbook Boutique which closes in a couple of hours.

Here is the fabulous inspiration pic.

I love chocolate, and I'm loving alcohol inks at the moment.

 I saw this card on pinterest today at Flower Shoppe Cards and had to take a closer look. 

So many fabulous cards using alcohol inks and one of my other loves, Memory Box dies!

It was my first time "pouncing" on glossy cardstock and I wasn't overly impressed with my results.

I googled some info on the technique and followed it the best I could but wasn't really happy with the colours ( I don't have many, think this will be remedied soon!)

However, once I diecut the butterfly, I was happier with the end result. I used cranberry, pebble and butterscotch.

 I pounced with blending solution after inking up the cardstock. I just love the marbled effect.

I'm also linking up to the anything goes challenge at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge,

which has an anything goes theme this week.

The theme at Addicted to Stamps & More is also anything goes.

Materials used:

Memory Box  Darla Butterfly die; MFT Fancy Flourish die; alcohol inks; sentiment sticker and bling from stash.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Aqua and Lime Peonies

Hi, I wanted to CASE this gorgeous card by Katherine at

little things blog.

I love how she trimmed the Lovely Peony Outline diecut so that you can fit more of them on the card.

My colours came from the current challenge at The Card Concept

as did the inspiration for the lacy background. My card is in the clean and simple category, or maybe clean and layered.

At Simon Says Stamp Wednesday blog the challenge is to emboss it, using dry or wet embossing or paste.

My background is embossed with the Entangle folder (I think it may be retired).

A new challenge for me is AAA Cards

The challenge this week is to create a CAS card be inspired by Angela.

I was inspired by her row of gorgeous crisp flowers and the pops of colour.

I diecut the peony centres from scraps of white and cream card. I used up quite a few bits as I cut 2 for each flower, coloured them with distress inks and glued them together for dimension. I was even tempted to put the trimmed outer petals into the snippets box! The only thing that stopped me was the fact they were too fiddly to untangle from the rest of the scraps.

So, I'm visiting the snippets playground again at Pixie's Crafty Workshop.

Materials used:

Memory Box Lovely Peony Outline die; Entangled embossing folder; distress inks; ribbon and bling from stash.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Hello

Hi, I was inspired to make this card by a few challenges.

CASology has a a pet theme.

It's a spots and dots theme at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge.

At The Card Concept it's a colour challenge.

My card is in the clean and layered category.

I used snippets of designer paper and the positive rectangles from the Memory Box window die
as my little blocks, so I'm popping into the snippets playground again at Pixie's Crafty Workshop.

(AAA Cards  had a sketch type challenge to use 4 shapes in a window block. That was a main part of my design but our satellite internet connection dropped out and I was too late to enter.

I'll try for the next one!)

Materials used:
Memory Box/Poppy Stamps window, cat ,bird and tiny bow dies; Simon Says Stamp hello die; snippets of dp; wink of stella clear pen; bling from stash.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend and thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Floral Flourish

Hi, I had a break from my craft room recently due to quite a few other things that were happening, some good, and some otherwise! Hopefully things will settle for a little while now.

This card started out as 2 pieces of flourish left from another project and 1 flower. It was for a sketch challenge, but it kept growing LOL!

The die is a fairly new purchase, MFT leaf filled flourish. I can cut 5 from a piece of card and then use up the scraps for bits of leafy flourish. My snippets habit is getting a bit compulsive!

The flowers were stamped, fussy cut and coloured with inktense pencils in carmine pink and shiraz. Great name for a colour! I shaped them a bit using a stylus on a  mouse pad and popped them up with foam dots.

I'm visiting the snippets playground at Pixie's Crafty Workshop. I thought I was in time for last week's fun but the gates had shut, so I'm an early bird this week!

The theme at Addicted to Stamps & More is CAS.

Materials used:

 Stampin Up flower shop stamp; MFT leaf filled flourish die; distress inks; inktense pencils; black opal stickles in the flower centres; sentiment sticker.

Thanks for visiting :)

Cathy x

Sunrise Celebration

Hi, this is my 2nd post as a guest for Addicted to CAS. It's been great fun, thanks again to Kylie and the team for the warm welcome. I hope you can join in with this fortnight's code word Celebrate.

I've had this stamp set for quite a while and hadn't used it. I love how carefree and happy the little figures look. 

 I stamped extra trees on the left to create a frame and thought a sunrise would highlight the silhouettes.

I'm also linking up to the challenge at Addicted to Stamps & More where the theme is Clean & Simple.

Materials used:

Flourishes Kids Play and Hero Arts sentiment stamps; Versafine ink and clear embossing powder; distress inks.

Hope you have a great weekend, thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Wedding card with alcohol inks

Hi, I'm still trying to catch up with cards I need to make!

We're going to a wedding soon and I wanted to make something a bit different for

the bride and groom.

One of the bloom die cuts is inlaid and the other is glued on top so that the crossing stems weren't too bulky.

The effect of the alcohol inks look way better in real life, can't quite get my angle right!

I'm going to link up at the Mixed Media Card Challenge where the theme is a touch of nature.

In addition to stamps and ink, you need to add at least 2 other items or techniques to add dimension and texture.

I've used an embossing folder, metal sheet, die cuts, alcohol ink and ribbon.

I'm still getting used to the rules, but there are lots of gorgeous examples of mixed media from the design team.

My tag and ribbon are from my snippets box so I'm popping over to the playground again at

 Pixie's Crafty Workshop. You only need to use 1 snippet on your project to join in the fun.

Materials used:

 Simon Says Stamp fresh daisies die; Entangle embossing folder; Annabelles Stamps sentiment stamp; versafine ink & clear ep; tag punch; alcohol inks; ribbon from stash.

Thanks for visiting, and have a great week,

Cathy x

Happy Happy Birthday Darnell!

Hi, it was Darnell's birthday a few days ago, so I'm late posting this card.

If you haven't visited her blog at djkardkreations then you're in for a treat.

Darnell is a talented card maker with a terrific sense of humour, her posts are always entertaining and a great source of inspiration. You'll probably also learn lots of new words and acronyms!

Ardyth is hosting a linky party to celebrate, there's still plenty of time to join in.

I've used the die cut words from my new Happy Birthday background die. I coloured them with 3 distress inks. At  Moxie Fab World, there's a wonderful words challenge, to use a word die.

The butterfly was stamped, fussy cut and coloured with inktense pencils.

The challenge at Addicted to Stamps & More is to use markers, pencils or pens in your project.

Materials used:

Poppystamps Happy Birthday background die; Darkroom Door butterfly stamp; Entangled embossing folder; Spellbinders square dies; distress inks; inktense pencils; bling.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Metal Flowers

Hi, I was trying to create some earthy colours from the alcohol inks that I have, but it wasn't meant to be LOL! I guess I'll just have to add more colours to my wish list.

I had some left over pieces of metal sheet from a previous project and managed to fit these flower dies onto them. I've got some smaller pieces left and have a plan for those also. My snippets pile grows ever larger!

The leafy stems and butterflies are also die cut from scraps of shimmer paper. I'm afraid that the scraps went back into the snippets box as I might get one or two more tiny die cuts or punched flowers from them!

All these snippets mean I can visit the playground at Pixie's Crafty Workshop.

I'm also linking up again to Virginia's View Challenge, where the theme is to use a die cut.

Materials used:

Memory Box fancy blossom, curvy stem and butterfly delights dies; Alcohol inks;Lifestyle Crafts metal sheet; shimmer paper; sentiment sticker and bling.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend, and thanks for visiting,

Cathy x

Night Sky Silhouette

Hi, such exciting news!

I was asked by Loll from Stamping with Loll  to be a guest designer for Addicted to CAS.

I was thrilled. I've been a fan of this challenge almost since I started blogging as I love CAS cards.

The DT is full of really inspiring and talented card makers.

The code word this fortnight is SKY.

I sponged the night sky with a few distress inks and stencilled on some stars with embossing paste.

The 2 die cuts are from Memory Box. I modified both of them by trimming away some of the little trees and pruned a few branches from the twiggy tree.

There are a couple of other challenges I'd like to enter too.
At Virginia's View the challenge is to use die cuts.


At The Mixed Media Card Challenge, they are celebrating their very first challenge with a nature theme.
I hope I've got the rules right, you need to use inks, a stamp and 2 other techniques or items to add texture or dimension.
I've used a stamp for the sentiment, distress ink for the sky, and my other 2 techniques  are stencilling with paste for the stars and diecuts for the landscape and tree.

Materials used:
Memory Box modern landscape border and twiggy tree dies; Simon Says Stamp falling stars stencil; clear embossing paste coloured with silver mica powder; Hero Arts sentiment stamp; versafine ink and clear embossing powder; clear wink of stella pen on the yellow window.

Thanks for visiting, and enjoy the rest of your weekend.
Cathy x

Recycled perfume box

Hi, I made a vase out of a perfume bottle not long ago, and had kept some of the packaging too.

The challenge this week at Less is More is to use a recycled item on your project, so I thought it was the perfect time to use it. 

I'd kept a large and a small box and ended up using pieces from both.

It was my first time using the Memory Box Ribbon Candy border too. I rearranged a couple of the strips into this geometric pattern.

The challenge at Simon Says Stamp Monday Blog is W, to use white in your project.

I used a scrap of white shimmer paper for the butterfly base and a white hammered card base to make the colours pop.

Snippets means I can also visit the playground at Pixie's Crafty Workshop.

Edited to add: I've realized that this card also fits the challenge over at Virginia's View where the theme is diecuts. (Thanks for the heads up Sarah, x)

Materials used: 

Memory Box ribbon candy border, Darla and Vivienne butterfly dies; sentiment sticker.

Thanks for visiting,

Cathy x