Oh dear, I'm late again with my 52 Christmas Card Throwdown card.
Andreja has chosen "Wood Background" as the stash challenge for June, so our design team have come up with some really lovely, natural looking, cards for inspiration.
Here's my contribution.
For my wood background, I used kraft card and the wood design embossing folder from Sheena Douglas' textures collection.
I tried two approaches. I painted one sheet of kraft with white gesso first, the other I left plain. I added distress ink to the folder before embossing - brushed corduroy and crushed olive on the gessoed card, then the darker walnut stain on the plain kraft.
Love this! I've used the plain card this time, but I love the white washed look too, this would go well with dark red toppers.
For these cards I use iced spruce - I love this colour, a neutral that isn't a neutral, so pretty and versatile.
I firstly stamped this great scene from Hobby Art, using distress ink. I then used a water brush to add shade, picking up the same ink from my craft mat.
For my other cards, I used the distress oxide in iced spruce to stamp. I cut each image out with a die.
I didn't use all of these today, but the spares have gone in the stash for another time.
For each card, I cut the wood background to size, then mounted onto white card, with an iced spruce edge. I wrapped lace and string round, then added the toppers using foam tape to lift above the string. I then added the lot to square card blanks - 7x7 for the two Christmas cards, and 8x8 for the birthday card, which is for my husband's aunt.
Simple and clean, showcasing the wood background and the gorgeous image.
A mixture of images here. I added a bit of foliage to the dragonfly (a Sheena stamp), masking the outside to give a straight edge, to add interest to that square. The sentiment is die cut from a spare scrap of the wood background.
Very simple, using a square stamp as it comes (I don't know the make). I think this one would look good in dark red on the white washed wood background.
To join in with this challenge head over to the 52CCT blog. As there are 5 Saturdays in June, you have two weeks, it closes on Friday 6th July. Enjoy playing and experimenting, I'd love to see what you come up with.
I'm a bit late posting my 52 Christmas Card Throwdown card this week - the photo went up on Saturday, but not the blog behind it.
Andreja has chosen "Wreaths" as her theme challenge.
I wanted to do a multicoloured repeating pattern with this, but time wasn't on my side this week - lots on at work and at home!
So I went for a simpler design - not sure I'm that taken with the result, although the idea could work better with a few more tries I think.
For the wreaths, I made a black and white background to die cut. I used sentiment stamps, mostly from Clarity, and memento black ink, first, second and third generation.
For the background, I wanted bright colours to contrast, and square shapes to contrast with the round curly wreaths. I looked for my abstract squares stencil from Clarity, which has lots of different size squares and rectangles, but couldn't find it - that's the second one I've realised is missing. Hopefully when I eventually organise my stash they'll turn up!
So I used the framework squares instead, the result wasn't quite the same though. I used brushed corduroy, crushed olive and aged mahogany distress inks, with a Clarity stencil brush.
I edged the background with a black sharpie.
I arranged the wreaths on the background, cutting off the overhang and using it on the opposite side.
To finish I used my favourite tattered lace sentiment die, cut simply from black.
To join in, head over to the 52CCT blog. This challenge ends on Friday 22nd June.
This week's challenge on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown is colour:
I have to admit I really struggled with this one. I started (went quite a long way) down the road of texture paste words with various mediums over them - this is where I got to:
Four cards nearly done, I like elements of all of them, but none of them quite right. And too tired and uninspired to "rescue" any of them - maybe I'll come back to one or two later!
So I went for something simple.
A brusho background in yellow, orange and brilliant red:
And a Clarity stamp in fired brick distress oxide:
And there's my card, so easy but I like it a lot more than the ones I'd been working on for ages!
If you'd like to have a go with these sunny colours, head over to 52CCT - the challenge closes Friday 15th June.
I hope you get on with them better than me!
I'm a little late posting my card for Andreja's first challenge as host of 52CCT this month.
As usual, we kick off with a sketch.
I had such a fun session last Monday, making backgrounds with my gel plates, acrylic paints and some stencils.
But I couldn't think how to use these for the sketch immediately, so made some more in more uniform colours.
And then I ran out of time, and was away for a few days, so have only just got around to finishing the cards!
In the meantime, I've had an idea of how to use the multicoloured backgrounds without it all being too much - use black!
I cut strips of black card to make the vertical and horizontal banners, then used dies to cut the circle (I didn't have concentrical oval dies!) and sentiment (an old favourite from Tattered Lace - I must get the Happy Birthday equivalent).
I then cut the sentiment again from gold and layered as a drop shadow (or highlight) to help the sentiment stand out.
I layered onto black to frame, then onto a 6x6 card base.
I like the drama the black creates.
Not wanting to waste the other backgrounds, I did make up the card with the green and purple backgrounds (the other multicoloured ones are in the stash).
I cut the green for the base layer and oval, then the purple for the banners and sentiment.
I edged the banners in purple stazon ink,and the base with a purple sharpie.
I cut the sentiment from black to give a drop shadow again.
I also cut another oval from black card to frame the green oval - I drew round the die and cut by hand.
This one went onto a 5x7 card base.
I'm not so sure about this one!
To join in with our sketch challenge, head to the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown. You have until Friday 8th June to share your card with us.
My last challenge as host of the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown this month is a stash challenge, and I've asked you to use lace to make your card.
My design team card uses lace in three ways.
Firstly, I used the gel press plate to apply gold pigment ink through a piece of lace to give my background. I then used the ink left on the plate to stamp the piece I used for my topper, giving a reverse impression of the lace.
Secondly, I added lace across the centre of the card, with dark red ribbon.
Thirdly, I used a lace border stamp to frame the background and topper - in gold pigment ink and cranberry adirondack respectively.
I stamped the sentiment (a Clarity stamp) in the cranberry adirondack too, then used a gold pen to highlight it. I used the gold inkpad around the edges of the background and topper, and mounted both on dark red card. The whole was added to a 5x7 card blank.
This looks far too neat to be one of my cards!
To join in with the challenge, go to the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown.
Have fun!
This afternoon I suddenly remembered a gorgeous stencil I have that's a Christmas star, so had to have a play and make some more star themed cards for our next challenge on the 52CCT.
No step by step photos for this one, but it's a technique I've done before, here.
I spritzed through the stencil with water onto watercolour card. I used my posh super smooth stuff, as the stencil is so detailed.
I then removed the stencil and sprinkled on brushos to react with the water. Put aside carefully to dry, then flick to remove the dry powder.
The first attempt is shown at the top - the best of the lot!
Here are the others:
Simple but pretty.
I also have 6 others that didn't work so well - mostly because I kept forgetting to remove the stencil before adding the brusho. They're still lovely but the star shape isn't clear. I'll have to think about how to use them - maybe emboss over the top. But not this evening.
I also have another star card I'm half way through I'd like to finish, but won't be in time for the challenge launch. I struggled for ages to think what I wanted to do, then the ideas have come flooding in!
To join in with the 52CCT Star challenge, head over to the blog page - you have until midnight BST on Friday 25th May to enter. Have fun with this one - I have!!
Time for another challenge at the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown! For my theme challenge, I chose "Stars".
I decided to make a panel card.
I started by die cutting stars of different sizes from a sheet of mask film. I cut two of each size to have a variety.
After cutting card to size for a 6x6 card blank, I masked off my panel. For my first colour, I added tattered rose, using a Clarity stencil brush.
I then added a few of my star masks, and added more colour - tattered rose and worn lipstick, getting darker gradually.
I added the rest of the stars and darkened the colour further, with picked raspberry, seedless preserves and dusty concord.
As well as the brushes, I used sponges to wipe the ink from the masks onto the card, to make the edges crisper.
Time for the big reveal!
While digging out the mask film, I found my sheet of Clarity star masks (ready made) so thought I'd try a version with these.
I chose blues and purple for this one.
And the reveal:
I did more layers of stars in this one, so there is more variety in the colours. But I only added purple at the end, so they don't blend as well, and the stars are more similar in size, so I think I prefer the first version with my home made stars!
To finish off, I edged the panels with a black drawing pen. I stamped a sentiment onto the panel with black archival ink.
It didn't stand out particularly, especially on the blue, so I added white highlights around it with a gel pen. I used the stamp platform for the sentiment, so once I'd added the white I could re-stamp in black to repair where I'd gone over the letters, and be sure it would line up perfectly.
The final step was to edge with a black sharpie pen, then mount onto a 6x6 card blank.
So that's two more Christmas cards to add to my collection for the year!
I do like panel cards, they always look so crisp and clean.
How will you interpret our "Star" theme?
To join in, go to the 52CCT page. This challenge closes at midnight BST on Friday 25th May.
I look forward to seeing what you come up with!
