Perhaps roses are not quite spring flowers, but pink seems to remind me of spring and even Easter too. I started with an unnamed brand die cut done in white CS which I glued immediately to a piece of pink CS. Then I took several shades of Distress Inks in pinks and sponged colour over it all. I wasn’t completely happy with it so I used some spray inks and some Perfect Pearl shimmer to add more colour and spatter. All I wanted was for the background die cut to add texture initially. After adhering this panel to a card front I proceeded to stamp the flowers using a small stamp set from Hot off the Press, a tiny sentiment from the same set and I also die cut 2 hugs in both black and white. Those I glued together slightly offsetting the white over the black. I coloured the roses using Sakura glaze pens and fussy cut them out. Adding some foam tape to the back I placed them on the card front with the stems appearing to grow out of the word hugs. I added the tiny Just Rosy sentiment above the die cut word and underneath the leaves of the roses. I quite like the result and hope others do too.

This card combines the negative pieces from a previous project along with a new die from MFT and an image from my new stamp set from MFT. The card is a small slimline 3 and 3/4″ by 6 and 1/2″. I glued the two negative Hug pieces together and added some shimmer over the top then set them aside. Taking a left over piece of the wild Lilac CS I die cut the birthday circle and adhered it to the card front. Then I added the hug piece underneath. After stamping the image, I coloured it with pencils and a copic marker before die cutting it. I die cut 2 more to add some dimension once they were glued together. I made a small bow and added this at the bottom and then added a few tiny pearls to finish it. The card fits 3 challenges so I have entered it into Just us Girls, Global Design theme challenge and Double Trouble Paper Crafting.

This is a 2nd card for a new (to me) challenge Shopping our Stash and it is basically made from using some scraps. I’ve had the Peach Bellini die cut square in a small tray since last year along with the heat embossed piece behind it. The stamp used for the heat embossed piece is a GKD background stamp. The wooden heart came in one of my MFT orders and I added the small red heart on top to hide the words engraved on it. The word Hugs is die cut from another of my new MFT dies and I double cut them and stacked to give some dimension. I also used a glitter pen to make them sparkle. Taking a StampinUp folder I embossed the card front and layered the rest on top. Another simple and quick card and I now feel I’ve been very productive – lol.

The previous post shows the negative die cut and this post shows how I used the positive piece. I used the same die set from Memory Box as mentioned in another post today. I also used a StampinUp EF on the white layer before adding the heart to that. Added these layers to the card front. Then I used another of my new MFT dies to cut out the word hugs and added that on top of the rest. There is a touch of shimmer to the word that can’t be seen here. Considering how much time I had available yesterday I think I used it very well completing 4 cards by keeping them fairly simple so I could do them quickly.

Like so many of us, I had a lot of small strip scraps leftover at Christmas. Rather than lose them I glued a bunch of them onto some paper for use at a later time. The striped background you see here is a negative die cut of one of those panels. I layered it onto the plum background piece which in turn was layered onto the pink piece and then onto the white card front. Using another of my new MFT dies I cut out the word love and added to across the heart. I added a few plum coloured pearls and also a bit of glitter to the word. I’m quite happy at the way this one turned out and it fits the Cut it Up challenge so am entering it there.

I have been wanting to use my new MFT die received a few weeks ago, but have been so short on time lately that it has been a challenge. Yesterday I finally had a bit of extra time and hurried into my craft room to use it wisely. This is one of the creations I came up with. Quite a simple card really as the die is what really shines here. After cutting it I layered it with foam strips onto the lighter lavender CS. Then using a scrap piece of the same CS I die cut the small hearts using a set by Memory Box called Stacked Hearts. I added some shimmer to the hearts and glued them. The I took a small stamp from a Divinity Designs set I purchased last year and stamped it. The card needed something so I decided to use the little bird stamp from a CTMH set and I stamped it as you can see. I stamped it again on some red CS and fussy cut just the body of the bird and popped it on top of the stamped one. I added a bit of shimmer to the wing and also to the letters of the word friend but the camera doesn’t pick it up at all. I thought about adding a bit of bling, but decided it was good enough to stand on its own by keeping it really simple.

Last week I made a b’day card for my hubby (he loved it) but in the process messed up a couple of times so I decided to find a way to use up the bad parts. First I rescued the inked part that I had accidentally die cut some images from and now had holes in it. That became the sky along with a partial die cut copper piece that I used as the sun. I added these to some cream paper and then added the stamped and die cut pieces that were not used on the previous card as shown here. I used a Copic pen to ground the kangaroos and tree. Then I stamped the sentiment and added some embossed lines to the base card after I glued the image panel to the kraft CS. I’m happy at how this turned out and have managed to use most of the messed up pieces in the process. It fits the Krafty Chicks challenge I think so I’ve entered it there.

Inkspirational has hearts as its challenge theme this week and I had some scraps on my desk that I wanted to use so ended up with this card. All the circles and tiny hearts are left over from other projects but the piglet image is from Divinity Designs and the word Love is from MFT. The image was coloured with a combination of Copics and pencils and was die cut twice to make it slightly dimensional before adding to the card front. The sentiment was cut from scrap CS and PP. My original idea was to use the PP which had hearts stamped all over it, but it didn’t look right so I cut the solid red piece and glued the two together slightly offset. I much preferred the end result doing it this way. I added the red pearls and called it finished.

It is my hubby’s birthday on Saturday and as I hadn’t yet used my Hero Arts kit from last year I decided to go with an Aussie theme for him. He is originally from Australia and my nickname for him is Kangaroo so somehow this seemed perfect. It is a CASE of one of Jen McGuire’s cards but I struggled with it a little so it sure isn’t perfect.

Firstly I created the background piece using the kit stencil and Distress Oxides. This fit into the Sisterhood of Crafters challenge. Following Jen’s tutorial I tried to create the rest as shown but I messed up several times and in the end I just added an extra die cut behind each silhouette to give it a bit more strength. I also used a small bird stamp from an Inspired by Stamping set as I don’t have any from Hero Arts as yet. I used a Sakura gelly roll pen on the clouds because I can’t find my Wink of Stella pen anywhere. I’ve lost a roll of purple tape as well but I’m sure they’ll come to light when I begin to pack up my craft room for the move. And on the sun I used a Shimmer Stix dauber for the shine with a tad more of the glitter pen around the edge. The kangaroo silhouettes fit into the challenge at Allsorts so I’m able to enter it into 2 challenges. A bonus when this happens. I’ve saved the messed up bits and they will appear on another card eventually as I usually find a way to redeem badly stamped or inked efforts. It isn’t a card that stands up so I used a small ornament to hold it for the photo and will probably use the same thing to display it for him after he opens it.

Having seen a few of these shaped cards that rock recently, I really wanted to try one for myself. As our surrogate daughter has recently moved into her first detached house a new home card seemed to be a good way to start. The 3-2-1 challenge recipe requires embellishments, pp and stamped or digital images. The challenge at Krafty Chicks is an any occasion so I figured my effort would work in both challenges although when I began the card it wasn’t with any challenges in mind. To begin the card I first die cut the largest circle had and folded it in half to create the bottom portion of the card. I cut another circle out of a toile pp but realize from the photo that it doesn’t really show anymore due to the other elements I’ve added, but if you look closely you can see the edges of it. I die cut two circle frames using two dies together and also 2 more circles of the same size out of white CS. My idea was to create a garden but the card evolved slightly differently as I went along. Using my new MFT stamps and dies, I stamped onto some textured scrap CS using the boot planter and the gnome stamps. Using mostly pencils I coloured these images then die cut them. I added sparkle to the flowers using Sakura gelly roll pens. Then on the circle using another MFT stamp set from Christmas I stamped the house with trees and coloured this with pencils. I added some clouds from the same set and some birds from an Inspired by stamping set. I also used some gold glitter at the windows. I adhered the frame to this piece and set it aside for a few minutes. Looking through my stash of embellishments I found the white fence and I cut it almost in half so I could extend it slightly beyond the edge of the base card. I then added 2 die cut grass pieces at the fence base. After this I added the image circle between the 2 grass pieces. Because the back of the card now looked a bit messy I took the 2nd circle and glued it to hide the split in the fence and tidied it up. To make it fit properly a I added some foam in between. Then I added the two die cut images as you can see. The middle part needed something so I took a flower stamp from a GKD set and fussy cut the image out after colouring it with Sakura glaze pens. Then I used 2 sentiment stamps from a Happy Mail set I have but I don’t know the brand name. Before I had a blog I never thought I would need brand names of my stuff and threw a lot of packaging away. These days I wish I hadn’t done this. I stamped both onto black CS using white ink and fussy cut the Congrats before adhering them to the card front. There is quite a bit of sparkle on the card which the photograph simply doesn’t pick up.