Happy Birthday Christmas Die!!!

I was quite sad to have missed the Newbury Papercrafting show last weekend as would have loved to have gone, but unfortunately I am still too sore to be out in company or spend too much time on my feet, but thankfully I am recovering well!

I really enjoyed making last weeks card, so decided that this week I would do another card using the same die, the Precious Merieke The Nature of Christmas range.  As you can see it isn't a Christmas card though!

It has such lovely details that I decided I would use it as a birthday card and just by changing the colours and a few flowers it changes the look completely. 

 I am sure you will agreed that this is an incredibly adaptable die and I think it will come out of my stash on a regular basis.

I also love to use flowers on my cards since learning the techniques from Anna-Marie of Anna-Marie Designs!  I really like the depth, shading and detail they add to a card.

Finally I added the welsh die for Happy Birthday from Tattered Lace, as this is a card for my daughter's birthday who lives in Wales.

Well that is all from me this week and I will hopefully be back next week with something new- will it be Christmas based or not??!

Until then, sending love and crafty hugs.

Ginny xx

Another Christmas Card!

Well as we are well and truly in September I thought I would stop by and share another Christmas card - don't feel quite so bad saying that now!

This is a very quick post as I am about to dash off on a short break - a couple of days spent carriage driving.  Who knows my next post may include some photo's of other things I love doing apart from card crafting!

For this post I have done the same card in two colourways. I have gone for a very classic gold and black look, and then reversed it on the second card.

Both cards are fairly simple to make, with quite a few mats and layers.

And again with the colours reversed.  Which one do you prefer?

Unfortunately you cannot see much of the embossing in the cards as it doesn't show up well in the photographs, so here is a closer peek!  I really like this die set and think it really does not need much else to set it off.

For this card I used the following:

Foundation cardstock in black and vintage gold

Sue Wilson's Santa's Sleigh

Sue Wilson's Christmas Scene Mini Background

Sue Wilson's Pierced Rectangles

Until next time

Crafty hugs sent with love

Ginny x

Playing with Alcohol Inks!

Last weekend I went on a workshop with Julia Watts and had a really great time.  The day was spent playing with alcohol inks, which is not something I had used before.

For this card we started by placing 3 different coloured alcohol inks onto the felt and attached it to the applicator tool.  I used botanical, indigo and stream inks.  Using the applicator tool the ink was applied to gloss card by dabbing the ink on and doing this across the whole sheet of cardstock, and reinking when necessary.  This was then left to dry.

Next I cut the Sue Wilson Birthday Shadow Box in coconut white cardstock. 

 

The very small elements (balloons, cake and present) I inked up with distress ink whilst in the die to add some definition.

Finally I made a frame from the Stitched Lattice frame and then assembled the card, layering it up with foam pads to add extra dimension.  As I had a slight mark on the left hand side of the frame I decided to add a flower which hides it well!!!

I was surprised at how much I enjoyed playing with the alcohol inks and how different everyone's cards looked in different colours.  I think you may see me using this technique quite a bit, as it was so fresh and the glossy card added a lovely sheen.

Until next time .........................

love

Ginny xx

An Easel Card

Today I have made a very simple card, which really is far simpler than you would think!  Again I have defaulted back to my comfort zone with a white and burgundy cardstock.

I cut my base card from foundation cardstock with a circular die that was placed slightly off the card, which gave me a a circular card.  The top part of the card I folded in half and scored it and then placed some ribbon and bow on the bottom section, which formed the base of my easel card.

I then cut a further 4 circles, each time making each layer smaller.  The largest layer was used as the part to fix to the part of the card that stands upright.  The other 3 layers I then cut into quarters and stacked them up, each time using foam pads to add depth.  I then cut the Spring Wreath die (by Tattered Lace) twice once in white and again in burgundy.  I cut the flowers out of the burgundy cut and layered these up on the white cut before placing them onto the card base.

It was not until I started to type all that out that I realised that it does look complicated, but I can promise you that it is not!

The recipe for this card is as follows:

Foundation cardstock
Circle dies (sorry cannot remember who made them!)
Tattered lace Spring Wreath die
Tattered lace Bow die
Ribbon

I hope you have enjoyed this card, I certainly enjoyed making it!

With love until next time

Ginny xx

Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow

This is a similar card that I made a few weeks back and I ran in a recent class, and they really loved it!

I started by cutting lilac (foundation cardstock) and some pearlescent white cardstock layers with the pierced squares.  In the top white layer I cut the Bellin Butterfly Collage die and then on a piece of coconut white foundation card I used the Inkylicious inkdusters to apply some pastel inks.  This was then placed underneath the top layer.  To finish the card I used the Sue Wilson  Daisy Cluster die cut in the pearlescent card twice and placed the lilac flowers underneath to give a contrast.  To finish it off I used a sentiment from the Pierced Flags sentiment set.

I hope you like it!

Look forward to catching up with you again soon.

Ginny xx

Wedding Card

Well it never ceases to amaze me how many people pop in to look at my blog on a day to day basis, and just how worldwide they are.  I have people who have dropped in from America, Portugal, Russia, Mexico, South Africa, Romania, Ukraine, France, Ireland, and of course the UK.  I would like to thank each and every on of you for popping in and it is always lovely to receive comments on my cards.

At the beginning of the week I was asked by a friend to make a last minute wedding card, which was a challenge as I didn't have any specific wedding dies or stamps, so had to make the most of what I had!  I hope she likes it, as I am always nervous when making things for people as you never know exactly what they are going to like.

As you know I like the clean and simple look so stayed true to this!  I started by cutting my matts and layers, including the die cut elements before putting them together, with two layers of foam tape added to give a bit more dimension.


I stamped the sentiment and then added the Sue Wilson Delicate Daisies complete petals and just layered these up to create this effect and finally I used the Creative Expressions white pearl corners which I think just finishes it off nicely.












The recipe for this card is as follows:

Foundations Cardstock - Coconut white & Iris
Sue Wilson Pierced Squares
Phil Martin Scribbled Sentiments stamp set
Sue Wilson Heraldic Square
Sue Wilson Herald Square
Sue Wilson Delicate Daisies Open Petals
Creative Expressions Corner Pearls
An assortment of small pearls from my own stash

I hope you have enjoyed this card and look forward to catching up again soon.

Until then, take care

love

Ginny xx

Class Cards 22nd February 2016

As promised, here are the cards made by lovely ladies that come to my monthly class in Reading.  There are only a few of us but I really love teaching them - we have so much fun!

This week we only managed to make one card as there were a lot of elements to it, and this is only our 6th month of card making.  They were pretty scared to start with but when broken down into smaller elements it really was quite simple. 

I think they were all really pleased with what they produced, and I made the box for one of the ladies as her sister's birthday was imminent!

It never ceases to amaze me how different the same card can looks in other colours - I really liked their colour choices.  I am so proud of them.

 

 

The items I used for this card were:

 

Cardstock:  Foundations cardstock and centura pearl

Dies:           Spellbinders decorative curved squares

                   Spellbinders curved squares

                   Sue Wilson pierced squares

                   Sue Wilson Delicate Daisies complete petals

                   Sue Wilson Delicate Daisies open petals

                   Creative Expressions pearls

                   Creative Expressions sentiments

                   Creative Expressions blue dazzlers

                   Stampin' Up! ribbons