Thank you Lynnda

                                            

 This week I received a wonderful parcel in the post from Lynnda at Oak House Studio. A few weeks ago she hosted one of her very clever online One Stamp events. There were so many fantastic projects from people and I loved playing along, particularly as she chose one of my favourite stamps to play with - her lovely double daisy stamp, and I was lucky enough to win one her very generous prizes for contributing on the facebook page.

I am in inky heaven....but so far have not had a decent session to really play with the wonderful stamps and inks I won.
I was intrigued by one of the little stamps and I decided to have a quick play and create a card with just the stamp, household products and scraps.

Lynndas stamps are so well made, I didn't even need a mount. I decided to try beaching some scraps of coloured card. I applied mainly neat bleach with one of my handmade daubers. The more it dried the better the effect, but I must admit I was a bit disappointed with the results, perhaps I need to try some different types of card. But as I was short on time i used some of my test pieces to create a little floral basket.

Inspired by LESS IS MORE to create texture I used some scrap corrugated car to make the basket and CASology wants some distressing which was definitely the touch that was needed to make the basket a bit more interesting. I also used the paint, to paint slivers of paper for leaves and I paint distressed some card to stamp the message on (another stamp from my prize).

I wasn't sure there was enough texture so I suspended the a panel from rough string ......still not satisfied I tried adding some faux blind stitching round the edge.......I'm sure it would look better with some matts and layers but I wanted to stay true to C.A.S. if possible. Which is also the challenge this week at HIDING IN MY CRAFTROOM. 

 

     

                                                                     

      

Not sure it was a success but next time I will practice on some scraps first instead of being gung-ho and going straight for it .....especially while the glue was still wet....and it was still attached to the card!....slightly scary moment when I lifted up the ruler and half the flowers were attached to it!!!!!.....will I ever learn to be patient?.....unlikely ;-)

Less is more - texture

CASology - distress

Hiding in my craftroom - CAS

OFF THE PAGE AND A STEP TOO FAR!

Can't believe another week has gone and it's time for the next LESS IS MORE CHALLENGE. It's the week I slightly dread ONE LAYER CARDS, this time the theme is OFF THE EDGE.

Yikes!! this was going to be a challenge without stamps. Especially as Chrissie and Mandi at LIM decided to up the game by decreeing "no embossed lines".....rats..... just when I thought I would continue with my "Faux" faux nestie technique from the last challenge, but this is what I love about the site, they continually push the boundaries!!!

WELL.....The only way I think I was going to achieve this was to design on the computer and then chop the card down to size, BUT, this is a budget crafting blog and the idea of wasting card made me slightly wince!! SO..... I decided the best thing would be to create a design on A4 which would then cut down into two A6 long cards, this way my design could also not only be.... off the page........

but over the page.........

......and inside the page!!!



I used a lovely little free digi I got sometime ago from FRED SHE SAID. I copied the flower and pasted it several times across the middle of an A4 landscape page in Word (set margins to minimum). I then opened another page, used the same settings and created two columns. At the bottom of the columns I created the messages. I then printed both pages on the same sheet, reprinted the flower design on the inside.

I love carrying the design onto either the back or inside the card when I use my stamps..to be honest I don't often do both on the same card!!!!

To enhance the design I painted inside the image with neat bleach,leaving some highlights of yellow card (avoid the printed lines as these can smudge).

So I was pleased with my first card.....but decided to push the design a bit further for the second.

• I highlighted the scrolls with bleach...pleased with that


• Added some dots on the little flower....liked that


• Decided to create a bleached panel over the message....carefully masked the area with rulers and tape............YUK WHAT A FAILURE!!

A step too far......

Will now have to rescue this card!!!!!!

The rescued card is now here

QUICK TIP:- if cutting and creasing your own printed card , it's worth putting the folded card inside a piece of clean paper before you finally neaten the crease.....
.....on my first card I discovered too late that even though the ink appears dry it can drag across the clean areas!!!

Not sure if you can see but by using a paper the ink transfers onto the paper ....not the design!

Thought these cards would be suitable again for PAPERTAKE as this time the cards have a bit more Lemon Zing

And as SIMON SAYS made me so welcome last week even though I had a hand drawn image I thought I would join them again with a proper digi image.

CREATIVE CRAFT CHALLENGE is all about thank you's this fortnight, so my first card should fit in with that.

and my final challenge is a new one for me ONE STOP CRAFT CHALLENGE who are also looking for clean and simple.

Just realised my photography is absolutely rubbish.....the card was a beautiful lemon colour and doesn't show in the main pictures....how disappointing :(