Loads of Love at Christmas time

Don't you just love long weekends? Time to sleep in and extra time to craft, what more could a girl ask for?

Well ... perhaps the same thing every week ;-) Greedy aren't I?

I enjoyed a fun pub quiz (virtual) last night over at In Love With Stamping. Thanks to Emma for organising it. I showed my ignorance completely but it was great fun, with fast and furious questions and hitting the refresh button on my computer every few seconds to try to get the next question as quickly as possible. Look out for the next one.

I'm posting now and then I'm off out to take Bess to her socialisation class. Hope the weather is better where you are, I think we're going to get a bit wet today. Should make for an interesting drive back from the class, lol.

For this card I decided to dust off my Loads of Love set while I've got time for a bit of colouring. This set is reduced from £18.95 to £15.16 but there's only a few more days to take advantage of the two-step stamping discount offer. Email me at sarastamper123@gmail.com to order now.

Recipe

Stamp sets: Loads of Love, Loads of Love Accessories, Time for a Tree

Cardstock: Old Olive, Whisper White

Ink: Basic Black, SU Markers, Versamark

DSP: Merry Moments

Other: White EP

An Old Olive side stair step card was backed with Merry Moments DSP for the base. The trees were coloured direct to stamp with markers, stamped out and then "washed over" with an aqua painter. These were cut out and adhered to the back step. Time for a Tree was wheeled onto Whisper White card with Basic Black ink and the truck, people and presents were stamped using the stamp-a-ma-jig for placement. These were all coloured using the markers and blender pens for shading. The truck was cut out and adhered to the middle step and the row of cars was cut out and adhered to the front step. Using Versamark, the sentiment was stamped onto Old Olive card and heat embossed with White EP. This was cut around and popped up on dimensionals on the side panel.

Here's the side view:

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Sara xx

A birthday card for my Dad that includes sneak peek 3

Tomorrow's my Dad's birthday. He and my Mum are hoping to go out for the day if the weather's good so I took his card and presents round this evening. I couldn't resist using a few sneak peek stamps on his card.

Recipe

Stamp sets: Loads of Love, Loads of Love Accessories, Sincere Salutations

Cardstock: Old Olive, Not Quite Navy, Bashful Blue, Certainly Celery, Basic Gray, Whisper White

Ink: Stazon Black, Versamark, Old Olive, Not Quite Navy, Certainly Celery, Chocolate Chip, Close to Cocoa, Taken with Teal, SU Watercolour Crayons

Punches: Scallop Oval, Large Oval

Other: Gold EP, Pewter Jumbo Eyelets

Non-SU: White shrink plastic

I also sneaked you a peek at a couple of stamps from the sweet Autumn Days (and that might even be a new Designer Series Paper in the background there)!

It's a bit of a standing joke in our family that the pheasants actually lie in wait, to run out in front of our car. The pheasant stamp was only a bit smaller than the car and wouldn't have looked correct proportionally so I stamped it onto shrink plastic and shrunk it to fit. I used my stamp-a-ma-jig to place me, DH and Bess in the car, lol.

Glad to say that he liked it :-)

Sara xx

A truck full of love for my darling husband's birthday

Well I was a tad late with DH's card and I don't know why that is because I'd had the design in mind ever since I got the Loads of Love set. I always seem to do his and my Mum's cards at the last minute. My Mum's birthday is in August so I'm setting myself a goal now to get her card made by the end of July.

Recipe

Stamp sets: Loads of Love, Loads of Love Accessories

Cardstock: Old Olive, Bashful Blue, Certainly Celery, Basic Grey, Whisper White

Ink: SU Markers, Black Stazon, White Signo Gel Pen

Narrow Grosgrain Ribbon: Certainly Celery

When you pull the ribboned tab it reveals the message.

I added a strip of Basic Grey to the bottom of the Bashful Blue card and tore a strip of Certainly Celery and added that above the Grey. The White Signo Gel Pen was used to add the road markings and then a slot was cut through all the layers, shorter than the length of the truck and wide enough to accommodate foam pads. The message was positioned with the Stamp-a-ma-jig and the background elements were added in the same way using markers, direct to stamp for the trees and to colour the flowers. The truck was stamped, coloured and cut out and added to the foam pads.

Pleased to say that he liked it, his favourite cards always seem to be the ones that you interact with like the slider cards and waterfall cards.

That's all for now.

Sara xx

A birthday card for a man using a combination of blues and browns

Male birthday cards are often the most difficult for cardmakers to design. I usually start with an appropriate colour combination (often blues and greens, steering away from pinks and peaches), add one of the more masculine stamps and look for hard edged designs for background papers rather than swirls and curves.

This one is for my friend Paul, whose birthday is tomorrow (I'm taking a bit of a risk blogging this one before the day but I somehow doubt that he'll spot it *giggles*). Here I've started with a card blank of Chocolate Chip.  The embossed panels on the background are made from Bashful Blue and Creamy Caramel card put through the Argyle Cuttlebug folder. I stamped the Loads of Love truck onto Whisper White, Night of Navy and Basic Grey card with Basic Grey ink. The presents and the lady driver (from the Loads of Love Accessories set) were positioned with the Stamp-a-ma-jig and coloured with markers. I also used markers to colour the tyres. The truck was cut from the stamped image in Night of Navy and the tyre hubs were cut from the image done on Basic Gray. 

These were then paper pieced onto the image (I always used to call it decoupage even though it was only one layer but I've noticed that most crafters call it paper piecing, so who am I to buck the trend). A white Signo gel pen was used to give a bit of highlighting to the truck. The whole was then matted onto more Night of Navy card. Bashful Blue taffeta ribbon was attached to the inside edge of the card and another tiny piece of the same ribbon knotted over it (I almost always use knots rather than bows if I use ribbon on a man's card).

I'd love to know what you think. Do you find it difficult to make cards for men? Let me know.

Sara xx

 

Its snow joke and a 60th birthday card

Hope you're keeping warm and cosy today and staying safe from the bad weather. I'm working from home as we're snowed in here and so I thought I'd take a little break for lunch and update you all.

Here's how things looked this morning out

 of my window when it first got light. It's snowed a fair bit more since then and it's still coming. And we've got it easy. Friends around the country are reporting 10" of snow! I just hope that the forecasters have got it wrong that tomorrow will be even worse.

On the other hand at least it's waited until today to really get bad. Yesterday we went to an aunt's 60th birthday party and apart from making the return trip a little hairy it didn't spoil the fun.

Here's the card I made for her. I used Rose Red 

cardstock for the base. I made a narrow paper ribbon with Sweet Always Designer Series Paper and added Ruby Red brads from the Earth Elements collection. These were just pushed through the paper and not the card, so that they didn't spoil the look of the card inside. I stamped Happy Birthday from the Occasional Greetings stamp set onto Regal Rose card with Versamark ink and heat embossed with white embossing powder. The leafy flower from the True Friend stamp set was inked first with Versamark then Regal Rose and stamped onto Whisper White card. This allowed me to add clear embossing powder and heat to give a glossy finished image. A large pink Circle Fire rhinestone brad was added to the centre of the flower before it was matted onto more Sweet Always paper. I hand trimmed a tag from Regal Rose card and used my white Signo gel pen to apply faux stitching around the edge. The numbers were die cut from Rose Red card and the tag was finished with more paper ribbon and a brad to match those along the bottom.

For the inside of the card I stamped the Loads of Love sentiment from the Loads of Love stamp set with Rose Red ink onto Whisper White card. I added another paper ribbon and brad before sticking the insert to the inside of the card.

Keep safe and warm.

Sara xx

We'll miss you

I've just realised that I didn't show you a card I made last weekend so thought I'd sort that out now. Our lovely neighbours moved away recently and so I made this card to let them know that we'll miss them. They haven't moved very far and we'll still keep in touch but it's not quite the same as having them right next door.

I used the little truck from the Loads of Love stamp set. I stamped this first on Whisper White card for the wheels to show through and then again on Garden Green cardstock which decoupaged.

The moving package, people and sentiment were all from the Loads of Love Accessories stamp set. I coloured the truck's wheels, packages and people using markers. Garden Green was used again for the mats and then More Mustard was used for the base card. A couple of flourishes from Season of Joy stamped in Versamark were added to provide a bit of background interest.

Thanks for dropping by.

Sara xx