Paula Pascaul Workshop

I had a fabulous weekend away at The Gentleman Crafters workshops in Godalming. If you get a chance to go on one, you're sure to have a fabulous time - you can check the itinerary here

On the Sunday we  had a class with Paula Pascaul and made three projects. This is the card we made:

We used lots of Tonic products and it was good to try the mouse and pastes

I really like this layout and this is what we'll be doing in my class on Wednesday so I've made another one just using inks.

I'm entering this into the following challenges:
Butterfly Challenge - Not Square and/or Navy
Pixie's Snippets Playground - snippets of blue and silver mirror card for the butterfly and swirl

Butterfly Quote & Quicksilver

The latest theme at The Butterfly Challenge is Quotes and/or Quick Silver. For this card I've used a technique that my friends Pam & Cally introduced me to a little while ago and I know that they got it from a class they did with Clair Matthews. It's great for masculine cards but I thought I'd try a more girly approach and this theme suited it perfectly

The basics are silver tape and plasterboard tape, both of which can be found in DIY stores (or hubby's toolbox) but I got mine in In-Excess:

The other things you need are die cuts and alcohol inks. You basically stick the die cuts to a sheet of card adding pieces of the plasterboard tape for texture and then cover with the silver tape, go over the whold thing with an embossing tool to make sure the tecture comes through before colouring with alcohol inks. For this one I then used the blending solution to remove the colour from the butterflies and flower (the butterflies and flowers are cut from snippets so I'm taking this to Pixie's Playground too. And the new challenge st PaperArtsy is Alcohol Inks and Pens so I'm entering this there too

For masculine cards I usually use die cut cogs and screws / hinges cut from cereal boxes:

This one just has some odd chipboard shapes that I would never have used because the colours were awful

So thanks Pam, Cally and especially Clair for this great technique

Hoops and Harebells At The Butterfly Challenge

This fortnight's theme at the Butterfly Challenge is Hoops and Harebells. I always intend to get my card for this challenge done early but it's always well into the second week before I get one done. I've gone for the purplish end of the harebell colour range and this sketch form CAS Colours & Sketches

I made my own backing paper using the smallest swirl die in the Stampin Up Swirly Scribbles set and cut it from funky foam to use as a stamp. My harebell colour comes from Shaded Lilac distress ink:

I had to take a picture at an angle to show the glitter on the butterfly but the stamping is a lot lighter in real life

Th butterflies are cut using Stampin Ups Butterfly Wings Embosslits folder using scraps of lilac card so I'm also taking this to the Pixie's Snippets Playground

White on White and or Wire

White on White and/or Wire is the current theme at the Butterfly Challenge. I've made a very simple card using up snippets of white card from making card blanks. The border on the left is cut with the Treading Water Fiskars punch and added some wire threaded with beads. I also added a bead to the butterfly body with wire

I'm also entering this into the Playground - hopefully Miss Di and Mrs A have a fabulous morning at the craft show and a safe journey back

Perfectly Imperfect

When we go to live in the Czech Republic, my craft stash will be severely reduced so I am planning to concentrate on a couple of crafts rather than dabbling in everything. One of the things I want to try is quilling and despite giving all my quilling things away last year I have managed to add a few things to my stash. One of the ladies asked if we could do quilling in a class so that is what we did this week. This is what I made - my first go at quilling

I did think of making a card with the little butterfly for Mrs A's Butterfly Challenge as the theme is Kaleidoscope but it didn't seem colourful enough or big enough so I set about looking for patterns but couldn't find one I liked with clear enough instructions so I winged it.

I used Stampin Up's Swallowtail stamp and set about using up the snippets from the days class to make various shapes then placed them over the stamped image.

How clever of Mrs A to choose Kraft as her colour for this challenge. I had planned on using a black background but it looks so much better on Kraft card. The result is not perfect by any means and is a bit bright but it is fun and it makes me smile when I look at it. It also gave me a chance to use some more of the white peel offs I used on my previous card and the sentiment is from a JOFY set embossed with white paper.

Because it's mostly made from snippets I'm taking ot over to Pixie's Snippets Playground

too

Vases and Vanilla

The current theme at The Butterfly Challenge is Vases and/or vanilla. I've taken the easy way out for this and used vanilla card stock as my base. I've also used these colours from Colours and Sketches:

I've stamped the JOFY image with Chocolate Chip and coloured the flowers with plum and coral pencils as the closest I had to these colours. I've added water using a Versafine pen and clear embossing powder. And the teeny tiny butterflies were on the free Hummingbird set I used in my last post which was free with Simply Cards and Papercraft

I Really Shouldn't Be Doing This!

I'm in my craft room to make my hubby his 60th birthday card but despite weeks of planning, I just can't get started on it. It's not until 2nd August but we're off to the Czech Republic first thing tomorrow so I really must get it done. But then I came across some eggshells left over from another project and thought it would be great for the Less is More challenge which is Tactile. I coloured the egg shells using a mix of Buff and Mocha Fresco paint (best I could find to make a Tip Top Taupe colour), Ocean Teal gilding polish and Banana Fresco paint to match as closely as I could the colours at Colours and Sketches this week:

I cut a strip of double sided sheet and stuck one side onto the card before sticking the eggshell to the other side. I then added white glitter to catch in the cracks. (the stray teal pieces are actually deliberate in case you were wondering). The sentiment is computer generated

I'm counting the eggshells and snippets and taking this over to the Snippets Playground
And because I've mixed the Buff and Mocha Fresco paints I'm entering this into the Party Artsy colour mixing challenge

Now to get back to that card - I wonder if he'll really mind if I buy one at the airport tomorrow!

Purple Denim

I've finally said goodbye to my purple denim jeans. They were my favourite for years until I put on so much weight I couldn't even get them over my knees! They were the first things I got out when I started to loose weight and I was over the moon that they finally fitted. Despite being too scruffy to wear outside, they saw me through the winter indoors until there was just too much glue and ink on them from the craft room so they were relegated to the rag bag for the charity shop.

And then comes along Mrs A with her latest Butterfly Challenge theme of Denim and Dimension. Well, out came the jeans and off with the little ticket pocket for my card.

I've added some 3D foam to the inside top of the pocket so it will stay open and the three full butterflies have 3 layers to them

I'm also entering this into the challenge at Watercooler Wednesday (a new challenge to me) which has the theme of  CAS Butterfly

Well, my jeans are well and truly rags now

A very quick post as I'm staying in Southampton for a few days for a funeral. The latest theme at the Butterfly Challenge is Aperture and/or Apricot. This frame is one in my stash by Craftwork Cards and is a good few years old so gradually using up my stash.

Texture and Teal at The Butterfly Challenge

Today is the start of a new challenge at The Butterfly Challenge and I'm honoured that Mrs A has asked me to be guest designer. I chose the letter T and Mrs A chose Teal and Texture

My first project features Teal and uses some beautiful wrapping paper with shiny teal and chalk white butterflies. The sentiment is from Stampin Up's Butterfly Prints set and I've cut a couple of butterflies as embellishments

 My second project features Texture and is a Powertex notebook cover. I started with a black notebook and this metal hanging butterfly which came in a pack of three from Poundland. I put masking tape over the butterfly before adding some netting material covered in black Powertex and set it onto the book cover with another piece of material underneath. Once dry I used a combination of turquoise and green powders to add colour to the butterfly and silver to the material

 For my third project I've combined Teal and Texture. I covered my die cut butterfly with pva before adding broken eggshell and painting

Paper Artsy fresco dusty teal paint

Cosmic Shimmer teal gilding wax

Stampin Up Gorgeous Grunge

Stampin Up Loving Thoughts

Gilding flakes

I'm counting the eggshells as snippets so I'll be taking this over Pixie's Snippets Playground. (Just realised I've entered this week and it's too early for next)

Fuchsia and Butterflies

Once I'd posted my folded butterfly for the Butterfly Challenge I remembered my stamp and stencil sets and knew there was a fuchsia in there and low and behold it had a butterfly on it as well

I love these sets but naughtily I rarely get them out but was surprised how quickly this card was made. I used a snippet of Rymans smooth card and stamped the fuchsia and butterfly with Momento ink before colouring with Promarkers. Then I used the stencil to add the glitter highlights using GlitzCraft frosting paste which cries in minutes. Once I'd done this, I wasn't sure how to put the card together then I remembered the Less Is More challenge this week is Use 3 Stamps so I added the sentiment from Stampin Ups Bloomin Marvelous set and raised the panel on a white card blank

I'm entering this into the following challenges
The Butterfly Challenge - Fuchsia and/or Fancy Folds
Pixie's Snippets Playground - Snippets
Less Is More - Use 3 Stamps

Fancy Folds and Fuchsia at The Butterfly Challenge

The current theme at The Butterfly Challenge is Fancy Folds and Fuchsia. It's been a beautiful day here in Sopley so I've spent a lot of the time in the garden folding this book into a butterfly. I love this fold so I've done very little decoration to it, just some fuchsia coloured card stamped with some butterflies to go on the inside cover

Rosette card

We had great fun making rosette flowers at my card group last week - it was great to get away from the building works - and this week we'll be making cards with them. This is one of my samples using some papers I found during my clearout. They were part of a Papermania pad called The Big One - Clare Curd's Signature range and had 200 sheets. There must be at least half of it left and I love how there are 10 different designs in each colourway. I've used the minty green to fit in with the theme at the Butterfly Challenge which is M is for Margins/Mint. I've followed this layout from Freshly Made Sketches

I'm also entering this into the following challenges:

Pixie's Snippets Playground - Snippets (green and white card)

Less Is More - Polka Dots

Get Creative Challenges - Use Green

Grape and Glitter At The Butterfly Challenge

I can't believe it's been so long since I posted a card. Things have been really busy here. We've had a lot of work done on my old craft room. It still had polystyrene tiles on the ceiling and you could see from the shape of it it would probably some down with the tiles which is why we never tackled it. As we thought, the whole lot came down along with the most awful grey dust. The poor builder looked like a chimney sweep and said he'd never known a ceiling so dirty! It seems that when the original slate roof was taken off it was just left on the loft floor and covered with insulation and most of it has gone to dust. So it's been a lot of housework keeping the dust down. So my old room had a new ceiling, a new wall and the other three re-plastered and a new door. Almost ready for decorating now, just another heavy clean of the floorboards. A weeks break before they start on the major work in the kitchen. We had hoped to get all of the upstairs done before starting downstairs but we've been let down by the roofer so need to find another.

Anyway, on to my first card for a while and it's for the Butterfly Challenge and the theme this time is Grape and Glitter and of course butterflies. I've followed this layout from Sketch Saturday

I'm not sure what variety of grape my colours are but hey ho! The butterfly is cut from a glitter paper that doesn't show too well and I've added Stickles glitter to the butterflies on the background paper. I had originally cut the paper so that the butterflies were central but now I realise that I've used the wrong piece so may give it another go if I get the chance

Spotlight Stamping

My craft class is doing Spotlight Stamping this week so I had to come up with a couple of quick cards as samples so I've made two very similar using Hero Arts Flower Wood Background stamp.

The first one I use just stamped in black on white card then with white ink on a snippet of black card for the spotlight so I'm entering this into Pixie's Snippets Playground

The second one I've just coloured some  of the spotlight with blue Promarker. The blue card for layering and the ribbon are also coloured with the Promarker as I didn't have anything matching. I'm entering this one into Mrs A's Butterfly Challenge which this week is Stamping and/or Sapphire (and of course butterflies)

Stickles, ribbon and a butterfly greeting finish both cards

Another Penny Slider

Our craft class this week is penny sliders so I've made another sample to fit in with the Butterfly Challenge. There's a choice of theme this time - either O for over the edge or U for Undulating. I've gone for the undulating so made the slider part of the card wavy. The papers are by Craft Creations and they're all quite muted but very pretty. The sentiment and butterfly are by Craftwork Cards

"Q" Is For Quadruple

The current theme at The Butterfly Challenge is Q is for Quadruple. For my card I've used a layout of a card I did at a workshop with Jenny Mayes of Hobby Art quite a while ago. It was at the Worthing craft show which sadly finished a few years ago as although not quite local for me it was always a great show. I've moved things round a little but it is basically the same layout and it works so well for so many images. Apart from the main card everything is snippets so I'll be showing it in Pixie's Snippets Playground

As usual, the glittering on the flowers and butterflies is very hard to capture

Many Thanks at Cuttlebug Mania

Our new challenge at Cuttlebug Mania is Many Thanks and our sponsor this time is

Crafty Sentiments Designs

I've based my card on this layout from CAS(E) This Sketch

I always forget that this Thanks die stays in the card but I think it works well. I've used Ken Oliver Colour Bursts to colour the tag butterfly and letters and sprayed the tag with some shimmer mist

Crafty Individuals Butterfly die
Memory Box Thanks die
Tag die free with a magazine
Embossalicious Chevron folder

I'm also entering this into the following challenges:

The Butterfly Challenge - Z is for Zig Zags

Less Is More - Fire Colour Challenge 

Pixie's Snippets Playground  - the tag and butterfly are both cut from snippets
CAS on Sunday - Use a Tag

Pink and Pearly at Cardz 4 Galz

It's our third challenge at Cardz 4 Galz and this week our theme is Pink and Pearly

My card is based on one I made a few years ago at a show in Worthing. The card we made was black and white which never seems to work well for me so I've gone for a pink and white version.

The flowers are from the Hobby Art Wildflowers set, stamped with pink pearlescent ink and embossed with clear powder. The butterflies are from a Robert Adams die dabbed with pink Stickles

We'd love to see your Pink and Pearly creations

I'm also showing this at the Butterfly Challenge where the  theme is E for Embossing

K is For Knots

The current Butterfly Challenge is K is for Knots. I've been having a real clear out of my crafting stash with a view to getting rid of quite a bit but I came across these embossed frames from Craftwork Cards. I've brushed it lightly with pink chalk and raised it on foam pads above the sentiment by Inkylicious. My knots are three snippets of ribbon which I've coloured with the same ink that I stamped the sentiment. Some Robert Adams butterflies to finish

I'm also entering this into the following challenges:

Pixie's Snippets Playground - Snippets

Nordsalten Hobbyklubb - Pink Ribbon