Tranquil Dreams

Hi!

Sob! It's officially the last Colour Creations Blog Share! I think we've managed to convince Catherine to keep going for the 5 new In Colours, so you may well see us back next Tuesday night though! In the meantime, this week we are stamping with Tranquil Tide. It's a lovely, deep earthy green that I've come to love.

Once again, I made a pair of cards using punched shapes and the Floating Frames technique. I used a sheet of Tranquil Tide DSP from the Classic Garage DSP pack and a retired arrow punch for my shapes. Apologies for using a retired punch, but it was just so perfect for the theme of my card that I couldn't resist!

The dreams sentiment is from the Follow Your Dreams stamp set, and the rays are from a soon to retire Hostess set called Here Comes The Sun. I think they work pretty well together, along with the arrows.

Here Comes The Sun also had the perfect sentiment for the inside of the card too! I think I'll give this card to Ada, as she's dancing in a charity performance on Saturday night.

Now, I know I said a pair of cards, and I've only shown you one. Silly me grabbed Shaded Spruce cardstock instead of Tranquil Tide for the other card, and I was too far gone with it before I realised. Oops! I will have to show you that one another time.

Catherine's blog is where you'll find the rest of this week's cards, which are always well worth the look! Hopefully I'll see you next week with a new In Colour.

Bye for now,

Tina

CTC #227: Favourite Retiring Bundle

Hi!

Welcome to by blog for the CASEing The Catty Sunday Challenge Blog Hop! The blog before mine was Julia's. You know the drill by now - grab a cuppa and keep hopping until you get back to where you started.

This week the crew are making projects using our favourite retiring bundle. It was really hard to pick a favourite of all those going, so I picked the one that I wished I'd used more while it was current. I think it will find it's way to my 'keep' shelf though, as I think it's great for teen girls.

It's the Follow Your Dreams bundle from page 54. The dream catchers, feathers and flowers are the perfect mix for teen girls, don't you think? As my daughter is about to turn 14, and I have 3 nieces around the same age, I have a bit of a need for teen girl things in the next few years or more!

I started by die cutting the 'dream' and the dream catcher 4 times each - one in the Gold Foil paper and three times in Bermuda Bay cardstock. I then glued all of the layers together with the foil on top. It's a great way to get dimension, especially when die cuts like the dream catcher are very fiddly to pop up with Dimensionals. I cut the gold pieces out of the panel I used to matt my main panel, as you never see it and would never know unless you (shock horror!) pulled the card apart.

If you look closely, you can see that I stamped the little star/flower image all over the main panel in VersaMark. I then sponged over the top with Bermuda Bay and Coastal Cabana ink. Finally, I splattered some water over the top to lift the colour under the splatters. It's such a cool effect. It's hard to see in the photo, but I embossed the Whisper White layer with the Pinewood Planks DTIEF - yes, there are other embossing folders besides Subtle!! Finally, I added some (retired) tiny pearls to the dreamcatcher.

I'd also cut some feathers out of the Gold Foil matt to use on the front, but didn't end up using them there. Instead, I made a home for them on the inside by sponging Coastal Cabana and Bermuda Bay inks on the bottom corner and flicking it with water before adhering the feathers over the top.

I showed this card to Miss Nearly 14 and asked her if I should add or change anything. She told me it was perfect the way it was, so I'm happy with that!

Don't forget to check out our Facebook group, where you can add your card to this week's challenge. What's your favourite retiring bundle? It can be one that's completely retiring, or one that will carry over, but no longer be sold as a bundle. Too easy!

Don't forget to complete the Blog Hop though! Next up is Rose, I wonder what bundle she'll choose?

Bye for now,

Tina

JAI #420: Just Add Inspiration

Hi!

This week at Just Add Ink Nikki has found this fabulous image to inspire our creativity. Isn't it cool? I've never seen a flower like that - I wonder how they did it? Perhaps it's Photoshopped, but that takes the fun out of it!

I briefly toyed with the idea of doing something with my Daisy punch, but my brain clearly wasn't working well that day, and I ended up going in another direction altogether.

I've been doing a lot of smooshing lately, as I found a better way to do the technique than the way I'd originally learned. I'd only tried one colour backgrounds, so this was the perfect opportunity to splash out and try a multicoloured background. Now I just need to remember the colours I used! I'm pretty sure they were Gorgeous Grape, Mango Melody, Call Me Clover, Melon Mambo and Lovely Lipstick.

The dreamcatcher had a layer of Wink Of Stella added to give it an extra touch of bling, and then finished off with some pearls. The word 'dream' was cut from some cardstock that I'd watercoloured with Gorgeous Grape and Mango Melody before cutting. It's important to let the cardstock dry first - ask me how I know! LOL

On the inside I used one of the dies in the set to create a little window. I'd tried the smooshing on a piece of glossy cardstock and wasn't happy with how it turned out, but it was perfect for popping behind the window.

The rest of the Design Team have had just as much fun as I have with this week's Inspiration Challenge. You can see their cards over at the Just Add Ink blog, where you can also link your card. Don't have a blog? You can still enter! Just email us your card and we will enter it for you.

Bye for now,

Tina

Welcome Back, Blackberry Bliss

Hi!

Welcome back to the new Colour Creations Blog Share by some members of the Art With Heart team.

This week we are featuring a colour that has been welcomed back to the line up in the Colour Revamp - Blackberry Bliss. I know there were a lot of cheers when this was announced, as it was a favourite of many.

As Blackberry Bliss is such a rich, dark colour, I decided to have a bit of messy fun with it.

I started by placing a sheet of Shimmery White cardstock in my Stamparatus and stamping the dream catcher from Follow Your Dreams in Call Me Clover ink. I then took my spritzer and spritzed the card with water, holding the cardstock vertically so that the ink would run off the bottom. When it had dried I stamped the image in Clover again (yay for the Stamparatus!), and spritzed it again, this time leaving the cardstock flat so that the colour wouldn't run, only spread a little from the image. Finally, when it dried again, I stamped the dream catcher in Blackberry Bliss over the image. Because I used the Stamparatus to stamp each time, I was able to line up the image perfectly - I especially love the effect where the dangly bits of the dream catcher are. Is there a technical name for the dangly bits? LOL

The asymmetrical top wasn't a planned part of the card, but when I was stamping the dream catcher for the second time I accidentally got a green fingerprint to the top of the image. It looked pretty cool, but still a bit strange, and there was no way I could recreate the mistake to make it look like a part of the design. Cutting straight across wasn't an option, so asymmetrical it was! You can see that I stamped the flower image in Blackberry Bliss on the top of the card base to make it more of a feature. I love the way it turned out - a happy mistake in the end!

It took me 3 days on and off to make the front of the card, so by the time I got to the inside I was more than ready to get the card finished. Rather than play around with ink and water a but more, I decided to play with my new Embossing Mats. Have you tried them? So much fun! In this case I cut the feather shape and then used the new mats to emboss the texture provided by the decorative ejection holes in the die. You'll be seeing more of this in the future, for sure!

You can find the rest of the team's Blackberry Bliss cards by visiting Catherine's blog. Be sure to leave comments - we all love a compliment!

Bye for now,

Tina