Music From The Heart

Hi!

When I was lucky enough to be asked to present Beautiful Moments at OnStage in Sydney last November, I also received a few extra stamp sets in my presenter pack. One of them was the fabulous Music From The Heart stamp set. I was soooo excited to see it, as I am a musician. It's a set that will definitely find a place in my 'keep forever' shelf!

Today's card was made for a mate of Alex's who was turning 18. He's a quiet lad, but is passionate about music, and so it was a perfect set to use for his card.

I used lots of bright colours to stamp the images on the card - Blueberry Bushel, Call Me Clover, Pineapple Punch and Real Red. The keyboard image was stamped on a Whisper White scrap, fussy cut and then trimmed into two pieces to allow it to stretch across the width of the card.

Here's a trick for making sure you stamp the notes and guitars in the correct place: lay the Stitched Circle die on the card where the die cut circle will end up, and trace around the inside of the die lightly in pencil. This saves you having to guess where you need to stamp the images.

I used the same colours to stamp across the bottom of the inside. The sentiment also comes from the set. There's a few cute pun stamps, and a few more for different occasions. the hand-written font is lovely.

Bye for now,

Tina

JAI #473: Just Choose Two

Hi!

Yay, time for the new Just Add Ink challenge! This week Nikki has challenged us to Just Choose Two.

Which two will you choose? I went for Metallics and Washi on my card. Ada had been invited to a birthday party for one of her besties, and the request for the card was a particular movie franchise set in space that was popular in the 70's, but has seen a resurgence in the past decade or so. Luckily, I had just the stamps thanks to Kindred Stamps.

The stamp set is called Galactic Adventures: The Sequel and features a mix of characters from both the original movies (the best ones!) and the contemporary movies.

Now, you may be looking at my card and thinking - where's the washi? Would you believe that the entire space background is washi??? It is! It's from Altenew and is called Galaxy Washi Tape. It's super wide, so that it fills the width of the card. The image is the Milky Way, and it's perfect for any space themed cards.

My little robot didn't take much to colour. I mostly used a gold and silver sharpie maker, with a touch of blue. Done! The letters were cut from Golf Foil and then run through my Big Shot using the Subtle Embossing Folder. I used a punched vellum circle to ground the elements without covering the cool Galaxy Washi too much.

Ada chose the image and sentiment for the inside. She likes joking around with her friend, so she thought it was very suitable!

Time to pop on over to the Just Add Ink blog, where you can see the rest of this week's Design Team cards. We've all had a lot of fun choosing our two - which two will you choose?

Bye for now,

Tina

JAI #466: Just Add Inspiration

Hi!

It's time for the newest Just Add Ink challenge, and this week Kelly has given us our challenge. Just in time for Christmas in July, she's given us a festive Inspiration photo to work from.

Aww, how lovely is that? It's the kind of display I'd love in my house, but can never quite pull off! My eye was caught by that gorgeous black and white polka dot ribbon. I can't quite bring myself to start making Christmas cards just yet, so I ran with the polka dots for a card for my littlest great nephew's birthday.

These papers are actually old Creative Memories paper from my stash. I came across them while searching for something else, and I'm glad I did, because the polka dots are perfect for this challenge!

The paisley paper is from the same pack. I love how it's quite subtle. The best match for Stampin' Up! cardstock was Crushed Curry, which frames all of the Basic Black quite nicely. I used Black Foil for the sentiment and number die cuts.

I couldn't resist adding a second little birdie to the inside of the card, using a scrap of left over Black Foil. I like how it adds a little bit of whimsy to the card.

That's it from me this week - time to pop on over to the Just Add Ink blog to see the rest of this week's Design team cards.

Bye for now,

Tina

JAI #452: Just Add A Sketch

Hi!

Welcome to the new Just Add Ink challenge. This week it's a sketch challenged designed by me! This was a fun sketch to design, and I think it can be interpreted so many ways - don't just stick to circles, any shape is fine!

I think I designed this before Christmas and I had snowflakes in my head instead of circles. In the end, I used a mix of Pokeballs and stars.

I made this card for my oldest child, Alex, who is turning 16 (gulp!) in a few days. He's mad on Pokemon Go, and the Pokeballs are a big part of the game. The Crushed Curry DSP is from the Classic Garage DSP Pack, I loved the subtle grungy pattern in it.

To make the Pokeballs I punched 1 1/4 inch circles in Whisper White and Real Red, then snipped the red ones in half. I added a thin strip of Basic Black to the back of the red and then adhered the whole lot to the white. To get the little circles, I used a 1/4 inch circle punch and then punched a 1/2 inch circle over the opening to create a black 'donut'. I then adhered it over the top of a 1/2 inch white circle and then glued that to the larger circle. Done!

The numbers 16 were done in a similar way to the larger part of the Pokeball. The hardest part was lining up the black strip!

I made a fourth Pokeball for the inside of the card too - why not when I'm already making three? LOL. I hope Alex loves his card, I know I had fun making it.

Time to head on over to the Just Add Ink blog, where you can find the rest of the Design Team's cards  and add your own to the challenge.

Bye for now,

Tina

A Roaring Good Time With Pumpkin Pie

Hi!

Wowee, the Art With Heart team are ripping though the colours in the Stampin' Up! range. We are up to Pumpkin Pie this week. When deciding what to make I reached for my Brights cardstock tub, but I didn't find Pumpkin Pie. Oops! I forgot that in the last Colour Refresh, Pumpkin Pie was moved to the Regals.

I have a great nephew turning two in a couple of weeks, and so this was a great opportunity to make a fun card for him. I was originally thinking a lion, but they are yellow, not orange! Tiger it was, then! I did a google search for tigers made using the fox builder punch and found a few. The one I followed was just marked as 'Alana'. How cute is he?

He was a little fiddly to make, but soooo worth the effort. I made his stripes by stamping just the ear part of one of the heads in the Foxy Friends stamp set. I repeated this for the 2, which I think looks super cute!

I had the foresight to make a second tiger at the same time as the first. Usually I only make one and then wish for a second one for the inside but can't be bothered as they are so fiddly. I got smart this time! You may notice that his tail is on the other side - that was a bit of an oops moment that worked out nicely.

Why not pop on over to Catherine's blog, where you can find the links for the rest of this week's Pumpkin Pie cards? They're gonna be great!

Bye for now,

Tina

JAI #429: Just Add Vellum

Hi!

Let's finish off the week with the newJust Add Ink challenge! This week Di has challenged us to Just Add Vellum to our cards.

My first thought was to use the Graceful Glass Vellum on my card, but then my son, Alex, got invited to a birthday party. I decided to kill tow birds with the one stone and use vellum on the card. As lovely as the Graceful Glass Vellum is, it certainly isn't suitable for a 16th birthday card for a young man!

I started by sponging some Frost White Shimmer Paint through a Kindred Stamps stencil onto Poppy Parade cardstock. The stencil featured a scattering of stars of all different sizes. I layered a large vellum circle over the top so that the stars could still be seen.

The stamp set I used was also a Kindred Stamps set called Plumber Brothers. The party Alex was going to was a go-karting party, so if you know the character, you know why it was perfect for this card! The retired Large Numbers dies and Number Of Years stamps were used for the 16. I wanted the number to be prominent, but not the main element, so I tucked them under the sentiment.

Alex thought the card was fantastic, except I was chastised for colouring the mushroom the 'wrong' colour - apparently the 1UP mushrooms should be green! Oh well - green just didn't work with the rest of the card. I'm pleased to say that the birthday boy (young man!) liked the card too.

You can see what the rest of the team has done with the vellum challenge at the Just Add Ink blog. Will you join in the fun with us this week?

Bye for now,

Tina

AWH Blog Hop: Fancy Folds

Hi!

Welcome to another Art with Heart Team blog hop where we are focusing on fancy folds. You will find loads of creative inspiration tonight, showcasing different folding techniques and projects. Don't be afraid of trying some Fancy Fold cards; they may look intimidating, but in fact, they are not that difficult to create.

I was recently asked to make a birthday card for a woman turning 50, but it had to be big enough for around 30 people to sign. My first thought was to make a super-sized card, but I thought about how annoying that would be to store, so I decided to make something that was the size of a regular card, and add some extra pages for the guests to write on.

I'm not sure of the name of the fold, but you pretty much take a sheet of cardstock that is double the height of the finished card and 3-4 times the width. In this case I used a sheet of 12x12 cardstock in Elegant Eggplant. I should mention at this point that my brief included using purple and no flowers - the recipient is a really outdoorsy kind of person who enjoys camping, etc.

I scored the 12x12 at 4 and 8 inches, and then turned it 90 degrees and cut at 6 inches from the edge and stopping at the second score line from the edge. I also cut two extra pieces of cardstock that were 6x4, with an additional flap on one 6 inch side. Here's a diagram that shows what I did. Dashed lines are scored, solid are cutting lines, and all measurements are in inches.

I adhered the to extra flaps to the edges of b and c. I then adhered A to a, B to b and C to c using Tear And Tape Adhesive. This creates a little book with 8 pages. You could leave the top of each page open, so that you could have extra tags in the pockets too.

I decorated the front and back cover with Wood Textures DSP and used another piece of cardstock to act as a spine, hiding all of the folds. I added a length of twine to the cover before adding the spine, so that the card can be tied shut.

Each of the pages was decorated with a little more of the DSP, and I also added a few stamps from the Tabs For Everything set to give it a bit more colour. I heard that the card was a hit, so I was very pleased!

Well, that's it for me, so now you're hopping off to visit Kate Morgan's blog. She always has something fabulous that is bound to inspire.

If you find a broken link or have come to this blog hop from a different entry point, you can view the participants below:

1. Caroline Manwaring
2. Ros Davidson
3. Monika O'Neill
4. Sharon Davern
5. Tina Gillespie
6. Kate Morgan
7. Andrea Roberts
8. Rachel Woollard
9. Claire Daly
10. Alisha Watson
11. Kimberly Hern
12. Catherine Proctor

Bye for now,

Tina

Happy 40th Birthday To My Superman

Hi!

A bit of a special card today, as I made it for my wonderful husband, Rob. He turned 40 last week, so. special card was certainly in order!

Rob is very much a comic book loving, superhero geek. I've made him superhero themed cards a few times, but this time I wanted to do something that was just that little bit extra. Superman is his all time favourite, so I found a line image online and printed it onto some Whisper White cardstock. I then coloured it with my Copic markers. You can see a little better in the next picture that I coloured a bit darker at the top of each part of the image, and graduated to slightly lighter towards the bottom. It was difficult to achieve the look in such small areas!

Did you notice I the first photo that I'd die cut the number 40 over the top of the logo? I wanted it to be quite subtle. After I die cut the numbers, I flipped over the piece with all the little bits still in place. I then ran some double sided tape across the back of the panel to keep everything in place. You can see that I used LOTS of white on white layers behind the logo. I was going for a very stylised Fortress of Solitude look, with the split down the middle of the lowest layer representing Superman pulling apart his white shirt to change from Clark Kent into Superman. Rob loved all the meaning I put into the card!

Here's a quick side look at the layers. Not counting the card base, there are 5 layers on the front, and one on the inside. Each of the layers is in pairs, with the bottom of the pair stuck flat to the one below and the top layer raised Dimensionals. I think I used half a sheet of Dimensionals, but the end result was well worth it!

The inside of the card features the retired You're My Hero stamp set - a keeper for me, with all of the geeks in my family!

Bye for now,

Tina

JAI #371: Just Choose Two

Hi!

Whoops! A bit of a technical glitch this morning, meaning my post went up late.

This week at Just Add Ink, Di has challenged us to Just Add Two to our cards. The choice is kids, patterned paper or pets.

I'm not too much of an animal person, so I went for kids and patterned paper.

My niece, Zoe, turned 13 last week, so this was a great opportunity to make her a special card for her special birthday. I chose the Foil Frenzy SDSP, as it's card weight card stock, so perfect for a card base.

I saw this style of Pop Up card, made by Jolanda Meurs, so I decided to give it a go for Zoe's card. When folded flat, the front of the card has a window that the 13 sits in. When you open it, this is what you see:

I thought it was such a clever fold, and even better that it lies flat for posting. I added some extra balloons to the inside front of the card, just to help hide the balloons on the front that hung over the window. If I were to make this card again, I would definitely write my message on the inside before adhering it to the card. It was very difficult to write on after sticking it down!

I hope you can join in with the fun this week at Just Add Ink. Which two will you choose? Pets, patterned paper or kids? Check out what the rest of the Design Team have created over at the JAI blog.

Bye for now,

Tina

Tranquil Tulips in Watermelon

Hi!

Today I have a card for you that uses a lot of new product from the new Annual Catalogue. It's always such an exciting time of year when you get to see all of the new stamps and papers.

Today's card features a new Hostess set called Tranquil Tulips. I think it's going to be a favourite! I've paired it with the new Delightful Daisy DSP.

Tranquil Tulips is a photopolymer set, so lining up the layers is a breeze. There are 5 layers in this main panel: The stems, leaves, two different layers to the tulips, and finally the stamens.

 

I can really see myself having fun with this set!

 

Bye for now,

 

Tina

A 30th Birthday Underground

Hi!


Sometime around the time that the Retiring List comes out, I go into a bit of a panic in regards to the amount of DSP I still haven't used. This card was a class sample that was an attempt to use up some more of the DSP before it retires.

The paper is from the Urban Underground Specialty DSP pack. It's a Specialty pack because some of the papers have a silver foil design. I've used the hexagon foil patterns on this card.

There's three layers of DSP on this card - it certainly fills the brief of using it up!

Are you a DSP user or hoarder? I know which side of the fence I fall on!


Bye for now,


Tina

Happy 13th Birthday Tyson!

Hi!


We have just got back from a birthday party for one of Hudson's friends, Tyson. As you can tell by the post title, he turned 13.  Such a milestone! I made a card for him last night using my new favourite colour - Dapper Denim.

Inspiration for this card came from a card on page 22 of the new Annual Catalogue. It's the Sweet Sugarplum card on the right. I quite liked the idea of stamping the cake multiple times on the background. My cakes were a bit more widely spaced though, and looked a little funny, so I added the sentiment to fill each gap. What a happy accident!

The largest scribble swirl was cut from the Silver Foil Paper. It's such a cool die cut, I've used it heaps! It helps to make the '13' stand out more from the background also.

LOL, when I use the 'hip hip hooray' on my cards, I'm always cheering it in my head as I read it - what about you?

I'm entering this card in the CASEing the Catty monthly challenge. It's been ages since I've been able to play along with another challenge, so it's great to finally find the time.


Bye for now,


Tina