Uniko Challenge #46

Hi there, I'm here with our latest challenge over at Uniko and here's the cue card to explain what's required, if you've been following the blog you'll have seen half of the design team announced the challenge a few weeks ago but I'm here with a reminder. 

... and here's my first card using the Uniko Style Floral set with a 'Happy' Sentiment from the Festive Sentiments set, released at the end of last year and the 'Some Bunny' set for the word 'Easter'. I've stamped the images and sentiments with Altenew Inks as they're great for layering in the colour families. 

For my second card I used the Organics Additions set and stamped the images in more Altenew Inks. They didn't stamp quite as brightly as I would have liked so I added some additional shading with Promarker pens in similar colours. The mini florals are mainly from the Background Builders: Vines set and Flower Power. It's amazing what you find that mixes and matches with Uniko sets when you flick through all the stamp sets. Having recently changed my storage set up into 2 large ringbinders with x-cut pocket inserts for my Uniko stamps, it's now so much easier to find what I'm looking for. 

I'd like to link this one up at Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge as they are having one of their 'Anything Goes' weeks! 

Our Guest Designer for this challenge is Michele Ferguson, one of our previous Uniko Challenge winners. Do pop along and visit her blog and leave a friendly word and some love.

You have until Friday, 20th April to link up to the challenge and all the details you need about prizes and how to play can be found over at Uniko HERE

As always thanks for calling by my blog today and I hope you feel inspired and will play along with us!

Less is More #324

Morning friends, are you ready for this week's challenge at Less is More

You can really let you imagination run away with you here. 
I've gone with a traditional Spring like image using a digi-stamp from our sponsor LOTV. Having said that I'm not sure I've ever seen a rabbit on a swing out in the countryside but there's a first time for everything!

The image is coloured with Promarkers then adhered to a die-cut panel by MFT Blueprints 15 with a 'Hoppy Easter' sentiment from Uniko.

The theme over at Inkspirational this week is 'Spring' so I'm heading overthere with this card too as well as the Make Your Mark challenge at Addicted to Stamps and More

It was going to be just the one from me for this week and then I discovered a little stash of arty sketchbooks also by LOTV and these are pre-coloured so a really quick and easy card. Cropped the image, matted onto a deep purple then onto the card base. A quick Anniversary sentiment by Avery Elle and done!

There's plenty more ideas over on the main blog HERE as my fellow teamies have been working their magic again this week and we are joined by our Week 3 Birthday Winner; Wendy of Pink & Dotty. I do hope you'll pop along and visit her too this week.

Hope you'll play along and have some fun. Thanks for calling by and I'll be back soon!

Uniko Challenge #40 - Reminder

Hi there, I'm back with a little reminder about our current challenge over at Uniko and the theme for this one is Spring with the optional twist of 'Easter'

This time I've teamed the Originally Organics with the Additions set that was recently released and done a little 'spot' colouring using pencils. I've used the same sentiment combo as my original challenge card; Simply Said Birthday and Some Bunny to do the Easter twist! 

As always there's plenty of fantastic creations by my fellow teamies, so why not head over to the Uniko blog HERE to check out the links and pay them a visit! I'm sure they'd appreciate it!

You have until Friday, 21st April to link up to the challenge and all the details you need about prizes and how to play can be found over at Uniko HERE

As always thanks for calling by my blog today and I hope you feel inspired and will play along with us!

Less is More #321

Morning friends, are you ready for this week's challenge at
Less is More
This week it's our Recipe week and here's the Cue Card

Not too difficult??? Here's my cards and I seem to be making a lot of 'teal' cards at the moment! Hee Hee ... I obviously can't move on from the 'mainly teal' challenge so here's another

Recipe: Inks: Altenew  Stamps: Paper Smooches: Botanicals 2 & Winnie & Walter: Big and Bold YOU Dies: Paper Smooches: Stitched Frame

It's a Clean and Simple week over at Addicted to Stamps and More so I'd like to pop my card in there 

Not so teal this time and going with an Easter theme in non-traditional colours.

This one uses:

Stamps: Mama Elephant - Carnival Cupcakes and CBS Cool Chicks

Promarkers and Filmstrip Frame die by Pretty Pink Posh

Don't forget to check out the fabulous designs from my fellow teamies over on the  main blog HERE and we also have a guest designer for you this week;  Nonni of Nonni's Handmade Cards who was the winner of Week 1  of our Birthday challenges. I hope you'll pay her a visit too.
Hope you'll play along and have some fun. Thanks for calling by and I'll be back soon!

Uniko Challenge #40

Hello crafty friends it's that time again when we are announcing our latest challenge over at 
Uniko
The theme for this one is Spring with an optional twist of Easter
Here's my card using one of the older but stunningly beautiful florals: Pure Florals - Gerbera. This would have to be my favourite Uniko bloom and although it's perhaps a little earlier in the year for Gerbera flowers here in the UK I've coloured it using Spring colours and to keep with the Easter twist I've combined a sentiment from Some Bunny with the 'Happy' from Simply Said birthday.

As always there's plenty of fantastic creations by my fellow teamies, 

so why not head over to the Uniko blog HERE to check out the links

and pay them a visit! I'm sure they'd appreciate it!

What's more we have 2 of our previous winners at Uniko Guest Designing for

this challenge. Their cards are real beauties so I hope you'll pop along and

pay them a visit. Here's the links you need for Marianne and Milka

You have until Friday 21st April to link up to the challenge and all the details you 

need about prizes and how to play can be found over at Uniko HERE

As always thanks for calling by my blog today and I hope 

you feel inspired and will play along with us!

AAA Cards Challenge #61

Hello Friends and a very Happy Easter to you. Hope you have a wonderful day and go easy on those eggs eh! I'm hoping Mr Blogger has worked a treat here at scheduling my post so fingers crossed you are seeing the latest challenge details for  AAA Cards CAS Challenges  at the right time! We are looking for stenciling for this one and I've ended up  making 2 cards although I'm not entirely happy with either! A couple of last minute Easter cards, firstly using a stencil from   Memory Box, inked through with my favourite distress inks.

Having finished the inky blending process I flicked and spritzed some perfect 

pearls onto the stenciled panel before slicing into 4 sections for added detail. 

The 'sending' word die is from Simon Says Stamp, with the Easter Wishes from 

Uniko. I thought the pinked circle of vellum (from Paper Smooches) gave a broken 

egg 'feel' ... yeah??? To finish a few enamel dots and gems.

This one uses the STAMPlorations Bubble Stencil, again inked with distress inks 

and once finished I went over the area again with the same inks to cover the white 

areas but still maintain the stenciled look. Another spritzing of water and perfect pearls. 

A strip of glitter paper breaks the 2 halves of the design although I feel it's too stark. 

The eggs and sentiment are from Clearly Besotted - In Stitches II with the eggs 

heat-embossed and coloured using more Distress ink. 

There's more inspiration from my fellow teamies HERE so please head across and follow the links to their blogs as I'm sure they'd love  a visit. Thanks as always for stopping by and I'll be back soon.

AAA Cards Challenge #60

Hello friends, are you ready for a new challenge from AAA Cards? This one is all about Easter and in case you need a little clue as to the types of things we'd like to see, our photo inspiration is  just beneath my card!

I couldn't resist being inspired by Michele Ferguson's card over at MUSE this 

week HERE and decided to create this card 'case-ing' her design and to play along there 

of course! I started out by masking the upper section of the card base with masking tape 

followed by a little inky blending using distress inks in Mustard Seed and Squeezed Lemonade. 

I've 'cracked' open a new from Clearly Besotted: Cool Chicks which I'm in love with - 

especially the mini shades stamp and faces! I've also added a few white spots to

their bellies! The 'happy' die-cut is from Hero Arts and 'Easter' from Uniko: Some Bunny!

Just to help you out more with inspiration here's our photo inspiration 

... and here's Michele's MUSE card

Our sponsor for this challenge is  with a prize of a $20 gift certificate As always my fellow teamies have created some fantastic designs  so please head over to the main AAA Cards blog for all the details. I hope you feel inspired to play along and can't wait to see your creations! Thanks as always for calling by and I'll catch up again soon.

Uniko Revisit Pure Florals: Cosmos

Hi there friends it's time to dust off and revisit a previously released Uniko stamp set and this month Bev has chosen the 
Pure Florals: Cosmos set
Here's my card and I've teamed it with the recently released Some Bunny set to make another Easter card.

Here's the image of the set and you'll see the flowers are

simply awesome and great for adding colour with all sorts of mediums

Just to show that you can use the images without colouring here's another 

card as I'm slightly addicted to removing watercolour pigment with clear water!

To add a little interest to the card base I've stamped the outline flower around

the edges. The 'inner' panel is coloured using distress inks then more outline images

added just at the base. I've added water to the petals of each of the blooms with a 

paint brush to remove the colour ever so slightly and added a sentiment from 

Paradise Humming Bird with a few sequins from my stash.

As usual there's more gorgeous creations by my fellow teamies over on the Uniko blog 

HERE plus details of the blog hop and how to win the set plus a £10 eGift Certificate.

 Good luck and have fun!

AAA Cards Challenge #36

Morning blog buddies - did you remember to alter the clocks? (If you are in the UK that is) Not sure about losing that hour in bed! BUT it means more daylight so I guess we should smile. I'm here with another new challenge from AAA Cards today and we'd like to see lots of Easter colours but keep it CAS. Here's some photo inspiration for you followed by my card

In the UK daffodils are probably the most common springtime flower

so I couldn't resist including one in my card.

I picked up a sneaky technique on You Tube by Kristina Werner;

 it's pretty old so I don't have a link sorry.

The trick was to colour a sheet of vellum in different colours using Copics;

alternating which side of the vellum you colour between the different colours.

I used this technique to create the backdrop using spring-like colours and Promarkers.

The floral image is heat embossed in Hero Arts white EP 

then coloured on the reverse, this time with Stabilo pens

(Thanks to Julia at Just-One-More-Card.com for introducing me to them)

Image is from Clearly Besotted Spring Blooms along with the sentiment

and I've used a Darice hexagon embossing folder with 

MFT Die-Namics: rectangle Stax & Blueprints 15

Please pop across to the main AAA Cards blog HERE to check out 

the fantastic cards created by my wonderful Teamies and

I can't wait to see your creations.

I'm also heading across to Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge

 with my card as it's Anything Goes this week so it would be wrong not to - eh?

Thanks as always for stopping by and I'll see you soon.

Less is More #217

Hi there, I'm guessing you've stopped by to check out  this week's challenge at Less is More 
BUT
before I give you the details I have to thank everyone who  entered last week's CASE a DT challenge!
WOW! You all did brilliantly and I hope you had lots of fun while Anne, Chrissie and I had our fun meet up and shop at the NEC.
So onto this week's challenge and it's recipe week ... We'd like you to Combine any 3 previous challenges There's 216 to go at so hopefully there's something for everyone!
I've got 2 cards and they are both on a similar line  as it's almost Easter bunny time!
So I've gone with chicks on the first one!

I'm combining challenges: #3 Spring (way back)

#66 Yellow and #143 Stringing Along (string or twine)

Card Recipe:

Paper Smooches: Chubby Chumbs coloured with Promarkers

WPlus9: Conversation Bubble dies

MFT Die-namics: Pierced Rectangle Stax dies

Uniko Studia: Flower Power #4 sentiment

Doodlebug: sprinkles and twine

I'd also like to enter this card at Timeout where it's 

Clean & Simple with the optional twist of 'black, white & a splash of 1 colour'

Edit: Thanks to Leslee who suggested I link this card up at the Fusion Challenge - I'm heading there!

Also Addicted to CAS has a 'cute' theme so couldn't resist popping these chicks in there too.

  

Ok it's bunnies this time!

So I'm going with the Spring Challenge again #3

#55 Punches or Dies & #185 Animal

Card Recipe:

Impression Obsession: Bunny Rabbit dies

These are partially cut so they remain adhered to the white card front

MFT Die-Namics: Snowdrift die

Uniko Studio: Flower Power #4 sentiment

Gems and DP from my stash

I'd like to enter this card over at Simon Says Stamp

as it's an Anything Goes week

That's my lot for today but I'll be back tomorrow with  a new challenge at AAA Cards so hope you'll join me then. In the meantime have some good old crafty fun.

Less is More #215

Morning All Are you ready for another Less is More Challenge?
Well guess what ... it's One Layer Week again and following the very successful discussion regarding inlaid dies Chrissie has added some new rules to the LIM site so do check these out.
So what do we want from you this week ... Animals   Please make it CAS and one layer and as always have some fun!

Here are my examples:

I'm always a bit late to the Mama Elephant party but there's too much  temptation out there in blogland to resist their gorgeous Pandamonium set which I recently treated myself too!
What a clever panda eh! Not only balancing on one stilt but juggling stars too! Well that was the intention using Cosmic Stars die from Memory Box with a deep blue insert to the card which you can just see peeping through and 'birthday boy' sentiment from Clearly Besotted.


Speaking of 'balancing' here's another clever animal! This time from Clearly Besotted: It's a Circus set All images are from this set including the sentiment and I've  added some glossy accents to the balls. The card looked a bit bland and 'too' CAS so I added some  black hand-drawn outlines - never tried that before but I kind of like it.

Last but not least - Easter is coming so couldn't resist

an Easter bunny sat on some glossy eggs.

Images all from Clearly Besotted - Hoppy Easter set (sadly discontinued)

I've used some Mowed Lawn Distress Inks to create a little 'hill' for 

the bunny and it certainly looks like a freshly mowed bowling green!

Bit too perfect but hey ho! 

Ok I'm handing the baton to you crafty folk 

and looking forward to seeing you super duper creations.

Thanks as always for stopping by and if any of you are visiting

the NEC next Saturday for the Hobbycraft show leave me a comment or message me.

All being well I'll be there with Chrissie and Anne so we'd love to meet up.

EASTER BUNNIES OUT

Back again with a really quick post as I forgot to post this a few days ago! Duh!

It's a combined challenge entry for Clearly Besotted - Spring Theme (using the Hoppy Easter stamp and die set), Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge where it's a Happy Easter and / or Sweet Treats theme and last but not least CASual Fridays where the 'code word' is 'Good Egg'

   

Ok that's definitely it for today!

See you soon.