November Mood Board and Christmas tags

Hello again! Donna here, and I’m excited to share with you what I’ve made with the November mood board.

I smooshed Distress inks onto watercolour paper to create the background, building up the layers until I was happy with the result. This background could easily be made using Distress oxides too.

I then stamped the leaf three times on white card stock before heat embossing the with gold. I fussy cut the leaves leaving just a tiny margin of white around the outside.

I tore some vellum into pieces to mount each of the leaves onto. I love the look of torn edges. Once I had glued the leaves onto the vellum, I put a little glue on the back of the vellum only where the leaves were because the glue shows through vellum and can wreck the look. I glued these to the card, starting in the centre.

So, are you going to enter the November mood board challenge? It's such a beautiful board, it seems a shame to miss out! Don't forget you can win a store voucher if you're the winner. 

Share your entries here.

Next, I have some very simple Christmas tags for you. So many of the Christmas packs have Ephemera and die cut shapes, and I've used these to make some tags. I cut the tags using a die, and layered greetings and pictures on top, sometimes popping part of the image up with foam tape. Here's a look at the set of tags.

Here are some close ups of the tags. You can see the dimension in the tag below, created by raising the top berries.

This Santa's face made me laugh. He looks completely frazzled and overworked, but he's pressing on!

This tree took the whole tag, and then some, but I like the way it hangs over the edge.

It's always a pleasure to share with you what I've been up to, and I hope you are inspired to get crafty, either with the mood board, or making some Christmas tags.

Until next time, may you enjoy the approaching Christmas season,

Blessings, 

Donna 

Instagram: donnadoll74

Floating on Air and Distress Oxide Bargain

Hello crafty friends!

Today I'm going to share three cards and an opportunity to grab a bargain on some Distress Oxide inks.

I don't think I'm ever going to get sick of the September Cropaholic Kit! Honestly, it's my favourite thing yet. I've made three cards to share with you today, using various parts of the kit. 

Firstly I used the clear plastic packaging that came with the kit to do some ink smooshing onto watercolour paper. I used Distress Inks in Peacock Feathers, Abandoned Coral, and Wild Honey. Then I used the stamp that came with the kit (pictured below) and laid it onto the blue and a little onto the coral ink and left it there until the ink dried. You can see that the ink is paler  where it had contact with the stamp. Then over to the left on the coral, you can see a darker pattern where I inked up the stamp and stamped on top of the ink.

I finished the card by mounting the panel onto cardstock, and using some heart wood veneers and the word today from the cutout sheet. In order to have it make sense as a card sentiment, I rummaged through my stamps until I found one with the word "enjoy" on it, and white heat embossed it to complete the card.

For this second card I got out my Distress Oxide inks. This is where the bargain comes in. The lovely Kylie at Shop and Crop is doing a deal on the entire first set of inks for $100. If you use the code DL5, you can get a further $5 off, so that the inks will be $95, instead of the RRP of $114 for the set. Bargain! I've ordered a set! the same deal is available on Set 2.

I used an old feather stencil that a friend gave me to make the feathers for this card. I used an ink blending tool and the distress inks glide on like butter. Unlike regular dye inks, they are very forgiving, and don't leave dark splodges if you accidentally press too hard. (which I do often). I used the exact same colours as the first card, but this time in the Oxide inks. I then carefully fussy the feathers, leaving a small white border. The Jillibean Soup paper with the feathers was a perfect match, but needed toning down a little so that the card wasn't too busy. I'm really pleased with the effect of the different sizes of feathers, but there are many images in the kit that would look great on this card, like the cute bicycles.

Here's a close up look at the layers of the card.

Finally, I have a very simple card that highlight the papers in the kit. There were so many combinations of papers I could have chosen to make this card, and all of the Shop and Crop Kits (except the Mixed Media Kit) have coordinating papers, so this is a card design you could use for any kit from any month!

I hope this has inspired you to stretch the supplies in your kit to get the most out of it, and that even if you're not a card maker, that you've enjoyed looking at the designs.

If you'd like to see more, feel free to visit me on Instagram  and see what else I've been up to!

Don't forget to use the code DL5 if you're planning to get the Oxides, so you can get the cheaper price.

Until next time, may you enjoy every day, and get a chance to be creative too!

Blessings,
Donna

HAPPY EASTER!!!

Hello! Donna Lewis here. I'm very excited to be sharing my first blog post with you. I've been having a lot of fun with the March Crop Kit,  making cards and Easter projects.  The crop kits contain all kinds of goodies, and all my projects shared here today use the papers, stickers and embellishments from Doodlebug Design inc that are included in the March kit. You can take a look at how to subscribe to the Shop and Crop kits here. You can even get $5 off your purchases at Shop and Crop using the code DL5. 

Firstly, seeing as it's Easter Sunday, let's look at the Easter projects I made. This pillow box was made using the WeRmemorykeepers pillow box punch board. I added some of the sweet papers from Doodlebug Design that were included in the Crop Kit, and the easter egg stickers from the kit. Finally, some twine from my stash finished the project.

As you get to know me, you'll know that I love shaker cards, and the gorgeous "Happy Easter" panel was perfect for a shaker. I cut the panel around the inside of the scalloped border and dropped the sentiment to the back. Onto the front I put some of the stickers included in the kit, and inside the shaker are some the flowers and jewels from the kit as well as some sequins from my own stash.

The images on the Doodlebug papers make the cutest little baby cards. I have cut out the individual images and rounded the corners. They have been mounted on a slightly darker cardstock to make a border for each cutie, as the papers all have very similar tonal value. There was no "baby" sentiment in the kit, so I made my own by writing the word with a Versamark clear pen, and adding white embossing powder and heat setting it. It's hard to pick up in the photo, but each critter has been finished off with some wink of Stella for sparkle, and Glossy Accents on their noses to make them stand out. Too cute!

The next card has been given a soft look by ink blending a background using Distress Inks in Mowed Lawn, Broken China and Fossilised Amber. The sentiment on this card comes from a stamp set from Mama Elephant called "Up and Away" which I also used to make the bunny background paper on the next card. This was the quickest of all the cards to make, but is one of my favourites. 

Here's a close up of the ink blending (and some very cute little faces!)

Finally, a card using several dies and my Sizzix machine.  I clear embossed the Mama Elephant bunnies to make a background. The ground is a cute bunny paper that I'm using as grass, which I have die cut using a scalloped border die. Some cute stickers from the March Crop Kit and a sentiment stamp from Paper Smooches finish the card. You can never have too many cute bunnies!

Hopefully this will give you some new ideas for projects to try with the March Crop Kit, or with any of the other papers you have in your stash. Have a blessed Easter, and I look forward to sharing with you again. If you are interested in seeing more ideas, feel free to check out my Instagram account @donnadoll74.

March Challenge - 'Cutest lil dude' by Sarah Rosse

Hi there, Sarah here with you this morning to show you my take on the March sketch challenge. Here's a little reminder of the sketch...

I had such fun making this layout and I find when following along with a sketch, it usually comes together quite quickly for me. I had one little problem....for those of you with toddlers, you may understand....I had just left my desk for a minute to start preparing dinner, after getting about half way through my layout design, when I noticed Mr 3 in my craft room......I ran to check out what he was doing and he had scribbled on the bottom left hand corner of my layout! So, I had two options....start all over again or re-design the layout to make it work and cover up the boo boos! So as you can see, the layout isnt exactly the same as the sketch. That's the great thing about a sketch....you can use it as a base to get the creative juices and ideas flowing and then make it your own.

To create the coloured background layer, I used distress inks (available in store here) using the packaging technique - I rubbed some ink onto a piece of plastic packaging, added a spary of water, turned it over and 'smooshed' it on to the page. I chose colours that matched with the patterned paper used on top of the layout, carefully drying between each colour to avoid them mixing into a muddy colour. Here's a pic of those beautiful ink colours...

I added some stamping with black ink to the background using 'Mixed Media 2' Stampers Anonymous Tim Holtz stamps. The wide range of mixed media stamps from the online store can be seen here. The papers used on this layout are from the Crate Paper Cool Kid collection. I LOVE this collection and have used it over and over again! Note to self: must stock up on some more at the online store here. The cut strips are from leftovers from previous projects using the Cool Kid paper range - I never through out a scrap from a collection I love!

I chose to use the Cool Kid vellum as the photo mat base so you could still see come of that lovely ink colour underneath. The Cool Kid adhesive chipboard frame was positioned under the photo, with a tag cut from patterned paper to represent the sketch outline. The Cool Kid adhesive chipboard is the ideal embellishment - the little truck and car and the 'dude' sticker in the title was all from this one sheet, with many more stickers to use on future projects. The stickers on the bottom left of the layout are also from the Cool Kid collection. Lets take a closer look at this layout...

Now on to the second project for this post.....

For this card I took the March challenge sketch and carried this out on a smaller scale - on a card rather than a layout. Again I used the Crate Paper Cool Kid collection with distress inks to create the coloured background, with some stamps from my stash. So much fun!! The digital stamp on this card is a free printable from the internet - simply printed and coloured with Touch Five markers and Stampin Up Blendabilities. I used a Wink of Stella pen to give some sparkle to his cape. The stickers "You'll move mountains" are from the Cool Kid sticker sheet. Here is a close up of the stamped image layered on multi coloured cotton to create some texture on the card.

I hope you enjoyed these projects using the March challenge sketch - I look forward to seeing what you create this month and dont forget to check out the blog for all of the Design Team's amazing projects and inspiration!