Making life brighter one card at a time
This was for the 4th challenge of the Sharing Spring card hop over on Instagram, hosted by That Crafty Golden. Unbelievably lots of my supplies are STILL packed up, but enough was unpacked that I could cobble together a card using things premade and laying around yay!
Another fun challenge over on the AAA Colourful Challenge blog – I managed to quickly throw this card together while in the throes of packing up my craft supplies, so I kept it super simple!
I found a printed paper pad that had a page with similar colours as the challenge image. I quickly heat embossed a floral image in white over the background paper, cut out the stitched rectangle and added to an A2 card base, then added a simple gold die-cut thanks.
Another fun challenge over on the AAA Colourful Challenge blog with a beautiful colour palette to work with. The colours open up so many possibilities – I hope it sparks some inspiration and that you’ll join us for the challenge.
For my card I decided to push myself a wee bit and I pulled out the magenta-based bright colours and the dark tones of the blues and purples of the image for my card. Normally I’d automatically go straight for the blue/lilac tones because that’s my ‘happy place’, but I decided to challenge myself. The original flowers turned out to be a bit pinker that I wanted (the joys of working late at night, then getting a surprise when it’s put under a daylight bulb!) – so I attacked the lighter pink petals first with some burgundy dye ink, then an OLO marker when it still wasn’t dark enough. I’m pretty happy with the overall result, though, and so glad I didn’t give up on it. The products I used are listed below.
I knew straightaway that I wanted to create a bit of a ‘night sky’ look for the background on my card, and originally had the idea of bright cosmos flowers in the foreground before realising they were a bit too pink compared to the challenge image. Then I spotted the tulips dies in my stash and I found some different tones of magenta/pink cardstock to layer with. As there’s no green in the challenge image I kept the stems and the leaves quite bare, and just used a flax-coloured OLO marker on white cardstock for some subtle colour.
For the background I chose distress oxide inks, which isn’t my usual go-to, starting with Chipped Sapphire, then adding some Villainous Potion – I didn’t like that as it was too dark for me, so I went over the top of it with Wilted Violet instead (one of the great traits of oxide inks, you can just cover up what you don’t like in most cases). I then added a bit of Seedless Preserves at the bottom of the card, but once again I didn’t like it that much so I covered up a lot of it with the Wilted Violet. I applied a very light touch with the Wilted Violet towards the bottom so that the Seedless Preserves still showed a hint and gave some contrast.
I feel very honoured to have been selected as a member of the Design Team for the AAA Colourful Challenge blog that launches today! I’ve always enjoyed colour challenges, so I couldn’t resist putting my hand up for my first ever design team gig. I’m also super thrilled with the theme of this month’s challenge, which is to create something based on the blog logo colours – that’s right up my alley, as I adore rainbow coloured cards, they’re so very cheerful and uplifting! The rest of the Design Team have created some stunning cards, so please do pop over to join us in the fun and to be inspired by our team of creatives.
I have a number of friends who have been struggling mentally, so I’m making 2024 the year to send some cards as a reminder of how the rest of us see them, or to just bring a brightness to their day out of the blue. For that reason I’ll often be using uplifting or supportive sentiments on my cards this year. This one is actually staying with me, though, as a personal reminder and also as a momento of this new creative journey.
A few details about my card:
I started by heat embossing the stamped image with gold, and used Gina K inks in just one shade of each colour for use with the stencils. I continued using the same shades in layers, starting off with a slightly lighter touch and getting more heavy-handed as the layers went on.
To try to get consistent colours, I began with applying the red through the centre of each peony, followed by the blue and the yellow at each far edge of the flowers. I then filled in the gaps with the pink and orange, and overlapping a bit over the previous colours. I really love the purple tones that appeared where the pink overlapped the blue. I started off using the Powder Blue colour but I found it too washed out compared to the other brighter colours, so I stopped at stencil 3 and went back to brighten it up a bit with Blue Raspberry. I was much happier then, and continued to finish the stenciling.
I have to say the card looks a bit complicated with the different colours, but the stencils really do all the hard work, and it’s actually a very simple card to pull together. Altenew really do make some stunning layering stencils!
This is definitely not the favourite card I’ve ever made – I had my head stuck on using the comic block stencil, as I couldn’t think of anything else. I was relatively happy with it until I added the white highlights at the very last minute after the card was assembled, and I think it spoilt it. I rarely use the highlights, so it was a good teaching moment for me I think – and that’s what I love about cardmaking, trying new things and learning from those moments when things don’t quite work out as I’d hoped. I’m happy I managed to use Gina K products for my card, though, as that was my main goal for the episode, as Gina was the guest crafter for the 200th episode of Craft Roulette.
I started by lightly ink blending the top edges of each stencil opening, then masked off one section at a time and stamped the animals in each block. I then created a mask of each animal and covered them up while I finished ink blending the backgrounds. The only additional layer was to stamp and fussy cut all the birthday accessories at the end. I then added a tiny pearl/bauble to the top of each birthday hat and added the wee flower buttons.
I made a quick card for the Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers challenge of N is for New. The new is in my sentiment. I stupidly didn’t measure how much space I needed for the sentiment so I pivoted and made it a very simple layout instead.
Oh boy I really struggled with this one – I had lots of ideas but none that would work with the large animal stamps I own, that was the parameter along with the bookmark that threw me. I’m pretty happy with the stamped background, though – mind you, if I ever decide in the future to stamp a full cardfront with individual letters I’d appreciate someone stopping me haha. This is my 123rd card I’ve submitted so far.
One more card for my personal month of focusing on unused Altenew products. I’ve had this very simple card in my mind for a few weeks now and final gave the experiment a try. I absolutely LOVE the results! It was so very simple too, just using some pretty patterned paper for the background, and white heat embossing of the stamped image. This is perfect for any occasion I think – sympathy cards, birthdays, just because cards, you name it.
I found this week’s Color Throwdown challenge to be a tough one – navy, red and pink. I decided to try using a brayer to add navy colour to an embossing folder to get the darker background, and it took three attempts to get something workable.
The sentiment is a good reminder to never give up, to keep on trying … every day is a new day. I’ve been trying hard to focus on the positives after a number of personal battles these last few years. I know a few of my friends have been struggling too, so I’m trying to make a few cards with positive sentiments to share with them and give them a boost. I’ve also become aware of The Path of Positivity blog that runs monthly challenges, so I think that’s a perfect place to join in the fun on this positive journey – and this card will be my first entry.
This card also completes my own personal challenge for January to create at least four cards using previously unused products in my stash by Altenew.
I can finally show my last card as guest designer for the AAA Cards challenge blog. I had a ball making this one for the love is in the air theme! The strings went a bit rogue but on the whole it makes me smile.
Supplies used: