Passion for Promarkers - Make it digital...

Good morning, Blogger friends! I am running behind today as we decided to take Daisy out again over the weekend - we had a fabulous family time in Yorkshire, visiting lots of interesting places and walking for miles! Unfortunately, this means I am now playing catch up and so am here to share my DT card for this week's new challenge over at Passion for Promarkers!...
It's the lovely Marie in the hostess chair and she's chosen a fab, easy theme of 'Make it Digital', so this can be a digital image, digital papers or sentiment and remember you can make any type of creation, not just a crad! We are being sponsored by Di's Digi Stamps who are offering one lucky winner a $12.00 voucher to their store...

Don't forget, to be in with a chance of winning the prize, you must use your Letraset/Winsor & Newton mediums and follow the challenge theme...

This card came in the Top 3 at Cardz 4 Galz - thank you, ladies!

For my card I used my Plush Pals Lion as a digistamp and coloured him up using my Pro/Flexmarkers...

I 3D decoupaged my lion for a bit more depth, then finished off with a few digital paper banners, pearls, some polka dot ribbon and a hand doodled border...

(Here you can see the decoupaged layers)

It has to be short and sweet from me today as I have another load of washing to put on, plus a pile of ironing and trying to get the house back into some sort of order...I hope you can find the time to join in with our fun challenge this week and look forward to seeing what you all create...
Crafty hugs,

I'd like ot neter my card into the following challenges :

Craft Rocket 2nd entry

Animal Kingdom until 31st

Cardz 4 Gals

Cats or Kittens closes tomorrow

(I hope my lion counts under your challenge theme, but if not, don't worry about it!)

Come and Get it Challenge

Use 2 or more different embellishments until 31st

(I've used ribbon and pearls)

Plush Pals with a difference...

Good morning, everyone!  I better not speak to soon, but I'm doing rather well with this posting lark at the minute!?!  It's because I'm still busy making samples (and probably will be up until the day) for the Ross Papercraft Show in Edinburgh on Saturday 27th September at Meadowbank Sports Centre, London Road, Edinburgh!  My old samples have been in and out of the box and handled that much that some of them are looking rather worse for wear now, plus it's nice to look at things with fresh eyes!

So for today, I have another card inspired by one of Jen's Deconstructed Sketches (told you I love this blog and you want to see the cutest Halloween treats she's just posted, oh my word!)  Anyway, this time it's number 159...

...and this is what I did with it...

I used Cuttlebug Distressed Stripes for the embossed background, the lemon polka dot paper from the Lamb design set and the Blue dotty paper from the Bear set which I then overprinted with the Green version to get the pretty aqua colour.  I inked the edges with Mustard Seed and Weathered Wood Distress Inks to define the edges and save having to mat and layer..

The flowers are from the multicolour flower embellishment sheet and I've inked the edges with Vintage Photo Distress Ink, cut into the petals and scored and pinched them for more dimension.  I added some Marianne Design Button Flower leaves, buttons to the centre of the flowers and small twine bow.  The craft card die cut (SB Labels Eleven) was left over from making my recent Bear Aperture card and was just sat on my desk waiting to be used!  I printed the sentiment onto Safmat and adhered on top.  Here it is to share - click on the image then right click and Save Image As...to download it to your hard drive...

..I really like the modern feel to this card - so pretty and fresh...hope you like it too and once again, thanks to Jen for sharing her wonderful inspiration!
See you soon,

I'd like to enter my card into the following challenges :

Fan-tastic Tuesday

Anything Goes Twist Add a Button (until 15th)

Fab n Funky Challenge

Cute as a Button (until 16th)

Try it on Tuesday

How does your Garden Grow? (until 15th)

A Flying Rabbit!...

Good morning, dear Blogging buddies!  How about this?  Three posts in 3 days, anyone would think I was organised?!  I must admit that I had written and scheduled these posts on Saturday whilst I had some free time as hubby was off picking the big man up from Aberystwyth and my little man was busy with his friends, but still, quite an achievement for me these days!

Anywho, I am back to share another fab (in my opinion) new sample using the Plush Pals disc, this time using the sweet Rabbit with Balloons decoupage...

...I love these scene cards and this little bunny was crying out to be floating along in the clouds!  I inked the background with Stormy Sky Distress Ink and I've made a quick cloud stencil (sized for A5 paper landscape) for those of you who aren't brave enough to cut your own!...

...Just print and cut the stencil along one of the cloud lines, place on your paper and lightly ink along the edge of the stencil onto your paper, to create fluffy clouds!

...My Marianne Creatable Circles die came out again for my sun, inked in the die with Mustard Seed DI and again I hand cut some clouds from white cardstock, inked the edges with Stormy Sky and added a touch of crystal glitter for sparkle...

..I printed the decoupage as is and layered using foam pads, embossing the edge of each layer with a large embosing tool to give it more dimension and adding Glossy Accents to the lilac balloon for a bit of shine.  I created the sentiment with my individual letter stamps stamped onto 1cm squares and inked with Stormy Sky and decorated the inside to match by inking the clouds on the top half of the panel and adding a banner with the second half of the sentiment on, which reads '...it's your birthday!'.
I really liked the way this cute little card turned out and it could easily be adapted for any of the characters, maybe with a bit of grass drawn at the bottom.  There's full instructions on how I made it over on my Samples blog.

DON'T FORGET TODAY IS THE LAST DAY TO GET YOUR ENTRIES IN FOR OUR 'BACK TO SCHOOL' CHALLENGE OVER AT PASSION FOR PROMARKERS!

I'd like to enter my card into the followign challenges :

Penny's Papercraft Challenge

Anything Goes

Papertake Weekly

Anything Goes

Crafting from the Heart

Anything Goes

A Lion in a Box!...

Good morning, my lovelies and a Happy Sunday to you all!  Some of you may have notcied this post pop up in your reading list yesterday as Blogger decided that it wasn't going to schedule my post as asked but publish it anyway! I quickly removed the post but it seemed to still  stay in the reading list as a preview!  So here it is in it's entirety...
I'm back again to share another new Plush Pals sample - I'm having so much fun revisiting this disc!  Today, it's the Lion's turn in the spotlight and I made one of my favourite card shapes of the moment, a pop up box card...

...If you would like instructions on how I make my pop up box cards, you can find them HERE., though I used 3 cross bar strips for inside the box.
I used the Lion decoupage, green Elephant Star paper and natural Cat Plaid paper overprinted with the Lion text also in natural...

...I inked a cloudy background for the back panel and a sun cut using the central die from Marianne Design Creatable Circles LR0180, inked whilst still in the die with Mustard Seed DI.  I added some hand cut clouds on acetate strips and glittered the edges with crystal glitter...

I cut some grass by hand and attached to the first crossbar and added some Marianne Design Flower Button leaves cut from Kiwi coloured cardstock.  I attached one of the Lion sentiments that are on the decoupage sheet to the front flap of the box and highlighted the Lion's mane with glitter and his eyes with Glossy Accents.  You can find full written instructions on how I made this card on my Samples Blog HERE.
Hope you like my little Lion in a box and that I've given you inspiration to have a go at one of these fun shaped cards!  I'll be back soon with some more new samples to share and don't forget that there's still time to enter into the 'Back to School' challenge over at Passion for Promarkers this week!
Hugs,

Back to the beginning...

Good afternoon, lovely Bloggers!  After meeting all the lovely crafters at Leigh last weekend, I thought it was about time that I went back to where it all started and make some new samples with my first ever CD-Rom, Plush Pals!  It was almost 5 years ago now that I designed my first disc and my crafting and crafty stash has changed so much since then that it's almost unrecognisable!  I didn't have any Promarkers, very little in the way of dies, a few embossing folders and I bought my first Distress Ink at my first ever demonstration day!  But I dusted down my CD and printed off some files, only to find that I still really love the designs and that they are still so craftable today, but in my new style!

It was so nice to hear the lovely feedback from people about my samples at the show, but the overwhelming comment was that they couldn't remember what they'd seen or how to go about replicating it when they got home!  Therefore, over the coming weeks, I will be posting various new samples and have started a sister blog where you can hop over and view all my samples in categories for each disc, to give you inspiration and with full written instructions on how I've made them!  I've even given the Print settings and instructions for when printing!

I love to share my passion for papercraft and hope that I can help to inspire others to create pieces that they'll be proud of!

So enough of my waffle and onto my first NEW Plush Pals sample using the ever so sweet Bear image...

...I used the Bear Text paper in pink for the background and Dotty Circle paper in Natural for the bunting.  I rescaled the Bear decoupage to fit the aperture using the Printer Properties and the aperture and sentiment were cut using Spellbinders Labels Eleven...

...I used individual letter stamps to stamp the 'it's a...' and 'girl' and also to add 'congratulations' on the inside.  I added some pretty glitter ribbon to the base and tiny satin ribbon bow to the bear and highlighted the bear's nappy with crystal glitter...

...You can find written instructions on how I made this card on my Samples Blog HERE.

I hope you like my first new sample and that you look forward to seeing more in the future...and don't forget, I'd LOVE to see what you make, so you can always email me a picture or give me a link to your blog post, if you have one!  Well, that's it from me today, I'm off to photograph some more samples ready for posting!
Big crafty hugs,

What a palaver!!

OMW what a morning I've been having!!  I sat down to have a play at my table and created the card that you'll see in a mo'....on nearing completion, I thought "I know what it needs - a silver Marianne swirl to accent my flowers"  Well, do you think I could find it?!  The annoying thing was, I used the frame yesterday for my Tilda card...an hour later and a now beautifully tidy craft room and I still can't find it!  Before resigning myself to having to buy another one (as I couldn't live without it)  and after hand emptying the bin and paper recycling bin, I decided to have a fourth look through my die sets.  Oh yes, you guessed it...there it was, having magnetised itself to the back of my labels die sheet!!  Aaaaah!  The by product of my frustrating wild goose chase is that I can now see my table, worktop and carpet!!  But the best bit is that I found my Marianne swirl die...phew!!

So, anyway, onto the card that I made to share...

...I decided to dig out my Plush Pals disc and have a play, so printed off one of the green lamb images from the jpeg and png folder.  I wanted a colour to contrast, rather than keeping it all monotone and love the combination of green and lilac, so printed off the lilac patchwork to A5 and green polka dot, too...

...I layered the lamb image onto 3 Marianne doily dies, which look stunning layered up like this and added a bit of shading to the image with Cool Grey 1 Promarker (I often forget about using my Promarkers on printed images, but it can add that bit of definition)...

...I added a sentiment in my fave font of the moment and some of the silk flowers like on the Tilda card, coloured with Amethyst PM and Soft Mauve FM, and as I couldn't find my swirl die, I plumped for a few MS leaf sprigs in pale green...

...some lovely turqouise satin ribbon and a pearl ribbon slider added a touch of luxury and I finished with a few pearls and a coordinating insert.

I cannot believe how much my cardmaking style has changed over the last 12 months, so it was nice to get out something I've not used for a while and see the difference!  Hope you like it and thanks for visiting me!  Lisa x

I am entering this card into the following challenges :

Simon Says Stamp

Spots and/or stripes 

(I've used green polka dot paper in the background)

ABC Challenge

G is for Green

Top Tip Tuesday

Anything Goes

My Teddy Bear...

...I know, I know, where have I been?!!  Gosh, these days are absolutely flying by - the children are already on half term and the clocks go back next weekend!  (Oh no!!)  I'm not very good once the nights draw in - I think I should have beeen a bear and hibernated all winter!  Which takes me nicely onto today's project...I came across this lovely little poem about a Teddy Bear and just knew I had to use it with the little girl from the 12 Cards of Christmas disc...

...I wanted to make something other than a card, so decided on a wall hanging...

...I love this little poem, which I found here, it's all about a child's love for their teddy bear, which instantly made me think of this girl and her bear...

...I printed the digistamp 3 times - on white paper, the birdhouse plaid paper and the pudding swirl paper, all from the 12 Cards of Christmas disc.  I then cut around her pyjama top and bottoms and paper pieced them onto the white image, which I'd coloured with my Promarkers.  Before attaching her top, I roughly cut around the heart from the white layer, so that I could colour it and use on the top layer (hope this makes sense!?)  Because of the wording in the poem, I drew a cross over one of the bear's eyes and added a couple of tiny pieces of cotton wool, as if his stuffing is coming out (Awww!)..

...I dressed the hanging with some of the gardenias (think that's what they're called) from Crafts4U and cut some Sizzix leaves from pale green card and added a few punched mini flowers coloured with Powder Blue.  The pretty border is a long X-Cut one and the backing paper is the pudding plaid, also from the 12 Cards of Christmas.  Hope you like it and thanks for popping over!

I'm entering this project into the following challenges :

I love Promarkers (which I do!) #88

Ain't it Cute!

My Time to Craft Challenge #162

Punches and Dies

Samples

Hi guys!  Well, it's almost a fortnight since my last post - I know, I'm a bad Blogger!  To be honest, I just haven't had anything to post as I've been busy with design work, not to mention that I spent half of last week fitting a kitchen at MIL's house with my hubbie's cousin!  I have to say, we did a pretty good job between the two of us, though I'd been praying that it would all fit, as I'd planned and ordered everything!!  So it's back to crafting this week and I've spent today making Plush Pals samples for a demo day that we're hoping to do up at Craft Land-udno next month (I'll let you know when I have a definite date).

It's amazing how much my cardmaking has changed over the last year - after being introduced to Nestabilities and Distress Inks, I wonder how I did without them!  The first cards I made were using the lion decoupage (no surprise there?!)...

 ...you may recognise the layout on this one, seems to be a favourite at the moment!  I used blue star glitter card (that I'd picked up from Craft land-udno), Cuttlebug Divine Swirls embossing folder, inked with Walnut Stain Distress Ink, Labels Seventeen Nesties and my Nellie Snellen fancy corner die...of course!  Ribbons were just from my stash.

Next, I used the Dovecraft Masculine 8x8 Paper Pack with the pyramage topper and added some paper letters to spell the word 'dad' - inside, the message reads 'Happy Father's Day...you big pussycat!'

I printed off the lilac rabbit decoupage sheet and created a simple Easter basket, trimmed with lace and gingham ribbon, then created an 8x13cm card using the lilac plaid backing paper, over printed with the pink polka dot, Cuttlebug Argyle folder inked with Walnut, Beaded Oval Nesties inked in the die with Worn Lipstick, then out of the die with Walnut.  I finished off with a Sweet Lilac tea rose, pink daisies, small cream rose and lilac feather, oh and pearls of course!

Finally, I printed off the lemon cat decoupage sheet (yellow is not really one of 'my' colours), lemon patchwork backing paper and used some of the left over panels from one of the Dovecraft Masculine papers.  I added buttons and light brown grosgrain ribbon...the ribbon loops hide the fact that I dropped my Versafine ink pad onto my finished card, leaving a nice balck stain!

Have to dash to pick youngest up from school, so that's all for now - Happy crafting!

Ella card

Hi guys!  I'm back in sample making mode, getting ready for the launch of Boys2Men on Saturday 23rd October, not to mention the orders I've had to complete this week, so unfortunately, cards for posting are thin on the ground!  I have managed to create a card using the Ella freebie...

It turned out very girly and pink, but I couldn't help it!  I used the pink spotty backing paper from the Plush Pals disc, my new oval nesties (that I got at Leigh show -think I need to extend my collection a bit more yet!), some dusky pink ribbon and cream lace.  I inked around the edge of the backing paper and ovals using Old Paper distress inks, which are my new favourite product...I'm sure I'm not using them to their full potential yet, but you have to start somewhere!  I decoupaged the top of Ella, to give a bit of dimension (I chopped her legs off, basically!) then added a touch of Glamourdust.  I have to say, the picture doesn't show the colours to their best, but that's because of the gloriously blinding sunshine and clear blue sky outside, so I'm not complaining!  I may try making this again and use my walnut ink to give it more of an antique look, I haven't got the jist of dirtying things up yet, I keep chickening out and opting for the lighter inks!

Hope to be back soon with some more creations, until then, enjoy the late sunshine, if you've got it!

Samples, samples, samples!

Well, it's almost a week since my last post and I have been a busy little bee making samples for the Papercraft @ Leigh Show this Sunday, 3rd October.  I'll be there with Crafts4U2Do, so come along and say hello and see some of the wonderful creations I've been making using the Plush Pals Disc, if you can.  There'll be lots of crafty products to buy to use in conjunction with your disc and if you haven't got one yet (why not?!), you'll be able to buy on the day!  For those of you that can't make it, here's an easel card using the bear character....

Born again papercrafter!

What a joy this week has been! With design work for the second disc completed, I have at last been able to have a few days of creating...as you can tell by the posts! Plush Pals was launched months ago and yet it's only now that I have been able to have a play, and I'm lovin' it! I don't normally 'do' Halloween, although I appreciate that it's a big holiday over in the US and it's starting to gain momentum over here, but when I found my halloween dies that I bought in the Sizzix sale a couple of years ago, I had to have a go! My lion made an appearance again - I'm starting to show favouritism (bad mother!) but I thought that he would wear the witches hat with style! The pumpkins and bats were both Sizzix dies and I'd borrowed Mam's oval nesties (I'm going to have to invest in some more, I just don't know which ones to choose!). I love the colours of Autumn and Halloween, so my orange glitter card saw the light of day for the first time and the background was the falling leaves paper from the Plush Pals disc. Some fantastic orange spotty ribbon finished it off and a card wouldn't be complete without a bit of Glamourdust! Maybe Halloween will have to feature in my card making every year, if only for the pleasure!

More Plush Pals for Christmas...

As promised, here's some more ideas for using the Plush Pals discs for Christmas. The first two are just a couple of the predesigned cards that I tweaked a little - the elephant one I copied over into Publisher and added the words 'at Christmas', then attached some snowflakes, holly, pearls and glitter. The lamb one I cut the front of the card from the predesigned sheet, cut a slit along the bottom edge and inserted a piece of card to add the Merry Christmas peel off to, then mounted onto a DL tent fold card. Snowflakes, holly and glitter were added and printed inserts put in both.


The next card I made was using the cat predesigned card -


I cut the front from the predesigned sheet, attached the purple spotted ribbon over the digital ribbon strip, mounted it onto a piece of white paper which I had punched around the page, using my Martha Stewart punches, then attached to an 8" square card, using foam tape.

I cut out the decoupage and removed the ribbon ends from the tag layer, punched a hole in the tag and added some more spotted ribbon. I printed a lilac rectangle with the wording 'Have a purr-fect Christmas' and added it over the original tag words, then finished with spotty buttons, glitter and some of the border waste (if you can call it that?!) punched snowflakes.

Next, (I know, I was on a roll!) I decided to make a card using the lion image. I printed off the lion topper sheet and made one of the lion's up, glittering his mane with Gold Glamourdust, then created a template of a Santa hat using a scrap of card. I cut the hat from red and white card and attached to the lion's head, then used Polar White flowersoft for the trim. I used my nesties to make the matts and created an easel card with the natural plaid backing paper and red spotted ribbon. Some punched holly and coloured pearls finished it off...


And yes, there's more! I then finished off with a lion door hanger, made up in Publisher. I inserted the blank green door hanger from the jpeg and png folder, then the brown cheri alphabet letters to spell the word 'Santa'. I added a text box with the words 'Please stop here' and then inserted the lion png (again from the jpeg and png folder). I found a Santa hat in Publisher's clipart and put it on the lion's head, then copied and pasted 2 copies for my decoupage layers and 2 extra 'a's. A bit of glitter, some Polar White flowersoft, a spotted bow and some punched holly and I was done! And here's the finished product....

Hope this gives you some inspiration to have a go! Happy crafting!

Plush Pals for Christmas...

Well, this week I've been busy putting the final touches to the new disc, Boys2Men and have somehow found the time between cardmaking for our workshop and making cards for orders, to have a play with the Plush Pals disc. Dianne gave me the challenge to make some Christmas cards using the disc and this is the first one. The card shape I saw whilst watching C&C (I can't take credit for it!). I used the random dots Cuttlebug folder on the background and a snowflake border embossing folder to make the strips at either side. I gave the elephant a scarf using some scraps of white card, then cut some thin strips of acetate (I used printable acetate as it's not as thick as project acetate) and attached them behind his trunk. I punched some snowflakes using my Martha Stewart punches and glued them along the strips, then added a sentiment, pearls and some Glamour dust (of course!).

I'll post some more ideas, when I come up with them!

My life has been taken over by design work!

Well, hello there!! I'm back! After 2 blissful weeks in one of the most fantastic countries in the world (Canada), it's back to earth with a crashing great 'bump'! Or should I say back to my computer chair! If things carry on the way they are going, I'm going to need to get it surgically removed!!

Being fed up of tied to my computer, I decided to get out the paper and make a mess! (You should see my craft table now!?! Or maybe not!) My ever so crafty sister, over at boxercreations has been making some wonderfully different creations using the Plush Pals disc - her July 30 post was using the flower embellishment sheet and I was inspired! A bit of printing, cutting, inking and a lot of shuffling later, and this is what I came up with...



I love the way that pinching the petals changes the shape completely and a quick tip about the backing paper:

I started by printing the brown plaid paper, then turned my paper 180 degrees (not flipping it over, but rotating it) then over printed the blue plaid - because most printers have a slightly smaller top printer margin to the bottom one, the patterns are offset and you end up with a double coloured plaid, neat! The text I used is Windsong, which I have recently discovered - it doesn't look anything in thw windows sample text box, but if you use a large font size, it's rather nice.

I hope to be making and posting a bit more from now on, as the design work for the next disc is almost completed (I'll post a sneak peek soon) until then, happy crafting!

Wall hanger

I have to confess that I pinched this idea after being on my sister's blog, boxercreations. She'd made a wall hanger for the Mami Doodles DT Challenge and so I decided to create my own, using the Plush Pals DVD and a picture of my youngest son - OMG was he cute!! (Not that I'm biased, of course!)

After making it, I discovered that the Paperplay Challenge this week wants "something brown and..." , so it was rather apt. And the challenge over at My Time to Craft is "Tooo cute", which I think it is...

As usual, I had to use polka dot ribbon and my favourite embellishment at the moment is the adhesive pearls, which you will probably be seeing a lot more of! I glittered around the letters on the word 'Joshua' and the stripes on the cat, not to mention my face, table and carpet! Nobody can go near my craft room without coming out sparkling!!

I keep trying to get time to play a bit more, but am spending most of my time designing - it's nice to get out the paper and card and make a mess sometimes..I'm good at that!!

TTFN and happy crafting!