Michelle Perkett BLOG HOP!

Below is the card I made from "Leilani" from the so-creative DT of Michelle Perkett Studio Design
for her blog hop. I painted watercolour paper for the sunset background, added handmade paper for the sand, and then makde a shaker for the sea.

"Summer" digistamp

The second card for Digistamps4joy.com was made from their digistamp called "Summer". I decided to be a little ambitious and try making a 'swing card'. Well I got it right, but it took me nearly 3 hours to make this card from colouring the stamp to cutting out all the card pieces! The end result is quite pleasing and eventhough I'm not an 'orange/yellow' person (blues, pinks, and purples for me thanks!) I quite like the colour of this card. Luckily I had a whole packet of orange and yellow flowers on hand. I think my biggest concern while making the card was that the oval topper would keep floppnig down. I may have overcompensated for this as it is quite stiff to turn!

Front and back of the oval swing topper.

NADIYA stamp

I am thrilled to be able to advertise the Digistamps4joy stamps, and this is the first card I made with the stamp "Nadiya". Isn't she absolutely gorgeous? Did I mention before that I love bling, well this stamp lends itself perfectly to looooots of bling!

I used my watercolour pencils to colour her in, then added lots of bling to her clothing and golden necklace. Two circles were cut with the largest 2 of the Nestabilities 'Petite Scalloped Circles', and the edge of the smaller circle was glued and glittered. I cut a floral border with a Fiskars punch, added some organza ribbon and pink gems, and stuck all of this onto a pink cardstock with hearts. The swirly flower on the left is a rub-on.

I think I'm still going to have lots of fun with "Nadiya".

Window digi

Last night I designed another digistamp, this time trying the Inkscape software. It took me a little while to get comfortable with making rounded edges, but I'm happy with the result. So now to make a card with the stamp!

I decided to make an easel card, print out 2 x images, cut out the inside panes of the one and then layer this onto acetate. The second image was coloured in then I cut out the background behind the curtains, found a picture in a magazine with some paintings on the wall, then stuck this behind the curtains. The front window frame was raised onto the second image with foam pads. I think it came out quite nicely and really looks like a window!

Then I hit a blank! Every piece of cardstock or backing paper I put the window on top of just didn't look right, until I found this piece from the Once Upon A Time Mat Stack, and the whole card just fell into place. Does this sound familiar? I glued on a small clay vase, filled it with flowers, and found a 'large leaf' I had forgotten about which I used for the overhanging tree branch. The sentiment "Mom's home" was printed on the puter and raised with foam pads.

Using puff paint

I am lucky enough to have a sister who is a professional screenprinter, and who just 'happened' to give me a whole liter of white puff paint (very difficult to find in craft shops!) the last time I visited her! So .... as there is one little animal that God made that lends itself perfectly to white puff paint, of course I had to make a card. The 'ewe' also provided a super opportunity to play with the word - hehe.

I had a lovely piece of bright red card with a white backing that was just waiting to be cut into a heart shape. My little ewe (also compliments from my sister) was cut on the Cricut and I coloured the legs, squeezed out lots of puff paint from a fine nozzled bottle, puffed the paint with the hot air dryer, and then stuck on one googly eye and a red ribbon. Isn't she cute? The words ... 'Thinking of ewe" were printed on the pc, then a border of puff paint put on to resemble a cloud. Both the ewe and the cloud were raised with foam pads. The flowers were an afterthought as I had this large empty space top left of the heart, but they seem to have done the trick!

Cracker shaped 'shaker' card

This card was made for a challenge viz. "make a card in the shape of a cracker and add serviette, clay, and mirror tile". Cutting the shape of the card was not as difficult as I thought it would be, and the shape is actually quite pleasing. It was the adding of the tiles and clay that stumped me at first. That is until I saw this absolutely gorgeous 'fat lady' decoupage paper and the creative juices just RAN! I probably went a little overboard with the 'shaker' oval, but I love making shaker cards and they are always so popular with my customers.

 So this is where I used all the challenge pieces:
1. Serviettes - I cut out 4 purple daisies out of a serviette and glued them onto the patterned maroon coloured paper.
2. Clay - the only clay embellishment I could find that suited this picture was a tiny peach coloured rose which I glued on top of the acetate of the shaker box.
3. Mirror tiles - In the image, the fat lady is looking into a mirror. Yes, you guessed it - I replaced the mirror part of the image with four tiny mirror tiles! Worked like a charm, and as they are all inside the shaker box no one handling this card will get hurt - a bonus in my opinion!

I could not resist the tiny gold shaker beads to compliment the gold colour around the purple daisies, and the gold spotted ribbon just finished it all off. A lot of work, but well worth it.

Freebies (topper and digistamp) - men's tie

For those of you who have not tried using a digistamp yet, here is a freebie for you to start with. I have also added a coloured stamp (= a topper) which you can also download (right click and save).

And don't forget I'd love to see what you've done with it! My card design is below.