Winter Friends

We woke up to snow falling this morning and although it's not settling much and probably

wont hang around for long, I thought it was the perfect day to share this wintery friendship card..

I love the Go Girl dies, the choice of hairstyles and accessories is fun.

These three ladies are ready for chilly days with their coordinating winter warmers

which I've cut using felt and decorated with acrylic paint for extra interest and texture.

The stencil background gives a lovely subtle frame and its very thematic 

being a geo snowflake design. I do like the simple style of the faces by just adding the lips,

they remind me of the dress up dolls I used to love back in the day.

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash used:

Go Girl stamp, Go Girl Winter and Summer dies - Waffleflower

Geo Snowflake stencil - Sugar Pea designs

Polar Pals - MFT

Bright Lights

Ahh, bright lights.... quite ironic that the day I photographed this card was 

anything but bright!! I could have done with some good lighting.

I love coloured fairy lights and this set makes it super simple to add them twirling and 

sprawling across your card front. The gap I left was just the right shape and size for this 'bright'

die cut and all that was left was to add some glossy dimension to each bulb :)

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Party lights stamp and die set - MFT

Rainbow Wishes die - Concord & 9th

Mini Merry Messages - Mama Elephant

Birthday Shout Out!

A break from Christmas cards today to share this card I made for a family birthday,

this Town Cryer is great for a guys card and fun to colour too..

I paired him up with the buildings from a Mama Elephant set and left them uncoloured 

so he would take centre stage... with a booming voice I think he already has centre stage!

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Oyez Oyez - Waffleflower

City Sidewalks - Mama Elephant

Stitch Arch Stax dienamics - MFT

Red, White and Grey Greetings

Time for a Christmas turnabout and I was brave and decided to heat emboss this one in white. 

I did all the stamping and pouring on of the powder first then hit it with the

 heat as I just knew it would be hard to stamp on warped card!

Actually doing it this way, it didn't warp much and after leaving it for several 

hours it had flattened out again!!

I was not going to be that lucky again so I stamped the berries with Candied Apple Distress

 Oxide ink and I think they show up brilliantly on the grey.

I used the coordinating die set for the vellum panel and glittery sentiment, 

all that was needed then was a little bell :)

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Holly Berry Turnabout Stamp, Holly Berry Die - Concord & 9th

Big Jolly Holly

My love of all things Christmas greenery drew me straight to this gorgeous stamp set 

I love its huge size... great for getting the watercolours into action 😉

I'm quite pleased how it turned out but if I'm going to make a few of these I think the 

watercolour will have to be a more loose style!!

I messed up the sentiment... well actually it's more that I didn't think the gold embossing 

showed up well enough so I embossed it in white on black card instead.

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Big & Bold Holly Berries - Colorado Craft Company

Fa La La La LLama!

I think Llamas are still in this year and with a name like

 that they fit so well in this sentiment too 😄

The Fa la la die is great... much easier than cutting all those

 A's and L's from a regular alpha die!

That little llama looks quite dirty against the pure white snow! At least he's nice and 

snug with his scarf on although with a coat like that I'm not sure he needs one!

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Fa La La die - MFT

Llama Just Say, Falling Snow Stencil  - Sugar Pea Designs

So Many Snowmen - Mama Elephant

Autumn Anniversary

I'm still enjoying the beautiful autumn colours in this neck of the woods, 

the wind has taken all the leaves away yet! I dug this die set out for an Anniversary card I

 needed to make and just immersed myself in rich shades of greens, oranges and browns...

I simply swapped the stem/veins and arranged the leaves around the sentiment panel by 

tucking them slightly underneath it... love those bright colours against the cream card :)

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Autumn Leaves Dies - Newtons Nook

Perfectly Penned - Concord & 9th

Fine Frames Rectangle - Altenew

Amazing Type

Love this typewriter die from Sugar Pea designs, I had to make it red just like my toy

 typewriter... only wish I still had it! If you pull up the sheet of paper you 

can read the rest of the message..

I used a die to make a slit in the circle panel which is hidden behind the typewriter.

This is what the workings look like on the reverse..

I found I had a typewriter background which is the perfect 

pairing for a subtle background..

More details for this card can be found on the Seven Hills blog HERE

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash used:

You're my Type Die, You're my Type Stamp - Sugar Pea Designs

Typewriter Text Background - MFT

Plant Lady

Well it's been a while but I'm trying to get caught up again with my DT makes 

for Seven Hills Crafts and I made this card to highlight the arrival of Flora & Fauna stamps 

back into the store..... I cannot resist anything green and growing!! 😃

You can mix and match the pots and plants in this set and some are solid so you can be 

creative with your inking, I trimmed all the plants out with scissors and then broke out the 

Faceted Turnabout stencil from Concord and 9th for a background.

Oh my goodness, this stencil is fantastic! You don't need a stamp positioner to use it and

the results are amazing. I used three shades of yellow Distress Oxide ink which 

also leaves you with a gorgeous chalky finish to your backdrop

I'm thinking it reminds me of a paved terrace for all 

those potted plants to live on 😊

More details and links to the products used can be

 found on the Seven Hills blog HERE

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash used:

Plant Lady, Oh Hello Friend - Flora & Fauna

Faceted Turnabout Stencil - Concord and 9th

Penguins Waddle

Well aren't these a happy bunch? 

These penguins are great to colour and quick too 😉

Just for something different I thought I'd decorate the inside of the card using 

a spot background and then curve the penguins so the front piece could 

slip into a notch I'd cut on the back panel...

I love to mix new stamps with older sets and this sentiment caught my eye from 

a previous Mama Elephant stamp set. This is how the card looks flat for mailing..

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash used:

The Penguins Waddle, Jolly and Merry - Mama Elephant

Dotted Fill in stamp - Concord & 9th

Confetti and Cake

A cake with candles is always a great image for a birthday card, don't you agree?

I mean who doesn't like a piece of cake on their special day!

The confetti turnabout stamp and cake layers die from Concord & 9th are such a cute pairing. 

The confetti background is a nice little circle of celebration that would work well with any 

image and the dies are well thought out with separate candle bodies so you can layer

them over the lit candles...

This first card is not necessarily boyish but I did decide to go quite girly for my second 

birthday cake with pink ombre icing..

I used pink Copics to colour a piece of copy paper then 

used the scalloped die to cut the layers

mmm.... my tummy is rumbling now!!

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash used:

Confetti Turnabout Stamp, Cake Layers Die, Top it Off - Concord & 9th

Bitty Birthday Wishes Stamps - MFT

Autumn Park

I make no apologies for another Autumnal card but I felt we needed some full 

on colour to represent the season plus I've had these trees in my stamp 

collection a while now and they needed some love...

I was thinking the green background of the sentiment was a good substitute for parkland 

and the line of trees a nice edge to it.... in a very stylised and simplistic way of course.

Mixing inks on a stamp gives such great results for autumn leaves as does a soft

 blend of scattered straw distress oxide behind the trees... 

I'm very happy with how this card turned out!

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Modern Trees stamps and dies - MFT

Sweater Weather dies - Concord & 9th

Autumn Wreath

Autumn is my favourite season, which I'm sure I've said on here every year, 

so when the seasonal crafting goodies come out I cannot resist!!

This beautiful stamp set by Avery Elle just had to live with me and I really enjoyed 

water-colouring the leaves and fungi... I went with a green leaved version this time 

and will try a more vibrant colour version another day,

The MFT background is a lovely subtle check to add pattern without distraction,

might find it hard to give this card away!

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Fall Foliage - Avery Elle

All Lined Up - MFT

Leafy Thoughts

It's quite a sunny autumn day here today so I thought I should share this card before the season 

makes a definite change!! I was inspired to use my Flora and Fauna stamps and these

 three rectangles of card sitting on my desk which are perfectly usable die cut waste...

Not sure what this technique is called but its sort of like spotlighting the three areas and to do this I used my good ol' MISTI and some scrap paper cut to the same size as my card front..

 This is what I ended up with..... then it was just a case of lifting the rectangles 

off of the scrap piece and mounting them onto the card front

 whilst matching up the leafy pattern.

Very dainty and summery.

Thanks for stopping by 

Jenny x 

Stash Used:

Oh Hello Friend, Aviary Love, Live Life Wildflowers - Flora & Fauna stamps

The Gift of Coffee

Here's a fun way to give a Giftcard to those coffee fanatics out there!!

This new die set from Waffleflower is brilliant and its great for mixing and matching

 with any coffee themed stamps and dies for a multitude of styles

I went girly and used this lovely lady in her autumnal outfit from a MFT set.... not tried paper piecing for a while but its a great technique for adding interest to your images..

I decorated the background with a subtle tone on tone 

floral pattern and added a sentiment

The tick box stamp in the coordinating set is a great extra detail to add 

to the back. I used the same floral pattern for the inside piece and masked an 

area to add a personal message...

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Coffee Cup Die and sentiments - Waffleflower

Friends at First Sip, Bundles of Blossoms - MFT

Uplifting Wishes - Newtons Nook

Swinging by...

Would you look at this pair of characters!!

Quite the double act and I'm not sure where they've

 pinched that sign from either!!

I couldn't resist inking these monkeys up and cutting them out with 

scissors so I could link them up.... they remind me of that tumbling monkey game!!

The vine is just one stamp in the set and is quite curved but with three small pieces 

of acrylic removed you can alter the curve and even straighten the vine!

It does mean having to cut the vines with scissors but it's 

well worth the extra time.

The sentiment has been turned into a wooden sign using Copics 

and some freehand cutting.

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Thanks a Bunch Monkeys - Hero Arts

Happy Birds

Our garden has become a playground for young birds at the moment, being in the countryside, we have quite a variety from sparrows to the great spotted woodpeckers... we even had a family of fledgling swallows precariously balanced on some metal framework the other day!

The most colourful are the blue tits but I don't own any stamps of British birds

so I thought I'd adapt these Wplus9 birdies in a very stylised way....

I used a pale tone on tone ink on the Kraft coloured card and my 

Prismacolour pencils to colour them.

The little fella on the end chirping away just had to be sending Birthday greetings...

perhaps he'd rather Tweet it!!  😄

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Happy Birds - Wplus9

Critter Chatter - Lawn Fawn

A Swell Background

Sometimes you just have to take your scissors to a stamp set and do some

 snipping to make it more versatile!! Come and see what I've done...

I've used the fairly new background stamp called Swell from Avery Elle

and I just had to perform a little stamp surgery to remove the boats from the background.

They can easily fit back in but by doing this it means I can use different colours 

for the boats as I've have for this card.

I've used a circle to cut the centre portion and inset the circular piece to add the 

sentiment to... I felt the Mama Elephant bunting went well with the nautical theme.

With the option of removing the boats means you can add other images instead, like this 

seagull from a smaller beach hut set from Avery Elle...

I've made another inset aperture to accommodate this gaggle 

of gulls, one of which is the birthday 'Gull' !!

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x

Stash Used:

Swell, Peek-a-Boo Summer Pals, Beside the Sea - Avery Elle

Swinging Borders, Lots of Letters - Mama Elephant

Seaside Gulls - MFT