Ice Cream

 Again I've treated  myself to a 'class in the post' from Stacey Marsh and this time we have been supplied with some Ice Cream design DSP to make up the cards.  I had some cornets left over so have now made a tall card adapting one of the new rectangle sketch designs from Jules who has kindly opened up a new section on her blog for rectangular card ideas to add to her extensive library of square ones.  My DL design for this card is loosely based on one of these new sketches so thanks, Jules.

The background I've used is from the Icecream papers and I've added a die cut border strip down the centre, topped with a stencilled and inked rectangle with cornets, fussy cut from the DSP,  arranged down the side.  A greeting is added below with another spare cornet and that's yet another birthday card for the box.

Ice Creams - Sweet Ice Cream designer series paper from Stampin' Up
Border dies - Daisy M\ae borders
Sentiment - stamped and punched with SU label punch, also Daisy M\ae label
Splat - stencil made by die cutting thin card, die from Sizzix

Birds and Blossoms

There were a couple of die cut and coloured birds loitering amongst the 'stuff' on my desk so I set about using up more of my snippets of white card to die cut some branches for them to sit on.  Had to dig out the extra long cutting plates for this die which is a long narrow strip with foam backing - ancient but still works well. Branches and leaves were coloured using alcohol pens.  I also had some small stamped, fussy cut flowers which I needed to use up so they were added as the blossom.  After considering the elements I decided to assemble them onto a DL card, adding a simple greeting.

 Birds - from Best Birds stamp/die set Stampin' Up (retired)
Branches - very ancient Sizzix long strip die
Blossoms - from Free as  Bird stamp set Stampin' Up
Colouring on Birds and Blossom - watercolour pencils
Colouring on Branches - Copic alcohol pens

New Home

 No it's not me thinking of a new home - not sure I could face packing up and moving all my crafty stash 😀😀..  I have made a 'New Home' card though using a wood-mounted stamp set which I've had for some years.  Re-visiting crafty items which haven't seen the light of day for ages can be quite an interesting exercise and it is ALMOST as good as having something new to spur the mojo into action.  Naturally being an old stamp set there were no dies to match and not even a punch, or if there was I didn't purchase it so all the little pieces were stamped, fussy cut and assembled into a little scene.  Started with a cream oval die cut and used a freebie texture stamp to make some 'ground' and a little touch of grass before popping the houses and trees in place.  Raided the scrap boxes for some other pieces of card and that's it - a New Home card made.

I hope you all remembered to put the clocks forward - it will be nice to have  more daylight each afternoon/evening now all we need is some warmer temperatures.

Houses and Trees - Good Neighbours stamp set Stampin' Up (long retired)
Ovals - Tonic dies
Fancy Border - die from The Works
Sentiment - freebie stamp, Stampin' Up die and fussy cut card scraps

Window Chick

 While having a bit of a sort out in the craft room I came across a box of miscellaneous card blanks, most of which I've had for a long time and which I decided should be used up before I think about buying any more.  There were a few left over from a pack of three-fold cards where the centre layer has windows cut out for mounting maybe cross stitched pieces or even Iris Folding (remember that??).  Anyway what I did was cut one of the cards into three, then die cut the window panel to a suitable size to fit my regular card blanks.   For this one I've stamped and die cut various chick related elements and built up a little scene in and around the four apertures, layered it onto a piece of green striped DSP to make what I think is quite a fun card.  I must say cutting and assembling the sweetcorn is a tad on the fiddly side but I don't mind doing that sort of thing and it certainly passes the time quickly.

Chicks etc - Hey chick stamp set with matching die set from Stampin' Up
Picket Fence - die from a Sizzix set

Butterfly Challenge

 Time for the Butterfly challenge again and this time the letter of the alphabet is 'K' and the elements to include are  below although we can choose either to use them all or just some of them.

 Your 6  elements are:

Kite Fold /Kilimanjaro/Kobi/Kombu Green/Knots

+your Butterfly.

n.b.   Kilimanjaro = a pale sky blue

kobi = light pink

Kombu Green = dark sage..

I'm not really a particular fan of shaped cards so this time I've just gone along with the colours and of course included butterflies.  Started with a piece of designer paper which incorporates the colours, die cut a butterfly border; added a fussy cut butterfly from some different DSP and die cut the sentiment which came in a set with the butterfly border die.  The words didn't actually have a die to cut a backing so I drew around the actual outer edge of the die and fussy cut because the words didn't show up too well against the floral background.

Border and Words - die set from Crafter's Companion
Butterfly - fussy cut from Butterfly Bijou DSP Stampin' Up
Background - piece of paper from my stash

Ice Cream Anyone??

 Craft companies are always bringing out new stamps, dies and other 'stuff' to tempt us and I have to admit to being tempted from time to time.  I also often consider items I already have and in some cases have had for many years, and try to think of ways to maybe use them in a different way rather than always going for the latest products.  There is at least one set of ice cream related products I've spotted and they reminded me of a cupcake design made by the same company a few years back.  I had a little play session and have come up with a passable version of an ice cream cornet using the stamped 'icing' from the cupcake set along with a matching punch and then had the idea of punching out the 'cornet' using a Christmas tree punch.  Kraft card was used for this and I then used an embossing folder to give it the texture needed.

Made a quick note card using up a scrap of striped paper and a punched square, adding my computer generated wording - the start of another set of cards for which I'm making a boxy envelope to pop them into.  Another small gift sorted 😉

Ice Cream - Create a Cupcake stamps with matching punch Stampin' Up (retired)
Cornet - Triangle shape punched using Christmas tree punch Stampin' Up

Snippets and a Sketch

The lovely Jules has given us another great layout sketch for March - see it HERE - and I've chosen to use it for my Snippets Challenge card. These are two brilliant blogs to visit for inspiration when the Mojo goes walkabout as it does seem to from time to time. Challenge #399 is another one which this time is for Ruby's Memory and the prize is an adorable and very appropriate stamp.  Apart from the base card and the image which is from the remnants of a pad of  bear designs which I've had for quite a long time, everything else on the card comes from my snippets mountain.  Took me a while to sort out bits and pieces which would all tone with each other but got there in the end I think and of course following sketches like this is another great way of using up some of the ever-growing collection of  scraps which I can't bear to throw out.

The eagle eyed amongst you will notice that this is more or less a CASE of the card which Jules made but using different colours.  The image was cut using a circle die, sentiment was stamped onto a scrap of card and the flower stamped and fussy cut using up the tiniest scrap left after trimming the pink piece.

Image - from a Lili of the Valley pad of bear images from a few years ago
Flower - stamp from a set of florals designed by Christina Griffiths (Card Making Magic)
Square - die by Phill Martin
Pink layer - corners rounded using Papermania corner punch 
Circle die - stitched circles die set Tim Holtz for Sizzix