Birthday Fishes!!

 No, the title isn't a typo because **Something Fishy** is the theme for the latest challenge at Allsorts and this one nearly had me stumped because despite my vast array of crafty goodies I discovered that I'm sadly lacking in anything fishy.  That is until I remembered that at some time in the past there had been a fish themed die set given away as a magazine freebie although to be honest I wasn't sure I still had it and I know for a fact that the packet was never opened (you guessed - not a favourite theme of mine 😉).  However, I delved deep and found the set which actually dates from 2017 and this is the first time the dies have been used - the magazine is long gone.  I used the fishbowl die to cut an aperture into a square of white card  which I backed with a scrap of green pearl paper and layered onto some green pearl card.  The bowl was cut using silver card and was then inserted into the aperture.  I selected some of the smaller dies to cut out so that they could appear to be swimming around in the bowl, adding an extra bit of weed and a starfish to the bottom corner of the card.  The fun sentiment dies were also included in the set which was actually good value.  There are some lovely Lavinia stamps as prizes this month and don't forget if you don't have anything fishy there's always the *anything goes* option.

Dies were a magazine freebie set dating from 2017 and the packet had not been opened until today🤣

Snippets Playground #489

 Time to pop into the playground to see what's afoot today - I hear there might be cake and a drop of bubbly 😊.  I've raided my ever growing Snippets collection to make a Christmas card this time although I did actually have to break into a whole piece of white card to fit my card blank but of course there was some left to join the rest of my Snippets for another time.  I started by cutting the large words with their backing from red and white Snippets so that I could place them to work out where I needed to cut out the Star Frame aperture.  A snippet of blue snowy printed paper was placed behind said aperture and I've added a row of tiny trees (cut from a snippet of green which was in my 'inky play' snippets pile.  Finally I die cut a little house to add to the scene and decided to call it a day, apart from cutting another of the starry frames to make that one a double layer.  Some great prizes as always so why not raid your Snippets collection and make a card.  

Greeting - dies by Julie Hickey
Star Frame and Trees - dies from Gummiapan
House - unknown but I've had the dies for a long time (come out each year for Christmas)

Landscape Scene

 A bit of 'thinking outside the box' today to show that stamp sets don't always have to be used for their original purpose.  I've used what started  out as a seascape set, with the addition of other stamps and a die cut, to come up with an inland landscape design.  I started with the sky sky and then added the 'sea' and 'sand' using two shades of green, adding some grass.  I then took some trees from a different stamp set and also a flight of birds.  Final touch was to add the die cut reeds and grasses along with a sentiment.

Main stamping - Ocean Front stamp set Stampin' Up (retired)
Trees and Birds - from other SU stamp sets (retired)
The die cut reeds were hanging around on my desk waiting to be used

Autumn Colours

 The theme for the latest Allsorts Challenge is **Autumn Colours**  or, as always **Anything Goes** so as it seems to be perfect crafting weather today (AKA damp and dreary) I set about making a card using some of my Lavinia stamp collection.  It so happens that the prizes this time are also Lavinia stamps which is great.  I started by smooshing various yellow and orange Distress inks onto some watercolour paper (300 gsm) and once dry I cut out a circle and set about building a colourful scene in various browns - decided against using any black this time.  Once I'd decided that 'enough is enough' I then stencilled a diagonal sweep across the base card and simply glued the circle in place.  No sentiment just in case the recipient decides to frame this card, in which case a sentiment would be superfluous 😉.  Very therapeutic working with these beautiful stamps in such lovely warm colours.

Stamps - all Lavinia designs
Stencil - also a Lavinia design
Inks - Distress Mustard Seed, Scattered Straw, Marigold and Spiced Marmalade
          Versafine Sepia and Versafine Clair Fallen Leaves and Golden Meadow

Inspiration

 Inspiration is all around us and sometimes when I'm trying to decide what technique to use for my next card I turn to the Group of Seven Cardmakers where there is a wealth of ideas to be found along with tutorials and links to videos.  For today's card I've used a colouring technique using a Speedball Elegant Writer and if you look HERE you will find full details and examples by the various members of this talented group.

This is my first time trying this pen and it was fascinating to see just how the colour changed as I added water, blotting with kitchen paper along the way.  I started by stamping the flower using second generation Versafine Clair Twilight ink which I thought would be less harsh than using black. I'm looking forward to trying this pen on a selection of different paper or card to see what variations are possible.  For this one I used some watercolour paper.

 Stamp - Sketch Flower from Crafty Roo, fussy cut
Colouring - Speedball Elegant Writer 1.3 mm pen
Texture Background - unbranded die

Stamping Sensations September Challenge

 The theme for this month's challenge at Stamping Sensations is **Anything Goes** or **Animal Magic**  and my card is certainly in the first category and with a stretch of the imagination might be covered by the second.  I made an inky background with Distress Oxide inks and overstamped with the some word stamps and the diamond pattern.  The bird was stamped directly onto the background and then the little bird stamped again onto some white card and fussy cut with scissors.  A simple computer sentiment was added.  Some great prizes as usual this month for the lucky name pulled out of the hat.

Stamps - all from Crafty Roo

Twofer

 I don't  normally make more than one of any card design but this one really lent itself to being done as a 'twofer' because it required two pieces of double sided designer paper to be die cut for the infills.  I started with a Snippet of white card and cut the cover plate die twice before finding some suitable DSP to cut again for the infills which were alternated on each card.  Next thing was to find some toning plain card snippets for the backing layer.  A small snippet was used for the stamped sentiment and the whole panel was popped onto a 5" x 7" card blank, which left a space at the bottom.  Rather than trim the card down to suit the panel size I decided to leave it as it was and had just enough of the two background colours to die cut three little matching flowers for each card.

This is a twofer in more ways than one because I made it for the Snippets Playground challenge *use snippets* and also for the latest Allsorts challenge **add a sentiment**.  Sorry no photo of the snippets this time - I used practically every last shred of the coloured card and the tiny bits left weren't worth taking a pic so they went into the bin.  There are the usual great prizes from each challenge so why not have a rummage and see what you can come up with.

Coverplate Die - unbranded
Papers used - DSP from Butterflies set Stampin' Up (retired)
Sentiment - From Stampn' Up Daisies stamps and dies
Flowers - Spellbinders die set which was a magazine freebie