Freddy the Frog Notebook - Encino Stamps

The young son of the recipient of the 'Hoppy Birthday' card I made a few weeks ago loved Freddy the Frog from Encino Stamps so much that he wanted his very own one. Rather than make a card I altered the front of this notebook so Freddy can go with him wherever he goes.

He's ready to hop into and envelope and jump to his new home.

Tattered Lace Oriental Elements Concertina card

This week I was lucky enough to be able to play with the Oriental Embellishment Die from Tattered Lace. As the die is a collection of embellishments I thought a bit laterally about how to use them and combine as many as possible. I've seen diorama/ concertina cards in the past and thought I'd have a go at making my own. 

Using my trusty Hougie board it was nice and easy. I simply trimmed a piece of A4 card to the right height and then used a card the size of the back (in this case 6x4) as a size guide. I positioned this roughly in the middle and scored at 1cm lines out from each edge. After doing the Hougie Trick it made a nice concertina fold at each side.

I cut some base layers and attached the Tattered Lace die cuts to them. I made 3 layers - the front with the bridge, one with the trees and one with the temple. I used strong double sided tape to attach each layer to one of the concertina folds. I glued a pair of foliage directly to the concertina fold to add height and a different angle.

I made the background using Dylusions Sprays - Sky Blue, Midnight Blue and Crushed Grape with some mica spray to add some shimmer.

I really hope you like it. I love the dimension it gives, while still in a way that will fold flat enough to fit in a normal envelope to post.

I'd love to know what you think & look forward to seeing your entries to this week's challenge at Through the Purple Haze Challenges

I'd like to enter this into:

One Stitch at a Time - White plus 1

Encino - Annie's Snowball Fight

Time for another fun image from Encino Stamps. This time it's Annie and she's having a great snowball fight. She's coming soon to the Encino Stamp Shop so make sure you're ready to duck! 

I mounted Annie in a plastic frame I was given a while ago.

I coloured her using my Promarkers:

Skin - Coral, Sunkissed Pink, Blush with Pastel Pink Cheeks

Hair - Cocoa, Henna, Chestnut, Walnut

Coat and Hat - Red, Berry Red, Cardinal Red, Burgundy

Gloves and Coat Details - Pilot Gold Pen

Top - Ivory, Satin

Trousers - Royal Blue, Indigo Blue

Now are you ready for the really fun bit????

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Shake the frame

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and it's snowing!!!!!!

I hope she's made you smile. See you soon with more fun Encino images.

Use your Favourite Colours - Delicious Doodles

This week's challenge at Through the Purple Haze is to use your favourite colour. This was a bit difficult for me as I have so many favourite colours. I like all sorts of bright, intense colours like red, fuchsia pink, purple, royal blue, emerald green, teal etc etc etc, but as I had to choose one I went for Red.

I had the beautiful Quiet Contemplation  from Delicious Doodles to play with. She's so beautiful that I wanted to do her justice and kept the focus of the card on her.

I mounted her on gold card and used dark red card backed with gold as the card base.

I coloured her with my Promarkers.

For her skin I my normal Coral, Sunkissed Pink and Blush, but then used Saffron and Vanilla over the top to give her a less pink and more oriental skin tone. I used Pastel Pink for her cheeks

Hair - Ice Grey 3, 4 & 5 & Black

Robe - Red, Berry Red, Cardinal Red, Burgundy

Sash and Jewellery - Pilot Super Gel Gold Pen

Flowers - Berry Red & Blender

Parasol - Henna handle, Vanilla, Satin & Ivory canopy

I cut the Chinese Characters on my Cougar. 

They mean

Peace

Tranquility

Strength

We'd love to see what you create with your favourite colours so pop over to Through the Purple Haze Challenges and join in. There are some great prizes to be won from 

Sleigh Ride with Sue - Encino Stamps

I wanted to make a fun card with this image of a Sleigh Ride with Sue (coming soon to the Encino Stamp store) so decided on a play on words to make a fun 40th Birthday card.

I used my Cougar's ability to Print and Cut to create a unique card shape with Sue riding down a lovely snowy slope. I also used it to cut the 'Happy 40th' from silver card.

I coloured Sleigh Ride with Sue with my Promarkers

Skin - Coral, Sunkissed Pink, Blush with Pastel Pink cheeks

Hair - Tulip Yellow, Sunflower, Gold, Raw Sienna

Top - Cerise, Shocking Pink*, Maroon

Trousers - Purple, Aubergine

Boots - Turquoise, Marine, Petrol Blue

Sleigh - Cocoa, Henna, Chestnut, Walnut

I sprayed some Arctic Blue and Ice Grey 1 Promarkers with my Blitzer to give a little texture to the snow.

I hope you like her. 

You can see more Encino Stamps over at the DT Blog 

Monochrome with Rick St Dennis

I will happily admit that this challenge at Digi Galore  absolutely TERRIFIED me!!!! We're sponsored by the incredibly talented Rick St Dennis. I've admired his artwork from afar for a while now, but never coloured any of his images. To have his sponsorship combined with a Monochrome theme  was even more challenging, but me being me I took the bit between my teeth and went for it! 

Rather than stick to black and white I decided to take Monochrome literally and stick to one colour tone. I decided on shades of aqua/ turquoise and went for a watery scene with Eleganza from Rick's store. 

I used some bubbles and water flows from the Make it Crafty Under the Sea Elements Collection to create a background

These are the only markers I used 

(well with the tiniest of sprays of True Blue in the water to add depths)

I used my Blitzer hand air gun to colour the sea to give it a subtle effect. I wanted the bubbles to be clear and bubbly so I coloured them with a layer of clear Sakura Glaze Pen. That meant that after I'd sprayed I was able to use my blender pen to remove any ink that had gone over the bubbles.

 It's difficult to capture the shimmer of the bubbles on camera, but the several layers of clear Glaze pen make it glisten like water.  I also added a few lines of Sakura Stardust to a few of the water lines to enhance the watery effect even further. 

I coloured Eleganza using my pens. Rick includes quite a bit of shading in his images so that was a great pointer. She's so detailed, but was a joy to colour. With the monochrome I found I just thought of shading as I normally would do with different colour, but while thinking of the bigger picture at the same time.

We're really looking forward to seeing your very own Monochrome projects over at Digi Galore - gone on be brave! If I can do it so can you!

Anything Goes at Through the Purple Haze Challenges

It's the first challenge of 2014 and it's a nice easy theme - Anything Goes! Our sponsor is Crafty Sentiments Designs and I had the lovely Eve to play with. I decided to make a nice bright birthday card to combat the grey rainy skies we've had with the recent storms.

I tried a new technique to make the background for this card - I wiped my Festive Berries Distress Ink Pad over the top side of a Papermania Happy Birthday Embossing Folder and then embossed white cardstock. It didn't give a complete coverage so I must masking tape on the back of the card to hold it exactly in place and repeated the inking 4 or 5 times until I had a coverage I was happy with. I love that it gives a slightly distressed look and lets the embossed words stand out clearly. 

The sentiment is a digi from the Heard from the Heart set from Stampin' Up. I printed it on card and cut it to the width of the card, then mounted a shimmery ribbon over the top so the sentiment looks as though it's on a ribbon.

I cut Eve out on my Cougar cutting machine and coloured her with my Promarkers:

Skin - Coral, Sunkissed Pink, Blush with Pastel Pink Cheeks

Hair - Tulip Yellow, Sunflower, Gold, Raw Sienna

Top - True Blue, Royal Blue, Indigo Blue

Shorts - Denim Blue, Storm Blue*, Midnight Blue

I hope you like my card. I'd love to hear what you think, and would love to see your entry at Through the Purple Haze Challenges

Thank you to our sponsor Crafty Sentiments Designs

Freddy the Frog

I'm so honoured and excited to have been asked to be part of the Encino Design Team. I've loved Ina's images since she opened, so when she asked me to join I was literally speechless (anyone who knows me will know what an unusual thing that is!). I'm really looking forward to colouring these lovely images. 

A little bit about me - I'm 34 yrs old. I live in the South West of England and have been crafting pretty much all of my life. My biggest love is colouring with my Promarker pens and I've been addicted to Digi Stamps for about 2 years now. I love how flexible they are and how little storage space they take up. I do all sorts of other crafting too, but Promarker colouring is my favourite. 

I made this Birthday card using the lovely Freddy the Frog and made him nice and bright and colourful as he looks like a cheery chap. 

I created the sky by cutting some cloud masks on my Cougar then spraying Sky blue, Azure and True Blue Promarkers with my hand airbrush tool. I love the effect it gives.

The font is Jokerman

I coloured Freddy using my Lime Green, Bright Green and Forest Green Promarkers.

I cut him out using the Print and Cut function on my Cougar Cutting Machine from Thyme Graphics and I put an extra cut along his front legs a little so he could be hopping over the front layer of grass (Grass border cut file).

I really hope you like him. Thanks so much Ina for inviting me onto the Team. I'm really looking forward to creating more cards.

Through the Purple Haze Secret Santa Blog Hop

It's time for another blog hop with Through the Purple Haze Challenges! I know!!! 2 in 2 days! This time it's a chance for us to showcase the lovely goodies we received in our Secret Santa packages. All of the DT members were paired up (by Anita's very able and excited son) and we we packaged up £15 worth of goodies to send to our swap partner.

I was lucky enough to receive this package through the post!

I must have been very good to receive this lovely package!

Such pretty colours of card!

A really useful stamp set.

and this fun stamp. 

Thank you so much Secret Santa! I love it all xxx

To continue the Hop hop on to Lynne's Blog

The hop started at Through the Purple Haze Challenges

Happy Birthday Anita - Blog Hop!

Happy Birthday Anita! 

The Girls at Through the Purple Haze Challenges and me have been a bit sneaky and planned a Birthday Blog Hop to celebrate your Birthday. We love being part of the DT and wanted to give you a great big Birthday internet hug! So here you are! Consider yourself hugged!

I decided to make you a silly card that will make you smile. I used this gorgeous frog who will soon be hopping into the Encino Stamp Shop. I'm lucky enough to have been asked to be part of the Enrico Design Team so will have more lovely images to show soon. 

I really hope his cheeky grin makes you smile. He should be hopping out of your post box soon!

We really hope you enjoy the hop (no pun intended!). Your next stop is with the wonderful Lisbeth x

This is the full blog hop list

TTPH - http://throughthepurplehazechallenges.blogspot.co.uk/ Lucy - http://loopylass2010.blogspot.co.uk/ Lisbeth - http://skaperlyst.blogspot.no/ Net - http://caique-momma.blogspot.co.uk/ Debs - http://debbeescds.blogspot.co.uk/ Rebecca - http://beckyscardsandcrafts.blogspot.co.uk/ Teresa - http://ceesascardcreations.blogspot.ie/ Lynne - http://esperitecrafting.blogspot.co.uk/ Nicola - http://craftycardsbynicola.blogspot.ie/ Sian - http://serendipity-cards.blogspot.co.uk/ Darcy - http://craftingwithdarcy.blogspot.co.uk/ Ashley - http://marinewifesscrappinlife.blogspot.co.uk/ Fiona - http://ahighlanderflingofcards.blogspot.co.uk/ Jacqui - http://jacqui-creations.blogspot.co.uk/ Eithne - http://cardroomdelights.blogspot.ie/ Pam - http://alljazzed2create.blogspot.co.uk/ Sylvia - http://sylviaskards.blogspot.co.uk/ Sara- http://saraleighuk.blogspot.com

Happy New Year from Digi Galore - Girly Challenge

Happy New Year Everyone. Here's hoping 2014 will be a happy and healthy year for everyone.

Lets start things off as we mean to go on at Digi Galore - with a brilliant new challenge. 

The theme is Girly and our sponsor is Little Blue Button Stamps. This is a new Digi Company to me but I love their style.

I had the lovely Heart Lollipop Charlie to play with. I kept my card nice and clean and simple and teamed her with some patterned paper (origin unknown) and a sentiment from Stamping Up's Define your Life Digital Stamp set.

I coloured Heart Lollipop Charlie with my Promarkers.

Skin - Coral, Sunkissed Pink, Blush with Pastel Pink Cheeks

Hair - Tulip Yellow, Sunflower, Gold, Raw Sienna

Eyes - Sky Blue, True Blue

Top & Shoes - Pale Pink, Cocktail Pink, Watermelon*, Glitter Glue

Trousers - Pale Pink, Blender

Looking forward to seeing your entries at Digi Galore x