Busy July

July is a really busy month for me with LOTS of birthdays and anniversaries so I'll be busy in the craft room creating lots of cards all month.   I have a couple to share today which are totally random.

This one uses four related products from My Favorite Things which I just adore and know I will be using a lot of all the teenagers in our life.   The background is created using distress inks and the equalizer stencil.  The headphones and MP3 player are die cut from black and grey card and then a sentiment and musical note from keep on rockin' stamp set that co-ordinates with it all.

This anniversary card started with the strip of paper from the new Dots and Stripes Sorbet paper pack from MFT - it's sometimes fun to pick a paper to be your inspiration.   A strip of that behind a white panel topped wit the gorgeous flower from the Lotus set and leaves from Leafy both by Waffle Flower give a focal point - in this instance embossed in white and coloured with inktense pencils.  The sentiment and the teeny-tiny hearts which pull the colour of the paper across the design are from Mama Elephant's Bountiful Blessings.

 NEWS FROM THE STORE

• We've had new releases from Mama Elephant, Reverse Confetti and Newton's Nook this week.
• We've also had massive restocks on Altenew inks and dies as well as some of the out of stock stamps.  They have another new release in a week or 2 so I will attempt to re-order out of stock products then but please note they have very slow turn-around times so I have no idea how long it will take to get them in store. 
• The new release from Neat and Tangled will ship early next week and be with us by next weekend fingers crossed.

Adding ink to Die-cuts - MFT Headphones

Hello folks... I'm sure you've all seen or heard about the new brand in store??!! Yep, I'm super excited that Tara is now able to stock My Favourite Things... unfortunately my bank account isn't though!!! Lol :)

I have a few stamps and dies already *ahem*, so I'm able to play with stash I already have for today's blog post.....

The Headphones die set is a great addition to your crafting collection especially for those hard to make 'young guys' cards. They can be easily personalised in any colour and by using ink and a sponge you can give the die-cut pieces some depth and dimension.

I started by cutting three basic shapes in black card and then I cut the extra detail pieces in black and again in blue card. Layering up the die-cuts gives the image dimension without using foam pads and sponging dark blue ink around the edges of the blue pieces gives the illusion of shape. The last extra detail was to use white ink and a sponge dauber very gently along some edges of the die cuts to give a bit of shine and highlight.

The diagonal text is from the Spotlight Sentiments stamp set.... I coloured the open spaced 'Happy Birthday' with black pencil and added glossy accents over it. I had to ask my daughters boyfriend if these type of headphones have wires and apparently one wire is the normal.... although they can also have two or none at all!!! I used hemp twine for mine... still think two would look better though ;)

It's amazing how just sponging a darker and lighter ink can take your die cut shapes up another notch to give you a more realistic look or you can easily get the same affect by using pencils or alcohol markers too :)

Here are the links to the products I used for my card...

    

Thanks for stopping by :)

Jenny x