Happy Birthday to my fabulous hubby

Stampin' Up! UK The Wilderness Awaits, Lovely as a Tree, Wetlands

It's happy half century day to my husband today.  We've celebrated at home with presents and gifts and now he's having fun sorting out the fish tank! Excitement has nothing on this household.

We've also had afternoon tea with chocolate chip Victoria sponge made by Charlie and some quality family time.

I made him a card without the big '50' on it, but I have to confess I partially cased the idea from a super start made by the customer of one of my team. You can see her card here on lovely Mandy's blog.  I did add the tree she threatened,  Wetlands grasses  and some extra trim with a birthday sentiment from Endless Birthday Wishes.

I used some of the retired laser cut embellies which came as two pieces, but they fit together like a glove and I coloured the rim with early espresso marker pen and then married them together again.

We have a crazy border collie, but this rather fine dog is from Stampin' Up! set The Wilderness Awaits.  It is great for masculine cards and you can revisit one I made using the fox in the set on my earlier Stampin' post.

Off now to finish the rest of the day.  Best wishes to all for a great week ahead.

Zx
Challenges
Sweet Stampin' Challenge - create a scene

You can purchase many of the products used for this card now in my Stampin' Up! UK Online Shop right now and remember if you add the stampin' rewards code in the top right of my sidebar and spend £25 or more up to £150 (excl.  P&P) you will be sent a gift in early September by me after I have closed the code and ordered some rewards for everyone who has a qualifying shop on this code.

Simple elegance

Stampin' Up! Bordering Blooms with Wetlands sentiment

An elegantly simple card for you today with just one colour on a whisper white base but with various shades of that single colour.  I've used Pool Party, Lost Lagoon and Soft Sky shades.

1. 1. Stamp one of the bordering blooms along a piece of whisper white in Lost Lagoon.  
2. Adhere flowers punched from Pool Party card stock using one of the Itty Bitty Accents punch trio along the border.  
3. Add a pearl to each.  
4. Use whisper white bakers twine to add a touch of texture by wrapping it around the stamped layer several times and tie with a bow. 
5.  A sentiment stamped from the Wetlands stamp set in Lost Lagoon also.  
6. Gently sponge Soft Sky ink around the edge of this layer and the base card.
7. Use the Project Life corner rounder punch to soften the bottom corners of the stamped layer and base card.
8. Adhere the stamped layer to the base card using Stampin' Dimensionals. 

Simple but elegant and sent with love.

Zx

Technique to make your Stampin' Up! Flower Bundle Pop!

I run a quarterly shoebox swap training event for my team of Stampin' Up! demonstrators and other demonstrators are welcome and join us for these events.

A shoebox swap?

It's lots of fun and very inspirational as everyone who attends designs and makes a card with a given recipe and sometimes a theme.  The materials, tools and embellishments are put into a box roughly inline with a shoebox and we all come together to pass our boxes around a table and everyone makes one of each card around the table.

We all have lost mojo days and we are always looking for other ideas and designs so this is an excellent way to see other styles and techniques.  Recently my lovely friend Michelle Bryant came along to one such event and she showed us a fab technique with masking tape and ink.  Her gorgeous card is below, but for my recent workshops I made a simpler version as the make and take for the parties.  It highlights that you can upscale and downscale designs and make them for girls or boys dependent upon the colour scheme and embellishments you use.  My version is with soft sky, so saffron and primrose petals.  Michelle used early espresso, crumb cake and soft sky.

We both used sentiments from the Wetlands stamp set which is one of those all round stamp sets ideal for male and female cards.

If you'd like to have a go at this technique along with a few friends please contact me and we can fix a date for your party where even beginners can make a card to take away with them and possibly find a new hobby.  Alternatively think about sharing techniques with your friends as a demonstrator and coming to our team shoe box swap.

www.zoetant.stampinup.net gives you more details about joining and my contact info.

More soon. Zx

Stampin Up UK - Cards for Keeps

Stampin' Up! UK Cards for Keeps

The Stampin' Up! UK Cards for Keeps auction is up and running.  This is your chance to bid on cards made by celebrities in aid of the charity Coram, which is the oldest children's charity in the UK.

Stampin' Up! UK demonstrators were also asked to submit cards of which one lucky person has been chosen to have their card listed on ebay for this very worthy cause.  The winner is Helen and her beautiful card can be seen on her blog.  This is the card I sent in.  It's very different and I really like how it turned out and was really unsure about ever giving it away, but I hope along with Helen's that it and all the other cards sent in by Stampin' Up! UK demonstrators are put to good use to raise funds for Coram. 

Please visit the Stampin' Up! UK Cards for keeps pinterest page to take a look at the celebrities cards and consider bidding on one or two of the fun, eccentric, one off amazing pieces of artwork.


You can see and bid in the auction at on ebay here


The auction includes cards from

Actors

Benedict Cumberbatch - Sherlock Holmes

Tom Hiddleston - Loki
Joseph Fiennes - Shakespeare
Phyllis Logan - Mrs Hughes Downton Abbey
Arthur Darvill
Alison Steadman

Presenters
Esther Rantzen
Rachel Riley
Fern Britton
Lisa Tarbuck


Models/Fashionistas
Twiggy

Artists and illustrators
Axel Scheffler
Tina Morgan
Rebecca Cobb
Pete Fowler
Nick Sharratt - Tracy Beaker
Ben Jennings
The Telegraph Cartoonist - Matt Pritchett
Anita Klein

Musicians
Dame Evelyn Glennie

Authors
E L James - 50 Shades of Grey
Philippa Gregory - The Other Boleyn Girl
Joanne Harris - Chocolat
Helen Craig - Angelina Ballerina
Andy Stanton - Mr Gum
Marian Keys

Comedians
Jo Brand

Comedy Writers
John Finnemore - Radio 4 Cabin Pressure
Doon Mackichan - Smack the Pony

TV & Radio Personality
Karl Pilkington

There are likely to be more, but you can view all the current cards on pinterest at CardsforKeeps

Please if you can't bid then share the auction details with all of your friends.

Thanks for your help!

Zx
 

 

Stampin' Up! Happy Watercolour and more!

At card club recently I shared a type of emboss resist technique with my lovely ladies.  We used the spring catalogue stamp set Happy Watercolour to stamp in versamark on watercolour paper and then heat emboss it with clear powder.  You can then add colour washes with your aqua painters and ink pools created in the lid of your ink pads and a little more stamping using other stamps from the set along with stamps from Summer Silhouettes, Wetlands, Simply Sketched ( hostess set) and Gorgeous Grunge. 

 

You can then mount your finished artwork on basic black card stock and onto naturals ivory card stock for the base card.  A sentiment from the ever useful and popular stamp set Perfectly Penned provides you with a striking card. 

 

Now I'm not a colourer inner or a watercolourist, but this technique allows you to get the satisfaction of looking like you might be one day!!  I've done a similar one in different colours which once mounted and finished I will share. 

 

Enjoy what's left of your weekend!

Hugs Zx