In the White Room...

Hi everybody,

I would love to share a card I have made for the current Mama Elephant Blog Challenge, which this time round, is 'White Space'.  Now this challenge is actually held over on Mama Elephant's Flickr, so go check it out to see all the other entries, but I like to share everything here as well...so I am :)

And here's my card...

I used Mama Elephant's 'Bloomsies', and the ridiculously cute and adorable little mouse from the newer, 'Woodland Gifts' set, to create my card.

I started by die-cutting a small circle from my card front, stamping out this lil' cute guy onto it, and colouring him with alcohol markers, adding the little heart flowers from the 'In My Heart' set.  I then took a selection of flowers from the 'Bloomsies' set, and stamped them out, around the circle, in some lovely bright vibrant inks, to create a kind of bouquet vibe.  I added a few layers of black card behind my circle die-cut, to make it 'pop' off the page, and in-laid it back into the card front.  I then stamped out my sentiment, also from the 'Woodland Gifts' set, and heat embossed it in Black Sparkle powder.  I embellished very simply, with few black enamel dots, and there you have it.

Nice, bright and colourful, yet simple and sweet with a whole load of white space.

I really hope you like it.

see you next time.

Jillx

Pretty setimental...

Hi everybody,

I'd like to share a card I made for the current challenges going on over at the delightful, Mama Elepehant, (which is now hosted via Flickr), and the awesome Simon Say Stamp Wednesday Challenge blog.

And here it is -

  

*Brag Alert* ...I was lucky enough to win the last Mama Elephant Flickr Challenge, which I was so thrilled about!  The challenge this time is to 'Make Me Say "Ooh That's Pretty', and the Simon Says Stamp Challenge is 'Let's get sentimental'.  I instantly had an idea in my head that I wanted to create a kind of Pinterest inspired 'Inspirational quote' poster/print kind of vibe, (you know the sort), and I thought the Bokeh effect would work perfect so went with that. 

I used Picked Raspberry, Peacock Feathers, Spiced Marmalade, and Fossilised Amber Distress Inks to make up my background.  I then die cut several sized circles from a piece of weighty cardstock, creating my own stencil, and blended white ink over the top, going from large to small circles, increasing the depth of the ink as I went.  Once I was happy with my panel, I stamped out my sentiment using Mama Elephant's 'splendid' set, in Versmark Ink, and heat embossed in white powder.

Like I say, I wanted my card to look like a print or a poster, so kept embellishments simple by adding a scattering of sequins, and some glossy accents to create pretty clear pearls, or little dew drops as I like to see them.

I adhered my panel to a beautiful Pool coloured Avery Elle notecard, and there you have it...'a pretty sentiment'.  I really hope you like it and would love to read your comments.

See you soon.

Jillx

Better with Special friends...

Hi everybody,

Here's my second post for the awesome Make The Day Special Blog.  I still can't believe I'm part of their amazing Design Team! Unreal chuffed :)  And here's my post...


Today I'm sharing a card I have made using the 'oh-soooo cute' Mama Elephant's, 'Ella & Friends'.

I fell in love with this set the second my eyes caught sight of it.  It feels like Elephants are everywhere at the moment, and I've gotta say - Ella is by far my favourite!  But you know what, it's Ella's friends who really make my heart skip a beat.  I just LOVE them, and can picture using them in so many different ways.  And here's my card -

  I love how sweet and naive the images in the Ella set are, and wanted to carry that theme through my card.  So, after stamping out my scene, I coloured it using Spectrum Noir pencils.  As I said, the little critters are my true stars, so I stamped Ella off the page to make them the main focus.  Once I'd finished colouring, I stamped out my sentiment, from the same set, in black ink and clear heat embossed.  To keep my card sweet and simple, I added only a little detail beneath my scene using Paper Smooches 'Dots and Dashes' die, and embellished using only a couple of clear gems to incorporate the bubble fun!  

I mounted onto an Avery Elle Notecard, from the Midnight Collection, in a beautiful smoky grey, off-setting it to one corner.  And there you have it.  A sweet and simple little scene using the cutest critters around!

I really hope you like it.  Everything I used is linked below so make you go have a peek!

See you next week.

Jillx

               

A dream come true...

Hi everybody,

Well, well, well ... I have got the best news ever to share (well, for me!) - I have been asked to join the Design Team over at my favourite place on The Internet....Make the Day Special!  I can't believe it, I am such a megafan of their blog, and their shop - oh my oh my - I think I own half of it haha.  Pretty much my full stamp collection is from there - Tara who runs it (amazingly well, and all on her own I might add!), has THE best taste, and the prices are unreal amazing.  Yes, I'm gushing, but i really really love it!!!  So I obviously wanted to share my very first post here as well - and here it is :)
...

Jill here.  I can't tell you how pleased I am to be part of this amazing and talented team, it really is a dream come true.  I only hope I do you guys, and all the awesome products we all love, justice!

So, without further ado,  here's a sneak peek at my first offering...

Deciding what to do for my first post was such a tough decision!  I came to the conclusion that the best way to introduce myself was to stick to a couple of my, (and hopefully your) favourite things - Mama Elephant and watercolouring!

I used Mama Elephant's 'In My Heart' set, Lawn Fawn's 'Grassy Border', and 'Spring Showers' dies and a whole lot of watercolour, to create my bright Springtime scene.  

I die cut my back panel into several pieces, giving each piece a watercolour wash using Distress Inks, and pieced it back together so it remained in one layer.  My little cutie patooties from the 'In My Heart' set, are watercoloured, again using Distress Inks, fussy cut, and added to the front of my card using foam adhesive to really make them 'pop' off the page.  I stamped out my sentiment direct onto my card, and heat embossed using a Black Sparkle powder.  I finished  by embellishing with a couple of bright yellow enamel hearts to give an extra splash of colour, and there you have it.  The sun isn't shining up here in the North of England, so I thought I'd make it shine on my card!

I really hope you like it, and all the products I used are listed below, so go and give them a closer look!

See you all next week.

Jill

                  

*I should have published this post on 1st May...oopsy*

Make ME Laugh...

Hi everybody,

Yee-haa, Mama Elephant have started their Challenge back up!  However, this time, there's a difference.  Instead of linking up via their Challenge Blog, we now have to link up to Flickr.  Something new to me, but it looks like a lot of fun, so I'm glad to get involved!

I still wanted to post my creation here, so here's the link to my card on Flickr...

Mama Elephant Flickr Challenge entry - Make ME Laugh

And here's my card...

So the theme set was...'Make ME laugh' and this is what I came up with. We all know the new 'Photo bomb' set by Mama Elephant is unreal, amazing, and cute as a button...but I thought it would be fun to create my own take on it, with a whole bunch of little critters from various ME sets...and then to make it more 'LOL' than 'Awwww'...I thought it would be funny to take one of the little cuties from 'Up and away', and have him being swept, well, 'Up and Away', by one the balloons from the background.  My scene took a whole lot of masking (see photo below) which was time consuming, but worth it.  I coloured my image using Promarkers and used Lawn Fawn's 'Say Cheese' die to turn it into a photo.  I coloured my Mama Elephant 'Happy' die, also with Promarkers, creating an Ombre effect to match my sky, and stamped out 'together' from ME's 'Happy Everything', on vellum in Black Sparkle, to finish off my sentiment.  I wanted my little photograph to take up your full attention, so kept the rest of the card white and simple.  I dry embossed a piece of white cardstock to mount everything on to, using a cloud skyline folder, added a little twine and some ribbon flags behind my picture, and there you have it.  I'm really happy with how this card came out, and hope yo made you giggle :)

Jillxxx

*EDITED 10/05/15 - I WON I WON I WON :) !!! #overthemoon*

Make The Day Colourful...

Hi there,

I'd love to share a card I have made for this month's challenge going on at the awesome, Make The Day Special Challenge blog, which this time round, is a colour challenge.  Pick your palette, and go for it...

I chose those beautiful chilled out tones of the first option, and here's my card...

I used Mama Elephant's, 'Zenith Borders', stamp set to create my background.  I stamped out one of my borders, a couple of times, in Versamark, and heat embossed it clear powder.  I used Distress Inks, in Tumbled Glass, Broken China, Squeezed Lemonade, and Dusty Concord mixed with a little Victorian Velvet, to wash all over the top of my stamped borders.  Once everything was dry, I ironed the embossing powder off to create this kind of flat, batik effect.  I then used Mama Elephant's, 'Happy' die to cut right out the centre.  I also cut this die a few other times, on kraft card stock, and, using the double sided adhesive Stick-it, stacked the dies on top of each other, adding the coloured piece to the top, and inlaying the whole thing back into my panel for a really dimensional look.  I finished my sentiment by stamping out 'vibes' from Mama Elephant's 'Happy Everything' set, which is just A-MAY-ZING, a sentiment for any occasion. and just sooo cool looking, I LOVE it!!!  I finished off by embellishing with a few co-ordinating sequins and mounted the whole thing onto a kraft card base...and there you have it.

I'm really happy with how this card came out, which is a lot more down to Mama Elephant and there awesome products than me haha, but hey ho.

I'd love to know what you think, so please feel free to leave a comment.

Hopefully see you next time.

Jillxxx