Habour Boulevard

It's time to make some cards in bright summery colours and who else would I turn to but Craftwork Cards. The Craftwork paper pads are really good quality and I love their designs. 
The paper pads I have used today are the Al Fresco and Habour Boulevard.  Both of these paper pads remind you of warm days spent in the great outdoors.  Not something I have been doing this weekend, other than to replenish my pot on the front door step with some fresh plants!

The first card has been stamped around the edges with sea shell stamp (Clarity Stamp) and painted with translucent H20s. Then I matted and layered the papers from the Harbour Boulevard paper pad and cut out the anchor with sea gull.  I love the the beach huts.

The next two cards were made from the Al Fresco paper pad.  I love the bicycle and basket of strawberries.  

Let me know if you have a favorite.

A Taste of India

I am full of crafty happiness this weekend.  I have been learning some new techniques for blending my dye inks and have some new stamps and dies to play with.  The theme is "A Taste of India".

Once again Sheena Douglass has designed some lovely stamps and embossing folders that work well together.  She has also found different ways of using glycerin with card.  I have already tried her faux leather technique and made a book jacket as a gift for my mum.  You can watch Sheena demonstrate this technique on her YouTube video found Sheena's Faux Leather.

Her latest discovery is using glycerin as a base before using dye based inks as it aids the blending process.  I have tried this process in the card I have attached here.

This first card I made I embossed some pearlescent card stock then used my Stazon Ink Pad over the surface to highlight the embossed area.  I then lightly sponged glycerin onto the card surface.  I used Adirondack Inks in Lettuce, Wild Plum, Eggplant and Stream colours and blended them all over the card.  This card came out quite pale in comparison to the second example.  The difference with this second example is that I didn't use pearlescent card stock which made the colours much stronger.  

I also used some H20s on this second example over the embossed areas to add some shimmer to the card.  I love the strong vibrancy of the colours.

Another card coming soon!