Waltzing Mouse Sketch Challenge

Today's card is a fairly c&s design for this week's Waltzing Mouse Sketch Challenge, despite it not having much white space.  I used a Waltzing Mouse background stamp, I'm really pleased how well it lined up for repeats.  The sentiment stamp is by Ludiec and the ribbon from Stampin' Up.

It Must be Love

I've played along with the sketch challenge at Waltzing Mouse this week and used the Nordic Spring set to make my card.  There's the most amazing stitch detail in the stamps and I used WOW superfine embossing powder to show it off.  The sentiment is also Waltzing Mouse, I added some gems and a bit of dry embossing.

My card is also for:
Bearly Mine - embossing
Papertake Weekly - a stitch in time (the stitches are knitted ones on the stamps!)
Deep Ocean - song inspiration (Madness, It Must be Love)

Three Shades of Green

This week's Less is More is a colour challenge:  three shades of green.  This was a perfect challenge to use my reel of shaded ribbon from my stash; I was thinking over how to use it and sadly I need a sympathy card to send.  So I added a Waltzing Mouse sentiment and a Memory Box corner die to my ribbon.

Waltzing Mouse meets Less is More

I'm not altogether happy about this card, it's a bit too subtle I think!  I made a one layer card using the doily set from Waltzing Mouse and followed the colourscheme at Less is More.  I tried a new embossing tip that I learned at the NEC on the WOW stand:  I put tiny pinches of spring green over the embossed images, then finished off with white powder.  The background is inked with Sage Green & Spun Sugar; I've added some bling to the doilies and embossed the WM sentiment.  What do you think?

Concertina Flower

 For this week's Waltzing Mouse Challenge I tried something new and made a concertina flower from paper that I'd stamped with the small houndstooth.  The Worn Lipstick ink matches the pink DP and butterflies much better in real life!  I used Shabby Shutters for the background and added some stitching and a gold embossed sentiment.  My card is also for Papertake Weekly, my "bingo line" is buttons, free (Stitching), flowers.

Candy Christmas

 

I like this week's sketch at Waltzing Mouse so much that I used it for a second card, I think it's using three elements that appeals to me, it's like planting flowers in threes.  This one uses the Christmas Candy set that I was lucky enough to win from Waltzing Mouse a couple of weeks back.  Both the candy jar and the piles of sweeties are popped up with Pinflair glue gel in front of the rectangular frame and the jar has a thick coating of Glossy Accents.  The sentiment is also from the candy Christmas set.  My colourscheme of red is taken from the photo at Christmas Card Challenges. This week's Shopping our Stash Challenge is food/beverage and is another challenge for this card.

Waltzing Mouse Sketch Challenge

It's a beautiful day here, after a long walk and some gardening I'm back with another clean & simple card, this time for the Waltzing Mouse Sketch Challenge.  I've used the chrysanthemum stamps, inked up with an array of small ink pads, adding a tiny bit of clear Stickles here and there.  The squares were cut out with Nesties and popped up on Pinflair glue.  The card is textured linen, I've added one of the new sentiments from WM as well as the Frame-It stamp.  I really like the look of this, hope you do too!
My card is also for:
Allsorts - say it with flowers
Totally Papercrafts - my favourite things (I love purple and I'm also loving my WM stamps at present)
Charisma Cardz - ribbon, ribbon, ribbon

Two cards for two clean & simple challenges

I'm very into my C&S cards just now and here I have two to show off.  The first one is for CAS-ual Friday which wants the sentiment to be the focal point.  Their challenges are shown with an old fashioned typewriter as their logo and this inspired me to ink up a Stampin' Bella stamp that I've had for ages and not used much.  I've added several layers of mat and frame but still left plenty of white space.

Card two is for Less is More, where the challenge is a one-layer card including script.  Similar theme but different card:  I masked off and brushed a background of Versafine Sepia, then inked an Impression Obsession newspaper script and stamped in on top.  The two sentiments I added are both Waltzing Mouse and I scored a line either side of the newsprint.  My stamp does not quite cover the whole of the card, I may trim it down to not-quite-a-square, but I wasn't sure so I have left it for now...

Less is More - neutrals and a new arrival

This week's Less is More Colour Challenge is Neutrals, one of my favourites for LIM.  The first card was nearly ready to blog around 9am, when the dishwasher decided to throw a wobbly and flood the kitchen, giving out an error message!  After mopping up the card took a back seat as I have friends visiting and we went to collect a new addition to the family.  Our beloved greyhound died in October and our elderly terrier has been an only dog since then.  My Mum gave me a rescue dog from the local Dogs Trust as a belated birthday present so here is Stella:

Doesn't she have the sweetest face?  I think she is mostly greyhound and staffordshire, what do you think?  OK back to the cards, I saw a stunning white on white card at Susan Raihala's blog which inspired me.  The sentiment is from Waltzing Mouse and I added card candy stamped with a mini alphabet stamp first. 

 The second card uses jewellery tags and a bit of twine, I think this is my favourite.

I'm also entering Aud Sentiment's "use the sentiment Happy Birthday" challenge  and Everybody Art's Monochrome challenge.

Waltzing Mouse Sketch Challenge

Good morning again, here's a second posting for today.  I had fun making this card for this week's Waltzing Mouse Challenge, using the Chrysanthemum stamp and sentiments from Say it out Loud.  I stamped the flower using purple chalk ink and clear heat embossed it, doing the same for the sentiment, then I popped it up on Pinflair glue, doing the same for the sentiment.  The DP is Prima, there's lots of stitching on the card, seam binding, pearls and a new Nestie for the sentiment that I got at Make-It last week.  I added some Distress Ink to the diecuts and to the image.
My card is for:
Waltzing Mouse Sketch Challenge - sketch
Dilly Beans - in stitches
Top Tip Tuesday - stitching
Corrosive Challenge - another dimension
The Ribbon Girl - pink, brown & cream

Less is More - don't scrap it

This week's Less is More challenge is to use up some of your paper scraps.  Great idea, I'm sure all of us have one (or more)  of those shameful avalanches of scraps.  I've picked the top paper from one of the heaps and used it with my new Waltzing Mouse Frame-It set, which has 2 frames, sentiments and a couple of motifs including this leaf.  I used Wow Gold embossing powder for my leaves then added a leaf border along the bottom of the card.  A scrap of gold mirri card is behind the border.
If you are wondering why the border is so close to the wsentiment, it's because the border was punched out to remove a tiny smear of ink :).

Waltzing Chrysanthemums

This card uses another of the Waltzing Mouse stamp sets that I was so lucky to win from Claire at WM, alongside the Say It Loud sentiment set.   I used WOW blueberry embossing powder to stamp the words and the flowers, used a MS round the corner punch and added some stitching, some pearls and some lace.  The large flwoers are layered, apart from the middle one.  The larger flower is stamped in Bashful Blue as background onto the blue card.  If you are wondering why the middle flower has only  1 layer  and there is an extra flower top left it's because I noticed that I hadn't lined up my punch correctly and there was a gap in the bubbles!
My card is for:
Waltzing Mouse - sketch
One Stop Card Crafts - create your own background
CRAFT Challenge - no designer papers
Totally Gorjuss - lace
2 Sisters - stitching
Whimsy Stamps - anything but a square card
Creatalicious - all about lace
SJ Papers - flowers
Crafty Purple Frog - flower power
Do You Stack Up - layers
Crafty Catz - favourite things - I am in love with Waltzing Mouse just now, also lace, stitching and embossing are firm favourites!

Waltzing Mouse Spring Hop meets OLW

 

This week's One Layer Wednesday Challenge is to use at least three stamps.  Remember tapestry stamps?  I dug out one of the sets of tiny stamps on wooden dowelling, this one is Wisteria.  We have a stunning wisteria on the front of our house that flowers in Spring, so I wanted to show this card as part of Waltzing Mouse's Spring blog party.  The sentiment is from Waltzing Mouse.  There a 4 tapestry stamps and the two words are separate, so that makes six stamps on my one layer card!  The inks were Distress Inks, Dusty Concord, Bundled Sage and some Sepia Versafine.  Here's our Spring Wisteria:

My card is for:

Waltzing Mouse Spring Blog Party

One Layer Wednesday - stamp, stamp, stamp

Cute Card Thursday - flower power

Waltzing Mouse and the Nice List

  

 I'd like to show you a card made with Waltzing Mouse stamps and I'd like to tell you about Claire Brennan who owns it, and her "Nice List". 

Claire asked people to leave a comment on her blog before Christmas for a giveaway of stamps, asking for the person who would be top of your Nice List.  She told us about her lovely neighbour who has done a great job of restoring a kitchen dresser.  I'm having a sad time at the moment and was moved to leave a comment about how helpful my friends have been, especially my friend Morag.  Claire picked her random winner of a prize but also picked my comment for a spot prize.  The twist with this giveaway was that it was for both the commenter and for the Nice Person.  I am so lucky to have beautiful sets of WM stamps and also a sumptuous treat for Morag who is not a stamper.  

So this card is saying a big THANK YOU to friends everywhere, all my kind crafty friends who read my blog and a Thank You to Claire who I have never met but who is clearly a generous and kind person.  Oh and by the way her stamps are pretty amazing too!

Card uses Large Dainty Doilies stamps and sentiment from Say it Loud.  I've based it around this week's Waltzing Mouse sketch challenge.  Lace, gems and white heat embossing.

My card is for:

Waltzing Mouse - sketch

Shopping our Stash - lace

Craft your Passion - no patterned paper

Stampin' for the Weekend - embossing

Allsorts Challenge - free and easy

Drunken Stampers - something new (my gorgeous new stamps!)

Fair Isle and Bling

 

It was time that I inked up my Nordic Winter stamps with something other than red, so I decided to follow this week's Waltzing Mouse Sketch and make an icy blue card for it.  The vertical stripes are some paper I won from Paper Temptress, a lovely satiny paper.  I just meant to put the larger bling in the corners and maybe a scattering on the snowflakes, but the card told me it needed more and I used up my small bling:).  There's a lot of sparkle in real life...

My card is for:

Waltzing Mouse - sketch

Shopping our Stash - glitters, sparkles or shines

Stamptacular Sunday - texture (twine, gems)

Use it Tuesday - all about winter (used up gems)

Tuesday Throwdown - baby it's cold outside

Sweet Stamps - hearts (middle border)

I Brake for Stamps - clean & simple

Secret Crafter - anything goes with blue

Simon Says - spots and/or stripes this one is stripes:)

Nordic simplicity

 

My mojo seems to be missing at the moment and I can only hope that it returns when things are easier.  In the meantime though, I have been playing with my new Nordic Winter stamps from Waltzing Mouse, making regular, geometric patterns with them is something I'm enjoying.   Those of you who look at my blog will know that my favourite stamps are tree stamps, followed by more tree stamps followed by yet more...  but this set is fast overtaking them with its simplicity.  Need to break away from just read and white though.

I followed the Waltzing Mouse Sketch Challenge and, at first, used a freebie Craft Stamper stamp on it, but didn't like it, so I changed it for the snowflake.  Here it is with the star, what do you think?  Hope it doesn't look too different to the sketch!  I have added one tiny piece of bling to the snowflake, matted it three times, with a thin strip of card across it, and that is it.  

My card is for the following challenges:

Waltzing Mouse - sketch

Mark's Finest Papers - use a snowflake

Winter Wonderland - red & white

Creative Belli - Merry Christmas

Simon Says - anything goes

Fashionable Stamping - anything goes, new stash

Pile it On - anything goes

Stampin' for the Weekend - anything goes

Tagged

The Nordic Winter stamp set from Waltzing Mouse was love at first sight for me, unfortunately I'm waiting for a full set of the stamps as the supplier sent out a faulty batch, including my set.  However Claire the owner of WM emailed all who had bought the sets to track down and make sure that any faulty stamps were identified and replaced.  Mistakes happen, to me it is how they are dealt with that shows the quality of a business.  Full marks to Claire for reacting like this, it certainly gives me faith in her as a customer.

Anyhow, I used the stamps that were ok, or short lengths of them, to make this tag for the Waltzing Mouse Challenge.  The white on red sentiment is a better match to the ink in real life!  I stamped 3 little squares and made a 3D shape for the bottom, attached with a jump ring, also added some red gems.  Beautiful, detailed stamps that really don't need anything adding to them.

My tag is entered for:

Waltzing Mouse - Christmas Tag Challenge

Craft Your Passion - tag you're it

PanPastel UK - gift tags

Designed to Delight - tag you're it

Shopping our Stash - tag it crafty