Just a little note

This weeks Less Is More challenge is to take inspiration from their blog header: 

Circles are 0.5, 0.75 & 1 inch, popped up on foam pads, sentiment (Tempus Sans ITC) created with Silhouette Studio.  Note is from clip art found on the web.

Linking to:
Less is More 74 ~ blog header as inspiration
Cas-ual Fridays ~ CFC59 Round & Round

Smile Monster

Stamps: Little Monster (Woodware); Smile (Elzybells)

Ink: Lilac Posies (Memento)
Other: 1.5 & 1.75" circle punches; corner chomper; wide clear tape

Card: from my stash, unknown

This is my entry for Cas-ual Fridays 2 circle challenge.  I just hope its clean & simple enough.

Strips of card are 0.5 inch wide, trimmed with my corner chomper.  Gloss on the monster is clear tape applied before punching out.  I punched a hole in the strips so the circle sits flush with the card front. The front of the card base has been shortened so that the strips make the card edge.

A monster, googly eyes & a cheery colour combo - what's not to smile about?

Linking to:

CAS-ual Fridays: CFC59 ~ 2 circles

Computer sentiment tutorial

A number of people have asked how I do my computer sentiments, so I have put together a tutorial  for how to do it using MS Publisher.  My software of choice is Silhouette Studio (available to download for free) but I figure that more people would have Publisher already installed.

Sorry, but this is a picture heavy post, so may be frustrating to read if your connection speed is poor.

I have used this card for demonstration purposes, because the sentiment had to be in a very specific place.
I knew that the finished card would be A6 ~ 14.8 x 10.5cm.  I measured the stamp I was going to use, & decided that a 4.8cm square would look the best.

Open MS Publisher & draw your card front to the right size as shown below.

Repeat steps 1 to 4 to make a square 4.8cm long.

With only the square selected, you can then use the up & down arrow keys on the keyboard to move it to the right place.  If you have a specific distance from the top, draw another rectangle using this dimension as the height, & use the new rectangle as a spacer (hope that makes sense...).

Now for the sentiment.

Now you can use the keyboard arrows to position the sentiment exactly where it needs to be in relation to the other items on your card.

So now you are left with the sentiment in the right place for printing on an A6 card, at the bottom of an A4 sheet of paper.

Some things to remember:

Don't worry, you can always undo stuff.

When putting text close to the edge of the page, your printer might leave a border so be aware of this.

Try it out on cheap computer paper first.

Phewwww!  I'm worn out now.  Congratulations if you have managed to stay the course.  I hope I have made things clear enough; I find it a difficult line to tread- giving sufficient info without being patronising.  If something is still unclear, leave me a comment & I'll try to help.

Well done

Stamps: Teeny Trees (Waltzing Mouse)

Ink: Teal Zeal (Memento)

Font: Brush Script MT, Narkism, Copperplate Gothic Bold

Card base: 9.9cm square Hammered White (Paper Mill Direct)

Well, this one just sort of ran away with me.  You start stamping in one corner, without any real idea in mind & whoosh, there it is.  The aqua colour was achieved by second stamping the Teal Zeal.  I'm quite please of the random nature here, I guess that's what happens when you stamp without a plan.

The sentiment was created digitally from the 3 different fonts & printed after the main stamping.  The line & 2 leaves were added later, using a tree stalk from the same set.

Linking to:

One Layer Wednesday: OLW94 ~ it's all about size (oo-er missus...)

Stamp It Cards Week: Congratulations Challenge

Mojo Monday 247



Papers: Stars & Stripes (Crystal Wilkerson)

Font: Stencil

Card base: 5" square hammered white (Paper Mill Direct)

Was extremely lacking in inspiration this week until these papers popped into my e-mail from Crystal Wilkerson.  And they are only 66p today yay!

Anyway, these just screamed BOY at me.  Which is lucky, as I have a number of special boy birthdays looming.

Using the Mojo Monday sketch, I designed it digitally & printed all the pieces off on a single sheet of A4.  I made up the 10 using the colours from the paper & sized it so I could punch it out with a 1.75" punch.

Dithered a bit about centralising things, & yes, that 10 is deliberately skew-whiff (had to look up how to spell that - have never had to write it before!).

Linking to:

Mojo Monday 247 sketch challenge

You float my boat



Stamp:  Tremendous Treats Valentine (PTI)

Ink: London Fog (Memento); Aqua (Ranger Adirondack), Christmas Red (HobbyCraft)

Paper: " Peas in a Bucket, Sheryl K Designs, Shabby Princess

Font: Migraine Sans

Here is my entry for this week's Less is More - paper piecing, hurray!

I printed the sentiment then masked off a square using torn edge paper for a softer finish.  I stamped the boat then sponged in the sky with aqua ink.  Originally, the sea was sponged with darker blue, but it looked all wrong, so I paper pieced it instead.  The heart & flag were sponged with red & cut out - the heart has sellotape over it to give it a bit of gloss. 

This is very similar to a card I made a couple of weeks ago using another stamp from the same set.

Linking to:

Less is More: Week 73, Paper Piecing

That frame again...

Stamps: Bitty Banners (Waltzing Mouse); Circus Animals (My Cute Stamps)

Ink: Pearlescent Purple (Brilliance); Lilac Posies (Memento)

I told you once I found an idea, I worked it hard!  Banners instead of washi tape today though.

The lion was stamped on DP & then the mane coloured with Promarkers. The dots were made using the Promarker blender.

If you haven't seen the first card I made like this, find it here.

Linking to:

Casual Fridays: CFC58, Pretty in Pink