Ink and Inspiration Blog Hop for January

 

Welcome to a new year and a new Ink and Inspiration hop.  This months colour combo challenge is a beauty, look at this fabulous colour combo!

I’ve  used Evening Evergreen and Merry Nerlot for the blended background of this card. I then used some white ink that I splattered over the top and later on after the butterflies were added, I included some subtle shimmer sequence to finish off my background.

The Butterfly Brilliance stamp set and matching dies make a really easy way to create a complex card. I’ve coloured in using stamping blends in several of the colours from the inspiration.

I really love how easily this came together, and that the background  reminds me of a sunset or something similar in a forest. Very fitting for the inspiration photo that we have been given this month.

Happy Stamping,

Rachael 

Valentines Day Blog Hop

Welcome to another fun Crafty Collaboration Blog hop with demonstrators from around the world.  Todays theme is Valentines Day. I went through my current stash and don't have many stamp sets that lend themselves to the idea of valentines but I did find several die sets to use for my card.  

Supplies:

Pattern Party DSP

Cardstock - Granny Apple Green, Flirty Flamingo, Pool Party, Poppy Parade and Petal Pink

Dies - Floral Gallery, Give it a Whirl, Tailor Made Tags

Stamp - Hydrangea Haven

The finished card is bright and fun, with very minimal stamping but uses some die sets that may not have been designed with Valentines day in mind.  

Thanks for popping along to our hop, don't forget to check in on the other projects and leave some comments.  

Happy Stamping,

Rachael xx

Stamping with friends Valentines blog hop

 

Hi and welcome to my blog post for the Stamping with friends valentines theme. I’m so excited to be sharing my card, not because it’s using a typical valentines products but more so because here in Australia, we don’t tend to celebrate as big as other parts of the world. That is why I decided to do an atypical valentines card using the fabulous new celebrations stamps that Awesome Otters.

I’ve teamed up this cute little otter image, with some love hearts cup from the give it a whirl dissect. I also used some of the little tiny heart stamps from XXXXX. The papers I have used for this card more male orientated colours, and are from the Pattern Party Host DSP pack in the annual catalogue. They were on my desk when I first started the card and were really calling out for me to use for this non traditional feel. 

Thanks for popping along to my blog today, you are headed to Robbie's blog next, click the link in the image below and check out how fabulous her project is. 

Roll Call
Linda Moore   

    Tricia Butts
              Rachael Merrick  

     Robbie Susan Chandler
      Karen Egan  

     Krissi Hannahs
Deborah Schultz 

   Donna Lester
  Mo Rootes     

   Kelly Taranto
Helen Jennings  

     Mickey Moore
Vickie Littlewood 

      Narelle Fasulo
    Melva Peters   

    Angie Mckenzie
    Betty Bickford  

     Lorraine Tierney
  Candi Suriano  

     Donna Schnees

Happy stamping,

Rachael xxx

Simply Sketchin Saturday #004

Welcome to another fabulous sketch inspiration from the Simply Sketchin Saturday team.  

I've chosen Fresh Freesia as my main colour for this fortnights card based on the sketch.  I'm loving all these florals at the moment.  

Thanks for popping over to my blog, I hope you join in the fun over on FB.  

Happy stamping,

Rachael xx

Zero Waste challenge

 I was so excited to see this as a challenge for our blog hop - the challenge was to either showcase how we can eliminate or minimise waste in our crafting or to recycle something in our project.  YAY!!! 

I had so many ideas that I actually started more than one project however this was my final piece.  

I guess this was the ultimate in zero waste, because everything I used is pretty much leftovers. The jar is an old olive jar that we emptied at Christmas. The dried citrus was left over blood orange and lime from my trees this year that I had dehydrated and they are perfect for adding to drinks. The confetti I hand cut with scissors from scraps of paper. In fact all the card stock in this project was scraps I had sitting on my desk.

 Finally the twine, was really old stuff that I had in a drawer somewhere and I pulled it out just to use. Of course any leftover ribbon or twine would do the same job.

I hope this has given you some inspiration and food for thought about how we can reduce, reuse and recycle in our daily crafting.  Noone likes to throw things away and I think papercrafters are great at using as much as they possibly can...

Happy Stamping,

Rachael xxx

HERE

Blog Hop Index

Simply Sketchin Saturday #003

 Hi everyone and welcome to another Simply sketching Saturday.  This fortnight we have a sketch that featured a large panel on the front of the card, totally my kind of card!!!  

Except, I didn’t make a card! Well I did kind of this card has a removable front panel which doubles as a pretty calendar that can go on your fridge! It’s held on the fridge with magnets but also on the card with magnets. I thought magnetic sheeting a while ago so I could put all my dies in a nice neat place in their packets, and this is the perfect thing to use for this kind of card. I can’t wait to gift it to someone this weekend, I know it’s not in the New Year and I know that January is half over already but that’s okay. I’m sure it will come in handy for them

I’ve used the blessings of home stamps it, which I covered with stamping blends in a variety of Granny Applegreen, old olive, blushing bride or flirty flamingo, and a touch of yellow so saffron.

I bought the little calendars off eBay, and they arrived only yesterday, who can rely on the post really at the moment and of course they were a week or two later than I had expected. But they did come in time for this challenge, and turned out really cute. I’m pretty sure I’ll be turning out a few more of these to hand out to friends just a way of letting them know that I’m happy to have them around and supporting me all of the year.

Here is the original sketch, how about joining us to some sketching fun too....

Happy Stamping,

Rachael xxx

Stampin Dreams blog hop - a throwback

 Welcome to the Stampin Dreams Blog hop, a This blog hop's theme was 'THROWBACK" and we were encourage to recreate or find inspiration from a previous project or an old catalogue etc.  

I chose to CASE this card which is one of the first ones I made when I got my starter kit:  

I still love this card and thought it would be the ideal one to try to recreate for this challenge. 

I took some liberty with the new version, trying to keep it reasonably monotone, creating a larger label for the sentiment and having banners in the background. 

I’ve chosen the Simply Succulent stamp and matching dies for this card and teamed it with the brick embossing folder. I love those dies from the bundle, especially the string of pearls - yes I have plenty of succulent babies at my house! 

I’ve used soft succulent, night of navy and soft suede as the main colours although mint macaron made the perfect base for the soft succulent sponging. 

I even managed to sneak in some of the brass butterflies because what’s a garden without butterflies!? 

Don't forget to jump over to the other blogs and thank you for popping by mine.  

Happy Stampin,

Rachael xxx

Vintage inspired Blog hop

 Welcome to our Vintage inspired blog hop.  I have to admit, it took me a bit of searching through my stash before i got my head around what it was I wanted to use for my card.  

I've used ink sponging on most of the card and created a collage using a collection of images and sentiments from the following stamp sets:

 Queen Anne's Lace

Artistically Inked

Elegantly Said

I also used copper foil sheets to match the Simply Elegant DSP.  I added Sahara Sand and Crumb cake sponging over the DSP to avoid the 'white'.  Vintage also meant a lot of inks from the Neutrals collection, all paired with Vanilla Cardstock.  

Don't forget to jump over to the other blogs and check out the wonderful projects the other demonstrators have created.

Happy Stamping,

Rachael xx

Stamping with friends blog hop - sketch

 

Welcome to another blog hop with Stamping with Friends group. 

This hop is a sketch theme.  I've chosen to ink up my new SaleABration stamp set that I got for free with my last order. 

Isn't this otter cute???  Of course we don't have them here in Australia... although I think he would fit right in.  

What says happy birthday better than bright colours and balloons.  I cut the balloons from the smallest circle die and added some hand drawn elements for the string.  

The combination of basic gray, melon mambo and granny apple green really turned out great, the brighter colours pop on the darker background.  

Thanks for joining me on the blog hop.  

Click the image below to jump over to Deb's blog for more inspiration. 

Happy Stamping, 
Rachael xx

Roll Call for this blog hop:
Linda Moore
Rachael Merrick
Deborah Schultz
Caron Bailey
Lorraine Tierney
Donna Lester
Karen Egan
Robbie Susan Chandler
Nicole Mahler
Tricia Butts
Diane Evans
Victoria Littlewood
Kelly Place Taranto
Melva Peters
Helen Jennings
Tina Hewitt
Candi Suriana Grace
Mickey Moore
Mo Rootes

Sketching Saturday #002

 Welcome to our second Sketching Saturday, I'm excited to show you my interpretation. 

Today I've used some of the new products from the mini catalogue.  Such a pretty bundle!

The sketch was great fun to create with and an easy one to use lots of stamping on.   Click on the below images to see the details close up, I've used some layering stamping in the corners and added some white splatters too.  I love the finished result!

I chose the colour combo of Cinnamon Cider and Misty Moonlight teamed with basic white.  Not my usual colour palette but one that I really like now I've used it.  The inspiration came from the DSP.  

Thanks for popping along, don't forget to jump over to the other blogs and see what they came up with.

Happy Stamping,

Rachael xx

Tutorial Bundle available for January

 Hello my crafty friends,

I have some exciting news, this year I am participating in a group who is putting together a tutorial bundle every month.  This months bundle has 28 projects in it and can be yours FREE with an order over $90.  

If you would like to purchase the bundle itself without placing an order, they are available for $28.00.

My card in the bundle, its a bit of a fun fold style card that is super easy to put together. I used some of the new mini catalogue products too.  

Message me if you would like a copy of the tutorial bundle for yourself.

Happy stamping,

Rachael xx

Blog hop for the new mini catalogue!!!

 

Welcome to a very exciting blog hop, today we celebrate the new mini catalogue and I get to showcase this fabulous Amazing Silhouettes stamp set.  

I chose to go with a brights theme, and created a backgound cutting several strips of cardstock.  I then matted it in basic black.  

The image was stamped using my stamparatus so that I could get a dark image.  I then used my Blending brushes to add colour to the image  and then added a sentiment and some of the white matte dots also from the catalogue.  I really love the result.  Vibrant and cheerful for a birthday.  

Don't forget to pop over to the other blogs, there is bound to be a huge amount of inspiration waiting.  

Happy Stamping,

Rachael.