Take one for Craft Roulette 176

This week's parameters the split card was the stumping me parameter and I was going to make a gatefold card with some fruity DSP but I really wanted to have a play with my You're the Zest stamp set (LF). I made a fab background by blending some Distress Oxides: Dried Marigold, Spun Sugar and Kitsch Flamingo. Then pounced through the Falling Hearts stencil some Liquid Stardust; both products are from Lawn Fawn. It's so pretty and jolly in real life.

I then watercoloured using my Zig Real Colour brush markers; at this stage was thinking I could use the branch to split my panel but then remembered my Tiny Sentiments: Hello die (Altenew). I so wish I had stuck with the branch splitting the middle as the parameter is split middle not split card!! So back to the drawing board. 

I really like my card so off to think about how to "twig it" for the challenge.

Challenge parameters are below if you want to join in on the FUNN with Craft Roulette.

EDITED ONE DAY LATER: Take two; I'm not sure if I made my card "better" but I have split the letters by Copic colouring them, the blend looks OK when you look at the card but in a photo it looks messy but I'm happy I got my 10th submission completed and submitted with 10 minutes to spare.

EDITED 2 DAYS LATER: I tried adding Wink O' Stella but it didn't really smooth add the blend, then I saw in a bucket on my desk some long retired Shimmery Crystal Effects (SU!) I thought it would be too thick or blocked but it actually was a OK and I have a wee glossy layer with a bit of shimmer which maybe doesn't show that well in the photos but works really well with the Liquid Stardust heart background. So take 3 is a wrap!!

✿ Karen ✿

Craft Roulette #175

Today's tricky spin was Colors : "Craft Roulette colors". 

I love the "team orange" vs "team purple" joking that happens on Craft Roulette - they even sell merchandise, so I used those 2 colours to make a night sky. The rest was pretty easy complete with a picket fence bottom border. Having the 4 parameters makes it actually really easy to make a card and it will be FUNN to go see what everyone came up, which is the most funn. 

I have to admit my tortoiseshell cat on the fence looks a bit like a hamster but hopefully hamsters don't have such long tails but still a cutie.

Stamps: Cool Cat and Cool Cats (both from MFT stamps)

Distress Oxides: Carved Pumpkin, Wilted Violet, Villainous Potion, Black Soot

I've used my Copics to colour up the stamped images. I've also misted Frost shimmer spray on my ink blended background to create some stars.

PS my team is the colour of the sentiment banner ;)

Craft Roulette #173 and #174

Not sure what happened last weekend but I didn't share my submission for episode 173 maybe as we had friends staying so all a bit of a rush job. This week I've ended up with a very busy card as I decided I wanted fairy wings and because I wanted a circle "die-cut" because of the roulette spin, it is all a bit busy but I'm still pretty happy how it looks. It is magical. It's a foggy  cold day in Hamilton today so not the best picture  but determined not to forget this week. 

Looking at the parameters wings and Wizard of Oz I decided fairies with paper dresses made from some old gingham DSP from SU! (?Balmy Blue). Googling what are Wizard of Oz colours it seemed Dorothy had a blue gingham dress and then there were regions and colours; blue (Munchkins), yellow (Winkies), red (Quadlings), green (Emerald City) and purple (Gillikins), It's actually quite fascinating as it's all at the back of my memory somewhere plus of course the yellow brick road.

Supply List:
Stamps (all LF): Fairy Friends, Gleeful Gardens (snail), All the Clouds (clouds)

Inks: Buttercup (C9), Harbor (C9), Parsley (C9), Poppy (C9), Memento Tuxedo black

Paper: Neenah White and Xpress IT blending card stock

Other: Circle die (HB), Geotiles embossing folder (SP), Signo white gel pen, Prisma glitter (LF), grass stencil (LF), Copic markers, Everyday sentiment banners (LF)

Last week's episode I created a card not really me but both Pete and myself ended up saying that is was rather cool as quite tranquil.

Supply List:

Stamps: Oceanfront (SU!), sentiment ?came from a Pinkfresh Studio set

Inks (all PFS): Mint, Sky Blue, Warm Buff, Metropolis

Paper: Countryside Inn 12 x 12" DSP (SU!), Not Quite Navy (SU!), light brown woodgrain (LF)

Other: Stitched rectangle die (LF), shadow box card theater add-on (LF), painted texture embossing folder (SU!)

✿ Karen ✿

Craft Roulette #172

I am sad I missed doing Craft Roulette last weekend as I came down with a terrible head cold whilst away. I was actually looking forward to doing it with the limited supplies I had with me, I thought that would be rather fun. This week I was also away Friday and Saturday but found time to have a wee play yesterday afternoon and the card came together so easily once I worked out what I was doing for the parameters.

This week's parameters were:

The "old" element was what made me think hard, I was looking for an old truck and thought about using my On To Retirement set again which I love with the "older" people images when I had a brainwave, well I thought it was a brainwave, Santa is very, very old. So the Z was under control, any colors was under control and my desk was a MESK after returning from SENZ and finishing of the card projects I started at classes or as make and takes there.

Once I had the general concept in my mind what I was doing I started looking through my Christmas DSP and I have to be honest I don't actually have a lot but I found a folder with the Christmas DSP from the first SU! catalogue in NZ and was going to use that, I could see Cranberry Crisp and some kind of "Thyme" calling me but in the same folder was a few sheets of beautiful DSP that I bought about that time with bright pink glitter, it was called Entwine (Bella!  Kraftastic Papers), I've used a shiny bright blue one before in cards but this was my first cut of this sheet and isn't it adorable and also very old, bought approximately in 2008. It made it easy to chose what was coming from the MESK then, I had bought a bottle of Frost shimmer Spray at SENZ, I use my Sparkle shimmer spray a lot but it was the first time I had seen a Frost version, and its an opaque shimmery white, perfect for snow.

To match the Kraft in the DSP paper my Crumb Cake card from SU! would work but I really like working with American measurements for my card making now, so I was very relieved my mixed pack of cardstock from Concord and 9th Wheat was a great match and Dragonfruit in that pack is also my brightest pink cardstock. I actually sponged the sky onto the Wheat cardstock which made it slightly darker. I've used Tumbled Glass and a tad of Salvaged Patina oxides. I then cut a few stitched hillside borders (LF) from white cardstock and used what was left on my blending brush to add a hint of blue and then added Prisma Glitter to make sparkly with my Sakura glue pen. I have used my old retired Layering Circle framelits from SU! too, so another another old thing and this is my 4th Christmas Card made for 2023.

My wee images I have Copic coloured on Xpress IT blending card stock and they come from Ho-Ho-Holidays (Lawn Fawn). 

An easy Z-card is just the front panel folded in half and you can add any shape to normally add your stamped image etc.

Up close and sparkly! Copics used (darkest >> lightest):
Bag and Santa suit: RV19/17/55

Skin: E13/11

Blues: B34/32

Greys: T8/6 and T4/2/0

Yellow: Y17

Well this turned out to be so funn, I may have to make a few more cards for my stash.

✿ Karen ✿

Craft Roulette #170

Only one parameter was challenging IMO. What the hell does "collection" mean on a card, it's interesting seeing what everyone comes up with to cover this parameter but it seemed most people were doing multiples of something on the card, so my teddy bear having a cup of tea at a table with a red gingham tablecloth maybe wasn't hitting the brief (I have a wee collection of miniature teddy bears, some of them cost me 100s of dollars years ago). Collecting miniature teddies was definitely cheaper than collecting stamps and took up less space!

So back to the thinking board and thought I'd use some red gingham paper to make a "table cloth" but don't own any and could have made one but found a Lemon Lime Twist gingham piece from when it was an in-colour ??2017. I love lime green so as soon as I found it that was my "picnic blanket" of choice.

One of my old SU! sets that I won't let go is Free as a Bird which fitted a collection of birds, wishing someone a Happy Birthday their way. Picnic colours (lime green gingham, blue, red, brown, lime green). I have added 3 Honey Bee black gems to the larger flowers. I have Copic coloured up the images and fussy cut out (I actually cut before I coloured in case it wasn't really possible). The stitching is Lawn Fawn's Just Double Stitched Rectangle die, I have used an A2 layer die to work out and cut out the picnic blanket layer so it fits inside the stitching nicely.

You have about 24 hours if you want to join in on the FUNN at Craft Roulette.

✿ Karen ✿

Craft Roulette #169

Wow this turned into a real challenge. I decided really early on with the see-through that I would finally have a go for real to use my Window Frames stamp set by Simon Says Stamp. This was the monthly kit in February 2020 and guessing I bought this just before we went into lockdown, which seemed a long time ago now. I never got around to using it at the time and have taken it off to crafty weekend retreats with great intentions to use it but invariably it returns home looking brand new and not used :(

It is a very different stamp set with 3 frames; one with flowers which I have used, one with balloons and one with hearts. At the time we got a trio window die in the kit and a square shaker trio pouch (MFT). The shaker pouches are probably long retired but I'm glad I bought 3 packets worth as I'm off to my annual Craftirific girls crafty retreat next weekend and will definitely make more cards now I've finally inked the stamp set.

Unfortunately it doesn't come with a die to cut out the images so time to get fussy cutting. I coloured the flowers up in more earthy tones, which equates rustic to me and I even used Crunchy Leaf ink from Lawn Fawn to make the stems etc a pale brown which is an alcohol ink friendly ink. I do love and LOL at Lawn Fawn names of their colours.

I was looking at stencils for hexagons and I had 6-sided dies but to be a hexagon each side is the same length and same angle as I was thinking I could add  the sentiment onto a hexagon die to discover I don't own a hexagon die when I Googled what is a hexagon. I did know they were six-sided I just hadn't realised they had to be symmetrical. So it now has to be a stenciled background OR what I used which is stunning DSP called Golden Honey Specialty (SU!). 

I had a bee in another old SSS monthly kit wearing glasses (as apparently glasses especially sunglasses are fashionable) but decided my wee flower frame would suit a trio of wee bees including the Queen Bee wearing her very fashionable golden crown. I've coloured in the crown with my Signo gold gel pen and a few wee hearts.

I have also used some long retired Sequins for Everything (SU!) which come in a variety of colours and shapes including more hexagons. I have added Prisma glitter (LF) to the bees' wings. The bees come from Lawn Fawn's Hive Five set and the sentiment "thanks for bee-ing there" is from Bee Yourself  (SSS) stamp set. The background paper comes from Spiffy Speckles DSP (LF), I was going to use a pale lemon or mid-green card stock but I find myself reaching for this pack of 6x6" DSP it seems to work with everything and I love it comes with speckles and I don't have to splatter, it's all done for me ;) The stitched detail is the largest stitched rectangle stackables dies (LF).

I used my old blending combos from when I first started Copic colouring and looking at my sheet this is my best guess what I used (darkest >>lightest):

• Orange flowers: YR68/YR15/YR21
• Yellow flowers: YR24/Y19/Y11
• Darkest green leaves (bigger ones): YG67/YG17/YG03 
• Smaller green leaves: YG17/YG13/YG03

I'm really enjoying Craft Roulette as the combo of the 4 parameters certainly makes for a different card or project than "normal".

✿ Karen ✿

Craft Roulette #168

I loved the spin of the wheel this week and it gave me the perfect opportunity to stamp up my new Mama Elephant stamp set; I have had my eyes on this set (Flower Friends), Flower Shower and Rainy Days forever and ever. Finally I got them  all last week so was dying to play with them. The first thing I discovered the stamp I used is not a chicken, it's a KANGAROO, which is too, too funny. I really thought it was a beak on his face but then thought why has it got bunny ears and whoo it also has a tail. So I was really confused by now and had to go to the Mama Elephant site to see what it really was. A chicken wearing an orange daisy would have been even more perfect but the wee roo is adorable too.

This week's spin of the wheel gave us these parameters to work with:

I have added gold gel pen to the bee's stripes plus gold embossed my sentiment. I have Copic coloured up my images. I used a post it note as a mask for my grassy area which is created with Twisted Citron distress oxide ink and I thought about sponging the sky but settled on some clouds with a Lawn Fawn die and their Pearlescent vellum paper which I love. I also love that the pearly sheen means you don't see the wee glue drop or mini foam square behind it either. This week I loved Mary's funn shaker card and the evil chicken card that the guest Maymay created, so it is well worth checking out HERE.

✿ Karen ✿

Craft Roulette #167

After discovering what Craft Roulette was all about I wasn't going to let a really and I mean really busy weekend get in the way of taking part this week.

Again I couldn't watch it live as I was doing my Create with Us Live class with Lawn Fawn which was the identical time (1130am on Saturday morning in NZ), so I had to watch in review late Saturday night about 11pm as falling asleep. It was lovely seeing Mary Gunn FUNN highlight "your card" as it was a first submission. It was even more fun to hear Laura Bassan yes "laurafadora" go WOW at my bag-a-lope I fell asleep very happily after hearing that.

This week seemed really easy parameters; a thank you card, Farmers' Market colours (???GOK what that really means as everything seems to be Farmers' Markets colours), something that rhymes with "bee" and some punctuation.

So late last night about 11pm again start thinking what can I KReate today. My first thought I must have a thanks die with an exclamation mark >>> NO I don't, maybe on a sentiment >>> not that I could find, thinking oh no this is not as easy as it seems. Then I spied an old set from Stampin' Up! Just Saying' which was just perfect (punctuation and gee rhymes with bee). My table was covered by this time with bee stamps, tree stamps, things to do with the sea.

I had recently grabbed a bargain at my local crafting store (Krafters Cart) a set of Mama Elephant die cuts called Let's Chat. I think they're sized to work with the small sayings for the small wee animal stamp sets and they were in the clearance rack; so they were too good a bargain to not pick up and I'm really happy I did as they worked so well with the larger sentiment from my SU! set.  This idea came from something I saw on a challenge site a few weeks ago which I thought was so clever, which you can view HERE. Of course for this challenge I couldn't find my pin but 48 hours later I have it was a wee way down (I do like to Pin) so editing my post to show where to find my "inspiration".

 Hopefully, I used Farmer's Market colours though my blue is maybe a tad bright but I felt like I needed a pop of colour on the card, I also had to throw in some brown for the mud on the ground and on the potatoes and probably the carrots.

Just sharing the difference between Versamark and a white pigment ink when white embossing.

The LHS is the Versamark one, ignore I haven't heat set it properly but looking at the sentiment its a lot thicker emboss with my white pigment ink. I'm in the middle of a Virtual Art Retreat and we are doing a lot of white embossing in it. I've been a good student and copying the teacher and using my white pigment ink but today I reached for my Versamark without thinking and then thought oh that's not that nice an image for my "highlight/centrepiece" and tried again with the white ink.

Supply List:
Stamps: Just Sayin' (SU!)

Ink: Unicorn white pigment (HA)

Paper : Neenah White, Shaded Spruce (SU!), Sweet Sorbet (SU!), Daffodil Delight (SU!), Pumpkin Pie (SU!), Soft Suede (SU!), Tahitian Tide (SU!)

Dies: Just Sayin' (SU!), Let's Chat (Mama Elephant), Folk Edge rectangles (PFS)

Other: Alabaster white EP (BM)

Challenge: Craft Roulette #167

I'm loving KReating something that I wouldn't normally make, I'm actually quite chuffed how amazing well that stamp set worked for the challenge and made it a doddle to whip up today. Roll on next Saturday and the next spin of the wheel.....

✿ Karen ✿

First go at Craft Roulette

A couple of my Aussie virtual crafting friends post weekly their "Craft Roulette" projects and I can tell they're excited by it. This week I thought to myself lets go see what the fuss is all about and went and searched in YouTube and there's lots of episodes so I watched the one with Cathy Zielske whom I love as a crafter and I thought wow this is a really cool idea and different than my card challenges. For non-patreon entrants we have a 48 hour window to submit. I off course decide to do it on a day I have about 2 hours spare and then I'm away for 2 days.

But wow I did it I watched the show its kicks off 1130am Saturday morning in NZ, before it starts they show everyone's cards/projects from last week which I think is really cool.

The show starts off with an introduction to the guest designer, today's episode had Christopher Allen; founder of Brutus Munroe. Then about 10 minutes of highlights from last week's episode then they spin the wheel and then the 2 of them make the project. I only had time to see the spin and scribble down the parameters. Which were:

• Project : small bag
• Element : wheel
• Colours: Rainbow
• Random : Shimmer

At this stage I had scribbled on my scrap of paper: reveal wheel card, bikes, Ferris wheel, wheelbarrow but as I was wondering to my craft room I thought ohhhhh Santa carrying a bag of toys, looked through all my Christmas stamps but alas no Santa with a Santa sack :( At thiss tage thinking OMG I may have to try again next week and then I had a lightbulb moment I thought I can make a bagalope, what is a bagalope - it is a bag you make out of an envelope. One of the stamp sets I had grabbed out actually had a handbag on it and a wheel too. 

I love I can search my blog and find projects of many years ago. So big drum roll all the way returning to 2009 HERE is my bagalope project from then I had blogged and it is so cute! The blog post also links to the blog of Cambria Turnbow with step-by-step instructions on how to do it. I also blogged multiple times in 2008 "bag-a-lope" projects.  Here's my bagalope / bag-a-lope in 2023; it's amazing what is tucked away in your brain for 14 years but arises to the surface so I can make a bag project for Craft Roulette, with some tissue paper and "fake gift card" to go.

I have scored my sealed envelope at 5/8" on 3 sides. Definitely use your bone folder to work the score lines both way if you want to fold it into a bag easily. I used a stencil in sort of rainbow order to add rainbow colours plus a scrap of rainbow DSP. Bags and wheel are on the stamped image, which I have coloured up with my Zig markers very quickly. A sparkly gem plus some Nuvo shimmer pen to give me all 4 elements, easy peasy, all done in less than 1 hour it might have taken me longer to clean up the craftastrophe I made!

Supply List:
Stamps: On to Adventure (SU!)

Ink: Jet Black (LF), Versafine Clair Nocturne

Distress Oxides: Saltwater Taffy, Dried Marigold, Squeezed Lemonade, Twisted Citron, Tumbled Glass, Shaded Lilac

Paper: Lavinia multifarious, Granny Apple Green (SU!), Sunshine & Rainbows DSP (SU!), C6 envelope

Dies: Layering circle framelits (SU!)

Zig Real Color Brush markers: Yellow, Cobalt Blue, Dark Pink, Yellow Green, Light Grey, Blender

Punches: Large tag (SU!)

Other: Repeat Rainbow stencil (TE), Hugs and Kisses gem stickers (HB), Nuvo glitter gloss pen, white gel pen, blending brushes (TE)

Well after typing that supply list I can see why my Craft room looked a mess as I also had out a few other stamp sets, which are on another table not snapped.

And the Craft Roulette parameters should you want to join in too:

I really enjoyed making a project/card with 4 parameters - it really helps focus you. I also liked that it's good to just go with the flow and KReate. So if you can't join in this week do have a go another time.

✿ Karen ✿