Curiosity Corner - It's Your Day

Today I would like to introduce the new Dovecraft Curiosity Corner collection to you. The colours are lovely and more muted, so they are great for vintage styles and elegant cards. And some of the papers, for example, also work nicely on male cards.

The initial idea behind the card above was to look for something that could accommodate just sections of doilies and not the whole doilies, so I started to trim off sections and came up with the design you can see here. A product list and step-by-step instructions can be found in my Trimcraft gallery.

I hope that you all had a lovely weekend and will have a good start into the new week.

A whole bunch of dinos ...

The previous sneak peeks on the new dinosaur stamp collection by Crafty Stamps focussed on the individual dinosaur images in the range. But Crafty Stamps are also bringing out a set of ten dinosaurs (DN1A5). These images are smaller than the individual ones and are therefore great for smaller projects or for creating scenes with two or more dinosaurs.

The project above is a simple desktop calendar created from a piece of A4 kraft cardstock cut in half vertically, chocolate pearlescent cardstock and piece of patterned paper from the First Edition Isabelle paper pad. I stamped the dinosaur to the right onto smooth white cardstock and also onto a Post-it note. The image on the Post-it note needs to be cut out and is then used as mask to cover the already stamped dino. After that the second dino can be stamped. For the colouring I used Spectrum Noir pens and ProMarkers.

For the calendar section I cut a piece of chocolate pearlescent cardstock that is slightly larger than the calendar tab and attached it with large 3D foam squares by Dovecraft (but there is no foam pad in the top middle section). The calendar tab is held in place with a Tim Holtz bulldog clip. This way it is easy to remove pages from the tab and even to replace it at the end of the year. A bit of silicone glue and an adhesive pearl give the bulldog clip a decorative touch.

Dinosaur images are not only great for birthday cards for kids, but also for humorous cards for adults. For this card I worked out a sentiment, keyed it into Word and printed it out. The products used for this card (in addition to toolbox basics) are as follows:

* Crafty Stamps dinosaur stamp set
* 15cm white linen textured card blank by Southfield
* Chocolate pearlescent cardstock
* First Edition J'adore paper pad by Trimcraft
* Smooth white cardstock
* Die'sire die by Crafter's Companion
* Spectrum Noir pens and ProMarkers
* Paper roses and rosebuds
* Decorative pins

The dinosaur stamps will be available on the Crafty Stamps website www.craftystamps.com or in their Edinburgh shop 'Stampers Grove' from Tuesday on.

Dino Birthday Card

I hope you are all safe and dry. Here the wind is howling around the house and battering the trees with rain hammering against the windows every so often, but that is nothing compared to the awful situation in the south of the country.

Today's dinosaur sneak peek comes in a completely different style - with a more colourful creature on a birthday card for young kids. I deliberately wanted to create a dinosaur image that comes over as more cute than scary.

I used the new Crafty Stamps image DN104M (the stamp will be launched on 18 February 2014) and coloured in the dinosaur using ProMarkers in Soft Green, Amethyst and Aubergine.

In addition to the dinosaur stamp I used:

* 15cm x 15cm white linen textured card blank by Southfield
* Smooth white cardstock
* Textured cardstock in soft green and in two shades of purple
* CoreCouture cardstock by Core'dinations
* Embossalicious Lattice embossing folder
* Leave embossing folder by Crafts-Too
* Number and letter die-cuts (peel-offs would work just as well)
* Cutting dies: circle and scalloped circle
* Candi

Land and Sea

It is time for another sneak peek on the new dinosaur stamps by Crafty Stamps, which will be released later this month. Inspiration for the two cards I would like to share with you today was provided by the habitat the dinosaurs lived in.

For the card above I used brown-grey tones of Spectrum Noir pens for the dinosaur and opted for a forest-like feel with brown and kraft cardstock, raffia and string as well as leaves. A torn strip of kraft cardstock and the distressed embossed detail add a rustic touch.

Some products used for this card in more detail:

* Crafty Stamps dinosaur stamp DN107Q
* Embossalicious A4 embossing folder 'Tumbling Leaves'
* Leaf die set by Cheery Lynn
* Santoro Mirabelle jute and raffia string set by Trimcraft
* White linen textured 15cm square card blank by Southfield
* Glass-smooth white cardstock by Southfield
* Kraft cardstock
* Tim Holtz Kraft-Core cardstock by Core'dinations

The second card is styled around a marine dinosaur (DN108K). I chose blue greys for the dinosaur and light blues for the surrounding water. This time I used a mix of ProMarkers and Spectrum Noir pens. The bubbles - and incidentally also plant sections within the background - are highlighted with Sakura Gelly Roll pen in 'Clear Star'.

The backgound is mainly doodled. I used a calligraphy pen to get thinner and wider sections for these fantasy plants and added then some circles with a fine liner by Letraset. After that I embossed the background using a 6" x 6" Embossalicious embossing folder and added adhesive pearls in various sizes and shades of brown for the bottom of the sea. Embellishments are starfish and shell die-cuts. I used my good old QuicKutz dies, but other manufacturers (e.g. Marianne Design) have brought out similar dies in the meantime.

I hope you like these two new projects.

Here come the dinos ...

Crafty Stamp DN102N

Towards the end of this month Crafty Stamps, the Edinburgh based family business, are launching a brand-new collection of stamps. The images should be popular with many recipients of all ages and are currently really trendy when it comes to kids: dinosaurs.

All stamps are made from high quality grey rubber and come cut and foam-backed. And this is just perfect for us impatient crafters, as they can go straight out of the packaging onto an acrylic block and are ready for a crafting session within seconds.

Here is a first sneak peek for two of the new images. More samples will follow over the next days.

For the card above I used:

* Textured cardstock
* Smooth white cardstock
* Embossalicious embossing folder by Crafters Companion
* Tonic Studios tag die (the die-cut is cut in half)
* Corner rounder
* Black Memento ink pad
* Spectrum Noir pens (green greys plus IG1) as well as a Letraset FlexMarker in 'Glacier Blue'
* Adhesive pearls

Crafty Stamps DN110Q

The products for the second card are:

* Black textured cardstock
* White smooth cardstock
* Patterned paper from the Trimcraft Back to Basics Monochrome collection
* Cheery Lynn corner die
* Britannia sentiment die set (peel-offs would work just as well)
* Octagon Nestabilities
* Black Memento ink pad
* Spectrum Noir pens (ice greys)
* Adhesive pearls

I hope you like these new stamps and are looking forward to more previews.

Lillibet Stamps

Lillibet - In the Garden

You might remember my projects created with the Lillibet collection by Trimcraft. Recently they also released some fabulous stamps. They are a brilliant addition to this lovely collection, as they give us so much more creative freedom than stickers or printed images.

For the above card I opted for more intense colours and tried out a different hair colour. I used Spectrum Noir pens to colour in the image.

A product list and step-by-step instructions are in my Trimcraft gallery. The swirls are created using a die by Marianne Designs. The background paper and kraft cardstock can, of course, easily be cut with a paper trimmer or guillotine, but I could not resist to try out the square layering dies by Tonic Studios. I could not be tempted by square dies for a long time, but the increments and the large number of dies in this set changed my mind. And somehow it is quite nice to get perfect squares every time, which will come in very handy for techniques like teabag folding.

Christmas Decorations II

I hope that you all had a great start into a happy, healthy, peaceful and successful 2014.

But will these storms never end? For weeks now it has been extremely wet and windy most of the time. I hope that you are all safe and dry.

I still need to share some more decorative items, which I made over the Christmas days, with you. These Christmas crackers are intended as decorative items that I can put on top of the fireplace, onto shelves, etc. They will get simple boxes, so that they can be safely stored away during the rest of the year and come out fresh and like new for the next festive season.

The cardstock used comes mainly from the First Edition paper pad 'Silent Night'. Other than these sheets I just used silver mirri card and a bit of textured cardstock. Additional items include adhesive pearls and curly ribbon.

The most important die for these decorations is the Christmas cracker die by Tonic Studios. Any Christmas themed dies can be used for the embellishments. I opted for Die'sire holly and snowflake dies as well as a bell by Crafts Too. The border punches used for these projects are geared punches by Tonic Studios, as these are easily copying with mirri card or textured cardstock.