Crafty As L

One of my recent purchases was from last year’s Tim Holtz/Sizzix vault release called Fresh Brewed, which includes a mini embossing folder and a collection of dies to make mugs and take-away drink cups.   I paired it with sentiments from MFT Coffee Order. For the backgrounds, I used the embossing folder and a variety of complimentary coloured card.   Once embossed, I snipped out each coffee cup, making irregular shapes. These shapes were glued onto white panels.    I left the centres uncovered so that the sentiment could be stamped there. After realising that most of the sentiments wouldn’t fit in the gap (doh!), I die-cut a selection of the coffee cups and attached them to a stamped sentiment.  These were adhered to the cards using thin foam tape. Mr L bought me a new gadget for Christmas – an embosser with my ‘Crafty As L’ logo for making my envelopes fancy! These were the cards with the bright backgrounds which I mounted on a black background th...

One of my friends is having to leave our watch as another watch is chronically short of staff.   Whilst it might not seem like a big deal, a watch is your work family and we forge strong working relationships, and often friendships, with those we work with on a daily basis at all hours of day and night.   We rely on and trust each other and often employ gallows humour to cope with the pressures of a shift.   My friend is a big coffee fan so, rather than buy him vouchers and be tied to a particular coffee shop, we had a collection and decided to just give him the cash as ‘coffee vouchers’.   To that end, I wanted to make a wallet to put the cash into. The free stamps with Creative Stamping 122 had a take-away coffee cup that would be perfect for the card.   To start with, I stamped and clear heat-embossed the coffee cup. I coloured the cup using Copic markers. When we get a break with another colleague, an often asked question is “You for coffee?” and then ...

Mr L gave me the idea for this week’s card where sometimes, a coffee just won't cut it! In the Nothing’s Better Than stamp set, there are lots of fun little phrases to pair with the main words but none that quite say this.  I first tried doing small lettering like the stamps but the big, bold lettering worked better for the feel of the card. I used the Love You More Than dies and wanted my focal words to stand out on a background.  For the words, I blended Misty Moonlight/Smoky Slate and So Saffron/Rococo Rose onto two pieces of white card. For the black backgrounds, I drew around the outside of the die and fussy cut. The black halo really helps the words have drama! Next, using my grid paper, I experimented with wording layouts and styles, eventually choosing a plain, bold style.  I transferred this onto vellum before transferring onto the card using my light box. To finish, I stamped the coffee cup and cocktail glass, colouring with the same inks and die cutting,...

  This week, a parcel from Stampin’ Up! was delivered so I got to play with some goodies from the new catalogue.  I really liked the look of the 'Nothing’s Better Than' stamp set and thought it would make a great card designed to look like a graffitied wall, albeit quite posh graffiti! First, I stamped my image and writing in black ink. Next, I used the block coffee cup to add some colour to the image.  I didn’t want a plain colour so applied Pool Party and Pretty Peacock using sponge daubers to give an ombre look. To get card looking like a wall, I ran the piece through my Big Shot in a brickwork embossing folder. The final stage was to mount the front onto a black layer and then a Bermuda Bay card base.  I stamped the coffee cup on the liner and envelope to finish. For my second card, I used a cocktails theme, and did the same ombre inking for the drink, using So Saffron and Poppy Parade. Lovely, quick cards but fun and stylish too!