The Little Stamper

Sunday, 8 February 2015

Anniversary Garland

Hi everyone. It's a lovely Sunday boring here in the UK. It's pretty chilly but the sun is shining and the sky is blue. Plus I noticed yesterday that the snowdrops at the end of my garden have started to bloom, and I always take that as a sign that winter is on it's way out a Spring is on the way. Happy days!!

I am hoping to get down to a bit of crafting today, but before I do, I thought I would post this 'card' made entirely from paper with no stamps at all.

Everything that you see comes from the Polkadoodles Hollypond hill CD which is entirely made up of lots of lovely soft pastel images, based around a family of rabbits.

I used this one to make an anniversary card, and, in the end it turned out to be a bit of a labour of love….you have no idea how long it took to cut out all those flowers and layer them up!

But the end result was well worth it and it is a shame that it was such a dull day when I took the photos, as they are not the best, but hopefully they give you a feel for the dimension.

I would like to enter this card in to a few challenges, so here goes:

http://polkadoodle.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/week-6-flower-power-polkadoodles.html
http://allsortschallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/week-297-love-is-all-around.html
http://craftycalendarchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/crafty-calendar-february-challenge.html
http://sisteractcardchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/challenge-92.html
http://craftingfromtheheartchallengeblog.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/challenge-45.html
http://papertakeweekly.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/anything-goes.html

Thanks for visiting today.

Sharon x

Sunday, 1 February 2015

Scruffy Little Cat in the bath

Time for a bit of Sunday morning decadence today, in the form of this fabulous Scruffy Little Cat stamp from Crafters Companion. I am sure we all wish we could look as glamorous as this at bath time - lol!

I spent a fair while colouring this image with both my Spectrum Noir pens and pencils, and it was so worth it as the pencils really give that little extra boost. I think the hardest bit was probably the hair, which is always a bit hit and miss with me, but, on this occasion it seemed to come out really well.

The backing papers are from the Scruffy Cat CD and I printed some f the papers in grey scale so that I could create a black and pink combination, but i am thinking that lose lace effect papers from the Frou Frou CD would also go really well with this image.

Finally I grabbed a couple of Doohickey Dies to create the tower and swirls foe a finishing touch, plus some pearl paint and a smattering of glitter to finish of that glamour (check out those eyelashes!!!)

Last but not least - here are some of the challenges that I would like to enter this time around:

http://pennyschallenges.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/pennys-challenge-212.html
http://cutecardthursday.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-358-stamping-mad.html
http://thepapershelter.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-188-layers-and-lots-of-them.html
http://sisteractcardchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-91.html
http://pinkgemchallengeblog.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-137-lots-of-layers.html
http://sirstampalotchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/february-challenge-anything-goes.html
http://cardsgalorechallenges.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/use-stamp-or-digi-for-february.html

Thanks very much for visiting today.

Sharon x

Friday, 30 January 2015

A bit of old fashioned romance.

Whahoo it's Friday! Thank goodness the weekend is here and, at the time of writing, even though it is absolutely freezing, the sun is shining so hopefully we have the promise of a good weekend ahead.

Meanwhile we launch in to February on Sunday, so it is the time of year when all things romantic are on our minds.

So on to my card today, using the lovely Rosebud characters from Polkadoodles. They are quite different to her usual style, but very 'Jane Eyre' to my mind and I think they make really nice cards for anniversaries etc - especially for older couples who might have gone beyond the super cutie stuff!

As you can see, I opted for an easel card and used an opening door scene which I learned from the lovely Jayne Nestorenko. One of her Cute Companions CDs has a number of scenes with opening doors, so I adapted that technique, using bits and pieces from the Rosebud CD to create the same result.

The two images have been lovingly coloured with my pro markers and decoupaged on to the scene.

It looks like the young man is just about to propose don't you think? He is certainly a bit flushed in the cheeks!

There are some lovely challenges to enter in to this week, so here comes my list:

http://promarkerchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/week-281garden-life.html
http://pennyschallenges.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/pennys-challenge-212.html
http://sisteractcardchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-91.html
http://thepapershelter.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-188-layers-and-lots-of-them.html
http://cutecardthursday.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-358-stamping-mad.html
http://natalieandamy.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-29-all-about-love.html
http://ilovepromarkers.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-254-purples-and-blues.html

Thanks for visiting today and a happy weekend to you all.

Sharon x

Wednesday, 28 January 2015

It's still Christmas at Fab n Funky!

Well Christmas is well and truly over now.....unless you are a crafter that is - in which case there's no time like the present to get started on your batch of hand made cards for Christmas 2015!

With this in mind - the challenge over at Fab n Funky this week is - you guessed it - Christmas!

Our sponsor this week is Stitchy Bears and I was lucky enough to receive this lovely digital bear to play with....which you can find right here.

I've kept my card very CAS this time around and I have coloured the bear without shading as I thought he looked nicer that way!

I did print his head twice just to add a bit of dimension.....I'm not sure if you can really see this on the picture though!

I hope you will join in with usover at Fab n Funky this week.

Bye for now.

Sharon x

Sunday, 18 January 2015

Alfs shed

I am quite a fan of the 'Alf' character from Digistamp Boutique - he has a very friendly face and I think you could relate him to a lot of dads out there.

This image worked particularly well for me as I have a family member who loves to potter around in the garden and of course in his shed too!

I opted for an easel card and used some nice grungy paper that I found in my scrapbooking stash.

I then went to town with my pro marker to try and achieve a woody effect……looks like my shed has recently been painted with Cuprinol doesn't it? - lol!!!

Of course with the stable door and the awning, this image was just begging to be decoupraged, so that it would look like Alf was actually inside the shed - so that's just what I did.

I created the cloudy background with a stencil and some pan pastels which was really fun to do and something I will definitely be doing again in future.

Finally I couldn't leave out a lovely picket fence which I die cut and added just a hint of colour with the pan pastels once again.

So on to the challenges that I would like to enter:

http://inkychicks.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-45-anything-goes.html
http://ilovepromarkers.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-252-hobbies.html
http://cinspirations.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-296-anything-goes-option-of.html
http://cardsgalorechallenges.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/a-new-year-and-new-challenge-anything.html
http://buckwellscraftychallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/buckwells-crafty-challenge-anything-goes.html
http://sisteractcardchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-89.html
http://sweetstampinchallengeblog.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/masculine.html
http://pinkgemchallengeblog.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/challenge-136-birthday-card-for-boy.html

Thanks for visiting today.

Sharon x

Wednesday, 14 January 2015

Some 'Fab' news

Finally, I can let the cat out of the bag and announce that I am delighted to be joining the Fab and Funky Blog Design Team.

This is a really fun challenge that I participated in regularly as a blogger and so you can imagine how pleased I was to be invited to join. The hard bit has been keeping it under my hat as I was lucky enough to receive the invite last month, just as the Crafty Fairies blog was coming to a close.

So I guess it's true when the say 'as one door closes, another door opens'.

I'm really looking forward to joining in with the fun this year, and the first challenge of 2015 starts today. The theme is 'Something New' and our sponsor is Di's Digi Stamps.

You can find the blog right here so it would be lovely if you popped along to look at all the lovely cards and join in with the challenge.

Meanwhile, my card is made using a very cute Di's Digi Stamp and some lovely papers from Bearly Mine's floral range (sadly these are no longer available as the shop has now been closed due to the new VAT laws on digi's).

I hope you like my card, and look forward to seeing you over at Fab and Funky!

Sharon x

Saturday, 3 January 2015

Something New

Well it's my first post for 2015 and, as usual at this time of year, everyone is thinking about new beginnings etc, so I thought I would post up a New Baby card.

I love to make these kind of cards, but don't often get the opportunity, so this lovely SWALK image had it's first outing when I stamped this card, even though I had bought it years ago!

As you can see from the close up image, I stamped and paper pieced the mother's dress and them coloured the rest of the card to coordinate with the backing papers that I had chosen.