Small Square Pop Out Swing Card - Springtime Foils Part 2

So... today is the very last day of Sale A Bration 2018... so only a few hours to sign up with extras in your Starter Kit (and more from me)... or to place an order and get Sale A Bration freebies for every £45 ordered... ends 31st March 10.30pm in the UK... Click here to read more...

And now  back to today's cards... with another comparison of Blends versus Markers on the Springtime Foils papers for you as I go along... which is code for 3 card versions being shared today... 

Small Square Pop Out Swing Card Card Tutorial shared here...

So this version has been simply Sponge Brayered with Pool Party ink... on both the front and inside panel... remembering of course to wipe off the ink from all that foil using a tissue!

The Sweet Soiree vellum embellishment has been coloured using darks Night of Navy and Pool Party Stampin Blends on the back (so as to avoid discolouring the silver foil on the front...) with the leaves being coloured with Daffodil Delight dark Blend on the back... and a gold gel pen on the front ( so as to ensure solid colour overall whereas the gold gel pen on its own proved difficult to colour evenly and solidly!) 

Note that I would have coloured in on the front using the Stampin Markers though... with a wipe off...

And the Silver Metallic Edged Ribbon was coloured using the dark Night of Navy Marker... with a wipe and more drying time... Greeting from Perennial Birthday...

Now... quick fast forward to another version...

Front paper Sponge Brayered in Pool Party again... Then the leaves were painstakingly coloured in using  the Night of Navy Stampin Marker... but.. it has to be said... it took a while... and I won't repeat! And nor did most of my ladies!! But I learnt something along the way...

A cotton bud becomes your best friend for removing the excess ink off small foiled elements... as a tissue would have just spread the excess ink all over!! Never would have thought of that before... 

And spot the Sweet Soiree Embellishment Kit leaves used around the Stitched Shapes square panel... a perfect match to the leaves on the paper... coloured in with the Night of Navy Stampin Marker... on the front with a cotton bud wipe!

Flowers from Cake Soiree... which as an aside... remember that you can get the Sweet Cake dies for free (today only) with a £90 order...

Stripes on the inner panel coloured in carefully using the Night of Navy and Pool Party Stampin Markers... I didn't find this too hard to do... but some of my ladies did... guess you need to have a steady hand... but it adds a lovely effect...

Ribbon coloured with the dark Pool Party Stampin Blend... 

And fast forward again... as I had to try colouring those foily leaves on the front panel with a Stampin Blend... so as to complete my Blends versus Markers survey!! Though I never did finish off decorating the card...

Easier than using the Markers (and careful cotton bud cleaning!) in the small leaf area... but the foiled parts became coloured as expected... and as I was trying to leave the outer leaf shape clean silver... it still took a while... and it went a bit "sloppy looking"... and the navy wasn't quite as deep navy...

And the stripes on the inner panel were much harder to colour in.. so I gave up with that idea very quickly and reverted to Stampin Markers (and cleaning)...

All in all... I prefer Stampin Markers for coloring my Springtime Foils papers... albeit with the Blender Pen for the larger areas... and maybe I won't be colouring any more of those small silver foil leaves anytime soon!! And for the ribbon... either works... but I love the extra feature of the silver edge becoming self coloured when you use the darker Stampin Blends...

And if you have got to this point of my ramblings ... I salute you!!!

Want more comparison... and a tip for blending with your Stampin Markers... then read more here... 

Springtime Foils Small Z Fold Card

We liked this card so much... we had to make another one... in a colour way one more associates with me!!

So it was Bermuda Bay Stampin Marker (aka the lovely handled box of Many Marvellous Markers)... and the Blender Pen in hand... and a quick session of blending action...

More details and background on the blending/colouring here... and the card tutorial is here... Such a great little but WOW card... as you get 3 from a sheet of A4 cardstock in its 9.8cm sizing... which for me means 3 cards at a time!! As I trim the width... score down the whole length and then cut... such a time saver...

Don't forget that there is now only one more day to get these gorgeous Springtime Foils foiled papers for free... one pack for every £45 ordered... as Sale A Bration ends 31st March 10.30pm...

So it is your last chance for SAB freebies with your order...  Click here for more details... or here to go straight to the selection of free items in the Online Store

OR for even better value... it is also the last chance to sign up with Stampin Up! and get that extra large Starter Kit including 2 extra free stamp sets... as well as an extra gift direct from me... Click here for more details and/or just click HERE to select your kit and join us...

I would love you to join us for your Stampin Up! journey... best thing I ever did for my crafty life!!! Though I still can't believe it was almost 10 years ago!

Heartfelt Hopeful Thoughts... and a Heartfelt Blooms parade...

When I made and posted these Hopeful Thoughts cards for the Meningitis Research Foundation... I  made the comment that I had had to change my plans midtrack... and quickly reduce the amount of gold heat embossing... as otherwise I would only have made a handful...

So I thought I would share the fully gold embossed versions today... as they also show off the lovely greetings in the promotional Sale A Bration Heartfelt Blooms stamp set... yours for free with a £45 order... but only available now for a couple more days...

Talking of Heartfelt Blooms... don't think I shared this video before either... and I didn't add it to the parade yesterday... so just click on the picture below to view more on this lovely greeting set with photo-realistic flower... available in clear mount and wood mount...

And a set I am going to really miss using come the weekend...

All the rest of the details on the cards in the previous post here... just with more gold embossing instead of the Sahara Sand tree!

And a (hopefully) useful tip for you.. these cards didn't buckle under the heat gun heat too badly.... as I could remove the stitched square from the card blank... so that was heat embossed separately... so then there was just a small amount on the card blank to heat emboss direct...

And to finish... a quick round up parade on previously shared Heartfelt Blooms cards... just click on the photo to go straight to the post... and maybe check out the sizing!! as funnily enough they might all look the same size on here!

Only 3 days left for Sale A Bration...

So time for a quick round up... as the Sale A Bration promotion ends 31st March 10.30pm...

Joining Now! Remember that now is the best time of the year to join the Stampin Up family... but only for 3 more days...

£130 product (and not a penny more!) plus 2 extra free stamp sets (of any value) to choose for you Starter Kit from Stampin' Up!...  plus catalogues and other business tools for free in the box... Pay only £99 with free shipping...

Plus an extra Team Kit separately from me including some personalised stationery, colour swatches, Demo Handbook, product samples, a Stampin' Up! shopper bag and an extra gift from a selection available...

Though I would urge you to join asap... but by the end of tomorrow, Wed 29 March latest... as the SU! offices are closed Good Friday and Saturday... so ... although rare... any problems requiring their input will not be able to resolved prior to the deadline if any later...

Click here for more information about joining my team... and/or click here to order your Starter Kit...

Shopping Now! A little free product round up for you... as I am not sure which I have shared before and which I haven't... so... here are a few short videos on some of the Sale A Bration products... just click on the picture to go to the video for that product...

Or just click here to see all the free Sale A Bration products... one free for every £45 ordered... with a few free with a £90 order...

Starting off with our little Party Pandas who have been this year's star of the show... and who are still partying... but only for 3 more days...

Hosting Now! And last but not least... an extra £20 product for free for orders over £200... 

Click here to go straight to my Online Store... and don't forget to enter this month's Host Code B3WTJ296 where prompted for orders over £20 and under £150 for a free gift from me... Please select your own Stampin Rewards for orders over £150... you will still get a free gift from me... 

Stampin Markers... Blending Tips...

Ok... yes, you have seen this little card before... click here for the card fold details...

But 3 variants to show a quick comparison between the currently-not-available-for a few-weeks Stampin Blends... and Many Marvellous Markers (aka Stampin Markers)

First up... the original Stampin Blends version... click here for more details on the colouring...

Second up... straightforward Stampin Markers colouring... looks somewhat... flat! Lovely coral colour... but no colour variation at all...

Look in comparison to the Stampin Blends at the top... 

And lastly... after a bit of a Eureka moment in a class... the Blended Stampin Markers option...

Now isn't that better than the first marker version! Just a little bit of marker direct colouring... blended out with a Blender Pen... colour variation a go go... quicker than Blends... and nice and controllable if you do one flower/leaf at a time... and actually my preferred colouring method with the Springtime Foils papers... as they have a slight sheen to them... which allows the marker ink to be moved round brilliantly in this way...

Here are the Fully Marker (top) and Blended Marker cards side by side... what a difference...

Oh and the ribbon was also coloured using the Stampin Markers too... just had to wipe the ink off (particularly off the metallic silver edge)... and leave the ribbon to dry a bit longer... 

So grab your Blender Pens and Stampin Markers... and blend your inky heart out!

And I would love to start a new Stampin Markers Club if there is enough interest... £45 per month plus P&P for 2 months starting now (so you could get 1 Sale A Bration freebie with your March order too!!) OR £33 per month plus P&P for 3 months starting in April . So contact me by clicking here if you would be interested...

OR for anyone that can order all in one go by the end of March... so £99 now... and 2 free Sale A Brations... order direct online here... and I will refund you the £4.95 postage (by cheque) and send you a gift worth over £10 too...

OR as the best value option... you could sign up with Stampin Up! for £99... which pays for the markers... and select another £31 product... plus 2 free stamp sets (any value)  if you sign up by 31st March... Free P&P... And I would be very happy to send you that £10+ gift too... Click here for more information.... and /or Click here to join my Team...

Blossoming Basket Part 2... and the Small Easter Basket now in inches too...

Quickly following on with another card using the Blossoming Basket bundle... which can be yours for free with a £90 order during Sale A Bration... though don't wait too long as Sale A Bration will end 31st March... that is just in 5 days time...

But before I start... as I have been asked by quite a few of you... the Tag Topper Small Easter Basket tutorial has now been updated to include the inches measurements from US Letter cardstock... and surprisingly it still works out for creating 2 mini baskets from the one piece of card... Click here for the tutorial...

Click here for the full details of the pictured versions... but Basket Weave embossed version...

 Faux Stitched version...

Ok.. back to today's card... quite a lot of details are the same as yesterday's card... but some sizing, colouring & layering differences... so I'll just start again and give the full step by step details... 

The full basket of flowers image was stamped twice in Memento Black... once on a trimmed Whisper White  4 1/2" square main image panel and once on a large piece of Whisper White scrap ... and then just the flowers onto another 2 pieces of smaller White scrap... 

A bit of dark & light Crumb Cake Stampin Blends action to add colour & texture to the basket and handle on the larger scrap (though the Crumb Cake Marker & a Blender Pen  would work just as well if you haven't got the Blends before they got turned off) And then a bit of basket fussy cutting... Though I could have got away with just colouring the basket on the main image panel... but I had already done one separately!

But whilst I am on the subject... come back tomorrow for a Tips & Techniques post on using Many Marvellous Markers in a blended way!!!

And then the flowers colouring on the smaller scraps... one set of three... and one single centre one... I used Dark & Light Calypso Coral Stampin Blends... with Dark Daffodil Delight for the centres... and then the flowers were fussy cut... one trio and one single (centre) Love how the colouring on these flowers makes them look really realistic!

The leaves were coloured in on the main square panel using the Dark & Light Stampin Old Olive Blends... 

The little tag was again stamped on Crumb Cake card in Early Espresso... the hearts coloured in using a (retired) White Signo Gel Pen... and fussy cut...

The basket and handle were stuck flat/direct to the main image panel ... though with hindsight I should have 3Dd the basket base...

The flowers and tag are stuck using 3D Stampin Dimensionals... those Mini Dimensionals being perfect for the tag! The trio of flowers being 3Dd.. then the single 3Dd again for extra dimension...

All mounted up on a 4 3/4" square Calypso Coral panel... and onto a 14.8cm square Thick Whisper White card blank (but use 5 1/2" square for US Letter card)

And then finished off with a Memento Black full greeting from the Perennial Birthday set... as the wording just seemed so right with the image...

Think that is everything! Amazing how so simple a card can need so many words!!

And if you missed it in yesterdays post... here is a little video on the bundle for those of you that prefer them...

Blossoming Basket Just For You...

My first use of the Blossoming Baskets stamp set for you today... and having seen lots of brightly coloured flowers around the web... I just wanted to go to the subtle side for a change...

This stamp set is part of the Sale A Bration earn for free with a £90 order Blossoming Basket bundle coupled with the fabulous Basket Weave embossing folder... and it is a such a lovely colouring set... even I have managed to colour better with more depth & highlights using it!

And here is a little video on the bundle for those of you that prefer them...

So the full basket of flowers was stamped in Early Espresso on Crumb Cake cardstock... a bit of Crumb Cake Stampin Blends action to add texture to the basket and handle (though the Crumb Cake Marker & a Blender Pen  would work just as well if you haven't got the Blends before they got turned off) And then a bit of fussy cutting...

The image was then stamped twice more in Memento Black... once on a trimmed Whisper White  3 3/8" square main image panel and once on scrap... the leaves were coloured in on the trimmed square panel using the Dark & Light Stampin Old Olive Blends... 

And just the flowers coloured in on the scrap piece... I used Daffodil Delight Stampin Blends... dark for the centres and light on the petals... and then blended the subtle petal colours out with the Color Lifter... so that the flowers appear almost white with just a hint of yellow... and then the flowers were fussy cut...

The little tag was again stamped on Crumb Cake card in Early Espresso... the hearts coloured in using a (retired) White Signo Gel Pen... and fussy cut...

The basket and handle were stuck direct to the main image panel ... with a quick extra banner with the For You wording being tucked in... Note that I handmade the banner... even though I do have the Triple Banner Punch... but it was upstairs!! And a quick 1/4" snip up the centre of a 3/4" wide white panel... followed by a quick snip from each corner to that centre snip... does the job without exercise!

The flowers and tag are stuck using 3D Stampin Dimensionals... those Mini Dimensionals being perfect for the tag!

All mounted up on a 3 1/2" Crumb Cake square panel... and onto a 5" square Thick Whisper White card blank (Cut card 5" x 10". Score LANDSCAPE at 5")

And then finished off with a Memento Black partial greeting from the Perennial Birthday set... as the wording just seemed so right with the image...

Think that is everything!