Petals & Paisley CTC#104

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This week at CASE-ing The Catty we are CASE-ing the Petals and Paisley section of the Holiday Catty. I chose a card at the bottom left of the catalogue picture, and changed the colours up to Sweet Sugarplum and Pool Party, but I needed to re-ink my Pool Party ink pad and the colour is a bit faint. I love those two colours together and have the glittery ribbon to match!!

Next I turned to the next page , as that was included in our challenge and CASEd a Totally Trees card. Again, I changed up the colours and the particular tree stamp used but it has been heat embossed in copper, and I used the same washi tape under the same sentiment. That one comes from Happy Happenings, one of those stamp sets full of sentiments for many occasions.

And now it is time to head to Rebecca to see her lovely creation.

Cheers, Rachel

Project Life & Kits CTC90

At CASE-ing The Catty this week we are CASE-ing either Project Life or Kits. You may have come from our guest designer, Fiona Cobbin, but if not, make sure that you visit her and leave a comment. I'm sharing a kit, because they are good value and easy to use. These cards are from Oh Happy Day featured on page 6 of the Annual catalogue. I ordered the kit with my pre-order, and held off opening it until my catalogue launch on June 4th. I wanted the ladies to experience the joy of unpacking a box filled with nearly everything needed to make 20 cards. There are cards, envelopes embellishments, twine, dimensionals, an ink spot, stamp block and 13 photopolymer stamps! You might need some snips to cut the twine, and perhaps another adhesive such as Snail or Tombow Multi purpose glue. 

It all comes in a lovely box, which helps you keep your project all together. One of the Make and Takes at my Catty Launch was a card of their choice from the box, and when I do something like this for a class, I often sort the pieces out beforehand and pop them in a sellophane bag. Sometimes it can be a little confusing getting the right pieces for each card, but it really doesn't matter too much. Nothing to stop you changing things up a little, or a lot if you like. 

These two from the kit, which I made up, are fairly close to the samples on the instruction sheet. For the one on the left, I stamped 'Happy Birthday' from Happy Happenings because there wasn't a suitable birthday sentiment that fitted the label. 'Party Time' didn't seem all that good when she was having a very low-key celebration. The card on the right has had the direction of the banners changed along with the position of the gold heart. These card kits are reasonably priced for all that you get. Watercolor Wishes is on the next page with the same inclusions and they both retail for $61.00 AU. 

They are a great gift for a crafty friend or for yourself so that you can whip up a card quickly for any event and you can still use the stamps after all the cards have been used up. I used my favourite stamp from  Watercolor Wishes. It really seems to suit the mood of the Swirly Scribbles Framelits and Swirly Bird stamp set, don't you think?

Now it is time to head over to sweet Krissy to see what she has to share this week.

Cheers, Rachel

Bonjour Beautiful - Babies & Children - CTC85

Sunday evening and it is time to blog hop with the Crew from CASE-ing The Catty. We are CASE-ing Babies and Kids pages 56-65. Even though my 'kids' are all grown up now, I've been blessed with six gorgeous grandchildren, who seem to love the cards I make them. I probably should be embarrassed to admit that I have nearly every stamp set from this section on my shelves, and quite a few retired sets too, but I need them all so I can ring the changes with these cards. I've been sorting over the last couple of weeks and boxed retired sets that I still 'need' in categories - kids, wedding, Christmas so far. I'm going through and stamping images onto plain PL cards and clipping them together on a ring from Officeworks, so I can refer to the stamp set that has a particular sentiment, image etc.

I've been quite liberal with my CASE this week. I adore No Bones About It and was tempted to make the shaker card on page 64, but it seemed a bit too easy to just straight-out-copy. I kept on flipping through the pages and voila! the answer was a shaker card using Made With Love, Happy Happenings and a tiny flower from Swirly Bird. I adore the InColors this year, every single one of them and I'm sure I've NEVER been able to say that, right at the beginning. Flirty Flamingo pairs beautifully with Watermelon Wonder and Blushing Bride. I love the sweet onesies in Made With Love and Something For Baby and they cut out so neatly with those matching dies.

I CASE-d Page 64 of Catalogue

I do like this dinosaur shaker card too, using the new embossing folder Seaside.

Now, I have only just begun making shaker cards, but boy, am I enjoying it, or what? I used the Lots Of Labels Framelits to cut the window, but any die that comes in graduated sizes works well. The No Bones About It card, has a textured top layer, but I decided to keep it clean and simple. I'd thought about stamping on it too, but in the end, held back. This photo has the card laid down so you can see the sequins, which are retired now. They were the Incolors which were retired 2 years ago (?) I think, but the soft colours suit this card too.

I think 'Bonjour Beautiful' is lovely for a baby girl, and the Happy Happenings set also includes this matching 'Welcome to the World'. Don't you think that's too cute? So, like I said, I really stretched things with my CASE this week at CASE-ing The Catty. Now let's pop on over to  Judy May and see what she has made this week.

Cheers, Rachel

Would you like to join the challenge and CASE the Babies & Children section of the catty? You can link your post here

Another Sneak Peek, One With Sparkle and Shine

Following on from my last post, where I shared some notecards I had made using Every Occasion, I have made some more, this time with a little more sparkle and shine. These three images were from that same stamp set, and this time they have been heat embossed in gold or silver.



The two on the left have the small square layered onto gold or silver foil, the gold star has been layered onto Flirty Flamingo, one of my favourite from the newest In Colors. I've used some of the new Playful Palette Washi, along with some of the ones already in my collection. It works really well with these smaller images highlighted on squares of card. They've been cut using the Layering Squares Framelits, which replace the current Square framelits( item #130921)They're retiring, but larger squares aren't in the new set, so I am hanging onto mine, and if you don't have them perhaps you should pop them on an order. They're reduced to $27.00 too, down from $45.00. That's pretty good, isn't it? Here is the online shop.



Congrats! is from the Happy Happenings stamp set, but Forever begins today, and 'You Wonderful Thing You' are both from Suite Sayings. The multi-word sentiment has been coloured with Stampin' Write Markers, in Peekaboo Peach, Sweet Sugarplum and Flirty Flamingo. I think we've been needing more of these soft, feminine colours, so I'm happy. What do you think about them?

I made a second card, this time in the standard size. The champagne glasses and layered square are the same, but there was more background stamping using Timeless Textures. You can see more of Flirty Flamingo here too - love it!

I'm putting in an order for new catalogues next week. If you aren't a customer of mine, but would like to come to my Catalogue Launch on Saturday June 4th, leave me a comment. It is at South Morang, north of Melbourne Victoria, Can you come?

Cheers, Rachel

Pot Of Tea, Anyone? CQC 335

What a lovely inspiration at Colour Q this week. The naive felt image suggested a teapot to me. At another stage of my creativity I painted ceramics, and teapots were one of my favourite pieces. Today I 'painted' the teapot with daisies from Grateful Bunch. I used bleach in an Aquapainter to remove some of the colour from the inside of the petals after heat embossing with white embossing powder. Next I filled in new colour with an Only Orange Stampin' Marker from my mother's stash. Soft Sky has substituted for Cool Caribbean, and I daubed some more colour around the edges. One sentiment is from A Nice Cuppa, the other from Happy Happenings.
It is awfully handy having the Cups and Kettles framelits and a punch for the Grateful Bunch daisies. Not half as messy as sanding back a ceramic piece and preparing it, before painting and then glazing. I'm very glad I found stamps and ink!

I thought you might like to see a bit more detail of the teapot and how nicely the grouping of three flowers placed onto the pot. There doesn't seem to be a lot of difference between my Only Orange and Calypso Coral, but it is a very old marker.

I think I might just go brew a pot of tea now
Cheers, Rachel

Rose Wonder Birthday

I had a couple of cards to make for friends this weekend just past, and this one has been handed over today.
My last Stampin' Up!® order contained the Rose Wonder stamp and Rose Garden Thinlets bundle - even I like to save 15%!!!




I was very inspired by last Sunday's CASE-ing The Catty Bloghop too, when a lot of the design team used this combination, with lots of different effects.

I had some fun die cutting several different colours of the smaller rose, and then putting them together in different combinations. This particular version has a Rich Razzleberry outline, and some petals, along with Blackberry Bliss, Perfect Plum and Wisteria Wonder. It has a lovely rich, jewel tone. I've kept the leaf quite basic this time - I'm liking the clean, uncluttered look of this card.

The iside has a sentiment from Happy Happenings and a strip of Bohemian DSP across the bottom. This paper is only available until May 31st, not long till we see a new catalogue now, so it's time to order any ink, paper or ribbon of the retiring In colours before the rush is on.

The colours retiring this year are Blackberry Bliss, Mossy Meadow, Lost Lagoon (my favourite) , Hello Honey and Tangelo Twist.

If you need supplies and you have an Australian shipping address I'd love to be your demonstrator. You can shop in my online store anytime, and I can advise you on how to use your new products. I also hold classes at home if you're able to get to South Morang, Victoria.

Do let me know if you'd like information, catalogues or product advice.

Cheers, Rachel