Hi guys! Erica here with my first blog post of 2018.
It’s been way over a week since I posted anything and I have a very good reason for this: I may have mentioned once or twice that I’ve been a bit under the weather in recent months? Well, after some persuading from The Man, I went to see the doctor who promptly put me on a strong round of anti-biotics and anti-inflammatory meds as well as pro-biotics to protect my stomach lining from the harshness of the beforementioned meds.
I had been trying to tough it out but to no avail, turns out I’m actually quite poorly. Which is pretty sucky. I’m not overly patient so lacking in energy and feeling pants, makes me a bit of a hand-full. Luckily for me, The Man has been off work and isn’t due in until Monday so he’s been looking after me and our little chicas. So there is definitely a silver lining to being ill in this house I must admit but I am also soooo ready to feel better and get back to a normal routine.
As I’ve not had to do anything other than whatever I feel like, I have actually managed to make quite a few cards as well as produce lots of snot. Does that count as multi-tasking? Well, it should!
Sometimes I wonder if The Man sends me off to the craft-room for me-time because I need it, or if it’s just because he needs a break from me, my snotty tissues and the whining?? (the whining gets on my nerves too, and I’m the one doing the whining…!! Big brownie points rewarded to him for sure for being patient with me.)
Right, as mentioned, I have managed quite a few cards and they are all penguin based! Remember a recent post, where I used the SSS Picture Book Secret Penguin wafer die? If you haven’t seen it, hop on over later and let me know what you think. If you have seen it, you may remember that I went diecutting crazy and made something like a dozen penguins? Nothing like having a menagerie of animals ready for some card action, eh? Those guys came in handy for three more cards.
On two of them I used the SSS Falling Snow stencil and white texture paste from Ranger Ink. One on white card stock, this one also has a bit of gold shimmer mixed in it and is done straight on the card base (this is super hard to get a good photo of!) and one on Kraft card stock (MUCH easier to photograph) I also used the same stamp and diecutting set, another SSS exclusive set called Love, for both cards. This is without a doubt one of my favorite sets ever, I use it all the time!
For my all-white card I cut out the shadow love part in vellum and for the Kraft card, in black card stock. I used my new favorite gold card stock, Brushed Gold from My Favorite Things , for the top word part. This gold card stock is absolutely lovely. While I was on a roll, I also cut out a few snowflakes for my Kraft card.
On both cards I crated a banner by layering some of that gold card stock as well as some white, on a slightly bigger strip of black card stock. On the white strip I stamped ‘So in _____ with you’ and left enough space in between them to fit my vellum and gold ‘love’ piece so the whole thing spells ‘so in love with you’.
To finish this card off I cut out a snowy bank for my penguins to sit on, by using one of the diecuts from MFT Die-namics Stitched Scalloped Basic Edges 2 and white linen textured card stock. I added this to the card using some foam tape and did the same thing with the banner. My two love penguins had all their colour added with Copic markers and are both holding a little heart.
These hearts are cut out from card stock which I stamped and heat embossed some snow flakes on (using stamps from a Pretty Pink Posh stamp set called Winter Wonderland) and then did some emboss resist ink blending over. It just gave them a little fun element rather than being plain. I had enough card stock left so I cut out a third one and added that to the banner too. With that, the first card was done.
On my Kraft card I also wanted a snow covered hill for the penguin to stand on but on this one I used the texture paste to create the look. Once the banner with the ‘love’ was added, along with the gold snow flakes, I popped the little penguin on there and then decided he needed something to hold to finish off the sentiment. The easy fix was diecutting a heart, stamp ‘always’ (also from the SSS Love stamp set) on it and then shade it a little bit with pink ink to make it pop a little. Both the penguin and the banner are, of course, duh, added with foam tape. ‘Hi, my name is Erica and I’m a foam tape-oholic’.
My third card is nothing at all like the first two, three if you count the one from the first blog post. On this one I used penguins I had made in gradient pink card stock, ranging from soft pink to fushia. Obviously not a natural look at all, but this was made on Jan 1st and I kind of imagine that the penguin ladies are all ‘dressed up’ to ring in the New Year. Or something along those slightly nutty lines.. Anyway, I thought it would look fun and they did not disappoint! I absolutely love how this one turned out!!
It’s a very different card size to what I usually make, this one is just over 8.75”x4”/22.5cm x 10.2 cm. Well the card base is, the back ground panel is 8.5”x3.5”21.5cm x 9cm. On this one I got my “normal” distress inks out to make a dramatic sky background. I used a mix of Salty Ocean, Mermaid Lagoon, Stormy Sky and Wilted Violet. I taped it down to an old cutting plate with some masking tape, leaving about 1/32 inches/0.5cm of a boarder which will stay white thanks to the masking tape. Blending away, mixing up the colours and dropping in more here and there, I kept at it until it was all covered. Whilst it was still taped down, I splattered it with some water and quickly lifted it with a paper towel. To add some gold shimmer I mixed up some Blue Gold from the Gansai Tambi Starry Colors water colour palette and splattered this very generously over the panel.
The Photo is a bit blurry but it shows the gold shimmer quite well. This is also so hard to photograph well to show off just how shimmery it is.
Whilst that was drying I started working on the other little bits and pieces for the card. The reason I wanted 4 penguins was to that they could all hold a number which would spell out ‘2018’. These I cut out of that gorgeous gold card stock again, using MFT Die-Namics Bottle Cap Numbers . Flipping open their little flippers (see what I did there?) I added the numbers to the penguin assigned each number and glued them down. Then more gold card stock and diecuts came out, this one is from SSS and is called Oh, Hello There. I cut out one layer of the gold card stock and also one in foam tape (what can I say? I L-O-V-E that stuff!) These I layered together and after releaseing the background piece from the masking tape I added that to the card base with… *drum roll*…. Foam tape!! Lol. Yep, total addict here and I am not ashamed to admit it either.
It was a pretty quick assembly job at this point but I messed up the positioning a little bit of the words. They are not centred.. ugh… typical to mess up on the last step, isn’t it?? On a CAS card it is not such a big deal but on a time-consuming one like this, it’s a bit frustrating. Lesson learnt though. Put all bits and pieces down and THEN one by one, glue them to the card. DO NOT EYEBALL THINGS!! I tried to balance out the card a bit by adding a few sequins but the mistake is still glaringly obvious to me.
Well, that’s it from me today, I’m off to poke The Man and ask him to get me some mango sorbet. For medicinal purposes only of course. I am sick after all. Cough cough. Splutter. Sneeze. (Am I milking it too much?)
Happy weekend and I hope you get some crafting time in!
Lots of love from Erica
For my card I decided to use one of my favorite coffee stamp sets which is 
CaCaCraft by Erica 