Laura Rumble - Crafter

I'm excited to have joined the team at CAS Colours and Sketches .  This is my first make for them and it is a colour challenge. I struggled to find an exact match for the berry burst shade but Pinkfresh's Regal Kiss was a good enough match.  I also went with Hydrangea, Spruce Tips and Lush Forest, all from Pinkfresh's ink line.  If green is in a colour swatch I immediately go to leaves and I fancied pulling out my Alex Syberia florals so that was an easy decision.   Keeping it CAS I stamped off the edge of the card base and embossed in white for a subtle look.  I then used the coordinating stencils to ink blend.  As I was blending rather than stamping my colours are a touch on the softer side.   Then I decided my greeting would go smack bang across the middle of my image.  Perhaps controversial?  Why place it over the prettiness?  I don't know really, I just like the closeness of everything design-wise. Come over and join us at CAS Colo...

 Here's my first card of 2024, based on the January sketch from Stick It Down. I feel I've stuck pretty faithfully to the sketch for this one. The die set is an oldy from Pinkfresh Studio and the sentiment stamps are from Alex Syberia.  All the patterned papers are old scraps from the box of doom. I started out thinking just three or five confetti sequins but I got well and truly carried away!  They add a subtle iridescent shine.  In the photos they lean towards pink but in the flesh they mostly flash green and blue matching the leaves and stamping perfectly. Stick It Down runs as a Facebook group now.   Do pop over and join if you'd like to be kept in the loop.

  Here's a round up of everything triangle-y from the last few weeks.  Everything from a small bit of patterns paper that features a triangle design to projects created with triangles at the heart of the design. This layout was for a Scrap Squad lift and features a piece of green triangle patterned paper amongst other scraps from my yellow, blue and green paper boxes. This cut file was designed specifically for my shape series.  I've also added triangle stencilling in the background and used some triangle patterned paper to back parts of the cut file.   This layout has some stencilling that uses a hexagonal design that is made up of triangles... tenuous link to triangles but *shrugs* This layout is all about that 6x6 patterned paper... it is marvellous!  It's from a Honeybee pad and I love everything about it! There is a textured triangle stitch design on the background of this card.  Also had a little play with coloured embossing powder which is something ...

Here's a round up of some heart themed makes from the last few weeks. First up is a heart embossed background for a CAS(ish) card.  Coverplate from Time For Teas Designs, bird stamp from MFT, sequins and sentiment from Pretty Pink Posh.  I love the quilt-y puffiness of embossing with a coverplate but I'm never completely sure the best way to capture it in a photo. Now a run of layouts, some more 'hearty' than others.  I really wanted to use up as many of my puffy heart stickers as possible.  It became clear that just a scattering per layout wasn't going to do the job... My cut file, patterned paper from Pinkfresh Studio, bits and bobs from the depths of my stash.  (This type of cut file is great as you get two usable pieces, one the opposite of the other.  Picture where this is blue being white and where this is white being blue.  I'll share the other layout soon...) I changed tack and went all out with the stickers... This is based on an old sketch of...

Today I have three more circle makes to share.  Two are based on the sketches I started with back in early January, the other is freestyle. I've used the same Honeybee Stamps 6x6 patterned paper pad for both the layout and the card.  I was really enjoying the fresh zingy colours. Here's a quick reminder of the sketch... And I did plump for the circular photographs in the end.  My main struggle was with which photos would cut down to a circle.  A lot of the prints I had weren't the right ratio or didn't have enough background to crop down.  Perhaps thinking ahead when I'm printing is the way forward if I want to use shaped photos (or buying a home printer, which I've always discounted before because I'm sure I'll break it frequently and I don't have a tech support in house!) The alpha dies are from Concord and 9th and were perfect because they cut both an inner and an outer.  Without the black outline the letters just don't show up.  And #BeMoreJe...

I always look out for the Pantone colour of the year announcement.  I was a little disappointed to see 'magenta' because in my mind that is pink and it is no secret I don't like the colour pink.  However I had a look at the Pantone website and the more I looked at the colour Viva Magenta the less pink it looked.   Maybe I can get on board with this years colour! To my eye, from looking at a screen, it shows as fairly red.  It has bluey undertones but really doesn't read as pink.  I looked through my inks and found the best matches were Distress Oxide Lumberjack Plaid and Gina K Cherry Red.  When I looked through my patterned papers I found my best match were from some old Doodlebug 6x6 petite print packs. I have thrown these together with this month's Stick It Down sketch and come up with this card   Alphabet dies from Heffy Doodle; birthday stamp and die from Alex Syberia Designs. I've not hit the colour spot on, I know, but it's what I can do with wh...

 Hello!  Here's my take on December's Stick It Down sketch...     I'm a fan of this sketch (if I can say that about my own sketch?!) as it is so versatile.   I have switched the circles out for tags.  I reckon the design will work for the majority of shapes - I quite fancy having a go with stars.  The challenge would be finding a photo that would crop well.   I have been enjoying my advent calendar this month.  I've got a couple of mini blending brushes which I was keen to try out.  I pulled out a Skull and Cross Buns stencil and a few Pinkfresh inks and had some pastel fun for the background.  Wanting to carry on play with the blending brushes I coloured up a few white tags too.  My attempts at ombre blending were iffy but I'm pleased with them nonetheless. I added detailing to the tags and background using a couple of Jen Schow stamp sets and a grey ink.  I thought black ink would be too harsh with the pastel colour pale...