Green and Grey Frog and Lilypad

This is one of my favourite cards that I've made over the past few weeks. It was made for a good friend (he was actually our best man).

I bought the stamp at the Sincerely Yours show at Lincoln from the Ali-Craft stall. They are a set of stamps made exclusively for them, and this particular character is called Filbert!!

This is also my entry to the following challenges:

• Cuttlebug Challenge - Garden Critters (the legged-variety)
• Caardvarks - Birthday Card
• Papertake Weekly - In The Garden
• Creative Card Crew - To Die For

So, to begin with I stamped the Filbert image, from the Angel Art Ugly Bugs Filbert stamp set, using Versafine Onyx Black archival pigment ink onto sage green card and cut him out. The eyes part of the image was stamped onto white card and the lilypad image was also stamped onto the sage green card and cut out.

The frog image was shaded using a selection of grey Copic markers, and the lilypad was coloured using yellow and grey Copic markers.

A white octagon was die cut using a Nestabilities die and the frog image was stamped in the centre of it so that the eyebrows can be seen. The cut out frog, eyes and lilypad were then adhered over the stamped image and the white octagon was then matted onto a sage green scalloped octagon, also cut out using a Nestabilities die.

The outside of the lilypad image was then highlighted using a blue Copic marker.

A panel of the green and grey plaid paper from the HOTP Heritage paper pad was matted onto the sage green card and attached to the card blank. White card candy from Craftwork Cards were added at the corners. Anita's 3D gloss was added to the eyes to highlight them.

What I didn't yet mention is that this is version two of my little frog - the first one had to be scrapped as the bottle of 3D gloss decided to explode all over the first one and wasn't recoverable!! And glossing the eyes was a bit of an afterthought and I was starting to think it was a really bad idea, but I was really pleased with the final result.

Brown and Gold Mica Agapanthus Golden Wedding Anniversary

This is the card I made for my hubby's aunt and uncle who recently celebrated their Golden Wedding Anniversary.  I had already made a card for my in-laws to send and decided to use my new set of Penny Black stamps to make this card.

I was actually inspired by someone demonstrating the Penny Black stamps at the Lincoln Craft Show (Sincerely Yours) at the end of May so thank you to whoever that was.

I am also entering this card into the following blog challenges:

• Papertake Weekly - In The Garden
• Tuesday Taggers - Anniversary
• Theme Thursday - Something Round

I began by die-cutting a circle mask from a Post-It note and placing it off-centre on a square of white card. Using Cut 'n' Dry foam, the edges of the panel and up to the mask were colour distressed using the Mustard Seed, Wild Honey and Walnut Stain Tim Holtz Distress inks.

The Post-It note mask was then removed and the flower images were then stamped over the white area using the Agapanthus stamp from the Penny Black Allegro stamp set and the Walnut Stain ink. Gold Lustre mica powder from Stamps Away was then dusted over the whole image highlighting the flower images and the the distressing around the edges. Unfortunately, the shimmer that the mica powders give to the image wasn't captured by the scanned image.

The image panel was then matted onto a panel of brown glimmer card and a length of white organza ribbon was knotted and wrapped around the panel.

A strip of the beige and brown vines paper from the Docrafts V&A Quilts paper pad was distressed using the Wild Honey and Walnut Stain inks and matted onto the brown glimmer card. The image panel was attached over the V&A paper strip and the sentiment was stamped in the bottom right corner of the card blank using the Stamps Away 'Happy Anniversary' stamp and the Walnut Stain ink.

Off to The Lincoln Craft Show

Well, having said I was going to be in bed by midnight, it's now 1am and I'm still up!

Got to get up in seven hours to get ready to go to the Lincoln Craft Show. I'm going prepared with my rucksack and not taking a coat - I made that mistake at Farnborough and had to carry it around for most of the day!!

So, hopefully I'll find some bargains and some new stash to play with.

I'm also hoping to meet up with some Docrafts forum buddies - so hopefully I'll see you at midday at the coffee place!! As I said, I'll be the one hoiking around a red rucksack shivering and wishing I'd brought my coat!!!