A Week Of Bling Cards!

Ok, ok, I admit, I've been rather slack with updating my blog, but can you blame me? We have had some lovely weather the last couple of weekends in Melbourne, and we couldn't resist going down to the beach at Torquay - warms days spent swimming, surfing, bodyboarding... my idea of heaven! I may love stamping, but I absolutely adore the beach! LOL J

Anyway, back to my most recent card creations. Interestingly, it's been a week of Bling cards for me. On the Penny Black Blog, last week's Card Challenge was to use bling or gems to accent your cards. Coincidentally, on the Hero Arts Blog, one of this month's (November Contest) challenge themes was to "Bling It Up!" Well, if you've seen any of my previous cards, you'll know that I absolutely love bling, so I couldn't resist entering both challenges.

I absolutely love 40-083 Twinkling by Penny Black, and have used it on a number of my cards (see here & here & here). Surprisingly however, until now I've never tried stamping it with silver ink on black card, even though it is one of my favourite techniques for creating simple yet stunning cards (see some examples here & here & here). I love the dramatic look of Encore Ultimate Metallic Silver ink on black cardstock - the silver is so rich & thick that it doesn't get "lost" on the black, as most other colours tend to. For this card, I decided to stay with the classic black, silver & white combination. Some clear rhinestones were added, and a combination of 3 different clear Stickles (Stardust, Crystal & Diamond) as well as White Liquid Pearls was added. Even though Stardust, Crystal & Diamond are all "clear", they each have a different iridescence and when used together can really make your cards sparkle! The greeting is from Penny Black 30-018 cystalline and was punched out using a Fiskars small tag punch.

I continued experimenting with stamping on black with this card. In this case I used Brilliance Galaxy Gold; although not quite as striking as the silver, I didn't mind the subtle gold colour. For a richer gold colour, the image could have been embossed with gold embossing powder (but I was too lazy to get mine out, LOL). The image was trimmed and then decorated with coloured rhinestones & various colours of Stickles glitter glue, and set aside to dry. The background was diecut from white card using Spellbinders Nestabilties Curved Rectangles. Snowflakes from Penny Black 30-007 & 30-018 were stamped randomly with Antique Linen distress ink and "Noel" from 30-035 was stamped with Scattered Straw distress ink. The edges were lightly distressed with more Antique Linen ink. This was then layered on a black card blank which had been edged with Galaxy Gold ink (this was done by gently running the inkpad over the edges of the black card). Once dry, the tree image was adhered to the front of the card with foam tape. "Happy Holidays" from 30-086 was stamped with Versafine Onyx Black onto cream card, then punched out with EK Success 2" Oval punch and edged with Galaxy Gold ink.

4214K simply ornamental

When I first saw 4214K simply ornamental by Penny Black, I immediately thought that the bauble was crying out to be "blinged!" So I definitely had to try it out for this weeks challenge. The one minor problem with using the bauble image from this stamp is that the girl's hand is resting on one side of the bauble. To get around this, I inked up the image carefully (with Memento Tuxedo Black), taking care not to ink the portion where the hand was. After stamping the image onto white card, I then filled in the blank area with a black marker, as well as outlined the rest of the image with it, to give it greater definition. (I used the Letraset Fine Line Drawing Pen, which does not interact with alcohol markers). I then coloured the baubles with TRIA markers, and trimmed them. I added coloured rhinestones to the baubles, as well as Stickles glitter glue. The main bauble was mounted onto some pink card diecut with Lifestyle Crafts Nesting Frame 4. A piece of hot pink card diecut with Spellbinders Nestabilities Labels 17 and embossed with Cuttlebug Polka Dots was used as the background. "Happy Holidays" from 30-086 was stamped with Versafine Onyx Black onto white card and punched out with EK Success 2" Oval punch. Some stickles & bling were also added.

For the Hero Arts Bling Challenge, I decided to use Hero Arts K5376 Hydrangea. I've had this stamp for a few months now, and haven't really used it to make any cards yet. For the first card, I stamped the image with Memento Rich Cocoa ink on white cardstock. Then I diecut the image using Spellbinders Nestabilties Labels 17. I coloured the image with TRIA alcohol markers, and edged the diecut with Tea Dye Distress Ink. Little clear rhinestones were added to the flowers, as well as Stickles. I used Kraft card for the card base. Although Kraft card seems to be very popular in the US, it's not that commonly used here in Australia and can sometimes be a bit hard to get hold of. I was quite happy when I managed to purchase some at the Picture to Page Papercraft Show from my friends at Envelope Solutions. $10 for a stack of 50 pre-scored cards - great value!! I stamped on the Kraft card with Hero Arts H2365 Old French Writing using Brilliance Moonlight White. The Hydrangea image was then attached to the card base, as was a flourish diecut with Die-namics Fancy Flourish. The sentiment is from Hero Arts CL343 Holiday Sayings - it was stamped with Walnut Stain distress ink, and punched out with McGills Vintage Label Punch, and distressed with Walnut Stain ink.

For this card, the Hydrangea was stamped with Memento Tuxedo Black ink, and diecut with Spellbinders Nestabilties Labels Two. The image was coloured withg TRIA alcohol markers and the edges were distressed with Worn Lipstick distress ink. Some stickles were added to the flowers, and distress stickles added to the leaves. Half of the background card was embossed with Cuttlebug Seeing Spots and the other half was stamped with Hero Arts CL482 Dots & Flowers. The sentiment is from Hero Arts CL497 Find Joy.