LIM DT: Black & Aquamarine (#480)

For the new clean and simple card challenge at Less is More for the next fortnight, we have a colour theme – black and aquamarine. I have to admit looking up what sort of shade aquamarine is and decided it was on the greenish side of turquoise/teal. I picked out a light and dark shade from my distress crayons and basically used them as watercolours to fill in the stamped image. Here’s the final result:

Aquamarine and black coloured tiles with happy birthday sentiment

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AAA Cards DT: Inspired by song, book or movie

A themed challenge this week over at AAA Cards: a clean and simple card design based on your favourite song, book or movie. As normal, I worked through my stash and sought out which bits and bobs I could use to make my design team sample card. I’ve fudged my response to the theme a little… Here’s my homage to ‘every black and white movie ever made’:

inspired by a movie Continue reading

LIM DT: Outdoors

It’s another challenge over at the clean and simple challenge blog, Less is More. This time, we’re invited to make our projects on the theme of ‘outdoors’. There were many choices within my (extensive) stash, but since I am working in watercolour in an online course I am following, this stamp stood out…

watercoloured outdoors scene
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LIM DT: Colour wheel

It’s a relatively easy challenge over at Less is More this week – use two or more colours from a traditional colour wheel. I love the contrast that complementary colours bring, so have stuck with just purple/violet and yellow for my colour scheme:

colour wheel - purple and yellow burst around birthday sentiment Continue reading

AAA Cards DT: Sketch ± thankful #226

It’s a sketch challenge over at AAA Cards blog this week – use the supplied card outline to inspire your design with the optional theme of ‘thankful’. My card is possibly the quickest and simplest I have done for the design team and I’m wondering if it will be inspiring or not! Still, it keeps to the sketch and is clean and simple so it counts 🙂


thankful washi tape card design

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Wanderlust 2022: Watercolours – weeks 29-35

I’ve procrastinated a bit on my homework for this section as I and watercolours often do not get on well together. The lessons have been great on Wanderlust 2022, with each of the tutors carefully and patiently explaining the techniques they use so that they are, in the main, replicable. Here are my results from weeks 29-35…

Various mixed media techniques on papers other than watercolour paper have generally worked ok. I still haven’t fallen in love with watercolours as a medium, but am glad I have tried them. Oh, and buying decent tube watercolours made such a difference to the vibrancy of the colours over the student quality hard pan collections I normally use.

AAA Cards DT: Colour theme ± dots #224

A new challenge has just been published over at the AAA Cards challenge blog. This time, it is to create a clean and simple card using a colour theme set by a photo with the optional extra of using dots. I picked out the primary four colours from the inspiration photo and spent a bit of time matching them to archival ink colours before stamping them onto white card using the same dotty stamp. Now, I usually avoid layers on my CAS cards, but most guidelines specify no or few layers so I feel I can get away with two. I like the individual pieces’ drop shadows and the depth they provide.

dotty colour theme birthday card

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LIM DT: Black and white colour scheme

This ended up being a fast and simple card once I had chosen the stamps! The challenge over at Less is More for the next fortnight is to create a clean and simple card using just black and white. I was tempted to add shades of grey as shadows and to add some depth but decided it wouldn’t meet the challenge.

black and white folk art foliage card Continue reading

AAA Cards DT: Small and few #221

A little challenge over at AAA Cards this fortnight, with the main theme being ‘small and few’. The optional twist is to add (lady)bugs to your clean and simple card design. Here’s my take on the theme:

floral corner with added ladybugs

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LIM DT: Butterflies

Over at Less is More, there’s a new theme challenge for your clean and simple cards/makes – ‘butterflies’. Clean and simple means minimal layers, and lots of blank space, drawing attention to the stamping/colouring/sentiment. Here’s my one layer take on the theme, using watercolour pencils and a bit of distress ink over a mask to get the blue band across the middle:

butterflies themed card Continue reading