It’s a colour challenge this week over at AAA Cards’ clean and simple challenge blog. Our task is to choose a side (of the colour wheel) – either hot or cold. Most of my art includes warm colours, so I thought this time I would take on the cold side. This meant choosing purples, blues and greens and I turned to the distress palette for my inspiration card:
We have a new type of theme at Less is More this week – working through the alphabet. Unsurprisingly, we start with A and the chosen item is ‘automobile’. I went through all my stamps and found just one featuring a car. I used that recently (actually not so recently I discover) and decided to look a little further. A quick internet search later, I found a suitable file I could edit and cut out with my Silhouette electronic cutter and came up with this:
One benefit of being on the AAA Cards design team is that the themes are set a year in advance. This allows me to work without last-minute deadlines – for instance, I’m writing this between Christmas and New Year 2022. It also means that you can get in early with your design so that there is minimal chance of duplicating ideas. On this occasion, one of my teamies had already posted a card using torn edges as a mask, so I have gone on a slightly different tack with my card.
Another ‘anything goes’ theme at the Less is More clean and simple challenge blog. This time it doesn’t have to be a one-layer card which leaves a little leeway for embellishments and matting to be added if needed. Remember that clean and simple requires a large amount of white space around your chosen elements. I’ve elected to add a little dimension to my card by lifting up the butterfly wings. I also added a little star dust to the wings which doesn’t completely show up in the pic. Here’s my finished inspiration piece for the challenge:
So, Easter is an optional twist on this week’s clean and simple card challenge over at AAA Cards. The main challenge is to use a shaped card that isn’t square or rectangular, with the suggestion that egg-shaped cards might be fun. Well, Easter celebrations, for me, are more than chocolate eggs, fluffy bunnies and cute chicks so I came up with this card instead:
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:
I’ve had a few problems with my laser cutter over the last six weeks or so… One of the cables was causing intermittent faults. The presumption was that after four years of use, it was gradually fracturing. I managed to keep the machine limping on until I replaced the cable this week. As a result, I’ve had to feed projects into the machine through a slot so that the lid was barely lifted – an interesting exercise.
It would have been fine if I had not been asked to do several projects in those weeks. A small group craft session for church folk, the ‘Be Still’ evening and a large group craft session for my church’s retired men’s group. All of these needed kitting out with laser-cut items.
Here are the projects I designed and crafted for the small group and the men’s group. They feature crosses for the Easter season. Both are available as workshops at the Studio for groups of up to eight people. To book, just get in contact with me.
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’:
The Less is More challenges are back from their Christmas/New Year break! The first this year is a one-layer card challenge – the image must be printed or stamped directly onto the card blank, with no additional layers and no embellishments. The theme is open – anything goes. Here’s my abstract design team card for your inspiration:
I was asked to run a craft table at a recent ‘Be Still’ community event at my church. The aim of the evening was to take the chance for attendees to have some ‘me’ time with massages, facials, mindfulness sessions as well as the craft table. I looked for all sorts of inspiration and didn’t really find any. I then stumbled on some photos of retro signage and decided to go with the theme. I created six different laser-cut wood signs, each with a typical self-affirming phrase often linked to mindfulness sessions. For each, I spent a long time finding a relevant Bible verse or passage to move it from self-centred to God-centred.
