Happy Wedding Day Kim and Stu!

Today is our friends Kim and Stus wedding day! So today i have the card that i have made to give them:

This card uses a beautiful stampset from the Spring Mini Catalogue called 'You Are Loved'. It is the most perfect stampset to create cards for engagements, weddings, anniversarys, valentines day and plenty more occassions too:

Isn't it just stunning!! I couldn't resist making a card with this set!! To create Kim and Stus wedding card i 'Heat Embossed' the heart image using 'White Embossing Powder' onto some 'Pool Party' card. I mounted this onto a piece of 'Early Espresso' card. Then on a piece of 'Whisper White' card i embossed the bottom of the card using the 'Big Shot' and the 'Square Lattice Embossing Folder'. I ran a piece of 'Pool Party' 'Ruffled Ribbon' and then glued the heart image onto it. I heat embossed the sentiment (from the 'Teeny Tiny Wishes' set) onto some 'Pool Party' card and punched it out using the 'Word Window Punch'. I finished this card off by mounting it onto an 'Early Espresso' cardbase!!

I hope Kim and Stu like this card and have a fantastic wedding day!!

Cate's 'Outlined Occasions' Card

Hey all, hope you're having a good week. Today i have a card to share with you that Cate designed and shared with us at Jades crafty gathering last Saturday. It featured the wonderful 'Sale-a-bration' stampset 'Outlined Occasions':

On a strip of 'Wisteria Wonder' we randomly stamped the small flower from the 'Fruit & Flowers' stampset in 'Wisteria Wonder' ink to create a background. On the centre of this piece of card we stamped the 'thanks' sentiment from the 'Outlined Occasions' set in 'Versamark' and then 'White Embossed' it.  We coloured in the sentiment using a 'Perfect Plum' 'Stampin' Write Marker'. We punched three small flowers from the 'Itty Bitty Punch Pack' and glued them randomly in place, finishing them off with some 'Basic Rhinestones' to add a little bling!

We glued this onto a piece of 'Whisper White' and then each side we pierced some holes using the 'Paper Piercing Tool' and the 'Mat Pack' to make sure the lines are all nice and straight!! Finally we glued this onto a 'Wisteria Wonder' cardbase!!

I just love this card and the design! Thanks Cate! It's a great way of showcasing the fab 'Sale-a-bration' set that is available at the moment!! Don't forget you can earn this stampset for FREE, just by making a qualifying order of £45 or more. But don't forget the sale-a-bration promotion is only on until the end of the month so you'll have to get your order in soon. Email it over today: amyjtidd@gmail.com

Mock Croc Technique (and tutorial!)

Hi everyone! Yesterday i went to a Stampin' Up! meeting with my team - the Blue Angels. There was 10 of us at the meeting at it was lovely to catch up with everyone and share ideas. Cate organised a couple of lovely make and take projects (which i will share with over the next week or so!) and we also did some swap projects. Basically we all made one project and produced it 10 times and swapped them with one another - which means i now have lots of lovely projects to share with all my CraftyThINKers!

Anyway i decided to do something a bit different for my swaps. I have seen the 'mock croc' technique online - it is basically a technique where you can 'alter' a simple piece of card creating it into a piece of faux leather (I'm therefore entering this into 'CupCake Craft Challenge', this weeks challenge is 'Alter It') that looks like this:

I have seen this technique used in several tutorials online and thought i'd give it a go to create some bookmarks for my swaps - the finished product looked like this:

Would you like to know how to create this effect? Well here you go - for the first time ever on my Crafty ThINKer blog i have created a step-by-step technique tutorial:

Step 1:

Start with a piece of cardstock and cut it to size - it can be any colour you like - in this tutorial i use 'Chocolate Chip'

Step 2:

Then dab your 'Versa Mark' (which can be found in the Stampin' Up catty) completely over your cardstock.

Step 3:

Next sprinkle 'Clear Embossing Powder' completely over your card!

Step 4:

Now use your 'Bone Folder' to squiggle lines through your clear embossed cardstock - don't think about it too much just do it nice and quickly!

Step 5:

Then use your 'Heat Tool', heat your 'Clear Embossing Powder' to create a shiny texture.

Final Product:

And you end up with a faux leather effect!!! Clever huh!

The bookmarks:

You can actually create 14 bookmarks from one piece of A4 card!! As i said before i used 'Chocolate Chip' cardstock. To create the toppers i stamped some tortoises from the 'Fox and Friends' stampset onto 'Very Vanilla' cardstock - using 'Soft Suede' and 'Wild Wasabi' 'Stampin' Write Markers'. I punched them out using a '1-3/8" Circle Punch' and mounted them on some 'Wild Wasabi' 'Scallop Circles'.

Here's a final close-up:

Sorry for the massively long post - hope you have found the tutorial useful - i would love to see any projects that you make using these techniques - please email me any pics of your crafty makes!!

Now... one final thing - tomorrow is the launch of the Crafty Boots Challenge Site - as you may know i'm a member of the design team! I'd love as many of you CraftyThINKers to get involved with the challenge! I'll be keeping an eye out for you all!!!