Meadow-tastic (by Julie)

Hello, today I have two meadow themed cards stamped with Wild Meadow to show you.

I started my first card by inking up various floral stamps from Wild Meadow with dye inks and stamped onto smooth stamping card. I find it easier to start with the lighter coloured inks and then gradually overlay the images with darker inks. Once I had completed the background I carefully blended Broken China Distress ink over the entire card and stamped the sentiment which is from Words of Inspiration. For the tag I inked up the Tagtastic design and stamped it onto a separate piece of stamping card. Then I inked up the floral images as before and stamped onto the tag. It doesn't matter if the images overlap the edges of the tag as you need to cut the tag out anyway. Choose a decorative eyelet from the Tagtastic set and stamp it where you would thread your ribbon. Punch a hole through the eyelet using a crop-o-dile or something similar and then thread your chosen ribbon.

Cut your background to size and mount on top of black card, before attaching to your card blank. The tag was then stuck into place with 3d foam pads.

My second card is a quicker DL version of  the first card. I kept the background clean and simple by just stamping the floral designs onto the card blank and leaving the clean white card showing.

The Tagtastic was stamped onto spare card as before and the floral images added before cutting out. To make the tag stand out I blended Broken China over the entire tag. Threaded the tag with ribbon, before attaching to the front of the card with 3d foam pads.

Thanks for stopping by and please call again for daily Design Team inspiration.

Julie x

Papers and Paint (by Nikki K)

Hello everyone, Nikki K is sharing another sneak peek of those beautiful papers designed by Lesley, and the fabulous new stamps from this month's TV shows on Hochanda. The rest of the Design Team will be sharing their projects with you next month.

Nikki writes:

Morning all,

it's my second post for the Guest Design Team this month, and I've had so much fun with the new stamps! I'm sharing another card with you today using Movie Strip Collage.

 I started this card using the lovely background paper with script from Lesley's new collection of papers, adhered to a card base. The Movie Script Collage stamp was stamped in black ink and embossed clear, to give me an outline. I usually use clear embossing powder quickly over ink, it works well as an embossing ink in most cases, and doesn't leave an embossing powder colour showing where you don't want it. I cut the corners of the card, and shortened the fromt for added detail.

I used the 'tag hole' stamp from Tagtastic to add detail to a couple of corners, and coloured in the flower with acrylic paint in Pthalo Turquoise and Primary Magenta, matching the colours on the card, but just making the flower slightly darker to stand out. The movie strip was painted in a wash of Quinacridone Gold to give it a vintage hue.

I edged the front of the card with Quinacridone Gold, and then went round the card edges with black ink. I repeated the stamping of the film strip on the inside edge of the card, and coloured in a wash of the turquoise and Quin Gold paints.

This stamp is so versatile as you can use parts of it like I have on the inside edge of the card, or you could just use the flower, and fussy cut it and layer it up decoupage style. The papers take paint really well, and it doesn't sit on the surface or resist it, it hardly warped with wet paint on either. They also take inks and stamping really well.

Hope you like my card today, don't forget to check out my teamies' other blog posts.

Best Wishes,

Nikki K.
xxx

Four Panel Card (by Nikki K)

Today we have a post from our Guest Design Team member Nikki. She is giving a sneak peek of the new stamps and designer papers that we brought on the recent TV shows on Hochanda. The Design Team will be sharing their projects with you next month.

Nikki writes:

Hi all,

it's great to be back for my second stint as Guest Designer on the blog for Chocolate Baroque this year. I've been doing some samples over the year too, and wanted to share some with you.

Today I have a card I made for the TV show last week.

I have created a four panel card, using the fab new papers that Lesley had on the show. I absolutely love the inky background look!

I added to the background with second generation stamping in co-ordinating colour inks, using the tag 'holes' from the new Tagtastic stamp, and also stamped the distressed harlequin stamp from a previous show, in grey ink to add detail.

I cut the background paper into four equal parts, putting it neatlyback together and then stamping and heat embossing Movie Strip Collage, first in white one way round, and then in black, turning the image so the white underneath showed as background detail.

I added a spattering of white paint, and roughed up the edges of the pieces of card with scissors. It was then mounted on black card, leaving a gap between the four pieces, just enough to make a feature, but so you can still see the image clearly.

Having the background papers made this a really quick and simple make, but it's still as striking as if I'd painted the background myself.

Hope you like it, don't forget to check out my team mates' other makes on the blog. x

Best Wishes,

Nikki K.

xxx