Totally Techniques - Masking Technique

Welcome back beautiful people to another Totally Techniques Design Team blog hop this month featuring Masking Techniques. . .

Hopefully you have come from Heather's Blog - isn't she incredible? I love how we have all used such different stamp sets and colours.

Here is my creation:

With the advent of the new "in colours" for 2016 I am challenging myself to use brighter colours and to embrace the bright and busy DSPs so I hope that you are shocked out of your socks by this little creation. . .

It is a rectangle card which I made with the full width of our A4 cardstock. The base is Pumpkin Pie, Mounted with Melon Mambo and then a piece of the glorious if overwhelming Festive Birthday Designer Series Paper. I used the reverse side of the one page for the contrasting stripes to break up the colour a little. I have also lined the inside of the card with a piece of Melon Mambo, mounted with Whisper White and thin strip of the striped DSP.

What have I masked you may be asking yourself? Well I am still a traditionalist when it comes to stamping even if I am stepping out in the colour department. I masked the cacti, the flowers and the decorations across the top of the stamped area. And being old fashioned I masked using post it notes. The stamp set is the Birthday Fiesta which is really versatile for children's cards - I can tell already that this is going to be a favourite in our house. . .

The cacti were easy to stamp, mask and stamp with stamped off ink. The flowers likewise were really simple - I wanted to marry in the background DSP a little and this seemed the most obvious way to do it. . . I loved using the border stamp for the decorations - being photo polymer I was able to shape the stamp to the curve I wanted and then stamp in Melon Mambo. I made a mask with post it notes then stamped with the same border stamp but with a slightly different curve in Pumpkin Pie.

The llama is stamped in Tip Top Taupe on Sahara Sand and cut out using the matching framelit from the Fiesta Time Framelit set. The blanket on the llama's back was stamped in Melon Mambo on Whisper White and the floral pattern is actually meant to be a banner stamp but lends itself to this blanket perfectly. I fussy cut the blanket.

I added two stand alone cactus cut out with the matching framelits for interest. and dimension. I balanced the whole layout with Whisper White Mini Pompom Trim to contrast with the bright colours. Because I haven't added texture to this card I thought some dimension would be good. You can see from the photo above how many layers I have incorporated. The sentiment comes from the Crazy for You set.

Trusting that you have found some inspiration for the technique of the stamp set.

Please take the time to check out the others creations from our design team.  Check out Alison's amazing project here!

Thanks for stopping by.

Shanni xx

Order of Masking Technique Blog Hop

Patrice Halliday-Larsen

Amy Koenders

Shelagh Freemantle

Erna Logtenberg

Heather Wright-Porto

Shannean Moncrieff (that's me)

Alison Solven

Fancy Folds - Lever Cards

Welcome back to another month with the Fancy Folds Design Team, thanks for stopping by. . .

This month we are making Lever Cards, which are sometimes called tunnel or hinged cards, irrespective of the name I hope you are enjoying the amazing creations.  If you have just hopped over from Frenchie's Blog I know you are feeling inspired.

Here is my creation this month:

I am really excited by the new papers in the Annual Catalogue and simply adore the Floral Boutique Designer Series Paper.  If you are looking for a video on how to make Lever Cards I suggest you check out Frenchie's simple video. My card is slightly different in that it is a square card (in Australia it is 14.8cm square but the imperial measurement is 6 inches square).

The Floral Boutique DSP is stunning and of course matches the Floral Phrases stamp set and Detailed Floral Framelits. There are other items in the suite all incorporating the beautiful Night of Navy and Whisper White colour scheme very reminiscent of Spode China. Today I have used the Floral Phrases stamp set only.

My cardbase is the thick Whisper White cardstock, layered with a square of Night of Navy with a square of Floral Boutique DSP on top of that. I used Square Framelits to cut the void in the front and cut though three layers of cardstock at one time to ensure that everything lined up perfectly. I then used the next sized (larger) square framelit to cut the DSP just that little bit wider. I kept the square of night of Navy cardstock cut out of the base mount to use as the mount for the stamped image.

The featured stamped image is the floral stamp from Floral Phrases; I simply stamped it upside down once I had lined up the top image, I married the bottom to be a bit of a reflection even though they are not mirrored images. The sentiment is from the same set. I love how the stamp inks unevenly so the image looks a bit vintage. The Whisper White base was narrower than the sentiment so I cut off the words "to you" but the message/intention is still clear.

I adore bling and couldn't resist mounting the stamped square (which was cut with a complementary sized square framelit to the Night of Navy mount) on a square of Silver Glimmer Paper which I cut to a corresponding size to the mount and top layer.

Because my card is square I adjusted the z-fold insert that fits the card and makes the lever or hinge work. Rule of thumb your insert needs to be 3/4 the size of the base card with a little extra for tabs. Your scoring is always half the width of the closed card. In this instance my closed card was 14.8cm or 6 inches square so the score mark was at 7.4cm (3 inches) then 14.8cm (6 inches) and I allowed an extra 2cm (1 inch) for the tabs and cut them exactly like Frenchie's video.

I couldn't resist stamping the border stamp from Floral Phrases in Night of navy to add continuity to the card patterns.

The card looks quite nice when it is completely opened up and the navy and white colour scheme is perfect for any occasion. If you plan to make it a birthday card or wedding card my suggestion would be to make the square cut out larger to allow room for a sentiment of that nature. The size of the cut out doesn't effect the function of the card and this is a really great card to utilise your collection of framelits with.

Let's hope you have found some inspiration in my colour scheme and use of stamps. This new suite is already proving a favourite of mine.

Why not head over and check out out next Design Team blogger Anne Granger

Until next month stay crafty!

Shanni xx

Order of Lever Card Blog Hop

Patrice Halliday-Larsen

Tanja Kolar

Delphine Lorelli

Martha Inchley

France Poitras Martin

Shannean Moncrieff (that's me)

Anne Granger