BA Inspiration Post with Pure Floral Gerbera stencil

 Hello friends!

Happy Wednesday!

It's time for some inspiration with me!

Today I wanted to showcase the Uniko Pure Floral Gerbera stencil and paired it with English Country Garden butterflies with two different looks!

Card#1

Who are ready for fall!!! I love the fall colors as the leaves begin to change and the weather turns cooler!

Here is my interpretation of the fall colors........

I started with using Distress inks and white pigment ink using the Gerbera floral stencil in fall colors. After blending the inks I fussy cut the floral image.

On a white piece of CS, I used MOD background Builder stencil and stamped the sentiment from the Yes, You Are stamp set. I love the soft look background with stripes!

Then stamped the largest butterfly and watercolored it with my ZIG watercolor brushes, die cut it.

In the end, I assembled all the elements with some die-cut leaves. 

Card#2

Once again I used the Pure Florals Gerbera Stencil to showcase its beauty!

I started with white pigment ink on a wine-red CS. For a detailed and deep look at the centre, I overlapped the centre with aged mahogany DI.

I stencilled the flower 2 times with the same method. Now on a white CS base at the top, I stencilled some wonky stripes look by overlapping it using Wonky stripe stencil with the same colors.

Now added a sentiment white strip with my inked flowers and some cute stamped flutters-by. I accented it with some white pearls and some Posco white paint dots in the centre of the flowers.

Hope you enjoyed it!

Happy crafting with Vinita!!

 

Mixed Media Monday - Guest Brand Ambassador Trish Latimer

 Happy Monday & Shiny New Week! 

Today I am bring a new feature to the blog and a theme that from an Instagram poll not long ago revealed that many of you would like to see more of, Mixed Media. As you know I lean towards clean & simple, but it is a style I dabble in now and then. More so when I was lucky enough to have a feature in Craft Stamper magazine. This of which leads me nicely to introducing our Guest Brand Ambassador to kick off this feature. Please give a warm Uniko welcome to Trish Latimer.

I'm Trish Latimer, full time mixed media artist. Former editor of Craft Stamper, current addict of all things painty! You can usually find me in my studio covered in paint, glue and very occasionally glitter too......

www.instagram.com/trishlatimerart

For this art panel, I scraped some texture paste through the Wonky Stripes Stencil and let it dry. Creating the rainbow is great fun, although a little messy! I used acrylic inks, but paint will work too. Simply add a small dot of colour, then spray with water. The colour will move around, giving a washed out look. The important thing to remember is to make sure each colour is dry before adding the next, otherwise you'll end up with a muddy mess. 

Once the rainbow was done, I added splats of white paint and the stamped words. This panel was glued to a wooden box frame, but of course this effect can be done as a flatter project, in an art journal or as a greetings card front.

Another art panel, but a totally different look! This one is a much more pastel affair. I painted pieces of card in my chosen colour scheme (of course you can use ready coloured card!) and then white embossed lots of designs all over them. I drew a scallop shaped template, and used this to cut down my card. Each identical scallop nesting underneath the next. 

I used the diamond shaped stamps from Background Builders Delightful Diamonds as the flower 'petals', white embossing those, cutting them put and then gluing them together. The flower stem was created by wrapping white cord around a bamboo skewer, then trimming to size. 

Again, I put this panel onto a wooden box frame for display, but the idea is another than can be easily transferred to cards!

WOW! Are you picking your jaw up off the floor like I am right now? 

Trish had no idea what products I was sending and has created two fabulous mixed media projects with completely different feels and I am inspired by them both. I am loving the rainbow colours and dimension of the first card and texture paste is something I always neglect to use but the results like Trish has achieved is amazing. Then we have the soft pastel shades with beautiful white embossing and creative flower making on the second. 

I hope you have enjoyed todays feature and a big THANK YOU to Trish for inspiring us all. 

Crafty Hugs

 

BA Inspiration - Wonky Stripes Rule!

 Morning all, Julie here with a little bit of Wonky Stripe inspiration! Here are four cards made using the two wonky stripe stamps and the wonky stripe stencil.

My first card was inspired by the challenge at CAS Mix up, where their theme is stencils and rainbow colours and a GD spot over at ATSM where the theme is stencils and die cuts.

I used a selection of DIs to ink my rainbow on an A6 panel of white card through the Wonky Stripe stencil, stamped the die cut Originally Organic Additions elements and coloured them with Copic markers. A couple of strips of linen effect card frame half the stenciled panel. I used scrap pieces of linen effect card and they were just a little too small so added a couple of slivers of gold mirri card to fill the gap. A sentiment from Pure Floral peony was stamped on black and embossed with gold EP, picking up the gold strips.

My second card uses the other half of the inked panel and a fussy cut large peony bloom.

A panel of linen effect card was glued over the stenciled panel and the fussy cut bloom added. I decided to leave the peony uncoloured as I thought it would detract from the rainbow edge. The sentiment is from the same Pure Florals- Peony set.

As with the last card I used a rainbow panel but this time I used the BB Wonky Stripe stamp.

It's difficult to use embossing and Copics without making a mess of your pens, so the trick is to stamp in a pale coloured ink, I used Altenew's Limestone, colour the image and then add the embossing over the top. If you use your Misti, just leave the stamp in place and make sure that you put your stamped panel back exactly where it was before. Don't cut it down until the embossing is complete!

Again as the background was quite lively, I used the simple outline of the small peony bloom from Pure Florals -Peony over my trimmed down panel. The coloured panel and bloom were added to an A6 note card on pads and a sentiment strip stamped with a greeting from the same Peony set completes.

Finally, I just had to use the large gerbera stencil again with the solid BB Solid Wonky Stripes as an accent along the bottom.

After inking the stencil with Mustard Seed and Twisted Citron in the center and Spiced Marmalade DI for the petals, I added detail with a matching Zig watercolour pen and blended the center of the flower with a little more Twisted Citron. The stencil doesn't have a stem, so I added one free hand and coloured it with green Zig pens.  

On a strip of white card, I stamped a couple of times with the BB Solid Wonky Stripes stamp in Altenew's Obsidian ink. My pad is still quite new and juicy so there is a little splatter where it shouldn't be but I think I got away with it! On another A6 note card, I added the stamped panel, then the trimmed down gerbera. 

My sentiment strip is made up from the words from two different sets Beautiful and Bee Happy. Once I got them laid out on my Misti, I stamped a few more to use in other projects, as its quite tricky to get the words lined up. You never know when you'll need a sentiment strip!

And take a deep breath... 

Hope you liked the ideas here, I sort of got carried away with my theme!

Anyway, look after yourselves and keep crafting until next time.

Stencil Sunday - Colourful Wonky Stripes & Striking Silhouettes

Happy Sunday & welcome to another Stencil Sunday!

I'm not gonna lie, this past week has been a tough one, lockdown life has been a struggle and I am trying to keep up the positivity and battle through. Finding some mojo to create has been hard, but this afternoon I forced myself to come in my studio and make something.

It actually felt good and I was happy when two of my favourite challenges could be combined to make one CAS card! First I used CAS Colours & Sketches HERE for my colour inspiration and then AAA Cards HERE for my one layer & product choice! 

These colours are so cheerful and I chose to ink up the Stencil - Wonky Stripes with them. I used a little bit of masking to ink up each of the individual lines and then used my MISTI to stamp the foliage silhouette from Happy Days. 

The sentiment is also from Happy Days and I think it is rather appropriate for these current times. I've decided to schedule in 30 minutes each day, dedicated purely to creating a card and having that 'me time' in my happy place.

That's all from me today, time for me to go and get my two not so little monkeys to go to sleep! Thanks for stopping by and I hope you are all hanging in there too.

Crafty Hugs Bev x

Celebrate World Card Making Day 2020!

 Happy Weekend

& 

Happy World Card Making Day 2020!

I hope everyone is having a lovely day & those in the UK are staying warm and dry. It's a very wet day here in the North East and the perfect kind of day to stay in and create! Which is exactly what I have been up to today ;)

I've been inspired by the changing colours from Summer to Autumn on my morning walk to school with The Beans and like the card I shared for the Uniko Challenge Reminder HERE, I decided to use Altenew Warm & Cozy ink collection for my card today.

It's been a while since I used the Uniko Stencil - Wonky Stripes. Here I have used the masking technique to ink the individual stripes in each of the four ink colours.

I've then embellished my card with a floral bouquet and sentiment from Wonderful Day. Brand Ambassador Jane has been using this clear stamp set recently and totally inspired me to dust mine off! I'm so glad I did, as I really like how this Autumnal card turned out.

As it is a celebration today and I am feeling a little sad with not being at Happy Stampers Festival today, I have a BIG Giveaway to add some cheer to the day!

The Prize valued at over £85* contains a few of my favourite Uniko products:-

Alphabet Outlined

BIG & BOLD Happy Clear Stamps & Designer Dies

BIG & BOLD Wish Clear Stamps & Designer Dies

Hello Lovely Clear Stamp Set

Stunning Snowflakes Clear Stamp Set

Designer Die Sparkling Snowflake

Stencil - Let it Snow 

*If the randomly selected winner already owns any or all of the prize contents 

a suitable replacement will be offered.

HOW TO WIN!

There are a few ways to enter the giveaway...

1. Leave a comment on this blog post.

2. Comment on the Facebook post. An extra entry if you share the giveaway post on FB.

3. Instagram - Be a GENUINE Follower of Uniko, Like, Comment, Tag a Friend/s to tell them about the giveaway, Share on your IG stories for an extra entry. 

You CAN enter on all 3 social media platforms. 

The giveaway will close at Midnight GMT Sunday 4th October 2020.

The winner will be randomly selected from all the social media platforms combined and announced early next week. Any comments left after the close of the giveaway will not be included.

Crafty Hugs Bev x

Brand Ambassador - Pure Florals - Rose

Welcome, it's Julie here with some Brand Ambassador inspiration for you.

I love the Pure Florals Rose stamps, they are great to colour with either Copics or with watercolours, but for this card I decided to leave the single bloom uncoloured after seeing this card on Pinterest.

I first created the background by inking through the Wonky Stripes stencil with Altenew Silverstone ink onto an A6 panel of white card, keeping the edges soft. I then die cut a panel of hearts from vellum A couple of the rose leaves were stamped on white card and I used inks to colour in a watercolour effect using blue greens to match with the stenciled background, before fussy cutting. The stamped small rose was fussy cut and I die cut some leaves from the same white card. The cluster of hearts behind the rose is a die, cut  from a piece of vellum. 

On a strip of white card, I had previously inked with the same Silverstone ink, I stamped the Always and Forever sentiment, from the Always and Forever set, in black.

Once I had everything ready, I started to assemble my card, keeping the bloom to the right of middle of the panel, adding the sentiment strip across the bottom of the rose. Always tricky to attach vellum to a project with out the glue showing through, I only added glue behind the leaves and bloom, sort of trapping it between flower cluster and background.

Finally I popped the finished panel up on foam pads over a 5 x 7 white base card. 

I designed this card for my daughter whose TA is getting married next month but after seeing the finished card, she decided it needed some bling adding and she preferred it without the border so here is the card she took away.

So that's all from me for this month. Hope I have inspired you to dig out your pretty flora stamps and have a go and see back here soon.

Stencil Sunday

Hi it's Julie and welcome to another Stencil Sunday at Uniko.

Today I'm going to share a couple of cards made using a wreath builder/ turnabout stamping jig that some of you may be familiar with. If you haven't got one here is a link to how to make your own.

Some of you may even have used one with your stamps to create some fun cards, like I did here, but this time I'm going to use a couple of stencils. I was inspired to have a go after seeing this Jennifer McGuire video.

My first card uses the wonky stripes stencil and the So Much clear stamp set.

I used Distress Inks in a rainbow palette and rotated the card panel under my stencil every time I changed colour.

1.  Tape your wreath template down so that you can place the stencil over the top, securing across one edge to create a hinge. This will allow you to lift it and move the card panel around.
2. Place your card panel to be inked, into the template, ensuring that at least one corner will fit snugly into the bottom left corner.
3. Lay a piece of tape or masking paper over the area you don't wish to add ink to.
4. Ink the area required then rotate the square to the next corner and ink again.
5. Continue until you have completed all 7 rotations.

If your square is the same size as the jig then you will end up with a space for stamping in the centre, but don't worry if it is not completely symmetrical as you can always add a die cut over the middle!

Once my panel was complete, I mounted it on a slightly larger piece of black card stock and then onto a 5" square white card base. From matching card, I cut a circle and stamped my sentiment in black before mounting it up on foam over the coloured panel.

This second card uses the Broken Lines stencil and a more restricted palette.

I followed the same technique, rotating my card panel in the jig and keeping the stencil in the same place with some tape. This is a slightly larger panel so you have to be careful and remember which corner you rotate! A larger white die cut circle completes with the addition of an ombre coloured thanks from All Occasions Sentiments #6, fussy cut after stamping and colouring with Copics.

The panel was mounted on a panel of  matching paper and then onto a 5" square base card.

You can use a rectangular panel but you need to be aware that the pattern will be slightly different depending on where you place your corner!
 The link to the You Tube video shows you much better than I can describe so it may be a good idea to check it out if you need a more visual tutorial.

That's all from me for today, I hope I've inspired you to look at your stencils differently and have a play!