Happy birthday mouse

Welcome back to my blog. Today I have a happy birthday card to show you. It is made with an image from the insanely cute house mouse stamps. Aren't they just the cutest thing? I wish I had cute mice like these, preferably ones that like cleaning up after me in my creative mess :)

 

 

I have a box with tiny pieces of paperscraps, so I went through it and found five pieces of paper that I thought worked great together. I then got some help from my trusted friend the cuttlebug (which I on occasion call "the cutiebug") to cut out circles using a nesting die. I also made a cardbase using embossed white cardstock. In the lower right corner I cut out an aparture.

 

 

I cut out five hearts in the same scrap papers using a punch and distressed the edges of the circles. I then added the hearts using 3D foam tape to create dimension and make them stand out. Then I added the circles to the frontpanels and handwrote "HAPPY" on the hearts.

 

 

Finally I colored the house mouse image using promarker pens in colors that matched the papers. I cut out around the image, used a rounded corner punch and adhered it to the inside of the card. I also added three strips of paper to the inside. 

 

 

To finish it off I added a handwritten "BIRTHDAY" sentiment and tied the card together with some pink string. 

 
Image: house mouse (I think it's discontinued)

Papers: scraps

Tools: circle nesting die, heart paper punch, promarker pens

Challenges:

Crafty calendar  - anything goes

Creative inspirations  - anything goes

Everybody art - birthday

House mouse  - anything goes

Passion for promarkers - bingo (ribbon, image, sentiment)

Simon says stamp monday challenge - april showers

Simon says stamp wednesday challenge - birthday (SSS is celebrating their 7:th anniversary! CONGRATS!)

Sketch saturday - sketch

 

House mouse card

Today I want to show you a Christmascard I made with one of the adorable house-mouse stamps. I used some leftover papers and ribbons and colored it with promarkers to match the colors of the paper and ta-daa. A quick and easy Christmascard.

Challenges:

Simon says stamp wednesday challenge - Create with critters

I'm FALLing for you

I've had so much fun and been so creative with my card today. It's been a while since I've been up late at night crafting. And even though I know my inspiration is best then, I just haven't had the energy or time to be up so late. But today I finished my homeexam (YEY!) so I allowed myself some crafting time without pressure.

I'm superproud of my card today that I made mainly for the house-mouse challenge blog. They are looking for a guest designer and I would love the opportunity to play more with my mice. The challenge was to make a fall-theme card and as house mouse likes to play with words I just had to us the "FALLing for you" sentiment. Thought it was very clever. I originally thought about making a lovecard, but combining it with fall colours and image only adds dimension to it. I thought it was brilliant if I may say so myself, but maybe I'm not that objective at 2 in the morning :D
I started by cutting out the image with a qk shape (heart and scalloped frame) and then coloring the image with oilpencils. This kind of coloring technique is perfect for fur or if you want colors to blend nicely together. I was actually a bit surprised over how great the leaves turned out. I inked the image with distress ink to take away the white background. After that I inked the frame more so it got a stronger color and embossed with clear ink. The other heart is dryembossed with a cuttlebug die and inked aswell. Finally I cut out some shapes with a cuttlebug and nestabilities die and handwrote the sentiment.

The image I have used is called fall commuters and it was one of my first favourites. The frame is cut out from the same image as the rest of the heart so you can actually see the rest of the image on the frame. I thought it was a cool detail.

Challenges:
Crafty catz - anything goes
House-mouse - fall
Papertake weekly - anything
Stampavie and more - anything goes
Stampin for the weekend - sketch (I started with it, but had to move the green decorations as they didn't fit otherwise, so unsure if I'll qualify, but that's what I used for inspiration)

House mouse ATC

Today I want to show you a cute ATC (artist trading card) I made with one of the adorable HM images. The little stamps are perfect for these kind of projects and are a perfect way to use up those tiny pieces of paper/ribbon/etc. You might think they are faster to make than cards, but since I'm not really used to making them it took almost as long as a card to finish. It's a great way to think outside the box though and a perfect way to let your special bits and pieces shine.

I'm especially proud of the piece of paper I managed to find that looks like the little feather laying on the ground. I also like the colorcombo.

Challenges:

Everybody art - summer
House mouse - ATC
Stampalot challenge - anything
Stampin for the weekend - spots and dots

House mouse 100:th challenge celebration

It's been a while since I played with all the other stamps I have in my stash. I have really missed doing that and entering challenges. During the last few months I've been focusing on my other crafts, but now I feel like I'm slowly coming back. And I'm having a blast.

Today's card is mainly for the house mouse challenge blog. These mice were among the first stamps I fell inlove with, but they were sooo expensive to get here in Sweden. I remember getting my first internet order from the US. Owning my first house mice...I think the love for cute images started right there and then. How could you not love these?

I was very pleased with the card I made yesterday and wanted to continue on the summery feel. Pink/green together with a cute image and butterflies, you just can't go wrong. I used my sewing machine around the edges of the image and pink card and to make a swirl looking like the butterfly's trail. I went over with a glittery pen along those dots and on the flower.

Challenges:

Basic Grey - sketch (I used patterned papers from the urban prairie line)
Everybody art - dots (from the sewing machine trail)
House mouse - buttons, bows and bling
Papertake weekly - getting cute
Stampavie and more - birthday
Stamp and create - ribbons and bows
Stampin for the weekend - animals with 4 legs

So glad I found a friend like you

It's been quite a while since I played with any house mouse images. Since the house mouse challenge blog are having a hop I decided to join in. I don't really have the time as school starts tomorrow, but you need to be able to relax too, right? Housework can wait. I just thought my hobbycorner would be shining from cleaning. Instead it's just sparkling (from glitter unfortunately :D)

The theme for the house mouse challenge was "new beginnings". I wanted to do something clever and thought of this image I've never used before. It's called "finding friendship" and I wanted to play with that theme.

The image is coloured mostly with oilpencils and rubbed with a kind of alcohol. I think it's called gamsol in the US. I only coloured the shade and looking glass with tea green promarker and inked the edges with weathered wood distress ink.. The rest of the card is made with scraps of two different patterned papers (although they look almost the same), an embossed cardstock strip and some trims. I also added two sizes of pale blue pearls in the corners. The text is handwritten as I'm practicing to be happy with my own handwriting for scrapbook layouts.

Challeges for this card:

Cute card thursday - monochromatic
Friday sketchers - sketch
House mouse - new beginnings
Stampin for the weekend - new and blue
Totally gorjuss - cuddly
Winter wonderland - paws (not sure if it needs to ba a X-mas card though because the DT has made others)

French horn Christmas wishes

I'm stuggling on to get all my Christmascads ready on time and make my first card as guest designer for papertake weekly and getting the secret bloghop ready for tomorrow....I'm sure you have more things to do, but this is quite enough for me especially since I'm also fighting a cold on top of everything else.

Today's card is one I'm especially proud of. I made it for a friend that plays the french horn in a symphony orchestra. We just recently started talking again after finding eachother on facebook after 10 years. I've had this little charm for years and when I decided to send my friend a Christmascard I knew I had to include the charm.

Finding the right stamp wasn't that hard as I remembered some of the house-mouse stamps had instruments in them. I thought this one was perfect!

The image is coloured using my promarkers and because I'm not used to using dark colours I nearly gave up colouring it. I actually started on a new one using a different colouring medium, but got so BORED having to colour the same image twice, lol. So I got back and worked some more on the original one. I'm quite pleased with how it turned out. Not my best work, but still something I can be proud of. Except the image that took ages to colour I had huuuge issues with the bow (or the other way around ;) I think it took me an hour to get it right, because I also wanted to include the charm in some nice way. I started with a wider bow, but it got too big and tieing it around the green one was too bulky - it was a nightmare as I was so close to finishing the card. In the end this is how I made it and I think it looks so good. Just don't ask me how much glue I used or how many pieces the bow is made of, lol.

The papers I have used are all from Basic Grey's Wisteria line. The gold music panel is a stamp that I embossed with gold powder. The edges are inked with a gold pen. And that's it :)


I used a couple of challenges while making this card:

All sorts - last minute Christmas
Creative card crew - anything goes
Creative inspirations - anything Christmas
Friday sketchers - sketch
I love promarkers - Christmas carol/song
Simon says stamp and show - A holiday greeting

Simply love

Hi and happy "little saturday" as wednesdays are called here in Sweden.
I've been working on several cards at the same time lately and yesterday I managed to finish one of them.

I used the colourcombo pink/grey from this week's cute card thursday challenge. I used a part of a house mouse called a spring tail - HMOR1129.  The stamp was one of my latest buys and I love how versatile it is. You get several stamps in one. The paper I used fit the theme at house mouse challenge: "faux grid". I didn't find any sketch that I thought worked so I freestyled. I wanted the silver branch to stand out so this is what I came up with. It's a slightly different card coming from me, but I love the simplicity. When you have beautiful papers - make them do the work :)

Promarkers: ivory, satin, baby pink, dusky rose, antique pink, ice grey1 and 3, blender.
Papers: paperpad "I do" from making memories and pink paper MME Wild asparagus "Pretty little girl".
Other: nestabilities blossom and circle, letter stickers, silver pen.

Hot chocolate

Hi there. For the last few days I've been working on this card. It's quite simple, but elegant. I wanted the beautiful glittery paper to stand out so I used a simple sketch from our creative corner. I also used the colourcombo from colour throwdown and charisma cardz. Cute card thursday had "something new" as their theme. Everything on this card is new, the house mouse stamp, new papers, ribbons and even new scalloped nesties. Simon says stamp had "hot chocolate" as their challenge as did quixotic paperie. Finally crafty calendar's challenge "keeping warm".

The dotty ribbon had white dots, but I coloured them pink with a pink promarker. That way you can get your own custom made ribbon without buying a specific ribbon for every occasion. That's my tip of the day.

Thanks for stopping by :)

Relax and (sun)shine

Hi and welcome back to my blog. Today I managed to finish a card for a couple of challenges. The first one is Basic Grey that had a colour challenge of pink, blue and cream. I used these beautiful papers from the "eskimo" line. This is by far my fav line from BG. I used a stamp from house mouse and added a sentiment from imaginisce. It fits the theme "on the beach" for the house mouse challenge blog. I also used a sketch from get sketchy and "layering" from ABC challenge.

I wasn't too thrilled about how the card turned out, but I'm quite happy with the positioning of the image. It kind of looks like the mouse is sailing on the patterned paper. If you squint a lot, lol.

I also got some more goodies from a cherry on top that I ordered during a Thanksgiving sale. It was well needed since I got a mail today that made me quite sad. No reason to get jealous about the goodies though, I'm not keeping all of it and some of it I've already put in a candy box :) I just need to get myself together and organize the darn thing. I'm planning on having it done by my birthday and think I will have a special prize for those that send me a card for my 30:th b-day. I'm all alone in this town with my fiancée - no family or friends so it gets lonely on b-days. Maybe you will cheer me up? ;) More of that later. First I need to get totally well and start on my DT commitments. Ta ta for now.

Love you forever

I've been sick again so it took me a while to make another card to show you. Good thing I had started on the Christmas cards early this year! You never know what's going to hit you :(
I was almost done with a card for a couple of challenges before I got sick, but now it's too late to enter. I will show it to you later though, don't worry.

This card I made for my sweetie for Christmas. I like giving him cards and he loves to get them. I used a sketch from lili of the valley and the theme "winter wishes" from the house mouse challenge blog.


The papers I used are same as for the previous card. I really like them. If you do too, make sure to come back after new year's as I will be offering them as candy together with a bunch of other things. I have a lot to celebrate and the latest thing is that I'm almost at 50 followers! And I didn't force anyone, lol.

I wanted to show you the latest loot that's been coming to my doorstep these last few days. Christmas really is early this year. The items below I won at Belles n whistles advent calendar.

The items here are stamps from Whiff of joy (finally got myself almost all the Charlotte and Charlie ones during their 20% off sale), lots of dies and alphabets from scrapyland and a box full of flowers, magnolias, papers and other things from Magdas.se.



I don't even know where to begin, lol.

Halloween card

Edit: I will be sending this card to Jordan since he loves animals. There is a foundation called make a child smile where you can send cards or gifts to sick children. I just found out about this. Hope you'll send something from time to time.


Just a quick post showing you a house mouse Halloween card I've been working on. I meant to make it for the house mouse challenge DT call, but for some reason they closed the call early! I was so annoyed. It said it would close monday at midnight. For me that means monday night, not sunday night. Grrr, I'm still mad about that. Anyway, the mousies shouldn't suffer for my bad mood. Here they are:

I used a very pretty corner punch I got from a House mouse friend years ago. It makes it possible to make frames because it decorates the background cardstock and leaves little corners to put the image in.

I'm entering with this card on several challenge blogs that had Halloween as their theme this week:

Simon says stamp
Cuttlebug challenge
Allsorts
Papertake weekly

And finally Crafty cardmakers had "ribbons and fibers" as their theme.

I'm quite happy with the quality of the phots today even though they were shot in the same lamlight as usual. The trick? I got a tip from a friend: put a piece of coffee filter over the flash to make it less white. Didn't work on all cards, but I think it worked pretty well here.

Now I'm off to study and sleep. See you tomorrow for the bloghop :)

House mouse stamp: "Halloween Purr-ty" HMTR1031

HM Valentine challenge #23

I'm back with another HM card. I've been quite busy this weekend rearranging my corner. We got a new uncollapsable (hopefully) bookshelf. Unfortunately it wasn't as deep as my former one and not everything fits like I wanted it to. So I have been trying to figure out how everything should be. I'm hoping for a light at the end of the tunnel soon because I'd love to have it cleeeeaaaan.

I did find a small corner where I could make a slightly different Valentine card. It doesn't always have to be a person you love. Here is a celebration of the love for a cupcake, lol.




Let me know what you think, it's been sooo quiet here lately...

Summer flowers

This week on friday sketchers blog the sketch looked like this:



I had decided how my card would look a couple of days ago, but didn't get around to actually making it. After applying for the house mouse challenge DT spot I wanted to work more with the cute mice, so I used one of my favourites:




This card fulfills the requirements for a colour challenge too (green, pink and brown) but I'm not applying to it with this card. I'm not sure how the rules are with the challengeblogs when there is a prize up for grabs, so I don't want to risk getting disqualified :) So this card is only for the friday sketchers blog.

The photo doesn't make the card justice. I'm very fond of green/pinks and the colours look much better IRL. I really need to make myself a lighbox. While bloghopping I found a tip on how to make one. I'll make one and see if it improves my late night photos. It will have to wait though because right now I'm revamping my whole corner. I'm getting a new bookshelf that won't risk collapsing every time I touch it, lol. Wohoo!

House mouse challenge DT call

The house mouse challenge blog are looking for two design team members. This is such a dreamgig for me, so I have to try out.
As some of you know my new year resolution is to get on a DT and to get published in a magazine. I think it's important to mention that I don't want to get on a DT just for the sake of it, but to join a team where I feel like I can inspire others. I don't apply to companies where I'm not fond of the stamps...

The house mouse stamps have been in my heart since the beginning of my stamping"career", lol. The first yahoogroup I joined was a house mouse, so they have a special place in my heart. It feels like revisiting old friends and I get so much joy out of colouring them, especially now since I found the alcoholmarkers to colour with.

I like doing things differently than everyone else and trying new things. Sometimes it ends up being harder than it has to, lol. I think I have a different way of making my cards sometimes and hopefully it would inspire others that are stuck in a rut.
Here are my favourite three house mouse cards. I have uploaded some "unofficial" ones because I had a hard time deciding. I'm very proud of the idea for the bottom card, so I wanted to show it to you.

Click on the images to get a bigger view.

The background of this card is brayered with a brilliance peacock pad. It's then stamped with a rose background stamp and silverembossed. The mouse is coloured with waterpencils (aquarelle). Text is written on the computer with a fancy alphabet I found on dafont. This is one of my absolute favourite cards ever and I'm still very proud of it, although I made it two or three years ago.



The second card is made for a polkadot challenge. I've used my pantone and promarkers to colour the image. I used different polkadot papers and embellishments to really go for it! I think the text works beautifully with this card. It's a stamp from Impression obsession (C6136 Rest...Relax)



This third card I love because I'm very happy with the colouring and it's one of the first cards where I splurged with different flowers. My "problem" has been that I don't embellish enough, so here I went with both texture and ribbon and flowers AND the bright yellow daffodil. Feels like a milestone, lol.






These cards didn't make my top three, but I still like them for different reasons, mostly because they made me try something new. Here I have made the flower be outside of the oval shape. And it points down to the corner, where I've been thinking if I should have a text. It would draw in the eye more to the text even though the image is in focus. And I'm really proud of the colouring too.


I wanted to add something when the card was done and I think the decorative edge is the icing on the cake. I also added gold glitterglue on the flower to make the card extra festive. My stepdad that got the card thought it was amazing. I was very happy that I decided to send it to him.

Here I have used a technique I came up with (I haven't seen it anywhere else, so I'm taking the credit ;) It's a whiteembossed background, coloured with chalks. I also like the sketch that I came up with and the piece of ribbon with the flower.

Maybe the execution isn't the best, but I love the idea.