Play Date Cafe & My First Grunge Flower

Hi, I’m back today with a card for The Play Date Cafe and I thought I would try my hand at a grunge flower.  I think it will take a bit of practice, but I had a go lol

We have some luscious colours over at The Play Date Cafe for our challenge this week.  PDCC was one of the very first DT’s that I joined and I haven’t taken much time off so it was a bit weird not joining in on the fun!  I’ve missed everyone! It’s like one big family and Julie, our boss is fabulous!  Julie is celebrating her 3rd blogaversary by honouring those that have become part of her blogging world.  She is having a big celebration over on her blog June 14-17 but until then why not join in on the fun over at facebook with the pre-party! 

I have kept the card blank for the moment, it’s for a friend of mine that has suffered a stroke and I haven’t made up my mind whether to do it as a get well card or thinking of you.  For my card I used some of the gorgeous Kaisercraft papers which worked really well for the colour palette but as I didn’t have the two blues I used some Stormy Sky Ranger distress ink to smooch in a bit of blue to make a couple of the flowers a little darker.

The grunge flower was the hardest part of the card for me.  My lovely friend, Sarah Anderson, taught me how to make one of these flowers a few years ago in a workshop but I couldn’t for the life of me remember how to do it.  If you haven’t checked out Sarah’s work you should pay a visit, she is Mixed Media Queen and she’s done some gorgeous BIG doodles lately!!  I miss not having her on the PDCC team, she’s so lovely.

Another fab friend Asia taught me how to make them this time around, she’s brilliant at 3d work and flowers/vintage is totally her thing.  You have to check out her AMAZING Jubilee project, she’s obviously got far too much time on her hands lol ;o) 

Anyway, for my card I stuck a piece of paper onto grungeboard and die cut some flowers using my Sizzix Tattered Florals die.  I then made up the flower using a hot glue gun. (By the way glue guns seriously burn when you’re a novice lol)  I had to add in loads of extra layers of flowers because it wasn’t quite working. To finish the flower I spritzed it with some glimmer mist spray, so close up it’s pretty with all of the metallic. I really need to make a few more though, it’s not great, but I’m pleased for my first attempt on my own.  

I hope you’ll pop by the rest of the DT for a visit, there are some gorgeous projects to get your creative juices flowing.  Pop on over to the main PDCC blog to be inspired and for details of our prize too.

The Craft’s Meow are our wonderful sponsors this week. 

Thanks for popping by.  It’s great to be back!

Play Date Cafe #83 & Skipping Stones Design

Hi there everyone!  I hope you’re having a good week.

Blogger is having yet more issues so if you’re not able to see the Play Date Cafe post when you click my link below then please bear with us.  We are working behind the scenes to get everything up and running, but it might be a little bit late in posting. 

You don’t need to miss out on all of the fun though because we have a blog hop for you today, you will find all of the links below.  We have lots of exciting things happening (more to be found on the main blog) but it’s also a sad day for us at the Play Date Cafe because our fabulous Sarah is stepping down so that she can pursue other things.  We are REALLY going to miss her, she’s always got some fun ideas and challenges us with her quirky colour palettes, some more challenging than others! Sarah, you know the ones I mean! It just won’t be the same without you Sarah, but the good thing is we will still be in touch.

Today I have an elegant card to share with you that I made for her.  You’ve probably noticed I’ve been trying my hand at CAS lately but I fancied doing something with a few more layers for this challenge.


Our blog hop is in celebration of our Sarah, we are so happy to honour her with this week’s colour splash.  You should have come from Fiona’s blog and your last stop is Julie Ranae.  If you have only just started here you can see the full listing here.

in Alphabetical Order..

Andrea Ewen
Libby Hickson
Colleen Dietrich
Jaclyn Miller
Michele Gross
Jinny Newlin
Savannah O'Gwynn
Tracey Kuzniak
Fiona Shultz
Ruby McGuire (that's me!)
Julie Ranae  

and obviously you need to pop over to see Sarah Anderson!

If you leave a message on each post then you have the chance to win an additional prize.


We were lucky to be sponsored by Skipping Stones Design this week and we got to choose a set of stamps to play with.  I chose the ‘Healing Wings’ set, I just LOVE the stained glass window butterfly in the set.  The only trouble is because I’ve been playing with my Copics I just haven’t been able to stop colouring in the butterflies with different colour schemes.  I’m addicted! I have quite a few now, pink, blue, purple, orange, red lol.  They are just GORGEOUS, I can’t get enough of them, and it’s so therapeutic to just sit and colour them in.  You must grab a set, they are FAB! Thank you SO much Skipping Stones for sponsoring us, I’m having so much fun colouring in your gorgeous stamps!

All of our cards were made this week using Sarah’s favourite challenge, the ‘Color Splash’. This week our splash of colour is green.


Each of the PDCC have chosen their favourite project that Sarah has made.  Mine is this one that she made for our one year anniversary at the Play Date Cafe.  I just love that she used our colours to create little birthday cupcakes!!  That’s our Sarah, queen of mixed media lol


(Looking at this picture is making me feel hungry now!)

I had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know Sarah in real life through a workshop that she was running not far from me.  She is so lovely, full of fun, always smiling, but on top of that she is an inspiration.  Her passion shines through as she speaks about her journaling and painting, she just makes you want to get busy creating canvases and journals and playing with different things to get texture and pattern!

Sarah helped start the Play Date Cafe blog with Julie and I know she will be really missed by us all, but especially by Julie.  She is embarking on a super fun adventure working in a job that involves getting her hands dirty with paints and things, she will be totally in her element!

My card was really simple to make, the time consuming part of it was the colouring, but that was the best bit too!  I used labels 16 for the black central panel, topped off with PTI’s ‘Limitless Layers' in black and white as shown.  I used Cuttlebug ‘Roses’ for the embossed background and a Martha Stewart punch for the border.  To add a bit more interest I distressed the edges of the white panel with Ranger ‘Bundled Sage’ distress ink and assembled it all adding pop dots for dimension.  To finish I stamped ‘Live the life of your dreams’ which I thought was a wonderful sentiment for Sarah.  I added a piece of lace that I coloured with my Copics (G28, G24, G21, G20)and that was it all done!

I also made a slightly different version, not sure which one I like best!


What I love about this stamp is that it looks just as beautiful stamped in one colour too, this is what I did for the inside of the above card and I also stamped the front of the envelope so that everything co-ordinated.  (I cut off the sentiment bit of the photo because it was a bit of an afterthought to show you the inside and I’d already written the card for posting lol)


For your chance to win pop on over to the Cafe for more information and to link your post.  If you use an online gallery, please use the keyword PDCC83, and remember to use our inspirational colours to be eligible to win this week's prizes!

I do hope you’ll play along with us and pop by to visit Sarah and leave her a sweet farewell message.

Have a fun day.  I’m hoping to get more postings done this week, I’m still trying to get into new routines where my hours have changed, but I’m slowly starting to catch up

PDCC 74 - Lizzie Ann Designs

Hello again!

Today I have a card to share with you for our Play Date Cafe challenge. Our colours are purple, blue and white this week.  I wanted to make a little card which is about 4.75in x 3.75in.   I used some very old purple paper from my stash of papers (trying to work my way through them!), with a Martha Stewart die cut doily and butterfly border punch.  I also used my new Enamel Accents for the centres of the flowers which I'd layered in alternate purple and blue.  If you haven't tried this enamel you must, it's so much fun!  All tied up with ribbon, and card finished!

Our sponsors this week, Lizzie Ann Designs, very kindly gave us some gorgeous stamps to play with.  I got this fab set, Bloomin' Doodles!

I do love my flowers but particularly the flower on the right of my card becaust it's a little like my logo :o)  Lizzie Anne Designs are offering up a fantastic prize worth $39.95!!  I think these flowers would look great on tags or even on wrapping paper stamped as your own design.

So pop on over to the rest of my teamies to see what they've created with the colours, there are lots of beauties  to see!

in Alphabetical Order..

Andrea Ewen

Colleen Dietrich

Fiona Shultz
Jaclyn Miller

Jinny Newlin
Julie Ranae 
Libby Hickson
Michele Gross Ruby McGuire (that's me!) 
Sarah Anderson
Savannah O'Gwynn
Tracey Kuzniak

We also have Taylor Usry guest designing with us this week.    You may even spot some of her teamies playing along too :o)  Her work is gorgeous, especially her more recent life size cupcake, now that's the kind of cupcake I'd like to get in the post!

Hmmm, yummy!!!!