Banana Frog Blog

PoTD :: A post but no pictures!

Hi Frog-Followers, or Frog-Fans

Many of you probably know by now that Banana Frog will be closing the doors to the lilypad at the end of January. I have really enjoyed my 3 years on the Design Team - 3 years!! Time really does fly when you're having fun!
I'd like to thank Bev (Leader of the Lilypad!)(Top Froglette) for inviting me onto the DT, for being a great designer of stamps, and for generally being a bit of a superstar! lol
And thanks to all you Frog-Followers for stopping by and looking at all the DT's projects, I hope you've been inspired to go and stamp on anything and everything :o)

I'm sorry but I'm still unable to post to the blog which is a shame as this may be my last PoTD but if you head (or hop!) over to my blog (www.jofy.co.uk) you can see my post.

Take care

Jo

Project Of The Day–So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, goodbye

Hi Froggy people
This is my last Banana Frog post
and I wanted to show you some of my favourite creations while I have been apart of the design team.

This layout from Christmas last year

and this Christmas banner

this layout

these cards

and finally the book I have been making with the kids at school

I’d like to thank Bev for the opportunity to create for Banana Frog
and I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and a safe and wonderful New Year.
take care

Sharmaine

POTD - Have yourself a {black &} White Christmas

Hi all and welcome to my little corner of the Lily pad once again. Today I’d like to share a simple but stylish black and white Christmas.

In the form of these easy peasy black and white stamped cards.

The ingredients: Banana Frog stamp sets; It’s Christmas Deer, Winter Wonderland and Retro Christmas. I also used white card stock, coloured card blanks, Black archival ink, Stickles and some bright festive ribbon.

For each card I cut a white square to fit on the front of each card blank and distressed the edges to add interest. I stamped the main image in the centre with black ink and then stamped a random pattern around the edges with the same stamp.

On some more white card I stamped my sentiments and cut them out, mounting them on the same coloured card as the relevant card blank. I added a strip of festive ribbon across the card and then added the sentiment on top of it with a foam pad for a little added dimension.

And finally I picked out a few little details on each central image with some stickles, well you can’t have Christmas without a bit of glitter!

And that’s it some super simple and speedy black and white cards that have a stylish modern twist!

Well it’s time for this froglet to hop off the lily pad I’m afraid. After much soul searching and juggling of time I have decided with great sadness it is time for me to step down from the Banana Frog DT. I have had an amazing 2 and ½ years with the lovely Bev and all the other froglets and have loved sharing with all of you many stampy projects and thank you all for your lovely comments over my time on the lily pad. I’ve had a blast and I hope to continue seeing you all in cyber space.

Much love MJM x

Christmas Cards–Project Of The Day

‘tis that season again
The season of Christmas card making
I’m slowly making a few and today I wanted to show you this one

I love the layers
Super Stars stamps I stamped straight on to the card as well as 2 that I stamped on to plain white cardstock and I then used some foam tape to give 2 stars some height and dimension
Retro Christmas stamp “Have yourself a merry little Christmas” I heat embossed in white
So as you can see I am off to a slow start
But it’s a start
How about you?
Have you made a start on making some Christmas cards??

Sharmaine

Project Of The Day : Journal

Hi Sharmaine here
I’ve been very fortunate to have had the opportunity to do some scrapbooking with the Grade 6 kids at our school
We’ve been working on some journals

we have been filling them with all sorts of things
memories, events, goals

For my “things I did'” page I included some Super Stars
in the way of the very cool scribble stars

Love the effect they give

Till next time, stay happy and stay scrappy
Sharmaine

POTD - A spooky twist

Hi all, it’s my turn to share a project of the day with you and I cannot believe it’s October already! As we’re coming up to that spooky time of year I thought I would do a spooky twist on this project that I did way back last summer.

 
I’ve only used one stamp set for this project, Fairytale Princess with some coloured card, co-ordinating distress inks, pro-markers and a photocopier!

 
I stamped the castle image onto some white card with black ink and then took the image to a photocopier, enlarging it by 175%. I printed this into some green card 4 times and when I cut the images out made sure I added tabs to the bottom edge of all 4 and to the two sides of two of them so I can join them together as a square.

 
I also printed an enlarged image onto some white paper a couple of times so I had a template for embellishing the castle. I cut out the sections and cut out 4 of the larger arched windows to make green ones to cover the central heart window (not very spooky!) I also picked out some details with pro markers and coloured in the windows (you could of course cut them out)

 
I joined all the sides together and then cut a base out of green card to add to the bottom. Using my paper templates I built up sections on the castle in different coloured cardstock, using distress ink around the edges to add definition and also added them on foam pads to add dimension.

 
And that’s it a cute spooky castle! This would make a great little table decoration filled with Halloween goodies for a grown up party or why not add a handle and give it out to special trick or treaters. Whatever you choose to do I hope you feel inspired to look at your Banana Frog stamps with a new eye, maybe not seeing the obvious, and get creative?

Thanks for hopping by and until soon Happy Crafting

Love MJM x

 

Project of the day: stamp - cut - create

Hi everyone,

It's Lory here and I miss Banana Frog blog from a while but I am here now with a new cool article to share with you all! A lot of things happened in my life lately but I couldn't wait to restart to blog here!

For this article I dedicated a day to make cards, relaxing and having fun! So close your eyes, forget your bad thoughts and let's be guided from your immagination.

Materials you need:

• Banana Frog build a cupcake stamps set, cake and words (all the stamps used in my cards are from BF, I am completely addicted!)
• punches of your choise
• pink and brown cardstock 
• patterned papers
• your favourite embellishments
• scissor
• 3d double side tape
• double side taper
• ribbons or baker's twines
• buttons
• watercolor pencils
• inks

Let's start I want to show you 4 cards, keep in mind that the point is havng fun using stamps with different tecniques.

Use two different color inks to create a cupcake, stamp on two different cardstock, pink and brown. one for the top, the other for the bottom.

You have two cupcakes, one pink and the other brown.

Cut from the the pink the top and stick it on the brown cupcake using 3d double tape.

Finish the cupcake using brads or button to embellish;)

I want to show you my cards :)

Thank to the fun stamps by BF I discovered to love the cardmaking! Give it a try!

Have a wonderful week.

Love Lory

Project of the Day: Something Fun

Hi Everyone, welcome to my project of the day.  I hope you like what I've done this month, it's been a really fun project to do, using just one set of stamps, Steelfish Outline.  And without further ado, here it is.....

A cute set of alphabet fridge magnets and this is how you make them.  First stamp your letters on plain white card, you may want to think beforehand about what letters you want, I did the whole alphabet but you may want to do extra vowels, certain letters to spell out your family's names or anything you fancy.  I used black Stazon.

Colour in the letters, using whatever colours you want.

Next mount them onto funky foam, I used the stuff that is magnet backed.

You then need to cut the letters out, the great thing about these stamps is that they are pretty easy to cut out, no little fiddly bits!

If you haven't used magnetic foam you will need to add your own magnets at this point.  I also gave mine a quick coat of mod podge to make them a little more robust.  And that's it...simple!!

They will brighten up your fridge....but please, no rude words!!!

xxxx

 

POTD - Tweet and fluffy

Hi all and welcome to my little fluffy corner of the Lillypad for this month. I came across a box of feathers in my studio the other day and apart from wondering why I had them, I also thought what can I do with them and came up with this...

 
 ‘Tweet and fluffy cards’

I used the Hiya chick stamp set with its tadpole sister shake your tail feathers and the It’s all about hearts stamp set alongside my new favourites Letraset flex markers, coloured card, a doodle pen, a crop-a-dile and some black brilliance ink. Oh and some cheap hairspray (all will become clear!)

 
I stamped the bird with a big tail from the tadpole set several times onto some letraset paper and then here’s where the hairspray comes in, when the ink was dry sprayed the images with hairspray, this fixes the ink so it doesn’t run when the images are being coloured in.

 
I coloured in one complete bird image and then just sections for layers on another. Flex markers are brilliant if you haven’t tried them. They are lovely to work with and work well with the other letraset markers, they kind of work like coloured blenders.

 
I cut out a bird and its matching layers and curled these for dimension and then added some feathers behind the tails for some fluffy fun!

 
For the pink square card, I stamped out the large heart from it’s all about hearts onto some red card and some paler pink card. I cut out the pale pink heart losing the scallops and cut the red heart out leaving a border around the scallops. I also cut out the centre of the red heart and kept it to one side for another card. Using the small heart stamp from the Hiya chick set and the sentiment from the tadpole set I filled in the pale pink heart.

 
 
Sticking the pale pink heart to the base of the card I added the red frame on foam pads as well as the bird for dimension.

 
 
I used the red heart I had cut out of the previous frame on the blue card and added a sentiment from Hiya Chick. The pink strip of card is doodled with a scallop and cut out then punched with a crop-a-dile. The pattern on the pink card is created using the cute little flower stamps in the Hiya chick set.

 
 
And lastly the yellow card is matted with a teal and a hand doodled and cut out yellow rectangle of card. The sentiment is from the Hiya chick set as is the branch stamp which I stamped 3 times to build a bigger branch for my bird to sit on.

I like my brightly coloured fluffy birds and think they would make great scrapbook embellishments.... oh and they’d look fab on a home decor frame!

Thanks for stopping by the lillypad, I hope you’re well and happy and I’ll see you soon. Until then Happy Crafting

Love MJM x

Project of the Day :: Scraps & Sentiments

Hi

I have made a conscious decision to use up my stash - the big picture stash - embellishments, paper etc etc etc...
First in the firing line was the box I have on my desk where I put all the scraps left over when making a project - we all have one of those don't we - the box that contains stuff that  'will come in useful..', that is 'too nice to throw away' and that 'there must be a use for..'  Oh yes, we all have that box - it can't just be me surely??
My cards this month are going to be using up some of those bits...

As part of the stash-attack I die cut lots & lots of rosettes (thankyou Tim Holtz for creating those dies - makes rosette creation much easier!) out of left over 12x12 sheets. I put them in a box ready for future projects:

So my cards this month use some of those rosettes, scraps and of course - Banana Frog stamps..
I gathered up sets that had borders and greetings and used them to add interest to the backgrounds and act as a base for embellishments:

      
   

Using 'All about Elegance' and  'Sentimental Style':
 

Using another 'All about Elegance' border and 'Sentimental Style' phrase:

 
 

Using 'Shimelles Backgrounds' and 'Sentimental Style'

 
 

Using 'Swirls' and 'Sentimental Style'

 
 

I hope these have inspired you to 'attack' your stash - you'll be surprised what you rediscover and what you can create (and you'll be glad you didn't throw it away!!) and further ways to use your stamps.

Thanks for stopping by, take care

Jo