Build a Scene Dies - no.2 Hot Air Balloon

Wow what a week! It started ok but just got worse lol!
It went from one then to three members of staff off (in a shop with a total of only 6!), an unexpected visit from some Head Office managers and me managing to strain my back and ending up hobbling around the shop like I was 90 instead of 30! Luckily its easing off a little now but I may have to go and see someone next week to get back to 100%.
The highlight of the week was a superb Friday evening spent with my friend Lisa at one of her Stampin' Up classes. We made 2 gorgeous cards with new products, saw some of the sale-a-bration items in the flesh and I came away with a huge bag of goodies I'd already put in my order for, can't wait to play!
Saying that..... I really need to stop buying for a while and start playing, my 'inbox' tray is overflowing with things waiting to be created with for the first time, oops! :)


Right, on to my shares of the day and as the title says I'm carrying on with the new Xcut Build a Scene die sets. I know some people seem to have had some trouble with these dies but me and my Bigshot have had no issues at all, just be careful with the string section for the balloon, maybe add some wax paper, use a tumble dryer sheet on the die or Jo Austin's new tip shown on Create and Craft recently, a dry baby wipe between the card and your die!

Ok so obviously this first card is a stepper card, I created the base from scratch and got a bit over excited with the clouds which meant they ended up being a bit high, but you get the idea, I just loved the 3D feel of it.

The cloud dies have no bottom to them, as in they do not cut a complete shape, just the top of a cloud outline so that you can cut the dies next to each other to get long cloud strips (great for a scrapbook layouts) and so that you can make them any depth you choose. The set also comes with some little whispy sort of shapes you cut into the clouds to look like the wind blowing, love those sort of details!

Now this one uses the die a little differently and shows the versatility of it. I have just cut the solid base section of the large balloon in some of the gorgeous Spots and Strips capsule collection papers and overlaid them onto a DL card, anchored them with twine tied round a button and cut myself another little cloud strip. This would be a lovely card personalised for a child. :)

I've also done another card using the small balloon shape turned upside down, cut from gold card and mounted into red/green to give a gorgeous (yep you guessed it, sorry!) Christmas bauble! Check out my super talented crafty friend DianaC's Docrafts gallery for her 2 bauble cards as I just copied her idea.

Right, time to hobble off for breakfast and then see if I can manage to sit in my craft chair for an hour or so and play with some of that lovely new stash that's calling out to me! I'll be back Tuesday for one of my last Creativity Club DT posts. X