Crafty Adventurista: February 2026 - DT Project 1 For Country View Crafts and Challenges

Hi there,

It’s time for my first DT project for Country View Crafts and Challenges for February with the theme of Hearts as chosen by our lovely team member Cassie.

The challenge is open worldwide and you can join the group here where you will find information on how to enter:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/164920247712393

There’s a fabulous £20 prize voucher to win for one randomly picked winner.

You can enter the challenge with 5 different entries but you must use brands that Country View Crafts stocks and please mention them in your projects.

February always means the month of ‘luurve’ for me (and pancakes), so I bring you my Valentine’s card and gift that I’ve made for my other half.

For the gift I decided to make a shadow box framed picture as I’d picked up a rather nice pebble on the beach a little while ago. That’s what sparked the idea off for me. A pebble!

First I created the background by smooshing watered down Distress Oxide Barn Door onto my card to create a water wash look across the middle.

I stamped Snarky Cat from Tim Holtz Stamp and Stencil set Snarky Cat THMM109, twice, in VersaFine Clair Nocturne and coloured him with Distress Watercolor pencils, then fussy cut him out. I cut along the line up his left ‘arm’ so I could tuck in a heart for him to hold.

I stamped Snarky’s heart from Tim Holtz Stampers Anonymous Love Notes CMS477, twice, onto card with Distress Oxide Barn Door and coloured these in with Distress Oxide Barn Door and a water brush and fussy cut out. Once dry, I pressed this into my WOW Embossing pad and then covered it with WOW clear embossing powder and heat set.

I repeated the above steps for the small hearts from the Tim Holtz Stamp and Stencil set Snarky Cat THMM109.

I kept aside one Snarky Cat and one main heart for my card to be made later.

Using a piece of nylon net from a supermarket chestnuts bag, I wrapped this around my pebble and secured with my hot glue gun. I then hot glued it to my background. I tucked in a piece of twig too and hot glued it in place.

I hot glued my small hearts randomly on the net.

I glued the main heart under Snarky’s arm and he was ready to add to the background. In order for him to be raised up so that he was sitting on the pebble, I constructed a ‘Z’ shape piece of card and fixed one end to Snarky Cat and the other end to the background where he needed to be propped up.

To finish I used glossy accents on his eyes and once dry I assembled this into my shadow box frame.

And here’s my gift for my other half but shhhh don’t tell him about it as it’s not Valentine’s Day yet.

Now for the Card…

Using a large heart from the Love Notes set, I stamped three of these with Distress Oxide Barn Door across my background card, overlapping them as I went. I then coloured these in using Tim Holtz Distress Watercolor Pencils in Barn Door and Candied Apple using a water brush and then drew over them with a black fine liner pen to outline them and give them some substance.

I stamped the sentiment under these in VersaFine Clair Nocturne and then I layered this onto a piece of black card leaving a border, and then layered this onto my main card substrate.

I had already stamped out, coloured and cut Snarky Cat and the heart so it was just a matter of assembling these onto the background, which I did with 3D foam tape. I then added glossy accents to his eyes to finish.

And here’s my Valentines Day card...