Painty

The Lisa.B.Designs challenge this month is all about acrylic paints backgrounds and coincidentally
the Tando Creative blog also had a Painty week this month.

With that in mind I created a masterboard with a piece of white A3 paper. Stupidly I didn't take a picture of the completed background before I started cutting into it so this is what is left!

I followed Lisa's tutorial quite closely, and used hexagons and circles stencils (die-cut with Papertrey inks dies) and for stamps Stampendous Grunge and Paper Artsy ESN10 (in lieu of Lisa's bottle's lid)

Then I started on the finished product, which I am currently thinking will be made of 3 tubular boxes and will be used for storage in the bathroom. I pulled out the closest themed stamps I had, the Crafty Individuals perfume bottles from the CI-341 set and stamped them in black. On a whim, I threw in the twenties lady (from another set) and coloured the images with Big Brush pens (Faber Castell) and a water brush.

To make it durable (and washable) I then applied several coats of varnish (DecoArt Soft-Touch) and sprayed the plastic lid with Silver paint (not sure this will be durable as I was supposed to prime it first with a specialist product).

Thanks for coming by,

Also entering the That's Crafty challenge with my girly make !

Brushos fishes

Paper Artsy has been playing with Brushos for the past week and of course I had to join in the fun!
I started with a background using mainly the brown powder on wet watercolour paper. This tends to result in a blurry effect as the brushos wick across the page.

In that blurry effect I saw a sea bed, colourful coral, stones etc.. I went with it and selected some fish stamps from Paper Artsy (Hot Pick 1111 and 1201) and stamped them with Versamark.
I used a translucent Pearl Blue (WOW) and silver for the background fishes and white embossing powders for the foreground.

Another photo to show the effect of the Blue pearl embossing powder and reveal the hidden fish.

Let me know what you think as although I think there are good bits I feel something is not
quite right!

Also entering the Craft Barn and We Love to create challenges.
 

1st Christmas card of the year

Yep, had to happen at some point... the Christmas card production has started at Craftyfield Towers!

I have been playing with Brushos, as this is the theme at Paper Artsy this fortnight, so this was my starting point for this non traditional Christmas card. I initially took inspiration from Helen Chilton's post but as my piece turned into a disaster I abandoned the idea and let the Brushos do their thing!

I stamped numbers (the 24 days leading to Christmas and the 25th) and embossed them in clear before applying the Brushos in Blue, Purple and a little black around the 25.
I stamped in black Versafine the baubles and Christmas trees from a magazine freebie set.
I also stamped the sentiment from the same set with glue and silver foiled it.

To decorate I added white and silver gel pen accents as well as snowflake die-cuts which I silver foiled. Another photo to show the shine:

Thanks for coming by,

Also entering the Country View Crafts (Numbers), WOW Embossing Powder and Craft Barn challenges.

Calendar Challenge September

Doesn't time fly... after today I only have 3 more calendar pages to make and barring any serious mishaps I should be able to complete the set for the Craft Barn Calendar challenge.

This month the colour is brown and the word is Tree. I immediately thought of using another Crafty Individuals tree stamp as I got the impression people really liked this card (I did too).

This time I used the CI-259 set and with the help of a stamp positioner created a scene. As in the card I blogged previously, I inked my stamps with several colours of inks using Zig graphic markers. I probably mentioned this before but I really like their tip, which, not being felt tip like most markers, doesn't shed fibres on the stamp. When stamping such detailed stamps a stray fibre does make a difference, especially to my blood pressure...
I finished off by adding a few stamped leaves (an old set by My Mind's eye) and the calendar of course.

I hope you will like this one too, let me know in your comments!
This page is also entering the Craft Stamper TIMI, That's Crafty challenges.

 

Sew Shabby (chic)

Stamping Sensations challenge's theme this month is Sewing inspired, which is my opportunity to test my latest Rubber Dance stamps!
I decided on a shabby chic style with lots of lace motifs which I found on the Live and Love Craft blog.

I used textured paste with a Prima doily stencil on the Kraft background, a printed paper which I punched with a Martha Stewart border punch.
I stamped my dress form on a piece of Prima paper (old collection) and gave it a bit of colour with a pink Gelato. A scrap of tulle and a bit of ribbon creates dress in progress on the dress form.

For embellishments I added real and faux buttons, a doily,  other stamped elements from the same Rubber Dance set and a scrap of gauze.

Thanks for coming by,

Also entering the Polka Doodle , Tando Creative and All Sorts  challenge.

Layout

Before getting on with the post, I wanted to welcome my latest new followers, I am humbled by their interest and not a bit proud!

For the Rubber Dance September challenge we can use any of the previous 12 colour schemes. A no brainer for me, it had to be the June colours since I had made a layout for that month and needed to make the facing page at some point... 

The base is a 12x12 Chatsworth paper (Paper Artsy).
I used 3 of the Mixed Media Thinlit (Tim Holtz/Sizzix) to make the diamonds, hexagons and "pebbles" stencils which I used with paste mixed with blue paint. I then coloured those stencilled areas with acrylic paint to darken the corners.

I used the Diamond Background and Netting texture stamps both from Rubber Dance, with vanilla paint (diamonds) and dark chalk ink (netting).

To tie in with the other page I die-cut the title from the same paper as the previous page.
Hope you like my page,

Also entering the Craft Barn challenge.

Diamond wedding anniverasry

Being the resident crafter in the household, choosing theme, colours and designs for cards is usually left to me.
Not wanting to be late with a 60th Anniversary card for my OH's parents, I created this one without asking for his input. How wrong was I?.... He managed to find fault in every aspect....

First, the shape, because even if it said Diamond anniversary, it didn't stand up very well, second the creases (the heavy weight cardstock cracked abominously when I scored and folded it) and finally he objected to have to write the message on the back. I'd easily concede he was right about the first 2 but I am not aware of any etiquette about the message having to be "inside".
Am I missing something? Please let me know in your comments!

The stamps used are from Flonzcraft and perfect for a couple who got married in the Fifties. The Diamond shape and the gold/silver threads were inspired by this card. But instead of using designer paper I created my metallic threads with foils and spray glue, incredibly easy! I used spare bits of paper to mask around the diamond shape and also a Spellbinders label shape where my sentiment was to go before spraying the glue.

I now need another idea for a 60th anniversary card...

************************************************

Now for an update....
Following your comments on this card, and after laughing at your suggestion to give my OH free run of my craft room for a spot of card making! - as if I want him to know how much stuff I REALLY have....)-

this is what I did :




I cut and scored a new piece of card as before except that I added enough width to "create" a 3rd panel. When opened the panel will reveal the handwritten message (as per OH request). I cut out the back panel (the one with the foil) from the old card and stuck it to the new one so I didn't feel like I had completely wasted my time...
On the plus side the added weight on the back helps the card stands better.



The extra panel offers more crafting surface which I immediately put to use with a "60" as per Chrissie's suggestion, a sentiment and a rick rack shaped stripe of glitter (diamond-ish colour). The "60" shows even when the card is closed whilst the sentiment is hidden by the diamond shape.

And the OH's verdict I hear you ask? Yes he did like it, at least he thought it was "all right" which passes as high praise!

I am entering the WOW Embossing powders and Bunny Zoe's Crafts challenges.

Come and play

Time for our challenge at Vintage Stamping and this month it's my turn to choose the theme. I created a game of Tic Tac Toe just for you!

The rules are simple, you must chose 3 elements in a line, either vertically, horizontally or diagonally to feature in your project.

I chose the last vertical line, namely People, Metal and the colours blue and brown.

I reverse-stamped the gentleman with the bowler hat from the True Gentleman, then stamped him normally to pretend my gentlemen are in conversation. I wasn't too happy with the reverse stamping I had done with the brayer because so much colour was lost in the process it looked too pale, so I stamped the image on a separate piece of paper and transferred it with gel medium.

The Swirl is part of a large flourish stencil by Tim Holtz through which I applied Bistres powders in Blue and Brown on a watercolour panel. The gentlemen were protected with masking liquid during this process.

To finish I added eyelets, I still have lots from when they were all the rage - was that more than ten years ago? - and I am yet to finish a single pack!

I hope you find the Tic Tac Toe grid inspiring and that you will join us over at Vintage Stamping Challenges,  you could win a lovely $20 to spend at the Flonzcraft shop. Remember your make doesn't need to be Vintage but it does need to have some stamping, NO DIGIS allowed!

Thanks for coming by,

I am entering the Penny Black and more and Craft Stamper TIMI   challenges.

Tim Holtz tag

As a late joiner to the tag craze I was yet  to make one of Tim Holtz's 12 tags... This had to be addressed and today's the day...

As soon as I saw the alcohol inks I had the urge to pull mine out and have a play too. I don't use them often enough and Tim's background looked lovely and bright...
Mine look a bit dull (strangely enough it's the metallic mixatives that dulls down the glossy cardstock) and a bit muddy.

I won't bore you with the details as Tim has a comprehensive step by step but I should mention that:
- I die-cut my stencil with the TH/Sizzix Mixed media thinlit.
- the butterflies are from the Crafty Individuals set CI-437
- I made my metal element by triple embossing a label and stamping into it.
- I used vellum in lieu of frosted film
- I flickered a small paintbrush with black paint as I don't have the Distress marker spritzer.

Thanks for coming by,

Also entering  the Craft Barn, The Artistic Stamper, Polka Doodle and Craft Stamper TIMI challenges.