Childhood is...

Childhood is my choice of word for the latest Craft Barn Challenge. I haven't really tried to illustrate the quote as it is such a conceptual one, so I took my inspiration from using:

1. new stuff  (as in brand new)
2. old stuff  (very old, very very old & antique)
3. scraps.

 First, I wanted to play with my new embossing folder (Tartan by X-Cut), well new to me as I got it in the sales! I wanted to use my old watercolour crayons again and tested a few versions. In the end I first inked the folder with Distress ink in Tumbled Glass, embossed and highlighted the raised areas with the crayons.
The colours were inspired by my scraps, this time ribbon scraps, as this is the challenge at Lavinia Stamps. These had been lying around for ages waiting for a purge! (still have 2 drawers full of varying lengths though...)

Before stamping both in grey and black my Dandelions (Lavinia), I run the background in the label die and embossed, in order to flatten the panel.

I used my antique gel pens to write the quote and to colours the edge of the label.

Quite pleased with my purchase as I have the choice of which part to colour allowing for an infinite number of designs!

Thanks for coming by,

Sufragettes

I like to think my Twenties ladies have the Girl Power required by That's Crafty, but without losing their sense of fashion or feminity!

I stamped my image with a mixture of distress ink pad (Tattered Rose) and water based pens, aiming for a no line colouring effect. I had difficulties hitting the right spot: whilst inking, the stamp is a mirror image and it's quite hard to tell apart dress from bag or umbrella...

My base is embossed Cored'ination (Flourish folder by Die'sire) to which I added a strip of Mulberry paper (yep still have oodles of the stuff), a die-cut border and corner (Spellbinders).
To frame the image I used a Martha Stewart PATP punch and backed it with a remnant of a masterboard (as old as the mulberry if I recall).
I made the flower with stamped tissue paper, die-cut with a Spellbinders Flower Nesties set, and sprayed it with a shimmer mist before scrunching it up.

I am also entering the Fashionable Stamping, Vintage Stamping and Wedodoobadoo challenges.

Zigazig ah! (cause all I can think about is the Spice Girls, not that I liked them much)

Autumn Leaves

The Craft Room challenge this fortnight is Something old, something new. Lots of choices lurking in my stash!

Have you noticed how watercolour has become popular in card making and scrapbooking these days? It's just as well, as I have lots of water colours, purchased a long time ago and begging to be used!
For my something new, no contest, it has to be a brand new  Memory Box die.
Since this die is a leaf and we are quickly running into autumn I picked autumnal colours for my make.

The card base is watercolour paper and I stamped it with a Harlequin stamp (Artistic Stamper). I used watercolour crayons as inks, mixing several colours on the stamp before spritzing and stamping. I love the distressed look of the stamped image.

I decided to splatter some more watercolour on the background, also quite trendy.

I die-cut the leaves from watercolour paper and rubbed watercolour crayons on the "inside" leaves and used a dark brown pen for the outlines. I intended my 3rd leaf to be gilded but in the end I thought it didn't gel with the natural, haphazard look of the rest of the card.

To finish the card I tried several arrangements of smaller die-cut leaves, twine, button etc.. but nothing worked so I added the sentiment and declared it complete.

I am also entering the Artistic Stamper and My mum's craft shop challenges.

Thanks for coming by,

CB Quote challenge Peaceful & Grace

For the latest Craft Barn challenge I found lots of serious quotes with either religious (grace) or political (peaceful) connotations, and it was hard to find a quote that was neither. I settled on this William Shakespeare quote, it turns out this is part of a play he wrote.

For the design, I started with the resolution to use scraps, and all of the paper & cardstock are scraps (except the background piece). I should be pleased but it's such a drop in the ocean!

For the background I used my rock paper, which is water resistant, and applied watercolour on top.
With a stencil I added sand texture coloured in green, and whilst I add the India Ink out after penning the quote, I decided to do some splatters....
I stamped some texture with a Muslin stamp (Impression Obsession), then decided the stencilled motifs were too green so I rubbed some gold oil pastels to knock them back and, hopefully, make them more interesting.

The papers are from Crafty Individuals (Summer), HOTP (Home Grown)  and PaperArtsy (Chatsworth), the latter has sprays and stamping from a previous make.
The ticket (I cut it in 2) is from a 6"x6"Docrafts stamp.

Thanks for coming by,

Birthday card for someone special

That is the latest Fashionable Stamping challenge. I made a special card for a special someone's special birthday!!! It's got to tick the box, right?

I have kept the front fairly simple as the "special bit" is the inside of the card. I have stamped the car and the hand from PaperArtsy (Hot pick 1207) in black and applied distress inks all around.

For the inside I took inspiration from scrapbooking and gathered some old photos of the recipient. A banner unfolds when opening the card and I have a bottom where my banner was to stand but now is just there for effect( and to stop the card from opening and ripping off the banner).

I used a 12"x12" paper from Graphic45 and regular cardstock that I inked/distressed.

The banner is made from letters cut out of stamped cardstock (Cover a Card - Rose Lace from Impression  Obsession).

The barely seen gold embossing on the "platform" is also a stamp from Impression Obsession, a large Flourish. I also embossed the top corners with a Personal Impression flourish.

Hope the birthday boy will like it, but I doubt I will know if he doesn't as no one dares criticise hand made offerings for fear of offending...

This is where you come in and tell me the truth in your comments!

My first ATC

It seems I am always late to the party...
Last year I made a tag for the first time and, this year, spurred on by the Vintage Journey challenge, it was time to try ATCs.

Rather obvious, but, I didn't quite grasp, until I had one in front of me, how small ATCs are. Since I started card making, I have been working on increasingly bigger, not smaller, "canvases" and I found the exercise quite difficult.
And some people do Twinchies and Inchies....

My starting inspiration was this stamp by Tim Holtz  (C0M004 - Time) which is ATC size!
I love vellum and thinking about his latest Vellum Paper Stash I wanted to add some to my panels. I substituted TH's by a British sourced version (Papermania - Mme Payraud) - cheapskate that I am... Sadly it doesn't show very well.

I made my background following a TH demo where he overlays several stencils, using Distress Inks.
As TH uses lots of metal embellishments, so I die-cut corners pieces which I embossed (Frantage Aged rose for the left ATC and WOW Pomegranate for the right one).
Small pieces of Tissue tape were added, just 'cause... and an altered paperclip that was lying around.

I am also entering That's Crafty challenge.

I apologise to my loyal followers if I am overwhelming their feeds, I just wanted to squeeze these projects before school starts again!

Je vois la vie en rose... Deja vu!!!

Wow 2 clichés in the same title, both French to boot, I am on a roll...

If you are working backwards in your blog feeds, you won't have seen my first pink creation, feel free to go there first if you like pink! The colour is inspired by the Pan Pastel UK challenge.

Since I bought the Eiffel Tower embossing folder (Sizzix by Tim Holtz) I want to use it on everything, so when the Wedodoobadoo challenge required textures it's the first thing I pulled out.
I mixed some texture paste with pastel and applied it fairly smoothly to my cardstock. When dry, I run it through my die-cutting machine with the folder.
Do wait until the paste is dry, otherwise the paste goes in the folder and the cardstock disintegrate as you try to pull it out. Don't ask how I know...

I then applied different shades of pink as well as a bit of white pastel over the raised areas , picking out the fleur de lys as a good spot to foil in pink and gold foil (it looks dark but that is a reflection).
The texture paste is a lovely ground for pastels by the way, it is smooth but grabs the powder very effectively.

I couldn't bring myself to cover it with anything, so whilst I pondered what to do with it I made my second pink textured creation which I posted previously.
With no further inspiration coming through, I just matted the panel on some pink cardstock and left it at that. Surely it would be futile to try and improve on TH design ?


I am all pinked out now,

Je vois la vie en rose...

If you abhor pink turn away now... but pink is what Pan Pastel UK want to see so I have made an all out pink panel with lots of textures using different media.

I prepared my background with gesso and scribbled some Inktense then sprayed with water.
I used stencils and texture paste that I coloured with pastel and sprinkled various pink mediums: glitter, micro beads, embossing powders. The micro beads were difficult to handle as, in order for the paste to hold them, they have to be squashed somehow but without compromising the stencilled motif underneath. Also, they have to be sprinkled quickly and they get everywhere, jumping and rolling far far away...

Then I created a bouquet with stamps and matching dies (Papertrey ink), wrapped it in a bit of mulberry paper and added a butterfly from my stock of previously made embellishments. (It has a stamped cardstock base and a vellum layer sewed at the butterfly's body).

I am also entering Wedodoobadoo and Lisa.B. Designs challenges.

I should warn you that before I settled on this design, I explored another pink idea which I will show in my next post.
Pink haters look away now...

Thanks for coming by,

Fall Fashion

Crafty Individuals challenged us to create something about Autumn fashion. Rather than "Autumn" I was inspired by the American "Fall", as I was imagining a dress of multi-coloured leaves.

And since there is no fashion without sewing, I created a scene with my many sewing themed dies and stamps.

I did the background with a first layer of white paint and to allow me complete freedom to soften or even remove this layer I used gouache. On top I used Inktense and other watercolour crayons, finishing by a liberal spray of Lime coloured mica mist.

The stamps are from CI set 238, the dies Joy Craft (Leaves) and X-Cut (Sewing). I also used an embossing punch by X-Cut (Oak leaf).

All the leaves were coated with Versamark before I applied mica powders (Imagination Crafts).

I am also entering the Imagination Crafts (Create a scene) and Artful Times (sewing) challenges.

I stand by my dress concept (although come the winter it might prove inadequate) but I am not sure about the background or the design. Don't hesitate to tell me if you see something that doesn't work!

Humoristic

A very quick post with a fairly quick card for Fashionable Stamping who wants us us to make them laugh. Hmm... don't know about laughing but this stamp certainly raises a smile every time I see it.

The stamp is by Impression Obsession (Pig Bros. Birdhouse) and I stamped it using pens to ink it up.

Hope you'll like it,

The thing is...

Thing is my word choice for the Craft Barn quote challenge, and I kept it simple with a quote from Bonaparte.

For the background I wanted to play with alcohol inks and play I did, with 3 bright colours (Lettuce, Cranberry and Stream from Ranger). I wanted to evoke the colours of summer and yes it was bright but... it looked awful. I decided to proceed with my next step before throwing it in the bin and stencilled (Prima Doily) with Sparkle Medium in Jade (Imagination Crafts). Still awful... I tried toning it down with white paint and it's better, not great, and as a consequence the Sparkle is not so sparkly! You'll also notice that the white paint is pinkish, yes the Cranberry managed to seep into the paint when the other 2 colours stayed put. Go figure...

My next problem was the ink I used to pen the quote, it's supposed to be dark red and now it's more light red. Something to do with the bottle sitting unattended for yonks?

Anyway....

I am also entering the Pan Pastel UK and Bunny Zoe Crafts challenges.

Thanks for coming by,

Double scoop of embossing

As I am translating this post, I will be brief. Don't hesitate to ask if you want details...

Ce post est plus succinct que d'habitude, du à la traduction. N'hésitez pas à demander si vous voulez des détails.
Katzelkraft nous challenge à utiliser une méthode de gaufrage. J'aime les deux méthodes alors j'ai mis le paquet et je les ai employées toutes les deux sur cette création!

Katzelkraft challenges us to use embossing so I decided to throw both dry and wet embossing at my make, as I love them both equally!

Stamp/Tampon: from KTZ86 a set of lovely vintage vehicles
Folder/Dossier: Tim Holtz Alterations Texture Fades - Bricked
EP/Poudre a embosser: Ranger Antiquities - Frosted Crystal
Stencil/Pochoir: The Crafters Workshop - Gears
Inks/Encres: Versafine, Distress Inks

Other challenges/Autres challenges:
WOW Embossing powder; That's Crafty

Merci de votre visite / thanks for coming by,