Zingy

The letter for the Craft Barn Dictionary challenge is Z with a twist of pearl...

I only remembered the pearl when uploading the pics on this here post so I hastily plonked a red Pearl in the middle and took a quick pic with my phone.

I hesitated between several words so I included the sun stencil (for the word Zenith) and lots of zesty and zingy colours. At least they WERE zingy before I stamped them and the violet got a bit muddied.

The wild grasses stamp I used is completely left field but it belongs to a set I had just bought in the sales, an old Gorjuss set by Docrafts .


Thanks for coming by,
Also entering the SSS Wednesday and That's Crafty challenges.

Bouquet

Today I am guesting over at Rubber Dance blog, with a challenge inspiration piece.

The colours for the August challenge are Black & White plus your choice of another colour. It's easy to think of the white as the paper, the black as the stamping ink and reserve the colour, well for colouring... which is fine, but you know me I'm a bit of a contrarian... still I'm also a wuss so I didn't pick Black as my paper base, I settled on the 3rd option and chose Kraft as my base cardstock.

Stamps: Textured flowers and Da Vinci from Rubber Dance.
Supplies: White gel pen, black Dye Ink, Versafine Black, white pencil, white Embossing powder

Do come over to the Rubber Dance blog, to see more pics.

Thanks for coming by,
I am entering the WOW Embossing powders, Stamping Sensations and Inkychicks challenges

Black & White CAS

CAS doesn't need to have a white background... Looking at my previous makes I realised that my CAS were always on a white base so I have decided to push myself into new colours. Today I have gone to the opposite on the spectrum with black, and it shows off my pink flower to best effect.

The flower is  the Dahlia from the Colour me collection by IndigoBlu and the die-cut is from the Thinlits Sentiment words set by Tim Holtz.

I stamped the flower with Versamark and applied chalk pastels in different shades of red and pink over the petals and yellow for the center.

Thanks for coming by,
I am entering the IndigoBlu, SSS Wednesday, Penny Black and more , Stamping Sensations and Uniko Studio challenges

C is for...

An easy letter for the latest Craft Barn Dictionary challenge, C and no twist either.

As it happens I had this stamp set already out when the challenge was published and it felt like a sign... Chillies it is then!
Looking the word up, I realised the spelling, especially the plural is, let's say... fluid but this is how I and my chosen online dictionary spell it.



































My final image has been inked with watercolour crayons, but the initial plan was to use Brushos, as I did for the W dictionary page. Several of you were curious so I took some pictures of the process. First the materials I used and how they were applied: 

I don't know if it's because of a chemical property or electro static but the powder will quite happily stay on the dry stamp .  However, and this is not visible, lots of minute bits of powder will have landed all over the stamp!

This became apparent when I stamped!

This picture shows the stamp just after spraying and with the naked eye there are no signs of powder or even water on the stamps that I'm not planning to print.

First generation (top) and 2nd generation (after another spray of water)  gave those results and although I couldn't see any water or powder you can see what happened!


So sadly to use the Brusho method I would have had to cut my stamp plate and I wasn't ready to do that.
You can see I'm working on top a newspaper and I can't stress enough that these powders travel far both wet and dry and this is a good way to make sure all powder is contained. I actually spray the page with water to "fix" any powder on the newspaper before disposing of it.

Coming back to the page... After stamping the chillies from the Hot, Hot, Hot stamp set (Rubber Dance), on the right fresh ones and on the left dry ones, I stamped the word "Chillies" from the word Chill and the letters i, e and s I retrieved from "spice girl" in the same stamp plate.

I inked the letter C from yellow, orange and red ink to echo the colours of the chillies and added the printed dictionary definition.

Thanks for coming by,

Also entering the Casology challenge.

Another Cutie

I did warn you... yes this is another cute and digital make! This time I used Octavia - Husky Hugs from Polka Doodles, which is more of a winter image but ...

Once coloured with alcohol pens I simply die-cut it with a rectangle die (Spellbinders) and created a mat out of Kraft Core'dination without sanding, embossing or anything else. Not because I felt lazy, but because it's a rather big image and any embellishment would make the whole thing rather heavy.

I feel cooler already...,
I am entering the  Polkadoodles, Colour Crazy and Paperbabe Stamps challenges.

Post It Notes take 3

Paper Artsy's blog theme for the fortnight is Colour Mixing. I know LOTS about colour mixing, especially in my medium of choice, watercolour. Well the theory anyway since I've read lots of  books, I wish all this knowledge translated into works of art, but, sadly no...

On the plus side, I know how to make do with a limited colour palette in acrylics, gelatos, Brushos etc... and even Distress Inks. If you want to use Distress inks with Cut & Dry then you will need  a pale and strong colour of each "primary" colour of Distress to obtain enough tones. For example for reds I have Fired Brick and  Spun sugar.

Anyway, I was very taken by Ellie Knol Gelli prints CAS cards and decided to have a go with my faux Gelli plate.

I used Claret and Nougat Frescos with Violet Storms and Golden Sands Infusions for this print and stamped the castle from Hot Picks 1207.

Other prints I took:

On the left I used Yellow Submarine, Nougat and Limelight with the Infusions.

On the right It's just the Infusions with water only.

I used the print as decoration for the front of a Post-It holder. This is now my 3rd one and I'm hoping this one, made out of plastic, will be more durable than the the previous one. It has a magnet at the back and will live on the fridge door.

And a side view of the holder :





Thanks for coming by,
Also entering the Love to Create challenge

It's veggie, veggie hot

What's the new theme at Country View Challenges for August? Hot summer days, of course! I do hope the weather will match our expectations, but if not, I know another way to get heat...

For the background I used dye ink applied with  Cut & Dry foam through a sunray stencil (Tim Holtz THS003 ).

I stamped the chillies and the Hot sentiment ( Hot, hot, hot! set from Rubber Dance) with dye inks. To deepen the colours  I used pencils in orange and reds on top of the stamped image.

The summer stamp is half a sentiment (Summer Bloom from Docrafts). I first inked it in red, then inked the top and bottom with black ink.

If you can stand the heat I'll expect you will join us in our challenge! Do pop over to the Country View Challenge blog to get more inspiration  and see what my teamies made.
I am entering The Artistic Stamper challenge.

Inspired by Circles

Only a few days left to enter the Country View Challenge where the theme is Circles. If you haven't entered yet, maybe my second dose of inspiration will galvanize you into action!

Did you notice how neatly stars fit in circles? The thought just tickled me and this was the inspiration for this panel.
I got so involved in the art making that I forgot to take pictures until my background was well underway... So here's a quick recap:

I started with a thick recycled cardstock panel and covered it with a piece of scrapbook paper (Docrafts, Gorjuss collection) thereby avoiding the blank canvas syndrome!
As I wanted to use wet mediums on top of the paper, I used DecoArt Ultra matte varnish to protect the paper and provide some tooth for the paints (use clear Gesso if you have it).
I stencilled circles with Textured Paste Transparent Matte (Ranger) in 2 corners, and used the Pixelated stencil (DecoArt) in the opposite corners adding Frantage embossing powder.

After drying and embossing, I applied 3 colours of acrylic inks, using a spray bottle to make it move and drip a bit. Some areas were too dark and too bright so I knocked them back with a little bit of gesso.
The photo shows the 2 texture stamps (Andy Skinner for Stampendous) I used with white pigment and black dye ink to add interest to the background.
For fun, I used this found object for additional stamping:




Those with youngsters will recognise the ammo for a toy gun.... it gives a lovely hole reinforcers (washers) impression.
For my focal point I used a text stamp (Da Vinci by Rubber Dance) on a die-cut circle stencilled with blue Distress ink (Scribbles by DecoArt). The bottom mat is a die-cut (Nellie Snellen) I found in my scraps, already coloured, embossed and generally interfered with, colour matched to my project with Gelatos.
I selected embellishments for their circle shape and chose some accordion flowers which I sprayed with pink mists.

And since my quote is about stars, I made a bottle cap embellishment with a stamped and embossed star (Crafty Individuals).

I felt there was something missing so I retrieved 2 scraps of papers and a die set (Spellbinders) and got to work:





















On the left is an offcut of a home printed photo and on the right a scrap of a failed Brushos experiment. Once cut they suddenly look more interesting don't you think? Anyway, from this set I chose 2 to include in my project and assembled with a ruler die-cut out of stiffened fabric.

If you'd rather attempt something quicker for the Circles challenge, have a look at my previous make here.

Thanks for coming by,
I am also entering the SSS Monday, We Love To Create, Stamplorations MM & Stencil, Stamplorations Theme& Sketch, SSS Wednesday and WOW Embossing powders challenges

Peacock CAS

Recently I saw a background made with drops of alcohol inks on glossy cardstock and the vivid colours made me want to try.

A simple image and sentiment on top and voila, a both rough and CAS make!

The image is a freebie from a magazine (Simply Card & Papercrafts, year/issue unknown but probably classified as Vintage!). I stamped it with Archival and as you might find it difficult to see from the photo what bird it is, it's a Peacock.

Thanks for coming by,
I am entering the Casology, Craft Barn, SSS Wednesday and That's Crafty challenges.

Charming ladies

The theme for the July Crafty Individuals challenge is minis.

Maybe it's cheating but I used clear shrink plastic as my base for my handbag charm, obtaining a miniature at the stroke of a heatgun!

The image is from the Ladies Who Latte (CI-401) set and I stamped it with Archival ink. I was impressed by how clean the impression was, considering the shrink plastic was not sanded and this image is particularly detailed.
I used a bit of acrylic paint to block the face and limbs of my ladies to "flesh" them out and die cut the image with a spellbinders die. (I used the die twice to create the same top and bottom shape, partially cutting each time).
I then backed the shrunk piece with a paper from the Crafty Individuals Seaside book (No 6) and,  as an afterthought, decided to decorate the back of my charm by sticking another piece of the same paper (it's not double sided if you wondered) and stamping an image on top of the paper.

The image on the back is from the Vintage Perfumery (CI-341) set.
To protect the tag from bumps and scratches I applied a layer of glossy accents on both sides.

I made a charm with left over beads and added a sandal charm with a length of chain to finish my handbag charm.
The pink flower is just there for the photo by the way!

Thanks for coming by,
Also entering the Colour Crazy and  All Sorts challenges.

Nostalgic colours

The letter for this fortnight's dictionary challenge at the Craft Barn is N and I thought how perfect it was to try out my Shabby Chic stamps (Andy Skinner for Stampendous).

As a departure from my usually blank canvas, I chose to create this page with a piece of Prima paper in Vintage colours, providing the Coffee and Cream hues effortlessly!

I stamped and masked my images and created a shadow with Distress ink and Cut & Dry foam.

 

As usual dictionary definition and letter (today stamped in black ink) to finish the page.

 

One of the more easy ones... Wonder if the next one will be a twister?

Also entering the Graph'It markers, Penny Black and more and Craft Stamper TIMI challenges .

Making a scene

The sun has been very shy in the UK but at last we've had some hot temperatures and can think of summertime and keeping cool by the sea...


I created this scene with Life's a Beach Girlfriends (Crafty Individuals CI-284) and Cape Lookout Lighthouse (Impression Obsession) both stamped in Versafine Sepia. On reflexion the Sepia image didn't make an impact and I decided to add colour with pencils.

I finished by adding some seashells embellishments made out of super light air dry clay and decided to keep it CAS(ish),  light and airy like the seaside breeze!

Thanks for coming by,
I am entering the SSS Wednesday, That's Crafty, Polkadoodles, Live and Love Crafts, Paperbabe, Anything but cute and Craft Stamper TIMI challenges