Happy St.Stephen's Day

I really don't know where the time goes, every year I say I will be organised for Christmas but this year was no different.....only this time it was making family cards late on Christmas Eve! A quick post because I just wanted to wish you all a Merry Christmas....

and a ....

Ruth x

Let's Celebrate! at ATP Exchange

Toni is our host for the next challenge at ATP Exchange and in keeping with the festive spirit she has chosen a celebration theme, for the challenge details please follow the link here.... and just a reminder there is a £10 Artist Trading Post voucher for the winner and this time you have a bit longer to enter....4 weeks!

I decided to pick some of the occasions our family have celebrated this year or going to celebrate and created a wall hanging as a reminder that although there are ups and downs each year, it's the good times we should remember!

I was inspired by the Lynne Perella frame I created at Sue's ATP class (see previous post for a picture). I started off with one of the MDF 20x20 frames and made up some sprays using the above primary element pigments. I received some coasters from a charity that were the perfect size and also had a coating on them so didn't need sealing before I started to alter them.

The frame was sprayed

and dried.....although the central area won't be seen.

The script stamp from the Eclectica ESN11 was stamped randomly over the outside frame and I used Wendy Vecchi's embossing paste through the Prima lace stencil and set aside to dry.

I used a piece of cut and dry foam to coat the coasters with Finnabairs black gesso.

Once dry I used a variety of stamps including CI-257  and Handwritten Holidays 1 from Stampers Annonymous to heat emboss with versamark and clear embossing powder. The 21 was a stencil I made using the Sizzix wordplay die. The same sprays were then used over the gesso and as I was in a hurry to dry them I took the risk of remelting the powder and used a heat gun.......hope I can repeat this happy accident because I love the effect created....the way the pigment has pooled on the embossing.

 We've celebrated a 21st Birthday.

A couple have bought their first home together.

Another couple got married.

And we are about to celebrate Christmas together........the sentiment seemed so apt for this challenge...and it's also my favourite Christmas film!

I used black ice silk glaze dry brushed around the edges, added some filigree corners and set the pigments using fixative (cheap hairspray!). 

Can't wait to see your celebration creations...for more inspiration, please hop over here and checkout what my talented teamies have made. 

A foot note...if you saw the original you may have noticed there are only 4 coasters and no central 5th one...well you know I like experimenting... I started by using snowflake fresco instead of black gesso on 2 of the coasters but when I added the pigment it just didn't look right with the frame so I started to dab it off with the intention of painting over with the black BUT it looked quite pretty so I sprayed more on, sprinkled some pigment on and dried them.....

I only had 4 coasters left so it was meant to be....well I couldn't paint over them could I? No idea what I am going to do with them and it's another I'm not sure whether I can repeat the accident again...but I'll have fun trying!

Thanks so much for stopping by.

Faux Chine Colle and a few other things.

Faux Chine Colle? I hadn't heard of this before I read the Joan Bess book 'Gelli Plate Printing'...which I can highly recommend. Briefly it's a collage of fragile papers on to heavier paper before printing on them, there's a link here to the Gelli Arts You Tube video which demonstrates it beautifully.

I only prepared one piece of card just to try it out and decided I'd make a card for my stash . I'd recently bought a few golden acrylics in primary colors that were translucent as I wanted to try layering colours with the gelli plate.

I tried to use the colours that are used in the video I've linked but I added a bit to much yellow to the blue and although I loved the collage effect, I didn't like the mix of colours especially the green...it reminded me of my science lab coat from school!!!... no I had to change it.

I've started by using some darker green colouring pencils just around the edges of where the colours meet and some verdigris embossing powder.

Next some gilding flakes on the yellow areas, looking better but still not quite right so more shading using red and purple.

Great technique, will be trying that again. I've realised that Gelli prints can be perfect as there are, may just need some additions or be a great starting point for a background. So thats Faux Chine Colle but I thought I'd also just share a few other cards and things I've been playing around with.

Carrying on with Gelli plate printing and translucents, I had a further play around mixing from the primary colours and pulled off the following prints.

 Love this first one for the colours and the fibre imprint 

Below is a new joggles stencil, the result reminding me of fireworks.

Lastly this was with silk glaze, difficult to see but the whole print shimmers. 

Just need to make some cards with them now.......speaking of which I have another card to share with you. 

 The first one and this are for 2 upcoming male birthdays. I don't tend to make complicated cards, often going for CAS, certainly for the males in my family. The background is an alcohol ink one and the map stamp is PaperArtsy. The bird and text is Stampers Annon classic...love the bird which I've UTEE'd, I've also added some alcohol ink to the compass coin.

Last on the card front, I finally got around to finishing off the cards from this post here and decided I would split it into 2, I think I prefer them like this.

And finally if you've stayed with me I've just a couple of pics from 2 workshops I've attended in the last few months at the Artist Trading post. The first is a pic from the Kasia one where we made a scrapbook page...this was a bit out of my comfort zone, partly because I like to think about what and where I'm putting things but this was don't think just do, which was actually quite liberating in the end and I picked up lots of tips

The photo is my mum when she was about 10.

This last photo is from Sue Carringtons  Lynne Perella 'beer mat' workshop. If you ever get a chance to do one with Sue, you won't be disappointed, you'll learn loads about techniques and there really enjoyable. Love how this turned out.

 Anyway I'll sign off now for November....I'm off for my early Christmas present of Finnabairs workshops at ATP, I'm just a bit excited!!

Thanks as always for stopping by, hope you enjoyed a slightly different post.

'Recycle for Christmas'

Hi, time for our next challenge over at ATP exchange and this time Yvonne is hosting it. With the festive season nearly upon us she has come up with a great challenge theme and is asking us to 'Recycle for Christmas'. It could be a box, a piece of packaging....there are lots of possibilities.

I decided to alter a star shaped bottle that I've had for years and could never quite decide what to do with but certainly didn't want to throw it away. It's about 6.5 inch/16cm high and originally contained some liqueur....which was a Christmas present!

I have been wanting to try Tim's Faux Cracked Glass technique for a while now and the idea developed of creating 'something' inside the bottle. The technique is the only part I won't explain as it can be found in Compendium of Curiosities III. I'm quite pleased with it as it's my first attempt....the only thing I will say is that as it's a star shaped bottle with many surfaces I probably should have tried doing a surface at a time, not the whole lot at once!

Firstly I used the houses from the CI 257 set to stamp onto a circle of tissue in black archival, then tore around the edge and adhered to the back with matte medium. On the front I masked off a circular area before covering the whole bottle in faux cracked glass.

I did use a lot of WV cornflower blue archival ink as I wanted a really intense colour.

Whenever I use shrink plastic I always think why don't I use it more often....I love it! At first I was going to make stars but then realised that stars belong in the sky not below the houses.  I found a snowflake stamp that would be small enough to go through the 1.5cm neck of the bottle....I do like a challenge. The star and text embellishments were made with PaperArtsy stamps (ID07 and Xmas plate 1)

There are 5 snowflakes suspended inside the bottle. I also applied some PVA to the edge of the circle and applied glamour dust before colouring with blue archival.

The cork was split and holes made in the top to thread the metallic thread through. A crackle effect was applied to the cork using frescos in space cadet and antarctic with PaperArtsy crackle glaze. I finished the cork with a button from my stash that I gilded with sapphire treasure gold.

Hope you enjoyed your visit, please do hop over and see the wonderful creations of the Design Team, I'm sure you'll be inspired and we can't wait to see what you'll recycle! Thanks as always for stopping by.

Lynne Perella Journal pages

Today I thought I'd share the last of my journal pages that I completed when I was on holiday in September. Not sure whether I've saved the best till last but they are probably my favourite of the ones I did..... and yes that is glorious sunshine on the pages!

...but in November the pages look rather different...

There was a little gesso on the pages before I sprayed them with colour blooms (iris and tea stain) just to see the effect on Kraft paper and yes I did want the drips to run up the page. I used some treasure gold through the TH doily stencil. The paint at the top has come through from another page but it just adds to it.

For the images I used the steampunk set of gelatos on some white card and stamped images from the LPCO30 set of Eclectica stamps by PaperArtsy in black archival.

The lace, sequins and beads that I had with me were added to the pages

 and I thought that the sequins were a bit like thought or 'dream' bubbles going up to the images and worked with the dream stamp (from The Artistic Stamper).

I never thought I'd be putting unaltered gold sequins on a creation of mine but I rather like how they've worked out.

I really should be thinking about making some Christmas cards but expect I'll be on the last minute as usual...maybe next week! Thanks so much for stopping by. 

The leftover dress...

...well it's a dress made from leftovers. I started to alter this mannequin about a year ago and got as far as painting it in fresco french roast, covering it with book pages and stamping and embossing on tissue paper before cutting them into circles.....and that's as far as I got until I saw Sue Carrington's wonderful altered mannequin here. Now I know this doesn't look like Sue's but the point is it inspired me to go back to it with some ideas around the tattered florals die.

Bare with me now...I recently had a sort out in the room where I craft and one of the things I did was sort out my boxes of bits and put them out in a tray so I can see what I've got because if I can't see it in front of me I won't go looking and will just keep creating more bits. You can see a space there now!...I know, it won't stay empty for long.

Anyway this is probably one of the best things to do if you are stuck for inspiration; it feels great when you find something in that box that is perfect for your project or can be altered very easily....and that's how the leftover dress got made.

I'd originally had some idea about using circles of tissue to build up a dress but it wasn't working just in white even with the gold stamping and embossing. I had a piece of brown toned gelli print deli paper which I painted the back of in blue/ green shade before cutting into circles.

Crumple them up, we are going for a distressed look.

The bodice is metal tattered floral pieces which I embossed and then sanded to distress, I then cut the flower into petals and layered them. I still needed something for the rest of the skirt. When I saw the challenge and wonderful inspirational creations over at A Vintage Journey for All Sewn Up  I remembered I had some eclectic elements fabric and one of the pieces was a perfect colour choice.

I cut the fabric with the tattered florals die and cut the petals out fraying the edges slightly. It just needed something to lift it so I used some of the same gold embossing powder I'd already used and some vintage photo distress glitter.

Some close  up details of the layers

To finish the back I found exactly 3 circles of scrunched up and gilded pieces of glassine paper to which I added some more distress glitter and beads before securing. I also added an ideaology charm.

The paper images at the base were left over from making the tiny tins from a few months back secured along with the metal embellishments.

Recently I've not been able to enter any challenges or post as regularly as I'd have liked to so I've really enjoyed just creating this for no particular reason....and it's a bonus to be able to enter it in a challenge.
I'm entering it in The Sunday stamper challenge which is 'Sewing and Stitches' and I'm also entering it in A Vintage Journey 'All Sewn Up' (link in above post).
The stamped images and dies are Tims and I've gone for a distressed shabby feel to this sewing themed entry, hope it fits the travelling instructions.
 I've really enjoyed making it and that's the most important thing. Hope you enjoyed your visit, I really appreciate all your wonderful comments and hope to visit your blogs a bit more often. Thanks so much for dropping by.