PaperArtsy weekly challenge

Quick post, on the last minute I know... but here's my entry for the weekly challenge

Return to Vintage for '304'

I enjoy trying new techniques and stretching myself choosing colours I wouldn't normally go for but I have to admit I love vintage and neutral tones; so when I saw the Sunday Stamper challenge this week was Memories I thought 'yes' but what to do...well this week apart from the lovely creation by Hels I have been inspired by 2 wonderful posts, one from Lin Brown and another from Sue Carrington.

I thought I'd use a favourite photo of my mum when she was 18 and make a little 7 x 5 inch canvas keepsake.

As it's a stamping challenge it has to include some stamping so I have stamped into the grunge paste with a text stamp through the harlequin stencil. 

I also used a Crafty Individuals flourish stamp and the Memories stamp is from the Artistic Stamper. Lots of bits and bobs including Prima flowers and mechanicals. This is part way through planning where 'bits' should go.

I used Fresco paints mainly in Nougat and Stone and painted some of the embellishments before I stuck them down, I had intended to start shading in brown tones once assembled but decided I liked it as it was and just used treasure gold in white fire to finish it.

Sorry but the photos aren't quite as good as they should be because of poor light but hopefully you can see the overall effect. Thoroughly enjoyed doing this....well that's the whole point isn't it?

Darcy Journalling Month 3

For guidance and step by step see link here. Slightly out of my comfort zone, not least because journalling for me is where I experiment and usually for my eyes only. What inspired me? I wanted to see if I could make it work for me. There was only one technique I didn't use....glueing in stamped images to add a layer. I've started with my finished page and then showed some of my choices along the way.

My journal is an old photo album which I adapted, you'll notice I only work on one page.  I use the other for notes. 

The top is quite patchy, but I like it, I have used torn text before but not peeled the edges away when dry...learnt and liked that. Colours used throughout project were snowflake, yellow submarine, london bus, zesty zing, limelight, hey pesto, beach hut, inky pool and eggplant.

I used 2 background stamps, both free with craft stamper, one in archival, one in snowflake and a CW stencil for dots.

This surprised me, when I had painted the 'eyes' and stamped over in black archival, the page just popped and it had a frame, really liked this effect.

I stencilled in where I wanted all the plants to be, growing and escaping from the terrarium. The cube is from a very old set of stamps I had and because I had all my plants in one cube I decided it would be too difficult to cut out and overlay stamped images so I used some clear embossing powder on the cube to give some definition..... a bit like glass.

I've used the bump technique before but only with white and then a translucent, I've been missing out an important base layer....liked this, also liked the effect of sketching black lines around leaves and the white dots, really surprised how it all added to the effect. Some more shading and treasure gold of course and that's it. I had a lovely play yesterday morning doing this, if you have stayed with me through the step by step..thank you!

PaperArtsy weekly challenge

This is my 'attempt' at the Hanging canvas trio  by Ellen Vargo. I loved the original, so fresh, and I am pleased  for once that I have managed to submit something in time. I enjoyed playing and trying something different but if I was repeating it I would make the words smaller, probably use canvas as I didn't prep the surface of the coasters very well and Mrs Impatient, I should have let the glue dry before outlining in black!....At this point I am telling myself there are no mistakes in Art.

 Anyway instead of canvas I used coasters, 

I also had a napkin with a flourish on it. Instead of the alphabet stamp which I don't have I wanted to use an open image so thought the trio of postmarks from a Hot Picks set worked very well. 

For the white spots I brushed snowflake through a stencil. The rest is pretty much as the original but I chose to use a great quote from Maya Angelou. Thanks for stopping by.

Sunday Stamper Challenge '303'

Eternal Flame is the theme this week, or flame colours, which for me means deep orange and red....no I won't say burn't orange...Here's my entry.

I've used pan pastels in yellow diarylide, orange and permannent red shade. I started by sponging some yellow on to card stock and then built a background starting with versamark through a couple of CW stencils, I then used versamark with 2 different Kaisercraft stamps (the butterflies making another return visit) and built up the pan pastel colours. Tim Holtz tissue tape formed the background on the card blank and to finish some ribbon, a button and a little walnut stain DI around the edges.

The colour purple..

Just thought I'd share a picture of the project I did yesterday at a fab workshop given by Sue Carrington at The Artist Trading Post. I've been to a couple of Sue's and can highly recommend them.
I seem to be having a purple phase at the moment.... no doubt it will pass!

Sunday Stamper challenge '302'

Well having missed last weeks, I had to submit one this week, the theme is...'Mother Nature's Son'. It's a one layer tag starting with some Chatsworth paper which had layers of fresco paints and quite a bit of stamping until I overdid the paint.

I've been wanting to use this beautiful Clarity stencil and got carried away with the stencilling... I added some primary elements pigments giving it a beautiful shine. The second lot of stamping was very simple in black archival and just some ribbon to trim as I didn't want to lose the bling or flower heads. Quick but at least I've managed an entry!

In these shoes........?

I made these a while ago, inspired by Leonie Pujols tutorial here. I had some scrapfx freebies and I really couldn't see me using them but they were perfect for this.

 Really liked the end result ......great for a card for one of my nieces. The only extra I added was on the base of each shape I stencilled some treasure gold through before I started dipping them.

I used the same stencil and treasure gold to make the background for the card, added some walnut stain DI around the edge and the central panel was embossed using one of TH sizzix embossing folders. Think I might keep the green shoe, reminds me of when I used to wear platforms...

Baby wipes and JOFY

I've seen posts where baby wipes have been recycled for backgrounds or journal covers and thought great idea, but usually mine are pretty muddy post clean up so I've never gone any further with it.
However in the process of cleaning away fresco paint and primary elements pigment from the chunky ATC (that is still sitting in the corner of the craft table looking at me) I thought that looks like it would make quite a nice background when dry.

  ....yes I used a few baby wipes! So I chose a piece where there were 2 pale areas and looking through my stamps thought the JOFY 14 set looked perfect for the background stamped in black archival. I chose promarkers to colour as the wipe had a few areas where it had 'felted' with rubbing and I wanted the colour to dry quickly and not wick out. I've used distress inks on the background card and spritzed with water,

added a little rock candy stickles and some stitching to finish. 

I will enjoy making some more of these in DL format with the remaining wipes. Thanks for stopping by.