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!