Belated Bloggerversary - and blog candy!

(This post will stay at the top until 7th December - scroll down for newer ones!)

This past year has been quite an eventful one for me, for various reasons, and it seems to have flown by. Thus the anniversary of the starting of my blog, in October 2008, passed unnoticed! Not to worry, though, I can celebrate it now! To do so, and to say a huge thank you to all the lovely people who have followed the blog, left supportive comments, and generally made life in Blogland such a pleasure, I'm giving away some blog candy.



It includes unmounted stamps from Crafty Individuals and Joanna Sheen, a Crafty Individuals "Christmas" Miniatures book, Christmas stickers, paper flowers, Craftwork Cards button messages, Woodware Tag Board Book, a Memento Tuxedo Black Dew Drop inkpad, a photo frame (to alter??) and a hand made notebook.

To win all of those, just leave me a comment. If you also become (or are already) a follower, that will give you a second entry. Linking to this post from your own blog, if you have one, will gain you a third entry. (ie. Comment = 1 chance, comment+follower = 2 chances, comment+follower+link= 3 chances.) I will post the candy to anywhere in the world. The closing date will be Monday the 7th December, and a winner will be drawn randomly soon after then, so don't forget to check back & see if it's you!

Thanks again to everyone for your support and friendship, it is much appreciated.

A great day out

Well, Sally and I had a brilliant time at the Sir Stampalot Demo Day. There were seven very talented ladies demonstrating various techniques, including our dear blog friend Brenda. It was so lovely to meet her face to face and have a chat. Brenda was showing us how to make the most beautiful paper roses, using punches. Have a look at the gorgeous samples on her blog, though I have to say the photos most certainly don't do them justice.

After watching the demos, we went round the shop for some much needed retail therapy. Twice. I'm sure we can't be the only ones who, having paid for our purchases, can't leave a shop without just one more look round! Talking on the way home, Sally and I agreed that we had come away with more inspiration from that one event than from all of the past few big shows we've been to put together. So I'd just like to say to Brenda, thanks so much for the warm welcome you gave us, and we'll definitely be back again for the next Demo Day.

Oldie but Goodie

It's great to learn new techniques, and I am always on the lookout for new things to try, but sometimes it's good to revisit the old ones. I quite often go back to shaving foam marbling, simply because the results are good, and it's such fun to do. I like shaving foam particularly as a marbling medium because it is possible to have some control over your finished pattern. What you see in the tray is what you will get on your paper.

Thus, in the easel card shown here, I was able to make a landscape effect with more blue at the top and more brown at the bottom. The larger trees are from Clarity Stamp, and the deer and tiny trees in the background are by Stampscapes. The greeting is Inkadinkado. On the angel card I used a panel of marbled paper as a feature, stamped with  a Stampington stamp. The sentiment is also by Stampington. The angel is from the "Christmas" miniatures book by Crafty Individuals.

For the holly card, I revisited not only an old technique, but also an old stamp! It's from The Stamp Man. Having stamped it on the marbled paper, I embossed it with sparkle embossing powder & then coloured the leaves and berries with Promarkers to make them stand out more. I mounted it at an angle over a piece of printed paper. The message button is from Craftwork Cards.

The final card is very simple, just four squares of card, three stamped with a snowflake (Stampington), the other holding a Craftwork Cards message button, and strips of silver ribbon to finish it off.


Well, it was fun to go back to the marbling, but tomorrow Sally and I are off to the Open Day at Sir Stampalot, looking forward to seeing what's new, & also meeting Brenda. Can't wait....

Fab Stamp Man Blog Candy!

Jill at The Stamp Man is giving away some fantastic blog candy! The prize will be a choice from 3 of Kay Carley's recent designs, the gorgeous Aspects of Design Funky Flowers, Funky Frames, or Fancy Flourishes. Nip over to Jill's blog to stake your claim. These really are beautiful quality stamps (they're all on my Christmas wish list!) and Jill has some lovely samples using them on the blog. The closing date for the candy is midday on Tuesday, 15th December.

Quick Tip

I'm sure I'm not the first person to have thought of this, but just in case anyone else hasn't, I thought I'd share it. I needed a black brad & didn't have one. So I tried colouring a different one with a black Promarker. It needed a few coats, but I was amazed at how well it worked. So now I won't have to buy lots of different coloured brads. Obviously for pale colours I'd need a white or very light coloured one to start with, but I can just colour one whenever I need it with whatever colour I'm using on my project & it will match perfectly. :-)

How many days until Christmas.....?

Another card made with the Brilliance Ink background. The flower stamp is from the Aspects of Design sheet "Summer Flowers", by The Stamp Man, (currently on sale at half price while stocks last!) and the sentiment is by Crafty Individuals. I used my Nestabilities and Cuttlebug to cut the circles and the label and punched a few flowers out of the leftover Brilliance-inked background paper.



Now I really should make some Christmas cards......

Ideas from The Stamp Man

I managed to catch The Stamp Man's recent show on Create and Craft, and really liked Jill's ideas for making backgrounds with Brilliance inks. She put the inks on to a craft sheet, sprayed them with water and then laid her paper on top to pick up the ink. It gave a lovely, shimmery, watercolour effect. The link above is to Jill's blog, where she explains how to do it. I've had Brilliance inkpads for years and never thought of using them in this way. Of course, I had to try it out, and here are the first two cards I've made.



I wanted a marble effect for the Roman gods, so I used starlight black, galaxy gold and moonlight white Brilliance inks. I inked up two pieces of paper. The first one took up some of the ink, then I picked up what was left with the second piece which gave it a lighter coverage. I used that piece for the background and stamped and clear embossed the image on the first piece.



For the second card I used pearlescent sky blue, pearlescent purple and pearlescent orchid. All stamps are Aspects of Design by The Stamp Man, except for the sentiment, which I think is by Papermania. Border punch is by Martha Stewart.

Meadow

Taking the colour removal technique a step further, I made this.



Using encaustic art card, the background was sponged with Distress inks, then the honesty seed pods were stamped in black and clear-embossed. I was thus able to remove the colour from them using a damp paintbrush without the water overflowing on to the rest of the background. I did the same for the campion flower near the centre, but having removed the background colour I then painted the flower with Distress inks. The remaining elements were simply stamped with Versamagic inks.

The picture was mounted on to an 8" x 8" card from Craftwork Cards, from where also came the background paper and the butterfly greeting. The butterfly was coloured with a Promarker. All stamps are Elusive Images from Graphicus, except for the trees in the background. The tiny fir trees are by Stampscapes, and the other tree is from Lavinia Stamps.