An Announcement!

 It was just an ordinary Wednesday afternoon. I'd been making a few Christmas cards, and watching Jean Hardy's Facebook Live on the Crafty Individuals Facebook Page, when my phone pinged. It was a message from Jean, asking me if I would like to join the Crafty Individuals Design Team! It took a few seconds to sink in. What? Who, me?? Really?? Then the excitement set in! Wow! Crafty Individuals was one of the first British stamp companies I bought from, many years ago, and they have always been right up at the top of my list of favourites! To be on their DT would be a dream come true! I was so excited! I thought I'd better ask Jean for some time to think about it, because I didn't want to make a commitment unless I was sure I could fulfil it. Jean said that was fine, so I had a think, and about 5 seconds later messaged her back to say yes please! Did I say I was excited?!!

The next development was the arrival of a parcel of the newest stamps and papers! They are all fabulous (you can find them here) and I was so excited to get to play with them. Did I say I was excited?!!

Here are some of my first makes as a DT member! My favourite of the new stamps, which have all been designed by Sharron Bates, is the wonderful "Of The Sea" (CI-559), which is an old boat with a lovely vintage feel. I thought it would make a suitable subject for pyrography.

 

I stamped the image with Memento Desert Sand ink on to Cass Art 300gsm hot press watercolour card, a good strong card with the ability to take the heat of the pyrography tool. I then used the tool to outline and shade the image. I overstamped one of the papers from the new "Wonderfully Weathered" Set 1 with some text from CI-397 before mounting the image over the paper. I added a few elements from CI-397, CI-272 and CI-349 to complete the project, which is a free standing plaque. Here's a close up of the lovely old boat.

My next play was with the gorgeous "Flower" CI-560, Sharron's stunning interpretation of a cone flower (aka Echinacea). I decided to make a journal. 

I made front and back covers from mountboard and covered the outside of them with papers from the "Aurora Borealis" A4 background paper set and the insides with one of the designs from a brand new paper set "Vintage Style Journaling Papers". The pages are a mixture of watercolour card and black cartridge paper, as you can just about see in the next photo. The covers and papers were bound together with my Bind-It-All machine.

Next, the flower was stamped on to encaustic art card, clear embossed, watercoloured and covered with Ranger Glossy Accents to seal it. Then alcohol inks were sponged over to make a background. An aperture was cut from a piece of textured card with a die from The Works, the image affixed behind it and then matted on to contrasting card to frame it. This was then adhered to the front of the journal, along with a book plate holder which has been in my stash for years! The wording inside it was computer generated. 

My final show-and-tell for now is the utterly fabulous "Pablo the Penguin" CI-557! I had finished all my Christmas cards, so I made a gift bag instead and put him on that.

I stamped Pablo, various elements from CI-257 and CI-326 and the snowflake (which I think was a freebie) onto fabric with Versacraft ink, which I heat set, and then added colour with Arteza fabric pens, which also needed to be heat set. I fringed the edges of the panel and stitched it to the front of the bag. I was quite happy with the result, but felt it needed just a little something else to finish it off. Had a rummage through my stash and found some tiny bells, which I attached to his antlers. Perfect!

Here he is in all his glory!

I've loved working with these fantastic stamps, and have more ideas for future projects, so thanks for looking, and watch this space!

Even More Colour!

I'm loving this month's theme at Stamping Sensations! Entries are coming in nicely for our "Make It Colourful" challenge and it's great to see such bright and cheerful designs.

I made another card using stamps from our June sponsor, Visible Image.

I stamped the flowers and butterflies with Versafine Clair Ink on Cass Art hot press watercolour card and coloured them with diluted Distress Ink reinkers, using a waterbrush to blend the colours. I splattered drops of the inks over the design with a fan brush and added liquid pearls to the butterflies' bodies. I hand wrote the sentiment and stamped the colour splash (a magazine freebie designed by Visible Image) over the appropriate word.

It was a very quick card to make, and I really enjoyed the process. Sometimes I prefer to work with more muted colours for a softer effect, depending on the subject, of course, but at the moment I'm definitely going through a bright and colourful phase!

Our June challenge runs until the 1st of July, so there's still plenty of time to enter if you'd like to be in with a chance of winning a fab voucher to spend in Visible Image's online shop.

Flowers All The Way!

Whilst butterflies feature high on the list of my favourite topics, flowers are also right up there so I am delighted that the theme for our May Challenge at Stamping Sensations is

* * * * * SAY IT WITH FLOWERS * * * * *

We want you to show us your very best floral creations! Please remember that we are a stamping challenge, and the focal element of your project must reflect the theme. This means that flowers must be the main subject of your design. A few added flowers as an embellishment will not fit the criteria, and will not be eligible for the prizes. We prefer conventional hand stamping, but do allow digital images as long as they are hand coloured.

We have not one but two fabulous prizes this month! Our sponsors are the wonderful Chocolate Baroque, who have generously donated some of their fantastic new Blueprint stamps, and our very own Dora, who as well as being a member of our DT, is also a designer of the most beautiful digi stamps. She is offering a choice of four of her lovely images for the lucky winner.

As tulips are amongst my favourite flowers, I have used Dora's gorgeous tulip image for my card.

Having printed out the tulips onto watercolour paper (Cass Art Hot Press), I coloured them with Arteza watercolour pencils and diecut the image with a die from The Works. Before removing the panel from the die, I sponged around the edge with pigment ink.

The background paper has been in my stash for years! I bought it from Lakeland back in the days when they used to have a craft section in their shops. There were several different papers in the pack (I bought two packs!) and I have used up most of them, but the one I have used here has always been my favourite, as it is so pretty with the tulips and lovely spring colours. I did think twice about cutting it up for the card, but it fits so perfectly with the image, and since I had two sheets left, I decided to do it!  I will be keeping the remaining sheet!

Because the paper already has an appropriate printed sentiment within the pattern, I didn't think it needed anything adding to it, other than a little diecut butterfly (magazine freebie die).

 

Our lovely daughter, who is doing the shopping for us during the lockdown, surprised me yesterday with this gorgeous bunch of the real thing!

They are currently on the windowsill of my craft room, where they are outshining the needle felted one I made recently!

My teamies have a profusion of beautiful floral samples for you - they really have excelled themselves once again. Do go and have a look at them over on the Challenge Blog. We are so looking forward to seeing your entries and hope you will enjoy this month's challenge.

And More Rainbows!

We're midway through the month but there's still plenty of time to enter our April Challenge at Stamping Sensations, where our theme is "Somewhere Over The Rainbow", quite appropriate at the present time. Full details over on the challenge blog.

I've been taking advantage of the extra spare time, during this period of lockdown, to explore some different artforms, one of which is pyrography. I bought a kit a while ago but hadn't had much chance to try it out until now. I've been inspired by Richard Dickson who, as The Pyronautist, does some fabulous work. Do go and have a look at his Facebook page. He mentioned on his page that he had been burning designs on watercolour paper, which made it possible to produce cards with pyrography designs, so I thought I would have a go at that. It works a treat!

I stamped the flowers (Woodware) on to the watercolour card with Desert Sand Memento ink, and then outlined and shaded the design with my pyrography tool. I wanted to add the rainbow background but didn't want the flowers to be coloured, so I used a Versamark pen to cover them completely and clear embossed them to act as a resist.

I sprayed the card with clean water and brushed various shades of Distress inks over in a rainbow shape, drying it with a heat gun so that the colours didn't continue to spread. I wiped away the excess colour from the flowers with a damp cloth.

The watercolour card, which I thoroughly recommend, is Cass Art Hot Press 300gsm. It's called "paper" but 300gsm is actually quite thick, more like card. I don't think I would want to risk burning on to anything thinner! It also takes the water very well and is perfect for stamping on as it is smooth. I wanted to keep the design clean and simple, so I just added a die cut butterfly (Cheery Lynn) and a sentiment (magazine freebie). For a first try, I was quite pleased with how it turned out, and will definitely be doing more.

We have had some absolutely gorgeous entries for our Rainbow challenge so far, but we would still like to see lots more. Let's fill blogland with this symbol of hope!

Another Favourite Stamp

Here's another sample for this month's Stamping Sensations Challenge, where the theme is "Favourite Stamps. We've had some superb entries so far, and there's still plenty of time to enter and be in with a chance of winning a fabulous prize from our January sponsor Tattered Lace. Full details, including our challenge rules, are on the challenge blog.

 I think I like this Aall & Create stamp (#206 Hexagon Stem), again by Tracy Evans, even more than the one in my previous post.

I made another background on a gel plate, this time the 5" x 3" one, which I attached to an acrylic mount so I could use it like a stamp. I brayered distress oxide inks on to the plate, flicked some Brushos on to it with a fan brush, sponged some ink through an AAll & Create stencil (#39 Lotza Dotz) to add a bit of texture and then pressed it down on to a piece of Cass Art hot press watercolour paper, which is very smooth and excellent for stamping on.

The stamp is quite large and needed an A5 size base card to accommodate it. I stamped it over my background and lightly flicked some more Brushos over the whole piece. I then stamped the stamp a second time on a separate piece of the watercolour paper. I coloured the flower head and several of the hexagons with my favourite Arteza Watercolour Pencils, cut them out and decoupaged them over the main image with foam pads. Having tied a strip of raffia down one side, I matted it with a thin purple border on to the base card. The sentiment, by the way, is part of the stamp.

The Aall & Create range is quite different from the styles I usually go for, but I think it's good to step outside the comfort zone now and then. It makes one think in different ways and stops boredom creeping in. I'm really enjoying working with these stamps and stencils.