Sunsets and Friends

One of the best things about blogging is that I have made some wonderful friends through it. There is a group of five of us who regularly chat online together. We have recently formed a chat group, where we natter about crafting, blogging, putting the world to rights and generally have a good laugh. It's very therapeutic! I had posted some photos I'd taken of some of the stunning sunsets we get where I live, and a discussion took place as to what might be the best ink colours etc. to recreate the scenes on a card. I challenged them each to create a card representing one of the photos, and they all accepted the mission!

These were the photos they had to choose from.

The single tree in the second and fourth photos is a wonderful old beech tree which stands alone on top of the hill and is a local landmark. We can see it from our garden, and quite often get people stopping outside our house to photograph it! A few years ago I turned one of my photos of it into a digistamp, but being a stamper at heart I really wanted it in rubber. I sent the photo to Deby at Inkylicious, knowing that she is a kindred spirit when it comes to trees, and hoping to persuade her to turn it into a stamp, and she did! Not only that, she added a couple of buzzards and a sentiment to make a fabulous set, which you can find here.

Having set the challenge, I thought I should also try and make a card myself. I decided to use the photo with the three trees. As luck would have it, I have a Crafty Individuals stamp (sadly no longer on their website) with three trees on it not too dissimilar to the ones in the photo, so I went with that. The sentiment and leaf stamps are still available.

To see what my lovely friends came up with, please do go and have a look at their blogs. You will certainly not be disappointed, their cards are all absolutely brilliant! They are all super-talented crafters who inspire me every day with their amazing creations, and, even more importantly, with their support and friendship. You'll find them here:

Crafty Salutations

Sandma's Handmade Cards

Late Night Stamping

Viv's Visuals

Chill in the Air

Into October now, and there's definitely an autumnal feel. We've had a few frosty mornings this week and the leaves are beginning to turn. I really do not look forward to the winter, but the wonderful autumn colours are some compensation. And it is in that vein that we introduce our October challenge at Stamping Sensations with the theme of

* * * * * TREES and/or LEAVES and/or AUTUMN * * * * *

We want you to show us the beauty of autumn in all its glorious colours. As usual, to be eligible for our October prize, kindly donated by our lovely sponsors Stamp Addicts, the main element of your project should be stamped and follow the theme.


I needed a lightweight card to post, so decided to make it one layer. I masked the edges of the base card before sponging pigment inks through the stencil and around the edges of the masked area, thus creating a white border to the card, before overstamping with the trees, buzzard and sentiment. Very quick and easy to do! All the stamps and the stencil are by Inkylicious.

We are hoping for lots of autumn colour this month, and I can't wait to see the entries! There is some wonderful inspiration from the Design Team over on the Challenge Blog, so do go and take a look. Good luck everyone!

In celebration of trees

In keeping with this month's theme (Treemendous) at Stamping Sensations, I thought I would just share a few photos I took yesterday and today. 

Very cold and frosty but glorious sunshine yesterday, then a light dusting of snow overnight and mist this morning as in the final photo, which was actually taken through my lounge window!

A Treemendous finish to the year!

It's our final challenge for 2012 at Stamping Sensations, and the theme is

TREEMENDOUS!

Plenty of scope there. They could be Christmas trees, if you haven't yet finished your Christmas cards, or if you have and you can't bear to contemplate any more festive foliage, any other kind of tree will be perfect! If you're a lateral thinker you might go for family trees, or shoe trees... or not! But whatever your arboreal aspirations, we want to see them!

Trees being one of my favourite topics, I have really been looking forward to this month! When I was at Stamp Magic in October, I couldn't resist buying the fabulous Inkylicious Christmas Tree Flourish, and that is what I've used for my card.

I stamped it with Versamark ink on to white card and embossed it with WOW Neutral Ultra Shimmer embossing powder, which gave it the most gorgeous shimmery sparkle which unfortunately is hard to see in the photo. I then covered the whole thing with Chipped Sapphire Distress Stain, which the embossed areas resisted, of course, and matted it first on to white card and then a piece coloured with the same Distress Stain. The computer generated sentiment was cut with a Nestie label die, and the little snowflakes with a Tonic Studios punch. Quite a simple design, but I don't think the tree needs anything more to complement it.

Our lovely sponsor this month is Visible Image, a British company based in South Wales, who have a fantastic range of stamps. They have given us this amazing selection for our prize.

So, if you'd like to be in with a chance of winning, show us your Treemendous creations. Just remember that your entry may be combined with no more than five other challenges (that's 6 in total including ours), otherwise sadly it will be ineligible. My talented teamies have come up with some brilliant inspiration for you, so don't forget to check it out on the Challenge Blog. I can't wait to see yours!

Autumn colours

My favourite season of the year is spring, when everything is bright and fresh and new. I don't like the dark mornings and evenings of the late autumn and winter, or the dull days. Having said all that, though, I do enjoy the colours of autumn. I am lucky to live in an area with lots of trees, and they are now changing their hues. I can sit at my desk and look at them through the window. Across the road from our house are some beautiful old elms, and the wind this afternoon brought the leaves swirling down like snow. We have a small forsythia bush in the front garden, and just now it is looking quite spectacular.



I wanted to capture the autumn colours in a card, and at the same time try out a technique I saw in the wonderful StampARTic Blog. It used foam stamps to take away colour from a Distress Inked background. The foam stamps were simply sprayed with water and stamped on to the background. Unfortunately I don't have any foam stamps. I do, however, have stencils and sponges. I figured that I might get a similar effect by stencilling with a damp sponge, and it worked! First I tried it on plain card, and it was not bad, but the best result was using encaustic art card, which is semi-gloss. The Distress Inks stay wetter on it for longer and can be blended more easily. Having made the background I then taped a stencil to it and sponged it with clean water.

My first attempt was not very good, as I had the sponge too wet and the water seeped under the stencil. Having the sponge just slightly damp was much better. I also found that I didn't need as much water as I thought anyway, because the colour faded even more as it dried. Another advantage of the encaustic art card is that the water doesn't bleed into it as much as with plain card, so the image stays sharper.

I used a stencil by The Crafter's Workshop, called "Windsong," which I thought was really quite appropriate. It reminds me of leaves being blown about in the wind, just perfect for this card. The tree and leaf stamps are Elusive Images from Graphicus, and the word is by Hero Arts. I really like this stencil technique, and I'll be doing more of it.

More Distress Ink landscape

Having got to grips with Michelle's technique with my previous card, I decided I should now try coming up with my own designs, so here's the first. The small fir trees on the left and the stag are from Stampscapes. Their stamps are perfect for this style, as are those from Beeswax, whose stamp is the tree on the right.

The outer frame is also made with Distress inks, and it's a piece I had left over from making the card I described earlier here. The vertical "Happy Birthday" filling in the space at the side is an Aspects of Design stamp by The Stamp Man.

At the moment I'm finding it a bit difficult to gain precise control over the inkpads when using them direct to paper, but I daresay that will come with practice. It's quite fun seeing how the landscapes turn out and then deciding what to use as a focal point to enhance them. I have a feeling I'm going to get hooked on this technique!

Contrasts

Still busy with my Nestabilities. I cut a scalloped frame for a Crafty Individuals flower image from their book "Butterflies & Flowers" (currently their free gift with orders over £25). Background and butterfly are Cuttlebug embossed. The wording around the frame is computer generated. Rather proud of myself for that because it's the first time I've figured out how to do it to make it fit! The edge of the frame and the Prima flowers are tinted with Spiced Marmalade Distress Ink.



Then, for something completely different, A Walk in the Woods. That's the title of my newest stamp, which is from Innovative Stamp Creations. As soon as I saw this stamp I simply had to have it, because I love trees anyway and a walk in the woods is one of my favourite pastimes. It's a superb stamp. Doesn't look much until you stamp it, & then it has an almost photographic quality, even on plain paper, though it's even better on the shiny card I used here. I coloured the picture with diluted Distress Inks. On the background card I stamped birch trees (from Beeswax) and part of A Walk in the Woods (though that doesn't show so well in the photo). Punched leaves extended the path out of the picture, balanced by three co-ordinating brads on the opposite side.

Trees

I love trees. I love their elegance, their colours. I love the sound the wind makes in their branches, the tracery of their silhouettes against the sky. I love walking amongst them, whether through forests of tall, mysterious pines, or in gentle woodlands of oak, ash, beech and my favourite silver birch.

In honour of trees, I made a book about them. Most of the stamps, papers and pictures I used are from Crafty Individuals. I think they must like trees too! I made the book as a present for my daughter, who also loves trees.