Bright and Beautiful Fox!

February already, so it's time for a new challenge at Stamping Sensations! We have a lovely theme for you this month:

* * * * * ALL THINGS BRIGHT AND BEAUTIFUL * * * * *

We are thinking along the lines of the wonderful old hymn - All things bright and beautiful, all creatures great and small. We'd like to see your hand stamped creations celebrating the wonders of nature. Please do make sure that your entry fits our challenge rules which you can find here.

We are delighted to welcome back Bee Crafty as our lovely sponsor for February. They have a wonderfully eclectic range of fabulous stamps and stencils, and loads of other things too, and our lucky winner will be able to choose £25 of lovely new stash from their online shop.

I decided to make something other than a card for a change, using stamps from two Bee Crafty sets, Scenery Animals - Fox and BEAUtanicals - Ferns.

 I made a plaque from wooden lolly sticks and painted it with gesso to prime it. I created the background with a home made mountain stencil, punched circle mask for the moon, and Versamagic pigment inks. All stamping was done with Versafine Clair ink. The row of trees and the single fern (which I hope looks like a tree!) were stamped directly on to the plaque, while the foreground ferns and the fox were stamped separately and cut out before being affixed to the plaque.

Here you can see the beautiful scenery detail in the fox stamp.

I'm sure this will be a popular theme, and I can't wait to see what you come up with! My amazing teamies have once again excelled themselves with some gorgeous samples to inspire you, so do go and have a look at them on the Challenge Blog. Remember, you can enter up to three times, and with such a fab prize on offer, it's definitely worth maximising your chances of winning. Good luck everyone!

News and New Stamps!

As a very proud member of the Be Creative Design Team, I'm delighted to announce that we now have our own Be Creative DT Blog, where we will be featuring our Be Creative projects and cards, along with hints and tips and product news. We'd love you to take a look at the new blog and become a follower. Justin has promised that when we reach 100 followers we can have a blog candy draw, so what's not to like?!

It's a close run thing, but I think my favourite Be Creative product is probably the alcohol markers, as they are such good quality and there is so much you can do with them. I've used them on the card I want to show you today.

Ever since I saw on Pinterest some stunning cards using Altenew stamps, just about all their floral sets have been on my wishlist! I managed to resist their lure for quite a while, but eventually gave in and ordered the Vintage Flowers and Painted Poppy. Couldn't wait to try them out, so here's my first card, using the Vintage Flowers.

As you will see, I need more practice in lining up the stamp layers, which I found quite tricky, but I think it's not too bad for a first attempt.

The roses and leaves were stamped with Versamagic inks in Sea Breeze, Turquoise Gem and Ocean Depth, and the small flowers with Versacolor Heliotrope, Violet and Grape. All other colouring on the card (except for the ribbon) was done with Be Creative alcohol markers.

Having completed all the stamping, I masked all the flowers and leaves. To make the speckled background, I scribbled the markers on to my glass mat and mixed the ink with Spray M Boss (Once Upon A Stamp), which has, amongst its many other uses, the effect of turning the alcohol ink into paint. I picked it up on an old toothbrush and flicked the paint on to the card, then removed the masks. I wanted the edges of the picture to be a bit darker, so I dabbed some ink directly from a marker on to a felt pad and stippled it around the edges.

The matting layers were cut from white card and coloured with the markers, as were the butterflies (Cheery Lynn dies). A little bit of sparkle was added to the small flower centres and butterflies with some Be Creative glitter glue. The border was cut with a Martha Stewart punch.

I love the versatility of the Be Creative markers, in that they can be used to co-ordinate all parts of a project. I don't know whether by accident or by design, but the two colours I used here, Pale Blue (which is actually purple!) and Peacock Green, perfectly match the ink colours Violet and Turquoise Gem! Probably coincidence, but a lucky one!

Anyway, I'm off to get some more practice lining up the layers. Think a MISTI would be very useful. Did I mention that's on my wishlist too...........?!

March Challenge

Spring is on the way, so for our March challenge at Stamping Sensations we'd love to see your interpretation of

THE GREAT OUTDOORS

Lots of scope in this one, I think. Anything that's outdoor-related (eg. fields, flowers, trees, seaside, gardens, mountains, children playing or any outdoor activity to name just a few ideas) should fit the bill. Here's my take on the theme.

The gorgeous Summer Poppy Meadow by Crafty Individuals  (our fantastic sponsor this month) came to mind immediately. I coloured it with watercolour pencils, but then went over the foreground poppies with Promarkers to make them stand out. A black Sakura Glaze pen highlighted the centres.

To make the background, I stamped a Crafty Individuals poppy (a freebie with an order) randomly, and then clear-embossed it to act as a resist while I sponged all over with VersaMagic ink. On top of that I stamped my favourite flourish (Crafty Individuals CI-182) .I cut black middles for some Prima flowers to echo the poppies, and finished the design with a Fiskars border punch, sentiment from Crafty Individuals CI-209 and ribbon from my stash.

Crafty Individuals is one of my favourite stamp companies. Not only do they have such wonderful stamp designs, but also gorgeous background paper books, masks, dies and other accessories, and their service is second to none. Do have a look at their newly revamped website. Jean and Malcolm, the owners, have a fabulous prize for this month's winner. Who wouldn't like this superb set of stamps?! Something for every occasion there.

Last month's theme really caught people's imagination (we had 159 entries!) and I have a feeling this one will do the same. Don't forget to check out my lovely teamies' inspirational samples on the Challenge Blog!

Yellow

The theme this week at Less Is More is Yellow. It isn't a colour I'd normally think of using, so to make a card with yellow as the predominant colour was a bit outside my comfort zone. But it's supposed to be a challenge, isn't it?! So here's my card.

Very simple, just sponged Versamagic ink in two shades of yellow down one side of a Nestie shape, overstamped it with an Inkylicious stamp in a darker shade of yellow (which shows up better IRL than it does in the photo) and a sentiment (Katzelcraft), with a ribbon at the side to finish it off. Not entirely sure that I like it, but at least the colour has brightened up a miserable, wet day! 

Sir Stampalot September Challenge

We're back to a set theme for this month's Stampalot Challenge, and it is

It's A Frame Up

We want to see a frame somewhere on each project! Plenty of scope there, I think. Just make sure that your frame is an actual "feature" of the design, rather than simply matted layers. For my example, I took inspiration from an article by Emy Buxton in the July 2011 issue of Craft Stamper magazine, where she used stamping and masking to create a frame for a scrapbook page.

I made my frame by masking off a rectangle of the base card and stamping round the edge of the mask with tiny stamps by Rubber Stamp Tapestry, using VersaMagic inks. The picture inside the frame is from the Miniatures book "People & Places 2" by Crafty Individuals, and the card is completed with a sentiment by Darkroom Door. Quick and simple to make, but I love the effect of the floral frame.

Here's the delectable prize donated by Sir Stampalot this month! Check out those gorgeous ribbons! Some fab stamps too, and lots of other goodies, so get those entries in!

And on the subject of Sir S,  HOT news! Watch out for a new weekly feature that Sir Stampalot are promoting, starting tomorrow. It’ll be called ‘Freebie Friday’ and it’ll be sent to you via their email newsletter so if you haven’t already signed up, you’ll need to sign up before end of day today, here. 

Or use the “stay in touch… sign up to smudges” icon on the home page of their website (left hand column).

I started the new job this week. So far so good! Quite different from my previous one, in that I flit from school to school (9 schools in two days!) instead of being in one school for the whole day, but I have certainly enjoyed my first two days. And it's lovely to be able to drive to work through beautiful countryside. Bit of a hold up yesterday morning when I met the school bus which serves several local village schools coming towards me on a narrow country lane, and had to reverse so he could get past. One or two slow tractors as well, but I can cope with things like that! So much better than being stuck in traffic jams going into the city.

Went to have another look at our new house the other day. I'll leave you for now with a photo of the view from the window of what will be my new craft room! If it looks that good in the rain, imagine what it's like when it's sunny with blue skies! I can't wait until we can move in!

Just because

It's quite a long time since I made anything that wasn't for a challenge, DT work, or a particular occasion. Having recently acquired various items of new stash, I thought I'd take a bit of time to have a play with some of them.

I'd been wondering whether to invest in some Distress Stains, and in the end couldn't resist ordering a few to try. I must admit they are very convenient to use, being in a sponge tipped bottle and so it's easy to cover a background quickly with them, and you can also ink up stamps with them, but since they are basically just like watered down distress ink, and you could probably get a similar effect using diluted DI and a sponge, I'm not sure whether I'll buy any more.

Anyway, inspired by Glenda's video on her blog, where she uses the Distress Stains with some of her gorgeous new Chocolate Baroque stamps, I made a card.

The background was made with Spun Sugar Distress Stain, overstamped with Hero Arts Dots & Flowers background & Old French Writing, which I had inked up with the same DS. The result is very subtle. Also stamped the Old French Writing on the base card. The picture is from a Crafty Individuals Miniatures Book (People & Places 2), and I made a frame for it with a Nellie Snellen die, inking around the edge with Versamagic ink. A strip of Tim Holtz Tissue Tape across the bottom, a Marianne Design leaf flourish (also coloured with Versamagic), and a sentiment by Innovative Stamp Creations finished the card.

I'd just like to say a big thank you to all you lovely people who keep commented on my blog. I do appreciate your visits, and hope you'll forgive me for not being able to reciprocate much at the moment. The big clearout in preparation for our move north is ongoing, slowly but surely, and between now and the end of term I will be very busy indeed at work, with several school concerts/events to come. A bittersweet time, as I have been at one of my current schools for the past 28 years and this is my last term here. But, as I said to my head teacher last week, 28 years is half my life, near enough, so I reckon it's about time for a change!

Less is More Week 13

Lucky dip this week at Less is More, with the theme of either Thank You or Congratulations. I'm just scraping in with my entry! I'm very busy at the moment, and haven't had time for much card making, let alone blogging. (I'll get there eventually, I hope!)  My hubby asked me to make him some simple thank you cards to send out after his father's funeral last December, and I haven't blogged them before, so I hope they'll be acceptable.

The first one has a vase of flowers by Penny Black, stamped on a Nestie label, using Versamagic dew drop inks, and attached with foam pads. The sentiment is by Anna Griffin.

The second is even more simple - the same Anna Griffin sentiment inside a frame also by Anna Griffin.








Phew! Just got them in in time! Sorry I haven't had chance to comment this week, but glancing at the thumbnails I can see lots of great entries. I haven't missed a week of LIM so far, and didn't want this to be the first one. Now what will tomorrow's be .........?

A bit more ...... but not much!

Well, I sat down to make a Less is NOT More card (see previous post!), but when it came to it, I didn't put very much more on it! I think I must have become too used to the minimal style! Need more practice!

I made this card for my niece's birthday. She's not an overly fussy person, so it's probably best I didn't go overboard with it. I was lucky enough to be given a box full of bits and pieces recently. The after-school club at the school where I work had had several boxes full of cardmaking stash donated to them, but some of it wasn't really suitable for them to use. The teacher who runs the club asked me if I would like some! I didn't hesitate for long!

It was mostly paper and card, and embellishments such as the dress on this card. Not something I would have bought for myself, but seeing as I'd got it, I thought I would try and use it. It had a bit of rather naff string tied in a bow around the waist, so I took that off and added the pearls instead. I've just bought a couple of Darkroom Door background stamps, Floral, and Flourish. They're huge (cover the whole of an A6 card), and I've used the Floral one here, stamped in a pale pink Versamagic ink on a cream card.  Unfortunately it doesn't show up very well in the photo. You can see it a little better in the close up.

My camera doesn't seem to pick up creams and pale yellows very well. They come out a mucky looking grey! The spotty paper is by Papermania, with a Martha Stewart border punch and Nestabilities ovals. The sentiment is a very old one by Stamps Unlimited, who I don't think are around now.

It will be back to Less is More tomorrow, but after that.... I've just got some of the gorgeous new printed tags from Crafty Individuals, and they're definitely not clean and simple....

  

Footprints

I'd like to begin this post with a big thankyou to everyone who has commented on my blog.  I was thrilled to get 48 comments on my entry to Week 5 of the Less is More challenge, a record for one post for me, and I can assure you that every single one is much appreciated and makes it all worthwhile.

It's now Week 6 of Less is More, and they want to see a one layer card with the intriguing theme of "Off the Edge". My first thought was of footprints marching on to and off the page. Trouble was, I didn't have a footprints stamps, but I figured it would be a fairly easy shape to carve by hand, so I made one from an eraser. I did, however, have the perfect sentiment to go with it, from an Aspects of Design set by The Stampman. I've had the set for a while, but haven't had occasion to use the sentiment before, and it's one I really like. I stamped that first, then made the footprints walk across the page in different colours of Versamagic inks.

I think this is a great theme, and some of the examples already posted at LIM are fantastic. I feel a second entry coming on, if I get time this week!

All Creatures Great and Small

That's the title of the Sir Stampalot February'11 Challenge. Of course, for me that had to mean butterflies. I have very few other animal stamps. Here I've used the huge Elusive Images butterfly, on an 8" x 8" card. The background is sprayed with Glimmer Mists (after masking a circle for the sun) and then stamped with Hero Arts grasses and some tiny butterflies from Crafty Individuals. The text stamp is by Katzelcraft.

To colour the big butterfly, I laid the uninked, unmounted stamp on the paper and drew a faint pencil line around its outline, and filled it in by sponging with various pigment inks. Then I stamped the butterfly on top with Versafine Onyx Black ink. Had I stamped first and then coloured, the black would have been subdued. I could have stamped first and embossed with clear powder to protect the black before colouring, but I think it would have been more difficult then to get a smooth blending of colours. I was pleased with the result, anyway. Hope you like it too!

Sunday again!

How did it get to be Sunday again so quickly? I'm sure time goes faster the older one gets. Even so, I managed to make a scrappy card for Jules's Sunday Scrap challenge.

I've mostly used up scraps of plain paper and card, except for the embossed bit at the bottom, which is by Papermania. It has a very pale pink and white pattern on it (hard to see in the photo).  Stamps are all by Waltzing Mouse, except for the writing in the background which is by Hero Arts. I used VersaMagic and Versacolor inks to stamp the background, and the same inks to colour the roses.

And that's two posts in two days! Must have too much time on my hands! (Or maybe I should go and tackle the ironing instead!)

Any left-handers out there?

I made a card! My first of 2011! I wouldn't say I'm back in the groove quite yet, but at least it's a start. Although there's no lack of inclination - I want to do it - I'm still struggling to find motivation. I don't think they are one and the same.

Anyway, here's what I made. I really like the clean and simple cards which Joanne Wardle showed in her article in the October 2010 Craft Stamper, and which were so beautifully demonstrated by the Craft Stamping Quartet in their challenge showcasing Joanne's work. The link goes to Lesley Ebdon's post, but see also the three subsequent posts.

I also love the masked landscape technique which I first saw done by Barbara Gray a few years ago, and which I first tried back here. Recently there have been several people doing something similar, linking back to Heather Telford, who has some wonderful examples on her blog, including a tutorial. Do go and have a look at it.

I didn't want just to copy what other people had been doing, so I sort of combined the two techniques and came up with this:

I *think* it works - what do you think? To make the shape of the landscape I cut a mask out of acetate (so that I would be able to see where I was placing things) large enough to cover the card, and then sponged the design with VersaMagic inks and torn paper masks. The tree stamps are by Clarity Stamp, the small and medium versions. The landscape was made entirely with the small tree, using just the edge to stamp the little bushes. The larger tree and the sentiment (Personal Impressions) were then stamped with VersaFine ink.

I was quite pleased with the outcome, considering how long it is since I made anything, except for one thing. You can tell it's been a while. The finished card turned out like this!!

I'd totally forgotten to check which way the card opened before I started stamping on it! The perils of stamping straight on to the card! I was so annoyed! I thought the best way to redeem it would be to cut off the picture side and mount it on to another card, but that wouldn't be the perfect solution. Then it occured to me that it might just be appreciated as it is by someone who is left handed! I'll have to test the theory on a left handed friend......

Cards for men

I struggle a bit with cards for men. I send fewer cards to men than I do to women, so I don't have many male-oriented stamps. Can't justify buying a stamp that I might only use a few times, and I don't feel, really, that I can use the same one each year, even though the recipient probably wouldn't remember it from one year to the next! Though I suppose they might if they got it EVERY year!

However, I couldn't resist some lovely stamps from Innovative Stamp Creations which I think are equally suitable for men or women. Both images are striking enough not to need much in the way of background or embellishments, so I kept those to a minimum.

The boat scene (the stamp is entitled "On The Shore") is coloured with watercolour pencils, and attached to the card with foam pads. The mesh, shells and starfish are all very old stash. I knew I'd find a use for them one day! The text is computer generated, printed on to acetate and sponged with alcohol inks.

The next one, called "Picturesque", reminds me of various beaches I have visited, and I think it's going to become one of my favourite images. I coloured it with Promarkers and mounted it over a background which was embossed with a Cuttlebug folder and inked with Versamagic inks.. Again, computer generated text  and another very old starfish embellishment, with a recycled bit of string separated into its component strands to tie it all together. I'm feeling really good about getting some old stash used!

As well as the two stamps I've used in these cards, I also bought a new ISC set called "Mini Ledger", which I think is going to be very versatile, though I haven't made anything with it yet....

Innovative Stamp Creations is owned and run by the very talented Betsy Griffin, who calls her design team the Creative Architects Group. They all have many samples, using ISC stamps, on their blogs, links to which can be found here, as does Betsy on her blog. All worth a look. (FTR, I have no connection with ISC, other than that I like the stamps!)

In Essence...

... I've just realised it's over three weeks since I last posted anything, and that's mainly because I haven't made anything to post during the last three weeks! I was very busy with school concerts and things leading up to the end of term, but also I've been sadly lacking in inspiration. I think my mojo broke up early and went on holiday without me!

However, it came back yesterday with the delivery of the much anticipated new Artylicious CD from Glenda at Graphicus. It's called Essence of Nature, and is simply stunning, full of the most gorgeous papers and elements in wonderful colours. Glenda's best yet, IMHO. I couldn't fail to be inspired by it, but  there's so much on it that the problem was in knowing what to try first!

I love the Elusive Images Eastern Grasses stamp set, and was very pleased to find a matching backing paper on the CD. It's beautifully subtle and makes a perfect background for the stamps. I used the main image from the set as a focal point (stamped on to paper coloured with VersaMagic inks), added some of the grasses along the bottom, and embellished it with a few butterflies from the Artylicious Butterfly Bliss CD. The sentiment is computer generated (not from the CD).

Inspired not only by Glenda's brilliant CD, but also by her posts such as this one about her decluttering, I decided that whilst I've got a decent amount of time off school I should try to emulate her! My craft stuff clearout is ongoing, but I hope to have time to get that finished and then maybe make a start on the rest of the house. (Note the word "maybe"!) So my blog will probably be a bit quiet again for a while (though I'm sure I'll be tempted to stop work now and then and make some more cards with the CD!), but I will do my best to look in on everyone else's blogs when I can. Hope you are all having a good summer.