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.

Blue, Purple, Turquoise

It's hard to believe, but already we are halfway through our 2019 challenges at Stamping Sensations! This year is flying by! We've had some great themes so far, and loads of wonderful entries, and there are plenty more to come.

For June we would like you to

* * * * * SHOW YOUR TRUE COLOURS * * * * *

By, that, we mean use your favourite colours in your project! This is a nice and easy theme, and one you probably shouldn't have to think too hard about. However, please do remember that your entry/entries must still follow our challenge rules, which you can read here on the challenge blog. 

We are delighted to welcome back Visible Image as our fab sponsor this month. They are offering a super £25 voucher for the very lucky winner to spend in their online shop. I'm a big fan of their amazing stamps, several of which I have used for my card.

My favourite colours have always been those at the cool end of the spectrum - blues, purples, turquoises, and greens. Shades of the sky and the sea, and of the earth and the trees. Calming and soothing hues. I think one of the reasons I feel so much more relaxed living in this beautiful rural area than in the city which was our previous home is that I look out every day over rolling green fields, majestic trees and distant hills, with stunning big skies overhead, although the latter are looking pretty grey at this moment!

My card reflects those heavenly colours. The circle background was done on a gel plate, with Distress Oxide inks, then I used a fan brush to flick some diluted Brushos over the whole square. I stamped elements from Visible Image's "Creative Chaos", "Wings of Change" and "Random Art of Kindness" sets, using Versafine Clair ink, and coloured them with Arteza coloured pencils (my new favourite art medium!). I sponged the edges of the picture with pigment ink to define them before matting it onto a background made with alcohol inks. No, I hadn't intended seeing how many different media I could use on one card, that's just how it turned out!

Occasionally I like to challenge myself and tiptoe outside my comfort zone with a different colour scheme, but I did so enjoy creating this card! I can tell by my teamies' beautiful samples that they also enjoyed indulging themselves, and I'm sure you won't be disappointed if you nip over to the Challenge Blog and have a look at them. I am looking forward to a rainbow of entries!

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!

Footprints on the Moon

Hadn't used the Brushos for ages, so having a few spare minutes, and some lovely new stamps from Stamps By Me, I thought I'd get them out and have a play.

First I stamped and masked the moon, and then made the background with the Brushos using the sprinkle & then spray method, blotting it after spraying to lighten it up as it was quite dark. Some of the paint leaked under the mask a bit, but I quite liked the effect. I thought it looked like clouds over the moon and gave it some dimension. Serendipity!

The Stamps By Me set has the trees, the moon and two sentiments. I particularly liked the one I've used here, but I thought the picture needed something else to help tell the story, so I added the rabbit & buzzard, along with a few grasses at the bottom, all from Inkylicious.

I stamped the sentiment in Versafine Clair ink and embossed it with WOW Neutral Ultra Shimmer Regular powder, which has the most gorgeous sparkle, but the photo doesn't do it justice. You can perhaps see it a little better in the next one.

And here's the rabbit gazing at the moon! (And probably hoping the buzzard doesn't spot her!)

 

It's quite a while, well before Christmas in fact, since I had chance to make something just for the sake of it, rather than for a particular person, event or occasion, and I really enjoyed doing this one. When I make cards for family and friends, I tailor them to the recipient and usually know what I'm going to do before I begin. Not that I don't enjoy doing those too, of course, but I love having the creative freedom to pick out a few stamps and inks etc. and just see where they lead. When I started making this card I had no idea how it was going to turn out, but I'm happy with the result!