Promises To Keep

On my blog header it says "Crafts, photography, music and life in general." I've mentioned my crafts and photography, and the occasional snippet about life, but some might have wondered where the music came into it. Well, it hasn't, until now! My day job is primary school music specialist. My main instrument is the piano, but my favourite one is my bowed psaltery. I guess some of you reading this will now be saying "your what?" I'd never heard of it either until about 15 years ago when I met the wonderful Tony Westran at a craft fair. (Also see Tony's blog.) At the time he was making and selling all kinds of early and unusual musical instruments. I got talking to him and he let me try playing the bowed psaltery. I'd never heard anything like it before and I was totally captivated by its beautiful sound. There was no way I was leaving his stall without taking one home with me.

Anyway, here's a picture of it. It has 32 steel strings and is played with a curved bow. The history of the bowed psaltery is questionable, but it is probably descended from the plucked psaltery of medieval times. I wanted to be able to play authentic music on it, but it was difficult to find any. Eventually I decided to play whatever sounded good on it, and also to compose my own music for it. In 1997 I achieved one of my life's ambitions and made a professional recording, entitled "Promises To Keep". It has 12 tracks, eight being my original compositions, and the other four my own arrangements of traditional folk songs. My electronic keyboard provides the accompaniment.

It is hard to describe the sound of the bowed psaltery. It seems that people either love it or hate it! I reckon the split is 95%/5%, in favour of the former. Those who love the sound commonly describe it as relaxing to listen to, which I would concur with. I haven't mentioned it before because I haven't had the means to link to a sound file on my blog, but now I have! Clicking on the link on my sidebar (fingers crossed that it works!) will take you to my Windows Live Skydrive page, where you will find some sample tracks from my CD which you can download and listen to. I'd love to know what people think of the sound, for or against! If anyone is interested in knowing more about the CD, please contact me via my profile.

Copyright note: I just need to point out that I hold the copyright for all tracks. I will be delighted if anyone wishes to download the sample tracks for their own enjoyment. However, please do not re-distribute them in any way (pass on the link to my blog instead) and please do not add them to any other internet site. If you should wish to use them other than for the circumstance described above, please contact me and permission may well be forthcoming! Thank you for respecting this.

Experimenting

I'm still intrigued by the notion that it's possible to create interesting backgrounds by taking colour off rather than putting it on. This time, using the same materials as in my previous post, (Distress Inks and encaustic art card) I wanted to see whether I could make a pattern with the Victoria Cuttlebug embossing folder. I inked up the card as before, and then lightly sprayed the open Victoria folder with plain water on the side with the raised (as opposed to indented) pattern. Then I laid the inked side of the card over the wet side of the folder, closed up the folder, gently smoothed it over and straightaway removed the card before it got too wet. NB. I didn't put it through the Cuttlebug! I blotted it with a piece of kitchen roll and was pleased to see that the pattern had transferred to the card pretty well.

From the patterned card I cut and embossed a Nesties Labels 2. I wanted to put a border around it, but the next size up would have made one too wide. So I coloured around the edge, following the embossed line, with a Promarker instead. Because the lighter areas of the pattern showed through, it gave the effect of a shadow. To complete the card I added a panel of white card embossed with the Victoria folder in the usual way, a few Prima flowers and punched leaves and some sheer ribbon. The sentiment is by Penny Black.

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.

Metal embellishments

Some years ago I bought some art metal. At the time it was being used mainly for embossing, by stamping or tracing on to it and then marking out the image with various tools & cutting it out with scissors. I wasn't impressed with the results, & the remainder of the pack has been languishing in a cupboard ever since. Until now!

Now there is the Cuttlebug! I found I could cut the metal with dies, eg. Nestabilities or Cuttlebug, and emboss it with the Cuttlebug embossing folders. And then colour it beautifully with alcohol inks or Promarkers. Voila!



The butterfly was cut with a Cuttlebug die, embossed with a Cuttlebug folder, and then coloured with alcohol inks. The patterned paper is My Mind's Eye, and the plain paper I have had for so long I can't remember where I got it!


The metal used for the swirl background on the lady card was gold coloured. I embossed it with the Cuttlebug D'vine swirls folder and then carefully inked over it with Brilliance Graphite Black ink, which I then heat set. So long as you do not press on too hard with the inkpad, the recessed swirls do not take the ink. The lady and wording stamps are from Hero Arts. I've had them for years, but they just seemed to fit with the swirl panel. The flourish is by Stampington.

So I have managed to use up some more old stash!

On the second butterfly card, I did even better. The butterfly is cut from a foil yoghurt pot lid, so it was free! The foil has a lovely texture and takes the alcohol inks very well. The inside foil cover found on some brands of margarine also works well. The new Cuttlebug Victoria folder provided a background for this card. The agapanthus stamp is by Stampendous, and the Birthday circles on both butterfly cards are from Craftwork Cards. The base card is pearlescent and it was quite difficult to photograph, but if you click on it to get the larger version, I think the detail will show up better.

More from Harrogate

One of the stands on our "must visit" list at the Harrogate show was of course that of Craftwork Cards. They had plenty of new goodies on display. I bought some papers, including some glitter-infused in gorgeous colours which will be great for Christmas cards. Also got some messages and embellishments in various shapes. And I couldn't resist some of the "Colour- me" ovals and butterflies. They also had some yummy new colour combinations of Card Candy, one pack of which (red, purple & lilac) inspired this card.



The Card Candy just happened to co-ordinate exactly with some Crafty Individuals background paper (from their Background Papers Book 1). I coloured the "Colour-Me" owls to match with Promarkers. The scallop border around the message is a bit of the glitter paper. Unfortunately, you don't see the effect very well in the photo, but it really is pretty. The stamped fleur de lys inner border is from a set of Just Rite stamps. I've only recently discovered these stamps, and bought the set at Harrogate, from Once Upon A Stamp. They work really well with Nestabilities, and the 1 & 5/8ths inch size fits beautifully round the Craftwork Cards in-circle messages. A silver peel off border around the background paper put the finishing touch to the card.

Another Secret Garden

I think the "Secret Garden" from Lavinia Stamps is my favourite stamp of the moment. Anything could be behind that gate! It's full of dreams and possibilities.

For this card I left out the fairy and used part of "Tree Trunk Trio" from Stampscapes on the left hand side. The trunks didn't reach the top of the picture, so I extended them with a black fine tip drawing pen. The leaves and other foliage stamps, and the toadstools are all Lavinia's. I used watercolour pencils to shade in the gateway and the background. It's probably a bit hard to see them in the photo (though they show up better if you click on it to see the big picture), but there's a Stampscapes deer and fir trees behind the gate.

And who knows what else you might find if you could enter therein......

Second childhood?!

Here are a couple of cards made with some of my new stash from Harrogate. Anyone who has read previous posts will know that I don't do cute. I must admit, however, that I do have a liking for fairies. Probably for the same reason that I like butterflies - they are such beautiful, ethereal creatures. A favourite book from my childhood, one which I still have (it's older than me!), is called "Once Upon A Birthday".


It tells the story of two children, a boy and a girl, who meet in Fairyland having been taken there magically to celebrate their respective birthdays. I loved it because it's full of gorgeous, colourful pictures of fairies. They have lots of exciting adventures in Fairyland, and in the end the little girl, once back home, gets a fairy outfit complete with wings for a birthday present, something I always wanted (particularly the wings!) but sadly never received!

Some time ago, at school, we had a reading week when staff were asked to take in a favourite book from their youth to read to a class. I took my fairy book, of course, interested to see what modern, worldly wise children, aged 5 to 7, raised on computer games and TV, would make of it. The story is strongly moralistic (eg. in one chapter a little fairy sulks because she lost a race in the school games, and her punishment is to come last in every game until she has learned her lesson, which she duly does) and quite politically incorrect. I was surprised, not to say delighted, that without exception they loved it. And, even more surprising, the boys did as much as the girls!

So what started this train of thought? New fairies from Lavinia Stamps! Lavinia Stamps are designed by Tracey Dutton, and her stand at the shows is always full of beautiful samples which are treats for the eyes. I was really taken with one card in particular. Check out her Gallery and you'll see it. This is my attempt to recreate it. I bought the Fairy, Vine & Secret Garden stamps at the show, and then filled in with others I already had, all Lavinia except for the trees on the left, which are by Innovative Stamp Creations. I would have bought the Lavinia Tree Root stamp also, but I'd run out of money by then, so I had to make do. I liked this fairy because she isn't too cute, and I love the air of mystery and magic about the "Secret Garden".




Still on the childhood theme, I couldn't resist these miniatures from
Clarity Stamp. I found the pretty ribbon at Harrogate too, but I'm pleased to say that all other materials on this card are old stash!

(The background paper, by Papermania, doesn't show up very well in the small photo - click on it to see the detail in the big one.)

Harrogate there we came!

Well, what a brilliant day we've just had. Sally & I had been saving ourselves up all year for the Great Northern Papercrafts Extravaganza in Harrogate. Usually we go to the Whichcraft show in Doncaster twice a year, but this year we decided to give Doncaster a miss, save up our money & give Harrogate a try instead, so we were very much ready for some retail therapy. The weather was perfect, we found just about everything we'd been looking for, and even met some of our blogging friends for the first time, which was lovely. Great to see them and put names to faces at last. Then we had a picnic outside in the fresh air to round it all off. Now I'm sorting out my new stash & looking forward to playing with it all tomorrow.

On the other hand, there's still a while before bedtime......

PS. Check out some fantastic blog candy from The Stampman (see my sidebar), but be quick, the draw closes at midnight on Monday the 14th!

Best laid plans....

Well, at my last post there were still three weeks left of the school hols. Now we've been back at school nearly a week, and I don't know where the last month has gone. Not to plan, that's for sure. Various things conspired to keep me from doing all that I wanted to, and the only crafting I did was to help my four year old grandson make birthday cards for his mum & dad. And a good job he made of them too!

A major problem was that my old laptop began to malfunction so much that it is not really safe to use now, and I had to get a new one. Not that I'm complaining about that! The new one is great, but of course I have had to spend a lot of time getting to know it & transferring everything from the old one.

However, it is now up and running, and I have managed to make two cards this week. Just as well, seeing as I will be restarting my card class tomorrow, after the summer break!

The first card was a belated one for a friend & I didn't have time to stop & photograph it. For the class I decided to have a go at a tri-shutter card, as illustrated on the Splitcoast Stampers website. It's one of those things which looks very impressive but is in fact quite easy to make (fortunately!). I am still trying to use up stuff from my stash, ahead of a trip to the Great Northern Papercrafts Extravaganza in Harrogate this coming weekend, and mostly succeeded on this card. The background paper I've had for years. It's by Provo Craft, from long before the Cuttlebug came on the scene! Sally & I have been very good, & haven't been to any other shows this year. (Well, ok, I went to a teeny tiny one in Nottingham several months back & hardly bought anything much, so I'm not really counting that.) We've been saving ourselves for Harrogate. The thing is, having just bought the laptop, I'm going to have to be very careful about how much I spend there....

Halfway through the holidays

We've just had a lovely few days in Dumfries & Galloway, in spite of the rain, visiting places we hadn't been to before. On one day we followed the Galloway Kite Trail around Loch Ken. The trail was formed after the successful re-introduction of red kites to the area. The highlight of the day was seeing 50+ red kites descend on the feeding station at Bellymack Hill Farm. Food is put out there at 2pm every day, but the birds start to arrive before then. Wonder how they know what time it is! It was an amazing sight. Just a pity the weather wasn't better. Note the Scotch mist in the background of the photo! The rain was blowing straight into the hide from where we were watching, and I could only hope my camera would survive the soaking. (So far so good!)




It's always great to get away for a while, but withdrawal symptoms soon set in, so back to the crafting! My first task when I got home was to make a wedding anniversary card for my daughter and son-in-law. It's their 8th this year, traditionally bronze & pottery. I'd been waiting for an opportunity to use a gorgeous background by Lesley Wharton, aka The Paper Engineer, which she generously gave away as a freebie on her blog. The colours seemed just right for the occasion, and it didn't need any more than a few Prima flowers and an image from Crafty Individuals to complete the design.


I'm still trying to use up my existing stash, rather than buying new stuff. It's not working 100%, but I am definitely buying less new and using more old, so I'm considering that a success! I've had some gorgeous Daisy D's papers for ages and have kept getting them out to look at from time to time. They are lovely quality and the most sumptuous colours and designs. Believe me, making the first cut into them was not easy, but I managed it. There are several sheets of each double-sided design in the pack, and so I have decided that if I keep one of each, using the rest should be quite painless. As with the previous card, the papers needed little embellishment. I used three different papers for the background, dividing them with narrow gold peeloffs, and a fourth for the scalloped circle around the greeting. The Spellbinders ribbon tag was made from the reverse side of the scalloped circle paper. Of course, all the papers co-ordinate beautifully. A couple of Prima flowers, and a Craftwork Cards Circle Message finished it off.

Only three more weeks of the hols left.....