Unrepeatable!

One of the characteristics of the Gelli Plate is that it is highly unlikely you will ever get identical prints. This can be a good thing, because half the fun is not knowing what the print will come out like until you see it. However, it can be annoying when you get a really good print and know you'll never be able to repeat it!

I was playing with some Crafter's Workshop masks, one of which was the Mini Roman Letters (by Dina Wakley). This is the first print I made with it. Possibly my best Gelli print yet!

I didn't want to cover up too much of it, so all I added was some stamped clocks (Crafty Individuals), a column top (Non Sequitur) (I think it's actually Greek but I'm pretending it's Roman) a couple of gods (part of an Aspects Of Design stamp) and a printed picture (Crafty Individuals).

Think I might have to keep this card. I'll never be able to make another like it!

Gelli prints

Been getting messy with my Gelli plate.....

The pile of prints is growing!

Made a card with the one bottom left in the first photo. (Butterfly: Chocolate Baroque; Flower: Technique Tuesday; Text on background:Hero Arts; Sentiment: Inkylicious; Label: Spellbinders.)

Now, what to do with the others.......

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!

More Fur and Feathers at Stamping Sensations

Just a quick reminder that our theme at Stamping Sensations this month is Fur and Feathers. Entries are coming in nicely, but there's still plenty of time to enter if you haven't already. I've made a couple more cards on the theme to show you.

For the first one I tried to think outside the box and came up with this Art Deco lady with her feather headdress.

She's a stamp which came free with DoCrafts Magazine, and I coloured her with Promarkers and cut her out with a Nestie die. The feather stamped on the base card is one I've had in my stash for many years. I found it in an oddments bin in a shop somewhere. There are no maker's details on it. Until now, I had never used it! Each time I've had a clearout over the last few years I've decided it could go and then changed my mind at the last minute, thinking that just maybe I might have a use for it one day. That day came. Finally, my hoarding of stash is justified!

The dark BP was free with Making Cards mag. The sentiment is by Hero Arts, stamped on a Nestie label, with real feathers, photo corners and feather charm from my stash. I added a couple of stick-on gems to her headdress and sash for a bit of bling.

I went back to the obvious for my second card, which I've called Mysterious Forest!

The birch trees are made with a Crafter's Workshop Mask (it's called Aspen Trees, but I reckon they're birches!). I sponged the background through the mask, and then shaded the trees to give them a bit of dimension. You'll find several little creatures hiding amongst the branches. A Little Claire's owl (small part of a large stamp), a Lindsay Mason squirrel, a Hobby Art deer, and a Crafty Individuals butterfly, again a (very tiny!) part of a stamp. The foreground grasses are by Inkylicious, and the sentiment is from IndigoBlu. The badger (mounted on Stix2 foam pads) is by Personal Impressions.

 There are lots of gorgeous cards entered for the challenge so far, and I think it's going to be very difficult for us to choose a winner! I wonder if it will be yours.......

Been playing.....

....with my new Gelli Plate! It's rare these days that I have time just to play and experiment, but I've been itching to get my hands on one of these and couldn't resist any longer, so I had to make some time!

My first attempts at prints were rubbish! Put too much paint on and it just got muddy. I get cross if I can't do things straightaway, and have to keep telling myself that, like most things, it just needs some practice. I wanted to make some backgrounds for cards, and eventually I got one I was happy with, and had to make the card forthwith!

For an earlier print (rejected!) I had used some skeleton leaves as masks, but they didn't show up very well. However, the leaves looked quite good covered with the paint. I decided to try stamping on one, and embossing it. I used an Inkylicious stamp, the same one I used to make the background print, and I think it worked quite well.

 I sprayed over the background with a Crafty Notions spray ink (a gold shimmer, but unfortunately it doesn't really show in the photos) and then overstamped it with a  a Stampin' Up text stamp. The sentiment is also by Inkylicious. The centre picture, which quite fortuitously matched the Inkylicious flower stamp, is from a Crafty Individuals Miniatures book (Flowers and Butterflies), and I framed it with a Nestie die.

The paints I used on the Gelli Plate were old ones (10 years +!) and I think half the problem was that they had become too thick. I couldn't seem to get a smooth thin covering with them. Living up here in the wilds of Dumfriesshire is wonderful, but craft shops are thin on the ground, to say the least. I wanted new paints, but couldn't wait for mail order, so on Friday I made my first solo expedition down into Carlisle since we moved up here, and visited the recently opened Hobbycraft! It's so long since I was anywhere with decent supplies that I was like a kid in a sweet shop! I found the paints I wanted (plus a few other bits and pieces - well, it made sense to get them while I was there and not have to make another journey, didn't it?!) but will now have to make some more time to try them out.

Watch this space!

Ps. Note to Sally, you HAVE to get a Gelli Plate!!

Fur and Feathers

We had some wonderful entries for our January theme at Stamping Sensations. Already it's February, though, and time for a new challenge. This month it's

FUR AND FEATHERS

Plenty of scope there, I think. I decided to go for feathers, being unable to resist these adorable owls by Little Claire.

I wanted the owls to be the centre of attention, so, after colouring them with Distress Markers and cutting them out with a Spellbinders die (Labels 10), I kept the rest of the card quite simple. The background papers, which just happened to go perfectly with the image, were a freebie from Making Cards magazine. I computer-generated the sentiment on to a Spellbinders tag, and the diecut flourish is a Marianne Design.

Our sponsor for this month is once again the fabulous Stix2, and just look at what they have generously donated for our lucky winner!

My lovely teamies have excelled themselves with their creations this month, so do go and check them out on the Challenge Blog. I think this is going to be a very popular theme, so I'm looking forward to seeing lots of Fur and Feathers!

The Force of Nature

A rapid overnight thaw combined with torrential rain and gale force winds meant that the scene which awaited us this morning was in complete contrast to yesterday's. What a difference 24 hours makes! All that rain and melting snow had to go somewhere. The beautiful vistas in my previous post have been replaced by these incredible views.  I couldn't replicate all of yesterday's photos, simply because many of my viewpoints were inaccessible today, but I think you'll get the picture. If you haven't seen the previous post, do have a look and compare.

This first one shows how quickly all the snow disappeared, in just a few hours. 

The others show where it all went to!

Picture No.6 in yesterday's post shows a gateway next to a tree by the river. Here (below) you can just see the top of the gate, which gives an indication of the depth of the water. Scary!

 The river does flood quite often, but this is about the worst I have seen it since we moved here. The water you can see in the next two photos is not usually there!

The normal course of the river follows the line of trees in the centre of the next picture and then bends off to the right in the distance.

The next view is looking in the opposite direction. The direction of flow is from left to right in front of the line of trees across the middle of the picture. The tree at the LH end of the line at right angles (the tree by the gateway in the earlier pic) is normally high and dry at the edge of the near bank!

Normally I would walk through this little wood alongside the river. Couldn't do that today!

The sky is now blue again, although it's still very windy. It's two hours or so since I took the photos and already the water level has dropped quite a bit. I always wonder what happens to the creatures which live in and around the river when it floods, but they seem to cope! We saw a large hare this morning, and some swans were swimming happily on the new lake which had appeared! I'm not sure where the otters go, but they seem to come back eventually. We found a dead otter, sadly, by the roadside a few weeks ago, but have seen more otter tracks since then, so hopefully there must be several around.

This is certainly a fascinating place to live!

A Walk In The Snow

Although it's been very cold here, we've been lucky not to have had as much snow as some parts of the country. However, yesterday it snowed most of the day. The most snow I've seen for ages. The sky was leaden, and it seemed dark all day. This is what it looked like from our lounge window.

This morning, however, we woke up to beautiful blue skies and sunshine, so I took the opportunity to get out for a walk and some fresh air. I went along the river and across the fields nearby.

The next photo is interesting. The sun was covered by a little thin cloud and must have been shining through ice crystals, as there was a rainbow effect all around the edges of the cloud. I wasn't sure whether it would show up in the photo, but it did. You can see it better if you click on the pic to enlarge it.

Unfortunately the good weather didn't last, because by late afternoon the sky had clouded over again and now it's raining. But at least that means it's getting a bit warmer!

New Year and New Challenge

Hope it's not too late to say Happy New Year everyone, and to wish you everything you wish yourself for 2013.

Being the first Sunday of the month, we have a new challenge for you at Stamping Sensations, and what better theme to begin the new year with than

** FRIENDSHIP ** 

I think that speaks for itself, and we would love to see your interpretation of what Friendship means to you.

We have a fabulous sponsor for you this month - STIX2! They have given us a wonderful prize. A huge selection of essential items, well worth an entry!

Now, my usual new year's resolution is not to make any! However, if I were to make any crafty ones for this year, it might be along the lines of thinking outside the box, or at least getting out of my comfort zone and challenging myself to do something different. So here's my card for "Friendship".

What's different about that then, I hear you ask! Flowers and butterflies are never far from my cards. Well, yes, but - they're red! Red is not my first colour of choice for a card. I don't like colours that shout at me, I much prefer cool, soothing ones - blues, purples, and greens. But having said that,  I do love poppies, and poppies are red, so....

It might also have something to do with the fact that Brenda sent me a package of gorgeous goodies for Christmas, which included some delightful dotty red ribbon which I couldn't wait until next Christmas to use!

I decided that it would go beautifully with some Chocolate Baroque poppies, which I stamped on to red spotty paper and on to plain white and then I paper pieced just the flowers. 

 I cut out the image and the red spotty frame with Spellbinders dies, and then added just a touch of colouring to the butterfly and bud with a red Promarker. I tried paper piecing the leaves too in green, but felt that introducing a second colour lessened the impact, so I left them plain. 

I didn't have any suitable background paper, so I made some with some more Chocolate Baroque stamps. A lovely friendship sentiment (also by Choc B) and a few punched  butterflies (Martha Stewart) completed the card.

So that's my celebration of friendship. My lovely teamies have made some gorgeous samples to show you, so do go and have a look at them on the Challenge Blog. I look forward to seeing yours!

More treemendous inspiration!

We're halfway through our December challenge at Stamping Sensations, where our theme is "Treemendous". I wanted a change from cards and Christmas stuff, so I made a little notebook.

 I cut an aperture with a Spellbinders Nested Maple Leaf die and stamped a little scene to go inside it. The trees are by Inkylicious and the fence and sheep by Hobby Art. The background hills and foreground grasses are hand drawn. The two small maple leaves are from the same die set, and the corners are cut with a Woodware punch.

 I stamped the same trees on each page for a bit of inside interest, bound it all together with my Bind-It-All, and finished it off with a ribbon hanger and fibres for decoration.

I also had to make a quick birthday card. Very clean and simple, it took me about 10 minutes!

Same maple leaf die, a Crafty Individuals tree stamp, a peel off greeting and various layers of paper.

Anyway, I hope that's given you some more tree inspiration. If you haven't entered our challenge yet, there's still plenty of time. Oh, and we have made a couple of slight changes to our rules! We realise  not everyone has time or can afford to make projects just for a specific challenge, so we have removed the restriction of 6 challenges and you can now enter any number of challenges as well as ours. Also you can enter up to three cards or projects of any type (rather than each entry having to be a different type of project). We hope that will help to make entering easier for you, and we look forward to seeing lots of lovely creations!

One more thing! We are getting very close to 1000 followers, so it's candy time at Stamping Sensations! Click on the link on my side bar to take you to the challenge post for all the details!