The Craft Barn Q & L Challenge - UP

Good aftrnoon friends, followers and passers by, here is my second postcard for the new challenge over at The Craft Barn, using the word UP in a quote or lyric. You can find more information HERE about the challenge which will run for the full year.  

Keeping with the 60's soul music theme I used the lyrics "Everlasting Love", written by Buzz Casson and Mac Gaydon, first recorded in 1965 in the USA by Robert Knight, released in 1968 in the UK by the Love Affair and reaching No 1 in the charts.

I am presenting my postcards in a folder which will be bound using my Bind It All machine (which I think needs dusting off and using rather than languishing in my craft cupboard).  My pages will include details of the writers, artist and dates the records were released, I am also adding a section at the back for the full lyrics of each song.

I am getting organised this year and hope to have time to work on the folder, completing the cover before the end of the year, my alpha dictionary from last year is still waiting for the cover to be finished.   Maybe when my craft room clear out is complete (it is taking ages) I will have time to sit and craft, just a few boxes to clear out then I will be finished.

Off now to do the dreaded ironing, then back to check out what you lovely ladies have been up to this week and leave you a few comments.

70th Birthday Greetings and watercolour stamping

Good morning followers old and new, friends and passers by. Today I have a water colour stamping card, using the Faber Castell Gelatos I received for Christmas, and a 70th Birthday card using Papermill's garnet pearlised card (300gm) which is on special offer at £7.50 per box of approx 75 sheets.  Why not pop over to the Papermill Blog and register for their newsletter, a good way to find out when offers are available, check out their Facebook page too for competitions and more. 

I have been giving the Gelatos a test drive and you can see a quick background tutorial  HERE.

Here are the two cards I made using the garnet pearlised card, the colour is rich and it has a fabulous pearly shimmer.

This 70th birthday card was for a neighbour, I used white linen cardstock for the base card and a lace panel cut using the Silouhette Cameo.  The greeting was computer printed, cut to size and mounted on a piece of the garnet card and the number seventy fixed to it with 3D sticky fixers.  The lace panel was attached to a piece of the garnet card with a ribbon and this was attached to the card blank.  The greeting was attached over the ribbon and the card was finished with a computer printed insert.

This card started out as a practice piece trying out the Gelatos, the Lavinia  thistle stamp was stamped onto soft white card using blue, red and a little green Gelatos directly onto the stamp which was spritzed with water.   The effect looked good although part of the stem on the third flower did not stamp. The colours were perfect for use with the garnet pearlised card, so out it came, the striped paper is from a Docraft grab bag and co-ordinated perfectly, the butterflies were free with a recent magazine and the greeting hides the missing stem. Don't you just love it when an idea comes together so easily!

New Year and a New Challenge at The Craft Barn

Hello friends, followers and passers by, there is a new challenge over at The Craft Barn, the challenge will run for the full year and is a Quotes and Lyrics Challenge.  You can find more information HERE.  This is the first fortnight of the challenge and the first two words are: 

SMILE and/or UP

You need to use either (or both if you wish) of these words in a quote or song lyric on your chosen sample.

I am presenting my samples in the form of a postcard,  nice and small for me to take with me on holidays so I do not miss a challenge deadline like I did with two of the Alpha Dictionary Challenge letters last year.

My chosen word is Smile and I have used a lyric - Tears of A Clown by Smokey Robinson.  I will see how the words pan out and may continue in the soul music theme, I was a 60's soul music type of a girl so this would be quite fun.

My background was coloured using Faber-Castell Galetos, a Dylusions stencil and a tear drop stamp I made myself.  The stamps are Indigo Blu "Take the Time"  and Oxford Impressions "Big Top".  The lyrics were computer generated.

Time seems to be slipping by again and I am not getting much crafting done, the craft room is getting a makeover and I have spent the last week sorting boxes and throwing out all unnecessary things, hope to be finished by the weekend and catch up with the pile of half finished projects on my desk.  Hope to be back soon with some more projects.

Faber Castell Gelatos put to the test

Good afternoon everyone,  I  read about  Gelatos colouring sticks last year and was lucky enough to get a set for Christmas.  Gelatos are little sticks of acid free pigment with a creamy consistency and rich colour, they blend easily, are water soluble and can be used to create watercolour effects, adding water can lighten the colour and also increases the blending ability.  I have been testing out my Faber Castell Gelatos and did a review of these for the Papermill, pop over to their blog and check out what the other DT members have been writing about.  

Here is a card using the blending and watercolour techniques.

 There are a few pictures below to show you how easy it was to create the background on this card.

Rub  the colour sticks directly  onto card and blend  together with your finger, adding more colour until you have the colour balance you want.

Choose stencils/masks to add layers to your background, colour with slightly moistened pigment using your finger or blending foam (I rubbed pigment onto my craft mat and spritzed with a little water).  I then added some stamped sea shells using the Gelatos directly onto a stamp and spritzing with water.

The images were stamped using Archival ink and coloured using  the Gelatos as watercolours.

It was great fun getting messy with the Gelatos and there are still more techniques I would like to try with them. Here is a card using the Gelatos applied directly onto a rubber stamp and spritzed with water to get a soft watery stamped effect.

Smooth White Card on Offer at The Papermill

Happy New Year to you all, hope you had a great Christmas and brought in the New Year in style.  Well here we are into another year and my first DT post for the Papermill.  This week's Special Offer at the Papermill is 260gm Smooth White Card, a midi box (approx 260 sheets) for £16.00 or a mega box (approx 645 sheets) for £34.00 - that's just over 5p a sheet!

Just a reminder that the  Luxury Antique White Envelopes and Artists Pads will be reverting back to full price next on Friday 17th January, so still time to grab a bargain.
               

Here are two cards made using the smooth white card, this is excellent for stamping and colouring and as you can see from both cards it embosses well too.  

My first card is for my granddaughter as it is her birthday this month, she is a girly girl and loves blue.  I started by making a 15cm square card using pink card, embossed a square of the smooth white card and matted it onto the card, to this I added some patterned paper, a doily, a square and a round aperture cut from glitter card and a stamped image using a LOTV stamp which was coloured with Promarkers.  A computer generated greeting and a few crystals were added to finish.

This male card, which is to be put in my birthday folder for use later in the year, is one of my favourite styles for male cards.  It was made using the smooth white card.  I embossed a piece of the card with a spellbinders embossing folder, coloured it with distress inks and a little treasure gold, stamped  a Tim Holtzs sentiment  and an image stamp which was a freebie with a magazine last year.  I added a few cogs which had been sprinkled with embossing powder and heated to give a rough texture to the shiny card.  The finished panel was attached to a top fold card leaving a small white border. I have used this technique before for male cards and the smooth white card works beautifully with the embossing and inking.

A New Year Surprise

Good afternoon everyone, this is the first day I have had time to get into my craft room and am hoping to get something done, everything was put away for Christmas and it will take a day or two before everything is back out and in use, so it may only be a little bit of blogging and commenting today. 

A wonderful start to the new year for me, I opened my copy of Craft Stamper, which arrived in the post this morning, to find a Valentine card I sent in had been published in the Ready, Set, Stamp! section.  There are some fabulous cards in there, here is mine:

My card blank was made using Papermill white linen card and paper for the insert, the other textured card is Docrafts Papermania premium textured cardstock.  For the main image and sentiment I used Paper Artsy Urban Snapshots Young Love, this was stamped onto Papermill smooth card and coloured with Promarkers and the background coloured with distress ink.  The heart doily was in my craft box, a freebie I think, and the roses are from years ago when I made some wedding invitations.  

Just a reminder while I am blogging that there is still time for you to pick up a bargain over at the Papermill in the sale, the make your own calendars and artist pads are half price, pop over and check out the offers.

I am working on my calendar pages and here is my January page, I intend to have a childrens' rhyme theme through the months, "January brings the snow, it makes your face and fingers glow" - "February brings the rain, it thaws the frozen lake again" etc.  The calendar and card used are all from The Papermill of course.

I want texture on my pages so started by embossing a piece of navy card with a snowflake embossing folder, I swiped a white ink pad over the raised areas to give the contrast.  The image was stamped in black and clear heat embossed, a little colour was added to the girl and the background was coloured with distress inks.  A little white flock was added to give the snow and a few die cut snowflakes embellished with pearls.  I used this idea the year before last and thought the rhyme theme would be great to carry on through my 2014 calendar.

Happy New Year one and all

Just popping by to wish friends, followers old and new and everyone who passes by a very Happy New Year.  2013 was a bit of a roller coaster for me here's wishing 2014 brings us all everything we hope for.

I would like to thank everyone for visiting and leaving  their wonderful comments on my posts over the last year, so once again

Happy New Year