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Sunday, 31 July 2016

A Year in Crafting - July

Well it's time for my next instalment in my crafty journey. I'll try and make this one short and sweet. First as usual a sample of some of the cards I made this month.


Design Teams:
I'm still with Whimsy Stamps, The Ribbon Girl and Deep Ocean Challenge Blog, but this month I felt like the time was right to add another. Just one, because I don't want to end up where I was last year when I took on way too much than I had time for.  So to that end I answered a DT call over at Tiddly Inks. I didn't get picked this time around, but I am grateful to be reintroduced to the fun that is Tiddly Inks. They are super cute and fun to colour.

Speaking of being re-introduced to stamps, I had a little play with some Make it Crafty images. I have no idea why I left it so long,but I thought I'd see what I could do, and hey it was fun and I was super happy with the way they came out.

Publications:
I made a few samples for the Summer edition of the Whimsy magazine, you can find it here and it's free to read. I'm toying with the idea of sending off some submissions to magazines, I never really have before except for DTs when asked, but maybe the time is right.

New Crafty Stash:
My love for Lemoncraft Papers continues, but I have also recently discovered some lovely papers designed by the awesome Klaudia Kzsp. Love the colours in this pack and I've made a few cards recently with these, both vintage style and with stamped and coloured images. I got a message from the company that produces them asking if they could feature some of my work on their page, which was nice! :)

Other than the usual embellishments and papers (I'm trying to work my way through my stash and trying not to buy any more papers for a bit, but we'll see how that goes lol!), I just bought some little Mama Elephant tag dies and the sentiment stamps to go with them, some Christmas sentiment stamps (can never have too many of those right?), some fishtail banner dies, a leaf die, (another thing I don't think it's possible to have too many off, though the OH may disagree -ahem), some sequins, (I wonder what they could be for? I'm blaming Jenny Dix and saying no more) and some Graphic 45 tags....hopefully I'll get around to playing with those next month. Hmm I guess I bought more than I thought! One other thing I purchased was a snazzy tin to store my Distress Ink markers in, I thought this would be great for toting them around in and perfect for my trip to the Whimsy Craft Retreat in September. Which brings me neatly to....

Teaching:
Oh my, the craft retreat is really not far away now, I still have a lot to do, but I have pretty much planned out my make and have chosen paper, dies and colourway. Now I just need to choose what images I'll be using and write up my lesson plans and I'm away. Well apart from all the other trip based planning I need to do. I did buy a new suitcase though lol. I'm really looking forward to it but I'm excited and nervous all at the same time and I am so looking forward to meeting everyone.

Techniques:
This month I've played around with sepia colouring, shaker cards, CAS and various ways of changing up chipboard. I've also been playing with my pencils. My partner bought me a full set of Prismacolor pencils for Christmas, but tbh I haven't been very happy with how I've been colouring with them. I've followed some tutorials but there always seems to be too many layers of colur or the skin looks too orange. In the end I finally got some time to just play around with them myself, and find my own comfort zone with them. I'll have a card to share with you in the week with a pencil coloured image. Still room (a lot of room) to improve and grow, but I'm getting there.

Well I guess that wasn't so short and sweet hmm? August is waiting and I still have my daughter's birthday card to make and my parents diamond wedding anniversary card to finish,...eeek...60 years together, I don't know how that's even possible lol.

See you next time!







Friday, 29 July 2016

Make it Crafty - Fairy Star

It's Friiiiiiiiiiiiiiday!!
Now don't faint, it's another Christmas card from me. I know, very unlike me but honestly last year was such a rush to get them done I need to get my act together and just start ploughing through them. Maybe one day I'll be motivated enough to start making them in January, but normally once Christmas is done I just don't want to see another Christmas card for a while.

Anyway, this is a card with traditional colours, which again is very unlike me but I'm loving these Lemoncraft papers. Its design is also a little bit out of my normal field as well, as it's stripped down, not quite CAS but nary a flower or bit of ribbon or lace in sight. Not that I didn't try and add them mind, but I just couldn't make them work with this design and well, I liked the design so that was that.


I used another Make it Crafty image, this one is called Fairy Star. I've coloured her in distress inks and if you Copic using folk think red is bad I can assure you that for DIs it's worse. I think next time i do deep red I may switch to pencils lol!

I used some Wink of Stella on her wings and ruffles and I slathered the star on the end of her wand with Glamour Dust. Then when I cut out the small star dies to use as embellishments I realised that the larger one matched the wand almost perfectly, so I stuck it on top. The glitter peeks out between the filigree and I really like the effect. The stars are a die set from La-La Land Crafts.


The large star she is mounted on is from My Favourite Things and I thought it made the perfect background for her. All the layers are popped up an some 2 mm foam tape.
The sentiment is from a lovely set from Mama Elephant I cut it out with a fishtail banner die from Your Next Stamp. All the dies and the sentiment stamp were from Dies to Die from.

I finished off with a few clear gems that I coloured to match with my Copics.

I hope you like her.
That's all from me today, have fun and I'll see you soon!




Wednesday, 27 July 2016

Vintage Blue - Inspiration Photo for Deep Ocean Challenge

Ooops I'm running a bit late with this as my scheduled post decided to misbehave!  Anyway, it's time for a change of theme over at Deep Ocean Challenge, and this time we have a bit of Photo Inspiration to share with you, please scroll to the bottom of this post to check out the inspiration for yourself.

I haven't made any non image cards for a bit and I thought this was the perfect opportunity, I used some lovely papers in vintage blues from Pion Design and added some some pretty embellishments in blue and ivory.

I inked all my layers in Walnut Stain, distressed them and added plenty of gesso, applied with an almost dry brush.
I slipped a square of light blue tulle between 2 of my layers. I coloured my little cameo frame blue and then brushed it liberally with a couple of coats of crackle paint, allowing the blue to show through.

To finish I added embellishments from The Ribbon Girl, links below.

Scrapiniec Chipboard Rounded Corners

This is the inspiration I followed



I do hope you can join in, and don't forget to check out my lovely teamies' work over on the blog.

Until next time!