This Blog piece is about a #3up challenge I reently completed for Paprartsy. I was told that I would receive some stash in the post so I immediately got to thinking what I could do. A few days later the bits of stash turned up, I got a wooden hanging plaque, 3 Tando(?) butterflies and a twirly branch or tree.I had in the back of my mind something that Leandra had done in a video a little while ago, fresco texture background with crackle http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lYBRACE4pU I had wanted to try this technique for ages, so i decorated the wooden base accordingly.The texture was made using Amber Gold ferro through either the Lacy swirl or Mini Capricious TCW stencils and the board was painted many different colours (all Fresco Finish) including: South Pacific, Beach Hut, Limelight, Guacomole, Eggplant, Nougat, Ice Blue, Claret, Pansy, Snowflake, Hey Pesto, Pumpkin Soup, Inky Pool , Crackle Glaze and some aquamarine treasure gold. The technique was as described in Leandra's video which is 36 minutes long, so I won't go into precise detail here. Of course the plaque has a reverse side so I decided to decorate that too. I painted it in Ice Blue then and stamped it ,using versa mark with the big flower from the Hot PIcks HP101 set and also stamped the "ART IN BLOOM" sentiment from the ELB01 Eclectica set i poured some sticky embossing powder over the stampings and then heated it until the embossing powder had melted. this powder remains tacky, as the name implies so I then applied transfer foil to both flower and sentiment.

I next turned my attention to the butterflies. already knowing that I wanted them hanging, I pierced 4 holes in the bottom edge of the plaque using a bradawl and screwed in 4 eye screws. then i added texture to the butterflies using Grunge Paste and 2 stencils mini capricious again and mini damask (both TCW), I then punched holes in the upper wings of each of the butterflies using my crop-a-dile, then the butterflies were painted squid ink and concrete, underneath and hey pesto and blood orange on top.then brushed royal amethyst and ruby treasure gold on them. the reverse side of the butterflies were painted beach hut and I repeated the transfer foil technique, this time using the SM10 mini. Attaching the butterflies to the board was very fiddly! this was mainly caused by the fact I thought I'd bought some large jump rings but they were in fact split rings and they were very difficult to get on the butterflies. Anyway. I managed to do this, eventually then I attached jump rings to both ends of 6 short pieces of chain that I already had in my stash and attached one end to an eye screw and the other to a butterfly.

The last piece of this project was the branch/tree. I really hadn't decided what to do with this at all. I painted the whole thing Sherbet. I decided I needed some bling so I put 4mm fuchsia swarovski crystal beads into the centre of the branches leaves using ranger Glue'n'Seal I also stuck some to the upper wings of the butterflies although I also used 6mm light amethyst ones here too. I applied some royal amethyst treasure gold to the branch and then stuck the branch to the plaque again using Glue'n'Seal.

I must thank everyone at Paperarsty for the opportunity to do this project and this week's totally guilt free crafting time :). I really enjoyed it. it was such fun.Phew, this describing what you are doing is quite difficult, thought id end up writing a book there.



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Big Sister's Birthday card

Oh my goodness.  I'm actually getting quite prolific or I'm actually blogging what I do, take your pick.  Anyway end of January is one of my sister's birthday so card time! I've been wondering, as I know exactly when people's birthdays are why I just don't make up a huge batch in advance so I'll always be ready?  Answers on a postcard please....


So here's the latest effort

Back at Last......

Finally started crafting again.  Mojo half present at least.  Made the above card for a little, fairy mad, friend of mine a couple of weeks ago. Used stamps from Chocolate Baroque 'Teeny Weeny Meadow' for the surrounding foliage and embossed this with Stampendous Stamp'n'Stuff Detail White.  I brayered over the embossing using Big'n'Juicy Mountain Meadow (I think!).  Stamped the fairy from the 'Born to Fly' Clear Art Stamp set and was coloured in using Derwent Inktense Pencils. Cut her out and stuck her on with foam pads.  The no. 4 was from a grungeboard number set, don't know which as I haven't kept packaging.  The panel and number have been outlined with gold pen.  The background paper on the card is an Artylicious paper from stash. Wish I'd made the background a little lighter but I love those little stamps and the fairy's quite cute too, even if it's not my usual style!

Oh my....it's been a long time!

Well the crafting mojo well and truly disappeared over the last year.  I even joined one of Glenda's online classes but wasn't able to keep up, was having my kitchen done at the time (actually it's still ongoing) and had nowhere to work as OH has commandeered the dining room.  How I'd love a dedicated workroom/studio, specially as OH is constantly complaining about my (rather large amount of) stash being stored in the utility room.  One day......

Anyway, I'm ready to give it another go. I've just ordered the set of cute mini stamps from Chocolate Baroque, a fantastic offer BTW, 4 sets at half price for Guild members.  May get them tomorrow, I hope!

Sent my daughter off on a train to visit a friend in Wales today. She'll be going straight back to uni after her visit so I wont't see her for a while :( . On the walk down from Euston to Charing X (yes don't choke - I did actually walk, it was a lovely day) I popped into Falkiners/Shepherds the bookbinding supply people and had a browse at their gorgeous papers, handmade, Japanese all sorts. They were very expensive though so I managed to restrain myself.

Round the corner from Falkiners is Blade Rubber Stamp. A nice little stamping oasis in the middle of London, actually it's the only one as far as I know. Central London overheads must be too high for craft shops. I was very restrained today, I bought some ez mount, which I needed after my 'blip' earlier this week ;-)

Anyway here is a picture of something I made earlier (about a year earlier actually). It was for a Scottish friend and the flowers are thistles, this is a CI stamp - CI213 and distress inks to stamp the image. At a guess I'd say I used Dusty Concord ans Pine Needles but not completely sure. I spritzed the stamp with some water (Tim Holtz technique)to help the colours a bit. The letters are grungeboard minis and the ribbon and cardstock was from stash. Next week I must definitely add some more new stuff. Especially after my shopping trip earlier this week!

I had a trip to the Craft Barn yesterday, after I'd done my duty trip to the Garden centre to get Pelargonium plugs, which by the way is by far the the cheapest way to get them, even cheaper than buying seed as far as I can tell.

I had a loyalty voucher burning a hole in my bag. I hadn't intended to spend much money (when do I ever) but still a few unplanned items fell into my basket. I bought a new PaperArtsy stamps (an A5 sheet), the one with the big bird on it(HP1005), Crafty Individuals chipboard houses, a notebook to alter (it looks about 5"x5"), a Crafty Individuals Miniatures book - People and Places 2, a Crafty Individuals Stamp CI-267 - it's tree with clocks and cakes and teapots on it, the Spica clear gel pen, Wild Plum alcohol ink, on TH's blog recently people were asked which was their favourite colour, this one came up really often, along with Stream and Lettuce (but I have those already :-)) and last but not least 2 pads of the new DI pads, Wild Honey and Victorian Velvet. They had all 12 colours in and I couldn't decide which to buy so I just picked 2 at random (we all know I will buy them all eventually).

I have spent this afternoon in the garden clearing the beds of their winter detritus. Only done a couple so far, my knees can't take much more than that! But it was such a lovely afternoon it just seemed nice to be outside, winter has lasted far too long this year and those of us living in the soft South East just aren't used to it.

Ooooh, just seen the line up for the Craft Barn Extravaganza (12th-13th June), Leandra from PaperArtsy, Jean and Malcolm from Crafty Individuals, Suze Weinberg and many more. I'm definitely going, not sure which day yet though.