Grunge Flowers

Back again... Remembered this morning that I hadn't blogged the grunge flowers I made last week. Saw a video with TH making grunge flowers and really liked the result so, of course, I had to try!

This was the first try. I cut the flower layers from grunge paper using the Cricut, then cut the same file from pages of an old book. I used Tattered Rose and Victorian Velvet to distress the flowers, then kindyglitz to provide the sparkle.
Fixed the flowers together with a bling brad then added a brooch pin to the back.

Used the same files to cut this one and tried Shabby Shutters and Peeled Paint DIs. Bought some Peeled Paint Distress stickles and used on the petals but didn't show up very well so used walnut stain stickles as well, and this added a bit of darker shading on the edges of the petals.
Same bling brad and brooch pin on the back.

My first video!

I finally did it - made a demonstration video! Last week, at the Crafty Girls meeting, I demonstrated a tri shutter card, which can be a bit complicated. So I decided to make a how to video showing the steps in making the card. The video is on You Tube and can be accessed below.



Written instructions with measurement details can be found by clicking here.

Please feel free to leave constructive comments. It is my first effort and can only get better!

Swaps and more

Had a really busy day yesterday finishing off some projects I was working on during the week. Again, have used some more of my new stamps, working towards achieving the challenge I set myself last week!
Lots to Do Revisited is having a number of swaps to celebrate the launch of the new forum. Hilda very kindly allowed me to take part so I got busy with skinnies, ATCs and Tags.

The theme for these skinnies was All Stitched Up so I was able to get out the sewing machine and play with that again too. The stamps for these are from a Darkroom Door set I bought some time ago. I used my Copic markers to add some colour to the images then distress inks for the edges. The centre one, I added lace to and some stick-on bling. The skinny on the left needed something extra, so I added some fancy eyelets and tied bows with raffia. I added some buttons with raffia ties to the skinny on the right.

The theme for the tags was Quotations, and I used the new Paperartsy stamps I bought at the Craft Barn. The theme of Time was carried through on all of the tags and I kept to the same colour scheme as well. I used Tattered Rose, Victorian Velvet and Chipped Sapphire distress inks and sprayed with Frost Tattered Angels glimmer mist. To finish these off, I added some bits of very loosely woven stiff fabric (don't know what it is called!) and some yarns, both of which were in the stash box from Sue.

The ATC theme was Art and I used the same stamps I had used on a previous Art ATC series that I did for another swap, but I used a different colour scheme this time. I used yellow card and Wild Honey and Rusty Hinge Distress inks, then spritzed with gold and red glimmer mists.

At Wantage, as you know if you have been following this blog, we all had little challenges to do. Zoe gave us all a peg to do something with and I have been really struggling to get something done with it. But I went to the library the other day and picked up a book on altered art. Browsing through it, I was suddenly inspired!

This is the result. I first stamped a face on tissue and attached it to the head of the peg with Modge Podge. I added hair so she didn't look bald! The dress was made from a layer of tulle and a layer of lace that I glued together, then stitched around to form the dress. I stuffed the arms with dacron filling. I made an underskirt of a dusky pink which I also used on the flowers. The flowers were made from little circles of each of the fabrics, cut with pinking shears and finished off with a little flower shaped bead in the centre and kindyglitz around the edges. I also edged the dress with kindiglitz.
I finished Peggy off with a crown cut with my Cricut, coloured with Victorian Velvet and Pumice DI and pearl dots.

Now I just have my tin to finish - maybe today! It is nearly there, it is just that paint takes time to dry when it is cold!!

Today I am also going to do my first demonstration video. Watch this space!

Sea shells

The free stamp with this month's Craft Stamper was a sea shells one and I rather liked it. I had bought some small 2 x 2 inch canvases and thought that the stamp would do very well on those.

I painted the canvas minis with blue and green acrylic paint. I stamped the images on tissue paper and applied them to the dried canvas minis with Modge Podge (glossy). I also had a larger canvas and painted it with black acrylic.

I found some small sea shells in a craft shop on Tuesday and thought they were just right for decorating the canvas.

When I was looking through the box of goodies that the lovely Sue gave me at Wantage, I found some blue/green/purple yarn that was just right for wrapping around the canvas minis to provide a little more texture.

I was quite pleased with the resulting piece of art - the very first one like this I have done.

Busy now getting organised to complete the peg and tin challenge set by Zoe and Sue at Wantage!

More for my challenge

Over the last couple of days have been playing and experimenting with inks and stamps and various other stuff. Here are some of the things I have done.

The background stamp on this one is from the Tanda background set that I bought. The main image is from a Paperbag Studio set that I got at Wantage. The button on the sentiment is from the stash that Sue gave us at Wantage. Instead of a ribbon, I used raffia that I got recently when shopping for crafty stuff here.








This card uses a stamp I bought at the Craft Barn at Lingfield. I wanted to buy a whole set of these stamps but had to restrain myself. The background paper is from a roll of hand crafted paper I got from the Trade Aid shop. Punched the flowers from some scraps I bought at the Warehouse. Layered these with black then used glossy accents to attach the glass metallic beads in the centres of the flowers.

The ribbon is a white self-stick ribbon that I am trying to use up because it is so hard to get evenly attached to the card.

This is a tri-shutter ATC that I made - basically to try out the technique, but I may use it for a swap that is happening next month for the NZ Crafters on Card Making World. I used a PaperArtsy Eiffel Tower stamp, a ticket stamp, cogs and propeller stamps from my friend Zoe! Distressed with scattered straw, crushed olive and dusty concord distress inks.

6 new stamps used - total so far 11 - I think!!

Challenge for my UK Forum Buddies

When we went to the UK recently, I was to meet up with some of the people I have "met" on some of the forums that I follow. Three people have now completed the "challenge" and have blogged their work.

What did they get? each person got a paua coloured paper napkin, a shrink plastic maori motif, a couple of bird die cuts done with my Cricut, some pieces of paua shell, a NZ themed stamp.

Following are links to the blogs where the wonderful items are displayed.

Zoe made a fabulous mask with her bits and pieces.

Sue, after much trial and error, came up with a beautiful canvas.

Burn made a stunning tag using just about all the things I gave her!

Please visit their blogs and leave some comments for them all. They are all so clever!
I am still trying to work out what to do with the wooden peg that Zoe gave me and the tin that Sue had in her box of goodies! Working on it...

Another one today

I decided to do another post today as I had made a card that fits a number of challenges for this week.

Card Patterns Sketch 68 was used to provide the layout for the card. I cut two black rectangles and rounded the corners then stamped a floral background with Versamark. I then used white perfect pearls to colour the background.

The ovals were cut with Nestabilities and layered. I punched daisies and layered those for the flowers after sponging with red Brilliance ink. The flowers have silver beads held on with Glossy Accents in the centres.
The lace was some that I had in my sewing drawer and was just right. Attached that then a red ribbon over the top. The sentiment is from my Hero Arts set.
I think this card would make someone very happy to receive it - flowers always do that to you, don't they?

Other challenges that this card fits:

Tuesday Taggers: All that Blooms
Stamp Something: Happy Something
Allsorts Challenge 56: Lace and/or Buttons

Challenge Day 2

Cold again here today so I shut myself in the craft room to try to do some cards for challenges as well as meeting my own challenge!

This is a skinny (3" x 5" card) for the Something Completely Different Cats challenge this week. I used a Tanda stamp then coloured the image with Distress Inks and a waterbrush. The edges were distressed with Scattered Straw, Wild Honey and Rusty Hinge. Coloured the eyes with green then covered with Kindyglitz.

I did another one the same using Milled Lavender, Weathered Wood and Dusty Concord, colouring the cat with weathered wood and black soot.

It was hard deciding which one to show!

Another one down for the challenge.
Total so far: 4

My Challenge

As I was sitting at my desk yesterday, finishing off some cards for a card swap, it occurred to me that, since I had bought so many new stamps while I was away, I needed to make sure that I used them - at  least once!!
So I issued myself a little challenge - to use every stamp at least once during the next month. Given that some of the stamp sets I bought had at least 8 stamps, and I got quite a few sets... that is a lot of stamps to use.

So, here is the result for the first day of my challenge:

The Tanda Teaser for this week is a Man card.
This is one of Tanda's stamps from the Retro Men Set 1. I stamped it using the black Memento pad, cut it with the largest nestabilities oval, then used the same die to cut the backing, which is a leather-look paper from some scraps that I had. I also embossed the die cut to provide an edge to the piece.

Layered on a cuttlebug embossed card outlined with a gold marker, then again onto a brown card. I cut the corner pieces from the same scrap of leather-look paper with a Martha Stewart photo corner punch. The whole was then attached to the beige card.

The sentiment is from a Dark Room Studio set that I bought in Australia last year.

The second piece is an ATC book that I made for my alphabet ATCs.

For the Card Making World New Zealand Crafters Group, we are currently running an alphabet ATC swap. I was thinking about how to store the ones I have made but not sent and I found the instructions for making a little folder that contains 4 ATCs. Carol from Hamilton sent the instructions to me and I found that you could join several together to make a book.

The cover detail includes a stamp from the Les Petite Whimsies collection by Stampington and Company which I stamped on card that I had already coloured with Tattered Rose, Victorian Velvet and Weathered Wood Distress Inks. I masked the image, then stamped swirls with WWDI and little cogs with VVDI. The little cogs stamps was from my friend Zoe, who designed a set of stamps especially for our meet at Wantage.

I coloured some swirls that I had cut with the Cricut to attached to the front with brads, along with a label.
I made 7 little folders and sewed them together through the spines, then attached to the spine of the cover, along with a ribbon to add some more colour and texture.

I attached pink ribbons to the cover, then added the two cards I had made for the decorations.

Quite pleased with the result, but always room for improvement.

I will do a tutorial on this and share it with the other NZ Crafters for them to store their ATC collections.

I also made some other cards, which I have coloured using my Copics, but will share these next week as they are for the card swap and I don't want to let the cat out of the bag, so to speak!!!
Total new stamps used yesterday: 5
Enjoy!

This one's for Burn!

After spending some time with Burnice when I was in the UK, I realised how much influence Tim Holtz has with crafters there as well as in the USA! I had bought his book - A Compendium of Curiosities from the USA and when it arrived, I was delighted to see that it had been signed by the Man himself.

Burn, naturally, was rather envious, so I thought that I would post a picture of the greeting from Himself - just for you Burn... x x

PS - I got to play with my new distress inks a bit yesterday!

Home again - and with lots of goodies!

Well, we got home safely and so did the luggage (Thank Goodness!!)
Had a wonderful time in the craft shops that I was fortunate to visit - especially the Craft Barn at Lingfield and The Stamp Attic at Wantage. I also bought stamps from the Tanda folks - thanks Andrew and Tanya for the prompt delivery, yet again.

Since I have only been home a couple of days, I haven't had time (or inclination) to go out to the craft room to do anything. It has been so cold and wet since we got back that I have been hugging the fire all day. However, I have cut up all the rubber stamp sheets and backed everything with EZ mount, ready to get on with it when it warms up a bit.

So what did I buy, you ask? I got several sets of stamps from Tanda - the cat sets and some background stamp sets. The large set was a Paperbag Studio set which I fell in love with at The Stamp Attic. Also got some ticket stamps and a few other bits and pieces from the Craft Barn. The sunflower set was one I picked up in a stationery shop in Bromley one day.



Another great purchase was a number of Distress Ink pads that I can't wait to use. I don't think I will need any more ink for a long time!!

Some other bits and pieces that I bought were ribbons, a few other stamps, some glimmer mists, a ticket die for the Cuttlebug, a couple of paper pads, a paper distresser, and a couple of other ink pads.

But, the best thing I bought was two sets of Copic markers, and at half the price that they are here. 

Well, I am looking forward to using everything... just as soon as it warms up!