#144 Anything But A Card

We have an Anything But A Card challenge for you today over at Crafty Cardmakers. Do please pop on over and check out the team’s inspiration.

I have used my Tim Holtz Layered Bee die to make a tag. I started with one of Tim’s Manilla Tags and coloured it with Spiced Marmalade, Dried Marigold and Wild Honey inks. Then I created a stencil to look like honeycomb by diecutting some card with one of the Memory Box Open Studio Distressed Collage Baptisia Dies. I stencilled through my home made stencil with Ripe Persimmon Ink. Then I stencilled again with Colourcraft’s Soft Form Relief Paste in white. This paste dries glossy, unlike some of them that dry matt. As it was too white when I had done that I went back over it, when it was dry, with an ink duster and some Spiced Marmalade ink. My mistake, I thought I had picked up the transparent one!!!! Oooops, lol

I added a couple of flourish stamps by stamping with Rusty Hinge in opposite corners, and the words Bzzz and Queen Bee. The flowers have been in my craft stash for over ten years. I remember seeing them and thinking how pretty they were, as they were embossed. However they have sat around for ten years and I haven’t used one of them!

The bee was diecut from orange bazzill card and I coloured the thorax and stripes in black with a copic pen. I also cut a spare set of wings from acetate which I had recycled from some packaging. After I had embossed both the bee and the spare wings with the matching embossing folder I added some Stickles in Spiced Marmalade to the Wings.

I edged the tag with black soot and added some double sided ribbon.

I am entering this into:-

Fussy and Fancy – #144 Things With Wings
Glitter ‘n Sparkle – #147 Something That Starts with B
Lisa Somerville Bloggers Challenge – The Letter B
Mixed Media World – #5 Stencils (Hope my home made stencil counts!)
Mod Squad – The Wing’s The Thing
Moo Mania – In The Garden
Recycle, Re-purpose and Re-Invent – July Anything Goes
Southern Girls – Get Messy With Ink or Paint
That’s Crafty – Stencils and Masks (Hope my home made stencil counts!)
Wags ‘n Whiskers – #159 Recycle (packaging for the acetate wings)
We Love to Create – #15 Anything Mixed Media Goes

DV 111 Embossing, Wet or Dry

Our challenge at Dream Valley this time around is embossing, and this can be wet or dry, or even a combination of both. We are sponsored by Crafts and Me and I have used one of their gorgeous stamps for my card, called Birthday Girl. This also comes as a digi but I have the rubber stamp. We are also sponsored by The Hobby House.

I coloured her with my copics, adding some glitter highlights to her balloons, and the lacey areas of her outfit, plus a little on the flower and lollipop on her gifts.

The image below shows the glitter on the image, which was called Sprinkled Sugar a Stickles one, but when it was wet it just looked like dimensional glue, not until it dried can you see it actually looks like grains of sugar. Sorry for the quality of the pic, but it was difficult to get the right angle to show the glitter properly.

My embossing is a Marianne Designables Embossing and Diecutting folder, no DS0908, and I embossed it onto a light teal from a DCWV mat stack of their Jewelled Colours. I have the matching 12” stack to this, but irritatingly there are a lot of colours in the mat stack that are NOT in the 12” stack! Bad form, as it’s difficult to utilise both when they are so mismatched in colour!

I matted the embossed paper onto another sheet from the same mat stack in bright pink, and also diecut the word smile with a Penny Black die.

I glittered around the edge of the pink layer with Ice Stickles.

I am entering this into:-

A Gem of a Challenge – #149 Birthday Wishes
Catch The Bug – July Bingo Middle Line Top to Bottom (Texture, No Square, Bling)
Corrosive Challenges – #229 To Die For
Digi Designs Challenge – Hand Coloured Image
Digi Galore – Summery/Bright
Penny Black and More – Anything Goes with a Sentiment
Scribbles Designs – #31 Birthday
Send a Smile 4 Kids – Bright Colours 4 Kids
Sweet Stampin’ – No Designer Paper
Wags ‘n Whiskers – #158 Birthday

ABC N Number

Our challenge at ABC today is N for Number. We want to see a number anywhere on your project please. We are sponsored by Art By Miran and I have used their lovely image Blossom Breeze to create my card.

As soon as I saw her she reminded me of the Flower Power days of the 60s, and looks like she is off to a music festival. So I found some lovely funky floral paper from a Basic Grey pad and coloured her in bright colours to match with my copics.

The flower pearls I also coloured with my copics. I created the sentiment on my pc. She might be a little too bright! I glittered her flowers, and sadly it has made them appear duller than they are.

I am entering this into:-

Craft and Smash – Sentiments
Crafty Hazlenut’s Patterned Paper – July: Anything Goes
Creative Blooms – July: Colour Challenge
Digi Galore – July: Summery/Bright
Going Grey With Scrap Creations – Summer
Natalie and Amy – #34 Summertime
Penny’s Paper Crafty Challenge – #236 Anything Goes
Southern Ridge Trading Company – July: Summer
Top Tip Tuesday – Summer Fun

CCM 143 Water

Our challenge over at Crafty Cardmakers this time is Water. We want to see your creations that involve water. They don’t have to be cards, any crafty project will qualify, just as long as there is some water on the project somewhere.

Oh how I wish I could draw. I fell in love with the gorgeous Art Doll I used in my journal page as soon as I saw her. She is from a kit called Validation and is by Courtney Designs. I did trim off her wings as they got in the way of her falling tears. I also printed her twice, the first time was actually an accident cos I chopped one side of her head off, so I had a spare hair piece I could cut out to give her matching bows in her hair, instead of the single one on the original image. I also drew on her tears.

The page was created with Distress Stains which I dotted on my craft sheet and squirted with a water mist. Then I smooshed the paper through it. The bottom piece I did separately in Neocolor II crayons which I laid down and then blended with a paintbrush and water, and then tore off to add to the bottom of the page. You can’t really see in the photo, but when it was finished, I sprayed the river with a fine mist of water that I had added a tiny drop of pearlescent medium too so in fact the water sparkles a little like the sun shining on it.

The bulk of the stencils are from Crafters Workshop, apart from the text which was a Viva Decor one from Pinflair, the little shoals of fish are Sheena Douglass.

I created the title sentiment on my pc, and then stuck it on later. The white highlighter pen is a Molotow paint pen.

I am entering this into:-

2 Creative Chicks – #28 Anything Goes
ARTastic – July: Water
Decorate to Celebrate – #104 Anything Goes
Frilly and Funkie – Something To Say
Make My Monday – Anything But A Card
Mixed Media World – #5 Stencils
Not Just Cards – #22 Anything Goes
Pile It On – #77 Water/By The Water
Scrapbook Blessings Club – July: Anything Goes twist Watercolours
Patties Creations – #112 Make A Splash

DV 110 Distressing

We have a brand new challenge at Dream Valley sponsored by Robyn’s Fetish. We would like to see your ‘distressed’ projects.

I decided to try something a little different for my image and paper pieced it almost entirely. The only bits I didn’t paper piece were the very small green areas of stems and leaves because I couldn’t get my chunky fingers to cut round something so small, so I coloured those with prismacolor pencils.

My papers, and indeed my paper piecing papers are all from the Flights of Fantasy CDRom from Crafters Companion, and were in fact left over from a project I did with them last week.

My die cuts are Memory Box Beloved Butterfly, and Crealies Decorette No. 2. The birds are some I already had cut but I think they were Joanna Sheen’s Britannia dies.

I am entering this into:-

2 Creative Chicks – #28 Anything Goes
Card Mania Challenge – #70 Anything Goes
Crafts Galore Encore – July: Use A Stamp or Digi Anywhere on your project
Crafty Time – July: Punches or Dies
Creative Craft Cottage – #42 Spots or Stripes
Digitally Sweet – #140 Anything Goes
Jo’s Scrap Shack Fun Day Friday – #95 Anything Goes
My Time to Craft – #299 Paper Piecing
Paradise of Stamps – #21 and 22 Anything Goes
Sisters of Craft – July: Anything Goes

TMC 11 Canvas

It’s time for our new challenge over at The Mirror Crack’d, a canvas.

I am lucky to have the most amazing team and they regularly put me to shame and today is not exception. I wish I had half the talent they have, but alas I just keep plugging away. Compared to them my canvas is very basic. However, it was still an effort for me to make it, so if you don’t think you can do this sort of thing, be like me and at least give it a go! You never know, you might surprise yourself.

I started with a 7x 5 canvas because my main focus was going to attempt to be the face, and I didn’t want it lost on a larger one. I cannot draw to save my life so without the help of the fantastic Paperbabe Templates and Stamps I wouldn’t even have managed this, lol.

I started off by applying four shades of Distress paint to the canvas and then spritzing with water to get them to blend into one another. When it was dry I used the ‘short and fringe’ template to draw the basic shape and then painted over it with white titanium paint. Then I used the head and fringe templates to draw the basic head shape and her fringe. I gave everything apart from the hair a layer of Lyra Aquarell crayon in the palest skin tone, working up in tones to give some shading and definition. I have to be honest this was hard on the canvas because of the texture of the canvas and the wax crayons didn’t want to glide to easily over that surface. However, as the colours wipes off quite easily I was able to keep going until I was happy with it. The downside is that it still isn’t permanent even now!

The beauty of the Paperbabe system is that it also comes with stamps for the features. So I next did the eyes. I can see they are ever so slightly skew whiff, but as I used a permanent inkpad they were pretty much there and stopping there, lol. I opted for the plain circle around the iris to do the pupil, but there are many shapes in the stamp set including a lined one that looks very like a natural iris.

Next I tackled the hair. I did a rough wash of pale brown and then just added layer upon layer of Aquarell crayon to give some highlights to the hair.

The lips came next, not my finest hour, lol, and finally the nose… I had a great laugh initially because my nose looked like a moustache! But I finally managed to get a semblance of a nose, minus moustache by persevering with some polychromos pencils for shading.

The sentiment was stamped onto tissue paper with memento inks and then mod podged onto the canvas. I think the sentiment is apt, because you don’t have to be The Mona Lisa to be Awesome!!!

The white stars are texture paste through a stencil and the little gold swirls I used my immense talent, LOL, and drew in myself. I added some highlights in her hair with the gold pen I did the swirls with, and also under the sentiment.

I wish I had the talent to draw and/or paint, but failing that I highly recommend this system as the next best thing. Whilst she may not be the Mona Lisa, compared to my normal attempts that look like a five year old with broken fingers has drawn a stick figure, this is truly a masterpiece, and I am sure that with practice I could get better!

Just to add that I made the mistake of blanking out the coloured background with plain white acrylic paint, and I think I would have had a much more obliging surface if I had gessoed out the background.

At the risk of embarrassing myself I am entering this into:-

2 Creative Chicks – #28 Anything Goes
Altered Eclectics – July: Anything Goes
Craft My Life All Crafts Challenge – June/July: Anything Goes
Craft Stamper Take It Make It Challenge – July Take A Stamp Anything Goes
Crafty Individuals – July: Face Value
Decorate To Celebrate – #103 Anything Goes
Frilly and Funkie – July Something To Say
Left of Centre Creative Challenges – #85 A Splash of Paint
Rhedd’s Creative Spirit – July Anything Altered Art/Mixed Media Goes
Stamplorations Stencil Sunday and July Mixed Media Challenge – July Anything Goes
That’s Crafty – Wish Upon A Star

ABC M Magnolia

Our challenge today at ABC is M for Magnolia. We would like to see your creations that utitlise either Magnolia stamps, Magnolia Die cuts or Magnolia papers.

I have gone for Magnoila diecuts.

My image is from the fabulous new Flights of Fantasy double CDRom from Crafters Companion which incorporates the amazing artwork of Morgan Fitzsimons. The papers, apart from the pale matting layer are also printed from the same cdrom. I printed my image and then coloured her with copics. I glittered her wings. The peacock and the lace effect frame around the image and beneath my sentiment are all Magnolia DooHickey diecuts. Flowers and stamens are from my stash.

I am entering this into:-

Cards and More – #135 Dots
CD Sunday – Flitter and Flutter
Classy Cards N Such – #91 The Colour Purple
Creative Craft Cottage – #42 Spots or Stripes
Cuttlebug Mania – Sentimental Journey
Die Cuttin’ Divas – #222 Anything Goes
Doodle Pantry – AIMPDC7 Anything Goes
Glitter N Sparkle – #143 Sentimental
Ike’s World – #41 Fantasy
Magnolia-licious Tuesday Challenge – Things With Wings