More Cards LOL!

I know I've just done 12 days of card making but I still need more, famous last words!

 

I began by making a few background, to honest I didn't want to cover them up, but in the end I did.

They were made by putting light modelling paste through a variety of masks making sure to miss areas with the paste to add interest.

 

Infusions powders were then sprinkled over the dried texture paste patterns and misted with water then dried, this made the most amazing backgrounds effects.

Gathered twigs distress ink was used to edge the background which were then mounted onto a card base.

 

 

Here ore a couple of cards with stamped images added.

 

Hope you like them.

 

Sue X



TCC 2016 - Day 12

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 12

And finally!

After lots of die cutting, inking  and layering this is my final card.

Happy Christmas everyone!

Sue X

TCC 2016 - Day 11

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 11

Almost there.

Today's card took a little more time to create compared to the earlier ones. no gelli prints on this one.

 I began by stamping a Christmas background with embossing ink and heat embossing with a lovely pale blue Wow powder. Weathered wood distress ink was smooched over the card then misted lightly with water then the excess was lifted off with kitchen roll. Distress wax was used to seal the card. This was mounted onto patterned card stock to make a base to work on.

All of the other elements were die cut from watercolour card stock coloured with distress inks layered up and this is how it turned out.

Day 11 complete!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas.

Sue X

TCC 2016 -Day 10

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 10

Grumpy penguins!
need I say more.

You guessed it, gelli print background (told you there was a theme) stamped and cut out grumpy penguins ( Yes Rebecca I'm owning up, its a new stamp. Had it a couple of weeks, that's it though just the two this year.).
 A touch of texture paste for the snowflakes followed by a die cut sentiment, a little stamped grounding for them to stand on and all layered up to make day 10 card.

In the true spirit of Christmas (or should I say shopping) its two for one day!

 

 

The penguins were coloured with  distress ink used as a water colour, hope you like them.

 

 

Sue X

 

 

TCC 2016 - Day 9

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 9

Leftover  gilli prints were used to make a patch work background, the edges were inked   with distress ink and layered onto card to create a base for the snowman.

The snowman was stamped onto white card and his head/hat stamped onto gelli print paper, these were cut out and layered up a die cut sentiment was then added to complete the card.

Day 9 done!

Sue X

Mixed Media Fun

The 1st of December bought a number of complications with it.

  This was the day my crafting buddy and I had arrange to meet up and have a play, however,  hubby decided to book the cats in at the vets, Penny for flu injection and Tom to have a few lumps checked out, poor lad has to have a little op to have them removed in the new year.

Daughter no.1 spent night throwing up and had to have the  day off school, fortunately hubby was working from home, so that was sorted I could still go out. She spent it in bed and didn't get up until I got home. Next was a family visit to the dentist. All good there.

 Back to it.

This is what we made today.
My version.

Rebecca's version.

I'm really sorry but there are no how to photos (too busy playing), however I will be doing another and then I'll take a few snap shots.
First we decided on a theme beach huts or boats, we opted for a light house on an island, or sea breaker on a beach ( however you want to see it).
 A large lollipop stick was cut in half and painted in chosen colours then sealed with a touch of Matt medium.
We began by using 2 layers of fabric laid over the inner ring of the embroidery hoop to create a base to work on, using layers of lace ribbon and threads we built up the ocean foreground. The lace etc was saturated in sculpture medium and twisted into place to create movement, once all of the fabric layers were in place the top hoop was lowered into place and tightened, the light house was glued in position with a blob of 3D gel  medium, this was then heat set which hardened the structure paste.
Light paste was used through a stencil to add texture to the sky line.
Paperartsy paint was used to colour the piece, adding white to give the impression of waves and sea foam. Shells were glued using 3D gel along with art stones, (now known as kitty litter! Rebecca you know why).  Small Tilda sequins were pushed into the gel and stones randomly to add yet another visible embellishment.
That's where we got to, crafting buddy Rebecca was then given strict instructions to sit and finish it.
I had to wait for hubby to finish his work off before I could do mine. I added a seahorse charm  which I found whilst rummaging for a metal birdcage to make the lighthouse top. I used my Tim Holtz scissors to disassemble the cage by cutting out the middle section with the bird in, this was glued into position with glossey accents which hopefully gave the effect of glass.
Mini glass beads in pale blue also added a visual bit o bling, its still lacking a little something but I will sit and look at it and maybe something will jump out at me.

That's it for now. Hope you agree that they are both fab so far.

Sue X

TTC - Day 1 Revisited

So, you know when you've made something and you know you don't really like what you have done or, it somehow doesn't seem finished.

Well that's how I felt about these two cards.

And so, I  changed them slightly, I am now a little happier sending them out.

Here is how they turned out.

 

 

From this.

 

Hope you agree they look better.

 

Sue X

 



TCC 2016 -Day 8

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 8

What can I say gelli print background, stamped stiches and die cuts.

All layered up to make a quick easy card.

Day 8 complete!

 

Sue X



TCC 2016 - Day 7

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 7

Ho Ho Ho, Another easy one!

This time the gelli print was made using the small shaped gelli plates creating an interlocking pattern in different colours, with the snowflakes stamped over the top to add interest. White paint was also brayered along the edges to lighten  the colours.
Die cuts added the finishing touches, a little colour was added to the die cuts using gelatoes before it was all layered with black card and stuck into position.

Day 7 Fini!

 

Sue X

 

TCC 2016 - Day 6

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 6


This card was made using a gelli print for the background then layered up with die cuts which were cut from white card stock.
   Colour  was added with weathered wood distress ink along with a touch of sparkle glitter to make it pop a little. 
This was all layered up and stuck into position.

Day 6 complete!

 

Sue X



TCC 2016-Day 5

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 5

This card was made by stamping the image onto cardstock then colouring with distress ink used as a watercolour,  a touch of glitter was added to make a little more Christmassy.

A die cut sentiment was added, and layered up with patterned card and a touch of black card.

Day 5 done!

 

 

Sue X

TCC 2016 - Day 4

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 4

Easy cards, do you see a theme here?

The background was a brayered version of pinks, buff and white which was  stamped with white paint using snowflakes from JoFY as is the snowman.
More stamping in pink archival ink of the holly to add yet another layer, and the stitches stamped in watering can. The edges were distressed wit black soot distress ink and it was mounted onto a white card base.
The snowman was stamped onto white card and the hat was stamped onto pink patterned paper, both were cut out and layered onto the card.

The sentiment was die cut from white card which had been coloured with pickled Raspberry distress ink, to make the Christmas part stand out a little white card was added to the back of the die cut before gluing it into position.

Day 4 complete!

Sue X

TCC 2016 -Day 3

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 3

A nice quick one today.

 Using  a gelli print background (made some time ago), I added white stamped snowflakes to make it all Christmassy.

This was mounted onto black card then a  white card blank.

The snowman was stamped twice, once on white card and part of it (with the hat and scarf) onto gelli printed pink paper. The snowman, hat and scarf were then cut out layered up and stuck into position.

The sentiment was stamped onto the pink printed paper (and also onto the actual card) cut out then glued on top of the stamped image on the actual card.

There you have it.
Day 3 complete.

Sue X

TCC-Day 1

Twelve Cards of Christmas 2016 - Day 1 and 2

Well here we are again another year, another 12 last minute Christmas card makes.
This is my challenge to myself  to make sure I get the last few cards posted in time for Christmas, it is another last minute rush as always.

 Day 1 and 2 together as yesterday (1st December) was a crafting day with my crafting buddy Rebecca who booked day off work to celebrate her birthday and spend some quality time chilling and making a piece of mixed media artwork (will post it later).
Moving on....
A little while ago I used half of an old book to use as a canvas type project and thought hey, why not make it into a 3D type of card.
I had gutted out several book halves and glued the edges to provide a solid base to work on, followed by a coat of clear gesso to seal the paper and provide a even tooth.

Some time later.

Texture paste was added through a mask and infusion powders sprinkled over while the mask was still in place, using a spatula to spread the colour. Once the paste was dry white gesso was dry brushed to knock back the colour a little.
Distress ink was smooched over the page then misted with water, kitchen roll was used to lift off the excess water and leave a lovely mottled pattern, this was sealed with distress wax.
Die cut leaves were coloured by double dipping in green distress inks then shaped with a ball tool, a die cut sentiment added along with various shop bought flowers, cones, berries and acorns.
A card blank was created and the book pages attached to the front a bit like a card topper, the back edge of the base card was cut slightly angled to let the card tilt a little more as it was a little heavier.

Here are the first cards for the mums and dads.

Hope you like them.


Sue X

SDC259 - Halloween

Stampotique Design Challenge 259 - Halloween

and Mixed Media Monthly Challenge 29 Sponsored by Stampotique

 

I do like a good old Halloween project,  in fact anything that has cats, skulls, pumpkins and general spookiness as a prompt.

Halloween colours are also a draw for me, black mainly but purples and oranges also play a part.

So, moving on here is my project for the Stampotique challenge.

I decided to make a scene from a hard plywood box canvas 8"x8", this was primed in white gesso followed by a dark yellow paint. Crackle paste was added but the waiting got to me and so I sped it up a little and instantly regretted it, oh well, part of it was okay to use.

  

Dark  orange/red and black paint was dry brushed all over the frame to produce an aged effect and knocked black in places to reveal the crackle and the Orange hues to give the impression of dark skies.

 

 

 

Next up, stamping! Using my new Stampotique Cat stamp (plus a few others I've collected over the years) stamped onto watercolour card stock and cut out.

A few dies were used to create brick effect, green leaves and cob webs.

 

 

Small blocks were made to lift the wall from the base of the box and a step created from black card to give a 3d  effect.

The leaves and pumpkins were coloured by double dipping  elements into distress inks which had been misted with water to give the impression of variegated colour. Kitty was coloured with watercolour pencils and blended with a water brush. I hand drew a trick or treat sign to hang on the door fussy cut it out and inked the edges.

To create a sort of path art stones in various sizes were glued onto the black card

along with the other stamped elements. not exactly what was in my head, however, I'm super happy with the out come.

 

Hope you like it, to see lots more inspiration hop on over to the Stampotique blog here, and
to the Mixed Media Monthly challenge here. 
This is the Mixed Media Mood Board.



 

  

Sue X

Weekend Crafting

What more can I say, a whole weekend crafting. No washing, no ironing, no kids and no hubby.

It cannot get any better than that!

Normally at this time of year Rebecca and I head up north for a craft shopping day at Port Sunlight, this year however we headed down south for a weekend workshop with Linda Brown.

 

It was a great break from the usual and well worth the drive down to Milton Keynes.

We arrived nice and early which meant we had time for a quick mooch around the shop, followed by gelli plate printing and rusting fabric. A patchwork of the prints and rusted fabric were arranged along with small houses cut from various fabrics.

The following day we got out  the sewing machines and zigzagged the seams of the patchwork pieces, very therapeutic only one problem the patchwork looked really cool and I didn't want to cover it up. Now there is an excuses to make more gelli prints.

The houses were all stitched and decorated by hand, this did take a little while but it well worth it.

We took our projects home to complete, I may have added a few more beads, buttons and lace too.

So here is my finished project.

 

 

Here are a few more close ups.

 

Thanks again to Linda Brown for guiding us on this workshop, hope you like it.

Sue X

Here is some rusty fabric I made as I was finishing off my project, I'm now addicted to making it, unfortunately though, out of rusting powder.

 

 

X

SDC258 - Favourite Quote

This weeks challenge over at Stampotique is, "Favourite Quote".

 

To be exact.

"What is your favourite quote of all time. Be it funny, inspirational or religious, let's see your favourite quote this week."

Ummmm! I don't really have a favourite quote, I did buy a set of scrapbooking stamps a while ago and chose to use one of those quotes to stamp on my journal page.

Talking about journals, I'd bought a denim journal by Prima on impulse and when I got it home didn't really know what to do with it, it went into the bin and then out again and in again then out, again.

I wanted to use it, really use it, carry it around without getting embellishments caught everywhere  so decided on just stamping and painting the cover. I also manipulated the journal cover and it now is an 8"x8", the inside has a larger pocket which started life as a pair of jeans and a few other tweaks.

 

Back to the  journal page. Using  8"x8" mixed media paper and a giant A4 stamp I pressed different distress ink onto the stamp then misted it with water, this was stamped on to the media paper which smooched onto the page.

 

 

  

The image was lightly misted again to help blend the colours.

Additional stamping was added in cornflower blue and purple archival ink.

 

 

 

Grey distress ink was used over a Tim H mask to produce the square effect in the background and the inks edged in black soot.

 

 

 

My new stamp which arrived while I was in Florida has finally been used, Yeah!!!!!!

It was stamped onto mixed media card stock and also onto tiles which were arranged to create gaps for added interest.

 

 

The tiles were inked with block soot distress ink to take away the plainness.

Both the tiles and the image were coloured with distress ink, once dry the paper image was glued into position and then the tiles were stuck down over the top.

 

And that is it, hope you like my project for this weeks challenge. If you would like to see more inspiration check out the Stampotique blog here.

Sue X

Play Day Tuesday

Its been quite a while since I've had a Tuesday play day,  so with the girls back at school for a little while I thought it was about time my sister in law and I attempted to get the creating juices flowing.

We started with mixed media paper/card and added dylusions paints in random blocks, this was stencilled on various patterns and designs followed by stamping.

The next part really upset Nola, the look of horror crossed her face when I said to her choose one of my home made masks place it on your paper and paint black all over it.

To complete the pages doodling was added to the black areas.

There was some resistance, however, when the project was complete she was well happy and was going off home to do more.

Unfortunately didn't take any photos during the process, but, these are my almost finished pages.

 

The masks were made by cutting images from a Sunday magazine many moons ago, these was placed on clear acetate drawn around and carefully cut out with a craft knife to produce two versions (an inner and outer). The edges were sanded to smooth down the sharpe bits.

Hope you like them.

Sue X

SDC257 -Put a Bug on it - Week 2

 

SDC257

 

Put A Bug On It

 

 

 

So here we are week 2 of the current challenge  over on the Stampotique blog, this was our inspirational text.

 

"Add a bug to your project.. creepy, crawly, flying, any bug at all. Get creative too!!"



 

Now, not wanting to follow the usual path of making a card (not really a card maker), I decided to make a project for Halloween.

With that in mind I had bought some Prima plaster shapes/skulls a while back and thought this was an ideal place to start.

 

Ummmm!!! This is what happens when you leave your phone lying around on a table, little people take selfies!!!

 

 

 

Back to the matter at hand take 1 skull and make it a body from tin foil. 

 

 

Take fabric stiffening medium and lengths of t-shirt fabric to wrap around the mummy and leave to dry. 

 

One hard wood canvas type painting board thingy, (sorry forgot what its called, brain jam). Painted slate grey and stamped with rust like dots to create interest.

 

 

Took me a while to make this photo out, its the box thingy and the stamp. A rusty wash was applied to  the box and left to dry.

 

 

Various stamps were stamped onto acetate, spiders, webs, words and a house. The house was also stamped onto white card and coloured with old paper distress ink along with the skulls from the Halloween cube, the edges were distressed with black soot. The mummy was dry brushed with slate grey and caramel paints to age them. The other element is half of a book I had created a niche in, this was given a rusty wash and stamped in the same fashion as the box and inked with distress ink around the outside edges.

  

 

The stamped elements were layered together, placing the card house under the acetate house intensified the black stamping and allowed the tree to be transparent as this had been cut out along with flying bats.  

 

 

The other elements were layered together using the solid skulls to hide the gluing down of the acetate.

 

 

 Well, that's my project complete for this week hope you like it, for lots more inspiration hop on over to the Stampotique blog here.

 

Sue X