Gingersnap Creations Visiting Artist 4

It's a sad but happy day at Gingersnap Creations as this is the last challenge; and of course it has to be the inimitable colour theme "Copper, Rust and Ginger".

My card is made up of these colours plus a fabulous vintage picture I found of Ginger Rogers, which I thought fitted perfectly.

Have you ever painted with alcohol inks? The rose background is a foiled piece of printed cardstock from the  DCWV Natural Stack, I wanted one of the flowers to stand out more so I used copper, ginger, pearl, raisin and butterscotch alcohol inks to create that metal effect. I also used the fabulous Graphic 45 Steampunk Débutante papers.

The two pictures show the rose in different lights. The first shows the foiling and on this one you can see the alcohol ink painting.

Go take a look at all the wonderful inspiration on the Gingersnaps blog and hopefully we will see you participate too.

Hope your week is going well. I finish school on Friday and can then say I am retired. Woo that will feel strange, but I am looking forward to having more time to experiment and create again.

Take care, next week I will be able to come and catch up with you all. My huge thanks to those of you who have stayed with me, I really appreciate your love and support.

For now.

hugs {brenda} xox

Gingersnap Creations Visiting Artist 3

The Random Redhead Challenge 

at Gingersnap Creations this week is to go back in time to the 

'Last Century'.

I had great fun starting a Glue Book with an old hardback version of  'What Katy Did Next' and using the theme of vintage sewing.

I seem to have collected numerous vintage images and other scraps that I don't want to throw away and thought this would be a good way to use them up.

Do you remember the old Simplicity and Vogue patterns?

For this project though I created some background images using digital files and merged them in PSE, adding other elements to create collage pages.

Sewing is very dear to my heart, although I rarely use the sewing machine with fabric any more, but it was my dear Mum who taught me how to make my own clothes when I was very young. She was a great inspiration, having no formal training herself.

There are some fabulous pieces on the Gingersnaps blog so let's see what you create.

Have a wonderful day.

hugs {brenda} xox

Gingersnap Creations Visiting Artist 2

Hi, at Gingersnap Creations today the fabulous team would love to see your projects that include border punches. I do hope you will go over and see the amazing inspiration that the Gingers have created, it really is fabulous.

The main focal point of my 8in x 8in card is a digital image I created myself using downloads from various places. I printed it out on thin card and then covered it in embossing ink and heat embossed using clear EP. I left if to cool off completely and cracked it a bit by just bending the image slightly. Then I mounted it onto white and then deep burgundy card.

The rest of the design is made using DCVW striped card with some glitter in it, a spellbinders border and Tim Holtz vintage lace border. I made a vintage butterfly using an artemio stamp and covered it with crackle accents. A Prima rose, some leaves and pearls finish it off.

Let's see your borders at Gingersnaps and enjoy the rest of your week.

hugs {brenda xox

Gingersnap Creations Visiting Artist 1

Hi Everyone

So this is my second bit of news - yes I have been asked to be a Visiting Artist for a second time at Gingersnap Creations. How amazing is that? This is the last month of challenges as both Ali and Shar are off to do different things and as you know Shar is starting Unruly PaperArts and I am going to be one of the Columnists, so there's a great link for me.

So the theme at Gingersnaps this week is 'Granny's Photo Album' and I have taken this title literally. I have made a tag book and included photos of my Mum and her family circa 1930 - 1940. 

My Mum probably about aged 16.

The tag backgrounds were done with the wrinkle free distress technique then stamped with the flowers and I used the same DIs to just lightly paint them in which has given them more form. In-between I cut tags using baking parchment and used a flourish stamp with Stazon and a small one with Flitter glue and gilding flakes.

Mum was fifth out of seven children. Here she is at the front with brothers, sisters and cousins.

My Mum's Mum - My Granny.

I loved making this - book making is what I have been doing the longest, and it was great to include old family photos.

Have fun with your vintage project and photo album theme.

hugs {brenda} xox

Another shabby vintage card.

I have been wanting to get out the bees wax for ages and have been trying to find the time to enter the wax Spicy Supple challenge at Gingersnap Creations. 

So whilst I was playing with vintage images this week I decided to add some wax to this card. You can just make out the wax stamped area which has been brushed with interference red perfect pearls and below enlarged so you can see the detail.

A small wooden piece, painted with white acrylic, adorns the little rosette.

Enjoy.

luv and hugs {brenda} xoxox

When you wish upon a star

Happy Boxing Day. We are off to my son's today to go and see what Santa brought the grandchildren - they always seem to get far too much.

I hope you have had a wonderful Christmas Day with your loved ones. Santa was very kind to me and bought me lots of wonderful goodies, including some great crafting pressies. How lucky I am.

 I have been inspired by the Gingersnap Creations Chestnut Theme Challenge - 'Starry Night'.  It is ages since I have had the chance to enter any challenges and am enjoying the opportunity to do so.

 Experimenting with PPs and Stazon ink I got a very clear definition from a Kanban stamp on a PP background. Once I had applied the colour for the background, I rubbed it over with a clean, dry wipe to get any excess powder off first.

The stars were created using some sequin waste and Versamark with several different colours of PP dabbed over the top, the star was made cutting two stars using the Cricut and then adding a star gem to the middle. The 'wish' sentiment is a Sizzix die and embossed with glittery embossing powder.

I think I will put this piece in my art journal and start a section for PP techniques.

Here are my other 'Stars'. This was the day before Christmas Eve and I had the girls for the afternoon whilst Mum went shopping and then both Mum and Dad and their other helper wrapped presents.

This is Ella (showing her gappy teeth) and Maddison baking cakes and decorating with .........

...... of course - stars. This is one of Ellas -

.... and these were Maddisons.

Do you know Santa must have been very hungry when he got to their house - he ate one of their cakes as well as a biscuit and mince-pie and he drank a cup of milk!!!

Enjoy your day.

luv and hugs {brenda} xoxox

Ravens

Yay it's Friday and if this has scheduled correctly, I am away for a long weekend in Swanage. Hopefully I will have my laptop and will be able to log in from time to time.

This is my second piece I have made for the Gingersnap Creations Poe month and this challenge is 'Ravens'.

I have made a second hybrid piece which will no doubt join the Horror Stories piece in my art journal.

The background I put together in Photoshop elements using images from Scrapbookgraphics, they were perfect for what I wanted and included the title and raven at the top.

 I added to it by stamping the black raven to the left and the cobwebs using TH mini halloween and I cut out the bats, butterflies and eyes (from Graphics Fairy) and added the skull charm, spider and key.

I would also like to enter this into Corrosive Challenges - Flying things.

Have fun whatever you are doing and enjoy some crafty time of your own.

Thanks for stopping by, I really appreciate all the lovely comments you leave me.

luv and hugs {brenda} xoxox

Poe - Horror stories

I am just catching up with the Gingersnap Creations Edgar Allan Poe month and this challenge was called Horror Stories, so here is mine.

Poe wrote a number of short stories and poems and I looked him up to refresh my memory, what surprised me though was when I looked for images of  'The Masque of the Red Death' there was Vincent Price staring back at me and reminded me I had probably seen the film in my youth when I used to go to Saturday afternoon pictures. I loved horror stories way back then - now I really hate watching anything like that, tooooo scary!!!!!!

This is a hybrid piece. I downloaded images from Scrapbookgraphics.com and used them for the base background and then added the title, charm, buttons, skull (one of my moulds) and black enamel accents with tiny red seed beads in it. I am going to add this to my journal OR if I get time I an going to make a Halloween book. I think the journal will win!

You can see that the backing paper is actually made up of layered pages of Poe's poems.

Thank you for stopping by today, I hope you are getting some crafty time to make things.

Please don't forget to add any of your Halloween projects to my linky HERE - I am going to give one of my Halloween tags away to a random chosen person at the beginning of November.

Have a great day.

luv and hugs {brenda} xoxox

Shared Moments

Yay I have managed to get a piece made for the Gingersnap Creations challenge this week. The pressure of work has prevented me doing much else other than DT work and also I am prepping for the classes I am giving soon, but I have managed to squeeze this in for this week. This is a wooden page for a journal.

The image is from The Graphics Fairy. I have used all scraps from my box to add the collage pieces.  Underneath the background has numerous layers - music paper, paint and ink, pastels, versamark with masks and more pastels, various stamps and satin glaze.  The flowers have been made using a marianne die and for the butterflies I used a crealies die.

This is the piece that I came home and experimented with after buying the Pan Pastels from Lin on Sunday.  The colours are vibrant and translucent and give a completely different feel to the DIs I always use.  I want to experiment more with textures and other resist techniques. (I just need some more time at the moment!!!!)

I have discovered that there is a brand new challenge blog starting for this product - PanPastel UK Challenge, so I am going to enter it into their first challenge - Anything Goes. The four colours  used were Magenta, Turquoise Shade, Raw Umber and Yellow Ochre. I love the mixes they give.

Other challenges to have fun with -

Crafty Ribbons - Anything Goes

Pals Paper Arts - Lace

PolkaDoodles - Distress it

My Craft Spot - Ribbon

Creative Stamp Friends - Anything but a card

Well we are supposed to be getting a heat wave this week in the UK - how strange our seasons are at the moment because we are then predicted snow in October -  really can't believe that!!!

Have a great week everyone.

luv and hugs {brenda} xoxox

Planes and Trains - art journalling

The Random Redhead Challenge at Gingersnap Creations this week continues the machines theme with a focus on planes and trains. I decided that having not done any journalling for quite a way this would be my chance to have a play and get very inky.

The backgrounds were made with torn strips of paper, including newspaper, stamped over the top and then given a colour wash. Over that I masked some sequin waste and added paint through it.

All the images have been downloaded, some from the Graphics Fairy and some I just Googled.

Both the planes and the trains are being transported high into space by the balloons enabling them to travel further distances, being watched by some very dubious characters. Are they spies?

The images have been cut out and inked and some have been edged with pen.

I had a real Steampunk fun time creating this.

Inspiration was drawn from -
Gingersnap Creations - Planes and trains
Try It On Tuesday - Steampunk
Simon Says Stamp - use newspaper
Sunday Stamper - Back to Black - as a tribute to Amy Winehouse, after the tragic news yesterday that she has died age 27. Like Hels says I hope she may now find the peace she couldn't find  before. xx The blue page has alot of black in it - hope that counts Hels.

I hope the weekend is going well - we have some lovely sunshine today and I have been to a carboot sale and picked up a couple of little bits for altering.

luv and hugs {brenda} xoxox

Cogs and wheels Steampunk

Hi All

Firstly a warm welcome to Patricia, Sandra and Wax Beach Artist who have all joined me this week. I am pleased that you have seen things you like on my blog and that you can join me on my creative journey.

This is my piece for the Gingersnap Creations Spicy Supply Challenge - gears, cogs and watch parts. It is machines month, focusing on steampunk and this challenge is to bring the mechanics of machines to the forefront. Other inspiration was drawn from Hels Sunday Stamper - make your own flower, Try It On - Steampunk, Stampotique - Flower power and Just For Fun - metal.

The base for this piece is a coaster made of black plastic with a soft black velvety backing to it. The head is from Hampton Art and is the same lady as can be found on the Graphic 45 Steampunk papers. I stamped her on some card which had been swooshed with distress stains and then used DIs over the top of that.

After stamping I drew over some of the cogs with Sakura glitter pens before heat embossing over the whole thing and stamping cogs into it using a gold metallic ink pad. When it was dry I sprayed it with a glossy sealer which actually left a nice soft textured finish to it.

To finish off I added lots of watch pieces, a handmade metal flower and a metal number plate. You can just see the tiny watch screws in the middle of the bolt at the centre of the flower.


Hope your day is good and thank you to all you lovely friends who visit and to those especially who leave me the most encouraging comments - I really appreciate them all.

luv and hugs {brenda} xoxox

Rusty embossing

Yay I have managed to get a tag done that has been inspired by both the rusty embossing background from the fab Tim Holtz for Grungy Monday and the Chestnut Theme challenge at Gingersnap Creations called On The Road.

You can find the explanation for the rusty embossing background HERE on Tim's blog where he shows how he has used it with a Christmas tag. There are some fabulous pieces as inspiration by Linda, the lovely hostess and two fabulous guest designers Barbara and Rinda.

Mine has the car, map and a bit of the nuts and bolts as Gingersnap's overall focus for the month is Steampunk and you know me I love to play in this genre.

This looks out of focus, but the glossy embossing hasn't helped on the truck. But you can see how I have added the journalling.

Supplies
TH die ATC and corners.
DIs - weathered wood, vintage photo, frayed burlap, walnut stain and black soot.
Clear embossing powder.
Old book of AA maps and bits from my oddments box.

Have a good day and thanks for stopping by to have a look at my tag today.

luv and hugs {brenda} xoxox

Challenges to have fun with -
Grungy Monday - TH technique
Gingersnap Creations - On the Road
Paper Crafting Journey - For him
Crafty Creations - Boyz to men
Make my Monday - Vintage and embossing
Crafty Catz - Tags