Sunday, 12 August 2012

PanPastel Create a scene

This is the last in a set of three PanPastel UK challenges where I have kept the theme of pages for a book.


The scene came about whilst focusing on the idea that school's out and the summer holidays are upon us. With the beach and water integral to my pages last week I carried on with that idea and created this sea scene, both above and below the water line.


The mermaid, boat and fish are all downloaded vintage images and the background pieces are still from the larger piece I made and showed you three weeks ago.

I coloured the mermaid using PPs and added some white to the dots and added some bubbles from the fish.


This is the finished book from the last three weeks DT pieces for PanPastel UK. I love it and and will try to link pieces in the future in this way.




If you choose to join us this week we look forward to coming and see what you have created and you might be the lucky winner of a great PanPastel set from Your Creativity Store.

Have a wonderful Sunday wherever you are.

hugs {brenda} xox

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FSC - Summer Ice Cream Colours

Strawberry, Vanilla and Caramel

I have a little set for you on the cat walk today in my summer ice-cream colours - two cards and a note book.




The note book was made by stamping onto tissue paper which I then used to cover some chipboard pieces covered with distress stains. I added a few bits and and bobs and used the Bind-It-All to complete it.

The cards were made in a similar way, this time covering a piece of card with the stamped tissue paper, then blending DI round the edges. The bunting I made using DS and DI on canvas, the button card I downloaded and re-sized sewing a button onto it. Some shabby ribbon, tape measure, lace, gem brad and PC generated sentiment finish it off.

Hope you can come and join the Stampettes at Fashionable Stamping Challenges this week, do take a look at their amazing pieces for inspiration.

Materials used -
Stamps - Haberdashery by Tim Holtz
Distress inks - Victorian Velvet, Antique Linen, Frayed Burlap, Walnut Stain

hugs {brenda} xox

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Friday, 10 August 2012

Stamp Man - Precious Medals/Metals

My 'Precious Metals' DT piece this week for the Stamp Man is a bound journal with the theme of gold to it. I have stayed away from the Olympic medals, just because I didn't have any inspiration for it. But any metals will be fabulous to see on your projects. The lovely Angela is hosting this week so do pop over and see the amazing samples from the team.

The frame on the front of my book was cut from gold metal sheet, put through an embossing folder. painted with brown acrylic paint, sanded down and gold inka gold rubbed into it. I then added some aged gold embossing enamel on the edge and some on the front and back cover too.


The inspire phrase was cut from gold mirri board stuck onto greyboard and die cut.


I found the words to Spandau Ballet's song and printed out onto paper for the opening of the book and of course other gold can be added when the book is made up.


Just some of the pages 




Jill is offering the winner a £10 voucher to spend at the Stamp Man On-line Store, you never know this could be you!

Supplies -
Mixed papers for pages and front cover
Bind It All
Sizzix dies - Ornate frame back #3, phrase inspire
Chocolate acrylic paint, inka gold
Cracked embossing folder
A selection of masks

Have a great weekend.

hugs {brenda} xox

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Sunday, 5 August 2012

PanPastel UK - Summer Fun

Remember last week I showed you the cover for a book I am making? Well here are a couple of the pages.

I have used some more of that A4 PanPastel background, stamps and burlap. The beach huts have been cut from a piece of freebie paper from a magazine and the sun on the second page is just made from card.


Tune in next week for the last instalment of the book and see it completed.

If you join in the PanPastel challenge this week, you could be the lucky person chosen to win a fabulous set of pans from Your Creativity Store. And remember you don't have to use PPs to link up.

Hope your weekend is going well.

hugs {brenda} xox
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Wednesday, 1 August 2012

UPA RAQ - Journal It

A hybrid scrapbook page.

Unruly PaperArt's theme this month is 'Journal It', focusing on scrapbook pages. I love scrap-booking and tend to make my own books, although saying that I haven't made any recently but I have been wanting to 'scrap' some photos of our trip to Paris back in April (you know the one Ken treated me to for my birthday).

This Moulin Rouge paper from Graphic 45 fitted the bill perfectly and has been sitting there waiting to be used for such a project. The graphics are fabulous and with so many lovely images I didn't want to cover too much of it up PLUS I needed to get the journalling in, so I have reverted to the classroom when I used to make books with my pupils and we would make lots of flaps and things to do our writing on. I just love secret places to explore on pages don't you?

Whilst in Paris I just had to find the Moulin Rouge as my final dissertation at college was on Toulouse Lautrec and of course this featured strongly in his work.


I have used PSE 7 to change my colour photos to sepia and to print some digital elements that I have added to the page. As this will go in a 12 x 12 plastic pocket it needs to be kept fairly flat and the paper is very busy anyway. The lampost I created myself from one of our Paris photos, the other bits come from DigitalCrea. I wanted a bit more of a 'girly' look to this so added the mannequin.

I also wanted the photos to have an aged and slightly distressed look so I used Antique Linen and Walnut Stain DIs on them before mounting onto brown card.

Beneath the photos you can see the little journalling mounts I have made to provide the details of the trip.


I hope you will enter some scrapbook journalling this month, it would be fabulous to see you on UPA and of course if you would like to be a guest contributor then see Shar's article here.

Crafty salutations.

hugs {brenda} xox


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Sunday, 29 July 2012

PanPastel UK - School's Out or Buttons and Bows. and a PUBLISHED CARD

Guess what I chose for my PanPastel DT piece this week? 
Yay school's out for summer.


Using an Oxford Impressions stamp set I have made a book cover depicting a girl with her satchel and a report book cover. The background (originally an A4 size) was made in summer colours using PanPastels and masks and a portion cut for this piece.


Here are some more pieces cut from that original A4 background. You will see these come alive over the next couple of weeks.

And here are the first two pages in the book.



All the things we love to do when on holiday when we have time for friends.


If you come and join in the challenge you could be the lucky winner of a set of pans from Your Creativity Store. You don't have to use PPs to be eligible for the draw though.

Have a great day and enjoy whatever you have planned.

hugs {brenda} xox

UPDATE (later that morning......)


I am sooooo excited.

I have just seen the Papercraft Inspirations website which shows a card I made for their PanPastel Masterclass.
You can see the card HERE, but will have to see the new magazine for the full Masterclass details of the design team. I will go searching for it today.  See my sidebar for the published card and click on the photo to be transported to my tutorial on the Papercraft Inspirations blog. Woo hoo. xox


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Anything Goes at FSC

Well we all love the anything goes theme don't we? So as long as you have used real stamping on your project come and join us and enter it into the Fashionable Stamping Challenge for this fortnight and please pop over to see what the amazing Stampettes have provided for your inspiration. There is also a DT call that you might be interested in.


I have been making some 'Thank You' cards for the lovely friends and family who came to our BBQ last weekend and have kept them simple because they have to be posted.


I used stamps by Kanban and Martha Stewart and added some ribbon, pearls, a metal corner and one of my downloaded butterflies.


I hope you are having a good weekend. We are away visiting friends in Birmingham and also having my eyes tested, I bet I need a new prescription and glasses!!

Have a great day.

hugs {brenda} xox

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Saturday, 28 July 2012

Lucky Me

I just had to post these fabulous pressies that came in the post to me from Lee - CraftyLoops.

I was lucky enough to be one of Lee's winners for her blogaversary candy and oh my goodness she has been so generous, just take a look at what she sent me. It was a huge parcel.

Here it all is. 
I just took everything out and had to photo it even though it was till on the breadboard in the kitchen. LOL



The most amazing book that Lee made which is going to California with me when I go. It will make a fabulous ideas journal for future projects and I hope to get some inspiration when I am over there.

At first I thought these were Prima flowers - but no they have been handmade by Lee herself. They are beautiful and will be kept for special projects.

Lots of embellishments as you can see.

And more embellishments and bits for altering.

papers, diecuts and a cosmic shimmer spray. (love that stuff)

And here is the inside of that magnificent book and the closure Lee made of elastic and lots of lace and feathers and another of her wonderful flowers.

Lee thank you so much for your generosity and for being a wonderful crafter that I have been lucky to meet in blogland.

I truly have been blessed this week as I have received another package with goodies in including some new PanPastel colours and secret bits to play with. Will let you know more about these when I get to post something I have made using them. But thanks also go to Berni and Paul at Your Creativity Store for their generosity too.

Hope you have a wonderful weekend.

hugs {brenda} xox
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Friday, 27 July 2012

Celebrations at The Stamp Man

I have a number of birthdays coming up so need to get a wiggle on and get cards made. This was the ideal opportunity to do just that and it is one of those that just seemed to come together so well. Even though I say it myself, I really like this card, and it does look better irl.


I think what made this was the partial colouring in of the flourish. I used Caran D'Ache aquarelle pencils but didn't use the water on them.



Collage style cards have to be my favourite, so I hope you like too.


Come and join the celebrations at The Stamp Man this fortnight and be in with a chance to win a £10 voucher for the on-line store, generously given by Jill (Mrs Stamp Man herself).

Supplies -
Tim Holtz - Shabby French stamp set
Sizzix Book cover 2 embossing folder
Downloaded butterfly
Vintage ribbon
Computer generated sentiment
Lace, button, burlap


Hope your Friday and weekend have started well.

Enjoy yourself and take care.

hugs {brenda} xox



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Sunday, 22 July 2012

PanPastel UK - Magical and Mystical

It's amazing what you can come up with when you think you don't have anything to fit a challenge. As I found with this DT contribution for PanPastel UK this week.


I had forgotten I had a few Lili of the Valley stamps and found this beautiful fairy, stamped and coloured with promarkers and I used gilding flakes for stamping the wings twice more to create this 3D effect. The Stampotique mushrooms were coloured with PPs and touched up with a white pen.


The background was created with PPs mixed with a little gel medium and water and I used Tim Holtz's wrinkle free distress technique, it works really well with the pastels and you get a more rugged effect. I stamped foliage over the top and spayed with spray and shine. When it was dry I covered with watery gesso and dabbed it dry to get that mottled effect.


I finished by stamping the beautiful flower border (Prima) and used zig water colour pens just to add a touch of colour then made the grass and added one of my downloaded butterflies sprayed with gold sparkle.


There are a number of pieces of art that I have created lately that don't lend themselves to a card or an art journal so I have started a book to house my own little art collection. It's a large Reeves sketchbook and will take larger than A4.

Hopefully we will see something magical and mystical from you this week at PanPastel UK where you are in with a chance of winning a set of pans and tools from Your Creativity Store.

Enjoy your Sunday and the new week ahead.

hugs {brenda} xox

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