Swirls at FSC

I wanted a girly card for my DiL's birthday and came up with this. 

Pretty papers, the new Tim Holtz Cameo die, a chipboard dress form and other feminine pieces came together in a shabby vintage card.

I used the text stamp from the Tim Holtz Papillon set over white acrylic paint on the dress form and another of his stamps to create the little swirls on the cameo background, these I painted in with a Vintage Photo Distress Marker. There are also swirls printed on the pink backing paper as well.

We would love to see your swirl projects for the next fortnight at Fashionable Stamping Challenges, so please do pop over and while you are there have a look at all the other fabulous inspiration from my DT sisters.

Have a great Sunday and thanks for visiting my post.

hugs {brenda} x0x

Pocket Envelope Give-Away Result

Hi Bloggers, as promised I have made the draw for my little give-away and the two people who are going to receive one of the double pocket envelopes are -

That is Brenda B - no not me another one - Well done Brenda.

This is Terry - Enjoy my friend.

Terry I have your address somewhere but Brenda if you would like to email me yours (my email addy is on my sidebar) and I will get these in the post early next week.

Thanks to those who took part, it was just a bit of fun but it was great that people played along.

Right got to go and get ready for visitors coming this evening.

Have a fun weekend. I will see you tomorrow with posts for both Fashionable Stamping Challenges and PanPastel UK.

hugs {brenda} x0x

WOYWW 196 - Distraction and GiveAway

It's ages since I joined in with WOYWW, mostly because I didn't have my craft room to use, but I am now back in and nearly re-organised  -   pics of that next week. If you would like to take a trip around the world to see other people's creative spaces then pop on over to Julia's blog at The Stamping Ground and be amazed at what you see.

This is how I left my desk last night with the potential of four different projects in all these bits and pieces. The paints show the colours of a piece I am in the middle of making for Tim's Tattered Florals challenge, the box has been painted ready to alter but I keep changing my mind as to what I am going to put on it, but it does hold an experiment of creating a little bird's nest for something Eastery lol. The little caddy is another idea I have currently discarded and the two pieces in the front have been the distraction this week. You know when you can't make up your mind about something and the inspiration hasn't truly hit you so you go off on a complete tangent and do something so totally different? Do you get that feeling sometimes? Well those are the result for me.

Here they are enlarged. Two double pocket envelopes. Don't ask where the idea came from I just don't know but I quite enjoyed playing with different colours and papers for a change.

This is the reverse side.

They can easily hold two fairly flat ATCs, some die-cuts perhaps or even a gift card and a little note.

Here you can see I stuck two envelopes together. I had used the Tim Holtz Pocket Envelope die and used the Papermania Happy Days paperpad and some Bazzill core dyed cardstock.

These bottle tops were made using Tim's new movers and shapers die. Great effects and keeps your card fairly flat for posting too.

Well I decided as these came from absolutely nowhere I would make them a give-away this week to two commenters who would like to receive one of them. Just add your URL to the Linky below and I will do the draw on Saturday afternoon.

Enjoy the rest of your week and thanks for visiting. I will visit all the WOYWW blogs with the same end number as mine and more if I can.

hugs {brenda} xox

Photographs - the Vintage Picture Wheel

I had great fun creating my photo wheel and making up this size 10 tag.

It all started with a beige wheel (Tim Holtz Picture Wheel die) that I distressed using walnut stain and tarnished brass DSs, defining the edge with walnut stain DI and then covering it with clear EP to give it a shiny effect. The photos are all from Tim's Lost and Found paper stash and fitted the little apertures perfectly.

The tag was smooshed with picket fence, antiqued bronze, tarnished brass and vintage photo DSs, sprayed with water and dried and then I dipped and dried using up the last remnants of the ink. I collected together a number of Tim Holtz stamps, The Boys, Odds and Ends, Curiosities and Little Labels, stamping over the tag with black archival and then made up the little clock, ticket and main word label 'Photographs' as I want to enter the 'Layers and Word' challenge at Frilly and Funkie. I also noticed that Simon Says Stamp and Show wants to see numbers this week and this fits beautifully with the clock, ruler and other numbers.

I collect vintage bits and pieces when I can find them and last week I found an old lotto set in an antique store so I have lots of fabulous old number pieces to add to my work, the nib is from a set of old nibs I bought off Ebay and the clock has an old watch part that I got from a car-boot sale - love it.

The tissue tape layer is from Tim's new set - Elements and I have added part of a bingo embossing folder, some filmstrip and a spinner. Gosh I think there's enough layers and numbers here don't you?

Right I've got some 'real' work I have got to get finished and out, then I shall be back at my craft desk later.

Have a productive week whatever you will be doing and thanks for stopping by to see me.

hugs {brenda} x0x

Other challenges to have fun with -
The Artistic Stamper - Tags
Wow - Anything Goes embossing (the picture wheel)

Country Cottage for Crafty Individuals

Why is it that my cards and projects never turn out like I envisage they will? Take this for example. I had seen me using the country cottages with beautiful bright colours and portraying a lovely summery card, thinking great this will show the promise of warmer weather to come. But what did I get? A very vintagey (I've checked the spelling in Wiktionary and it's a real word) piece that really depicts night time or twilight when the colours are more muted and there is a stillness in the air.

I have used CI-263 stamp plate which gives these four gorgeous country cottage scenes. I did in fact use some lovely bright colours using my water pencils and wish I'd taken a photo of them at that stage, but by the time I had used vintage photo distress ink round the edges and all over the colours became more subdued.

The background is from the CI trees background papers book and had two thin coats of white acrylic wash over it plus I stamped some bubble wrap in white too and added small strips of dictionary paper.

The birds and flowers are memory box dies, cut in dictionary paper and given a treatment of distress ink and white acrylic paint, dried then given colour with the watercolour pencils  spritzed with water and dried, then finished with brown and white pens.




Love these little birdies together.



I now will be giving workshops using Crafty Individuals stamps and I am soooo looking forward to doing them. Four have already been planned for after Easter.

I would like to say a big welcome to many new followers who have joined me recently, thank you for choosing to share this creative journey of mine. Unfortunately when some people sign up to follower they don't leave a trail of where they 'live' so I am unable to come and look at your blogs, such a shame as I really appreciate the time you take to look at what I do.

I hope you all have a lovely day and find a bit of creative time.

Take care.

hugs {brenda} x0x

Add an ATC at Unruly PaperArts

It's the first of the month and a new issue of Unruly PaperArts is published and it always starts with two readers Art Quests that you can get involved with.

My contribution is to 'Add an ATC' on a tag.

Using the Tim Holtz mini blueprints 2 set, I stamped the little Easter Bunny twice inking him and the background with some distress inks and adding chit chat stickers. 

The background was embossed with the new blueprint embossing folder and I used the diffusers to keep it to the edges. Just a little gold scrap is all it needed to finish it off.

The next stage was to add it to a tag. This was painted first with acrylic paints, stamped with the egg and spritzed with cappuccino perfect pearls.

Some ribbon and old book paper with some other small elements created the collage effect for the ATC to be mounted on.

ATCs can be very versatile little works of art. If you read the UPA blogozine over the month of March you will see lots of ideas from the columnists of how they might be used. I have a column that will be published in a couple of weeks.

Take care, thanks for reading and have fun with your ATCs.

 hugs {brenda} x0x

A new Challenge launches TODAY

A BRAND NEW CHALLENGE SITE OPENS TODAY

Country View Crafts' Challenges

"Where challenges are fun and open to all crafters. Whether you like vintage or cute, shabby chic or simple elegance, cardmaking, scrapping or altered art then we want to see what you are making. Join in with our challenge community and share your crafting ideas".

Country View Crafts' Challenges is sponsored by Country View Crafts an on-line shop for all your crafting needs with very keen prices. There is also a Country View Crafts' Updates blog where you can get news on new releases and inspiration samples made by Gabrielle and Chris.

This is starting as a monthly challenge blog and the theme for March is 'Pic 'n' Mix' also known as 'Anything Goes'. My DT piece is an altered domino book.

I have been in education all my life and wanted to make something that reminded me of my view that learning is for life, something that I am experiencing again now with all my endeavours to learn new techniques and to have new ideas in this creative world of ours. 

I started by using alcohol inks and a script stamp on the domino covers, then added a piece of Tim Holtz filmstrip on which I glued a clock (to represent the time I have been a teacher and educator), and three words dedicated to my philosophy.

The little charms hanging at the sides all have meaning too. The letter B and the bee insect to represent me, the key which is about unlocking the knowledge and learning and wings because I believe that when teaching we should take our students to the edge of learning and let them fly.

Inside, I masked and inked a piece of card and stamped over this using the clock image, then cut pieces for the pages. I created my own inspirational words on the PC.

I do hope you will join in our challenges with your own inspiration piece. The rules of entry can be read on the blog and it would be lovely to see you over there. At the end of the month the winner will receive a £20.00 voucher to use at Country View Crafts on-line shop. Pretty decent eh?

Have a great creative month of March - Spring is on the way in the northern hemisphere.

hugs {brenda} x0x

Texture and techniques with Andy Skinner

It was great to get all messy with paint and texture paste on my workshop with Andy yesterday and we made this book box which is made from paper mache board.

With respect to Andy and his on-line workshops I won't give you the recipe, but suffice to say, there are numerous layers of embossed card, texture paste, crackle paint, fabric and paints to create this patina copper effect.

I just love the finished look and feel to this altered box and had to play more. 

I decided to  marry up the Artistic Outpost Referral Programme where anything goes this month and Simon Says Stamp and Show's challenge to use a stamp that hasn't yet been inked. This time I used the rusted metal technique. It's similar to the box above but uses different colour combinations.

I have a couple of sets of Artistic Outpost stamps I bought before Christmas still waiting to have the light of day and decided to open Secretary Pool and make a little box to keep all my paper-clips in.

I used a Crafts Too embossing folder to get the typewriter keyboard effect for the lid.

The fabulous AO stamps are perfect to embellish the top and sides and also to make base and lid covers for the inside.

I can see me experimenting with these techniques to discover more colour combinations and not just to create metal effects.

Hope you are having a creative day.

hugs {brenda} x0x

 Other challenges to have fun with- 

Sunday Stamper - Texture

Crazy 4 Challenges - Texture

It's all about the vintage - Boxes

It's all about Birthdays at PanPastel UK

Got a birthday project in mind for this week? Then head on over to PanPastel UK challenge blog and join in the celebrations with us.

I have more of the mini blueprint stamps by Tom Holtz (I really can't help myself LOL), they are from set 4, I am just loving these at the moment and so this is my make - a birthday card. 

All the elements of a great birthday, 

the cake, 

the pressie, 

the party hat 

and the birthday balloon

Have a great birthday if you are celebrating yours this week. 

Some quick notes - for the images I stamped onto pearlised paper and used the Graph'it markers, they really blend beautifully. On the text paper mount I used PanPastels and another stamp from Mr. Tim off of the Ultimate Grunge set. I also got the sewing machine out and had great fun with the stitch dial LOL.

I hope your weekend is going well and that you have some creative time for you.

Take care and thanks for visiting.

hugs {brenda} x0x