Admit Hope

Hello everyone and thank you so much for coming by here. A special welcome to new visitors and followers.

I have had a tricky week and needed a kind of affirmation, I've called it "Admit Hope". Hope is one of these interesting things.... do we really let it in? I could go on a long philosophical sojourn, but really you are here to see what I have made right? So let's not go there. I created this card with a beautiful image from Nicecrane Designs. I printed it on tissue paper, "cut" it out by going around the printed image with a damp paint brush and then carefully tearing it so you get a feathery edge and then adhered it to water colour paper with gel medium. I then blended Distress Inks in Wild Honey, Bundled Sage and Peacock Feather and a tinsy bit of Dusty Concord. I also added a little scrap of a paper serviette and some stamping.

I don't seem to be able to do any project with out adding some embossing with an embossing folder, this is my favourite of the moment, a TH Texture fade border. The raised bits were highlighted with Treasure Gold in White Fire another favourite.
Finally I tore the water colour paper so it would have a rough edge, glued it on a white card stock mat and then a card base out of Kraft card. I stamped my Hope ticket (a Whimsey stamp I seem to remember) and embellished with flowers, a filigree metal charm (a gift from a friend),some gauze (almost totally hidden) and some flowers.
Here are a few more close ups.

Thank you for your visit as always. I really appreciate the time you take to stop by.HERE is a link to the
Nicecrane pack I used. It contains loads of gorgeous vintage Calendar pages, that no doubt I will use next year for a calendar.

Promises of Spring

Less than a month till the official start of Spring. I for one can't wait for it to come!
Today I am showing a spring time project over at the Artistic Stamper Creative Team Blog

Full details of the project can be found HERE. Thank you for visiting and of course I would love it if you leave me a comment there.

Wonderful Life

Hello everyone and welcome. Once again I have to specially welcome so many lovely new followers, thank you for stopping by here.

Today I was lucky enough to play with some wonderful new stamps. It's the brand new set by Sam Poole called Art Houses. I used one of those paper mache hanging thingies, but turned it on its side.
I stamped the house four times, three times in black Archival and once embossed with gold embossing powder. I cut part of it out, coloured with Distress Inks and then layered it all up.

For the background I adhered strips of old scrapbook paper all over the front and sides. Then added some texture through a stencil. I used plain old Pollyfiller for it rather than all the expensive pastes that are available, and it works just fine and dries really quickly. I painted over the center of the little board with Snowflake Fresco paint and then sprtizt with a mixture of black and brown Dylusions sprays that I had mixed up in a mini mister. I stamped the heart part of the house once more and used that as an embellishment.

I stamped my sentiment from different words that come with the set, stamped the "sending you art" stamp, directly onto the board and then stamped all over still with a little Prima text stamp. The raised bits were still highlighted with some Treasure Gold. I also gave the whole thing a few spritzes of Perfect Pearls Biscotti (bad idea as it made it really hard to photograph properly...
Here are a few close ups still and the big question, who will I send this to??? (Remember the Facebook pay it forward game HERE?)

Well, that's it. Thank you for visiting and I hope you'll have a creative week with lots of happy inkyness!!

Friday Freebie, birds and butterflies

Hello everyone and welcome again. I cannot believe that it is Friday already again. So many of you have decided to join this blog since last week and I really want to give you all a specially warm welcome! You know what, today it is less than a month until the official start of Spring. Well at least here in the Northern Hemisphere... I can't wait for it to come!
Well here is  this weeks collage sheet, and like usual individual elements as pngs also. enjoy. The images were created with the help of elements from The Graphics Fairy and Bumble Button.

Please remember :
My TOU are as follows:
-You may print these images as often as you like for your crafting needs.
-You may re-size and/or alter them and incorporate them into your own digital work
- You may make things with these images and then sell what you have made, as cards, mini books or whatever your creative mind comes up with. If you want to give me credit that's great, but you don't have to.
- You may not sell these images unaltered either as sheets, stickers or similar!

Thank you for visiting and see you next time.

I miss You!!!

A happy good day to you and thank you for visiting! A warm welcome to all, but specially my new followers, - you are all much appreciated!!
Today is the day I am sharing a project over on the Spellbinders Blog

To see more and get a step-by-step, all you need to do is click HERE and of course I would love it if you left me a comment there. THANK YOU FOR VISITING like always, and I wish you a day full of joy and creativity!!

Queen of (He)Art canvas

Hello everyone, lovely to see you. Can you imagine we have had a third day of sunshine here in Scotland? It's wonderful, because honestly I had nearly forgotten what a blue sky looks like.

Today I want to share a little canvas with you:

I am still on a mission to use my stamps more. Depending a little bit on your definition, this is definitely a mixed media piece.....
It's a little 6 x 6" canvas, not very deep and I started by covering it with all sorts of different acrylic paints, some Fresco paints ( I don't have many colours of those) and some Golden fluid acrylics. Though they have different qualities, I found they mix actually quite well. All the stamping (stamps from the Graphic 45 A ladies Diary set) was done on tissue paper and then coloured with mainly Distress Markers.

For the lady I coloured her face and arms on the back of the tissue paper with paint first, this to stop the colours on the actual canvas coming through the tissue paper once I adhered it. I used Golden Acrylic Glazing liquid for this. That was a first for me, I usually use gel medium, but I found it worked really well!

The boot was done in a similar way. I find colouring with Distress Markers works best for me when I scribble them onto my craft sheet and then pick up the colour with a refillable water brush, I can never blend them properly any other way, but like that they work great. Once my images were adhered to the canvas I coloured further to blend them in with a right mix of paints and Distress Inks. I then stamped the text stamp using Fresco Snowflake in some places right over the canvas to tie everything together still a bit more.
I gave the lady a crown from Grungeboard, coloured with Golden Gold  fluid acrylic and Peacock Feather DI and added a heart and the word art, also grungeboard pieces I have had for ages, after I coloured them with more paint and over stamped them with the text stamp.

Finally I added a flower and a pen nib and rubbed some Treasure Gold around the edges.

Hope you like my little canvas.... Thank you so much for visiting and see you next time!

Layered stamping tag play...

Hello everyone and thank you for visiting! I am delighted you have decided to drop by, welcome, specially also to all the new followers.

I am a terrible hoarder of stamps and papers, and sometimes I think I don't use them enough, particularly my stamps. So today I challenged myself to use at least four different stamps on one tag and to try not to make them get in each others way too much. I started by covering the tag with a little scrap of Tim Holtz paper, no idea anymore what collection it was, but as most of it got covered over with Fresco paint in Snowflake, it doesn't really matter. Next I stamped the big face stamp which is from La Blanche in Black Archival, masked it and then stamped the background with various Prima stamps and another old script stamp. I used Archival Sepia, (after stamping off on to scrap paper first),  Coffee and Jet Black Archival Inks. I then inked around the edges of the tag with Walnut Stain Distress Inks.

 I mixed up some spray by adding a few drops of two different Dylusion Sprays together with some water in a mini mister, to make them a bit less intense. (I used Worn Leather an old pre-Ranger Dylusions colour  and Black Marble). I embellished with some flowers and other bits and pieces, and then spritzt over my tag with the home made Dylusion mix and some Cosmic Shimmer Egyptian Blue here and there til I was happy with the effect.

The word Fragment was stamped on a little scrap, inked with Walnut Stain and then I shaded around it with a charcoal pencil.
I died some vintage seam binding with the same colour inks and finished it with a brat.

 Below you can see how I gave my vocal image a little crown still, also coloured with the same ink sprays, it's from an old Cuttlebug die. The texture appeared all by itself after I sprayed it. happy accident.....

Well, hope you like my tag. I was the lucky winner at Simon Says Stamp and Show last time round, so just for fun I'll add this to their latest challenge which is "Something Messy". Well I certainly got messy, my fingers are pretty inky still.
Thank you for visiting and I hope you'll have a good week ahead with lots of creativity!!

Friday Freebie Springtime promises

Hello everyone and welcome! Once again it is time for a Friday Freebie. I am longing for sunshine and warmth and Springtime. Today's freebie is all about Springtime promises.....
But, before I go on, I want to explain my T.O.U. in more detail: Someone has pinched many of my papers and tags and is selling them on ebay, without either asking me or doing anything to/with them. My TOU are as follows:
-You may print these images as often as you like for your crafting needs.
-You may re-size and/or alter them and incorporate them into your own digital work
- You may make things with these images and then sell what you have made, as cards, mini books or whatever your creative mind comes up with. If you want to give me credit that's great, but you don't have to.
- You may not sell these images unaltered either as sheets, stickers or similar!

Thought I would also show you a little project where I used the paper. It's a little gift bag.

If you printed the tag out large enough, it would fit perfectly inside.
 Hope you like today's offering. Thank you for visiting and see you next time.

Just a little bit of fun....

Hello everyone and welcome to all of you but specially my new followers! Well if you are here on the day this is posted, then I wish you a very happy Valentines Day. May you spend it among your loved ones.
Today I had some fun playing with some Nicecrane goodies:

A little goodie bag for a nostalgic loved one. The bag is just the right size for a size 10 Manila tag (plus some crafting goodies should you wish). The vocal image is from one of several Peter Rabbit sets. The images in these are so adorable. They come in various sizes, with or without backgrounds. I used two pngs and put them together in my own background, just for fun. Unfortunately they can't be sold in the UK or Europe, but if you are from across the pond, check them out! For the rest of the bag I played around with inks and sprays, a texture folder from Sizzix and other bits and pieces flying around my desk. Here are some close ups:

Sorry for the horrible blue tones in these photos, the light was bad once again when I took them...

For the tag inside I used one of the images from the Tiny Tots ABC Collection, equally adorable and from a similar age, so I think they match in style.

Again I created a background with inks and stains and some stamping and embellished with die cut leaves for a woodland feel.

The embellishment at the top is a Vintaj leaf that I put through a Sizzix texture plate and then sanded.

Well this is a bit different from my usual stuff but I had good fun playing. Thank you for visiting and I will be back tomorrow with the usual freebies...☺

Key to my heart!

Hi everyone and thank you for visiting!
Today I am sharing a little Valentines project over at the Artistic Stamper Creative Team Blog.

To see the full project, please click here

Pet hate or what's your least favourite???

Hello everyone and sorry for the horrible title, I just don't seem to be able to think of any good ones....

In any case, a warm welcome and thank you for visiting. So where did the post title come from? Well I'll tell you the reason in a minute, or reasons rather. The first one has to do with colour. You see, without a doubt, red is my least favourite colour to use in any project. But today on my travels through blog land I noticed that the theme at Fun with ATCs challenge 81 is something red. Now I have not made an ATC in months and months and I thought, hmmm that could be a fun challenge, ATCs usually don't take too long (gosh I quite forgot how tiny they really are) and nothing like a challenge to take you out of your comfort zone. So here you are, a love themed ATC with a pet hate colour.

I started with a bright red bit of card, Spritzt some postbox red and black Dylusions over it, and then added some bits of collaged old text paper. The lady is a Graphics 45 stamp which I once got as a freebie, I think it's from the Le Cirque collection.

So now to my other pet hate, I am going to write this in bold as I hope you will read it:

A blog friend just told me about an ebay shop where someone is SELLING my freebies, yep, just lifted just as they are and selling them. But not just mine, also from Lilac -n-Lavender and probably from the Graphics Fairy and others also. 

I really hate people who do this sort of thing, but if you are interested, have a look: La Luna

Anyway, thank you for visiting and don't worry, people like this are not going to stop me from making my freebies!