A Vintage Journey

Hello everyone and a very warm welcome to you all, specially also new followers. Today I have no project to share but some exciting news to tell you about: On the 7th of March there will be a brand new challenge blog starting. It is called "A Vintage Journey". 

We are a fortnightly challenge blog for vintage, shabby chic and mixed-media artists and paper crafters. We focus on the style, techniques, products and ideas of Tim Holtz, we love to use Ranger distress inks, distress paints and distress stains and lots of Idea-Ology including metal trinkets and embellishments. Rubber stamps, sizzix dies, embossing powders and folders are all part of our vintage tool kit and we will provide you with technique tutorials and step by step processes to provide inspiration and help develop your creativity. We accept all types of projects like cards, albums, 3D assemblage, scrapbook layouts and pages, tags, frames, shadow boxes and anything your creative mind can come up with, as long it is in a shabby vintage style. There will be a regular design team focus with step by step tutorials and for the challenges there will be a winner chosen by the team with a fabulous prize provided by Country View Crafts

I very much hope you will join us for our challenges. All further details can be found by clicking HERE

Shrink to fit

Hello everyone, thank you so much for visiting!
Can you guess what the title of this post is about? All I will do is show you a sneak peek:

If you want to see more, you'll have to go over to The Artistic Stamper where it is my turn to share a prject again today. All you need to do is click HERE.

Hope you are all having a good week with some creative time!!
Thanks for dropping in here and look after yourselves!

Positivity journal the next page

Hello everyone, thank you so much for taking the time to drop in here. It's been ages and ages since I last showed a page in my positivity journal, but that does not mean that I have given up. I still write one positive thing every day, but because there is so much space on the tags, I only create a new double page about once every two weeks or so. Anyway, here is the latest:

I have been enjoying my little altered cards shown here in the last few days so much that I used many of the same techniques here for this journal spread, even the little heart crept into the page as you can see.

As I work on very thin paper, I first of all covered it with torn strips of old book and music paper, then I spread on some texture paste, stamped into it with a wetted script stamp and when it had dried, added a layer of  Gesso, using a pallet knife. Colour was added next with the help some Pumice Stone distress ink and a few drops of Adirondack Cranberry re-inker that I have had in my stash like forever. This was spritzed with water and then wiped back a bit with a baby wipe.

Background stamping was next, followed by some scrapings of Black Soot Distress paint put on with the side of an old credit card. I also added some Tim Holtz rub ons and the word Live, it had been flying around on my desk and it wanted to be used here I could tell.

Here is the other side, following all the same techniques. The shading round the heart was done by rubbing Glue and Seal over and around it and then when dry adding the shading with a Pumice Stone and Black Soot Distress Marker and rubbed in with my fingers.

A close up of the heart, as you can see I added some stamping and the eye rub-on. It had a little accident, but I actually quite like the effect...

Here you can see the effect of the stamping into the texture paste. As you can see I also added quite a bit of tissue tape, around the edges as I glued two pages together again to create a pocket to hold the journaling tags.
Well, there you have it, the next spread...

If you are new to all of this, more information about the positivity journal project can be found HERE

I know several of you are doing your own positivity journal and I have hugely enjoyed seeing your pages when I have come upon them.

I am going to add this to the Simon Says Stamp Monday challenge, where the theme this week is "paste"

Whatever you do, I hope you make some creative time for yourself and
thank you so much for visiting today!

Notebook Inspiration

Hello everyone and so lovely to have you visiting. I am sharing an altered notebook with you for today's post.

Recently I was hugely inspired by the stunning faux leather makes of my two crafty friends, mother and daughter Rita and Annie. They shared a link to a tutorial on this technique and I simply had to give it a go.

This little notebook started life as a cheap little notebook with an ugly cover (well to my eyes anyway). Of course being me I forgot to take a "before" photo, but here is a picture of the inside covers, that will give you an idea of what the outside looked like:

So the faux leather technique is very simply achieved with some Kraftcard, a little glicerine mixed with water and an embossing folder. I used a Sizzix one.
I made a front and back panel and a separate piece for the spine.
Here are some close ups:

The central embellishment is a Tim Holtz Ornate Plate, altered with various Distress Paints. For the inside of the plate I used some old book paper and some of the little word stickers.

A Kraftcard die cut ruler, a gift from my lovely friend Zuzu, altered in the same way. I also added some sprays and some Golden Turquoise paint to get a bit of a Verdigris look on the front cover.

I used the same embossing folder for the back, to give the note book a unified look and sealed everything with two coats of glossy Glue and Seal and some Decoart Traditions Multi-surface sealer.

Of course I had to cover the inside covers too, so this is what they now look like

Vintage Photo, Bundled Sage and Peacock Feathers spritz and flick,a little spritz of Dylusions White Linen and some over-stamping with Picket Fence Distress Paint.

Same on the back and as you can see I finished it all with some Tissue Tape.

The paper inside the notebook is dead thin, so it can't really be used for journaling, but as I will have to take a lot of notes for work in the next few days, I needed a note book anyway, and this will be a lot more fun to use than your ordinary shop bought note book.

Hope you like it... I am definitely going to use this technique again as it is so easy and loads of fun to do.
HERE is a link to the original tutorial, in case you want to give it a go yourself.

Thanks for visiting like always and I hope you will make some time for creativity yourself!

52 card pickup, the next 4 cards and a sneakpeek

Hello everyone, thanks for dropping in and thank you so much for all the lovely comments you left me for my first post on altering these fun little playing cards.

First of all, I am sharing a sneak peek for a project I am showing over on the Calico Crafts blog:

If you want to see more, just click here

But now, here is the next instalment of my 52 cards project, using very similar techniques as on the first set. Altogether, the cards don't look that different from the first lot, but then hey, this is after all a set of cards.

I used all the same techniques, - old book paper, background stamps, stencils, inks, tissue tape etc. Again, I had so much fun doing these and they are just perfect when you don't have the time for a very involved project and yet want to do something creative.

This is the dapper gentleman from the Tim Holtz Paris to London set, to me he looks brave and determined enough to make a difference, and making a difference is the inspiration behind this card and message.

chit chat stickers and some scraps of an old paper collection (can't remember which one) created the message on this one.

A much needed reminder in times where there is so much suffering going on..... This time the words were computer generated.

Tim Holtz letter stickers and mover and shaper dies on this one. One of the best techniques I recently found out when doing these cards is rubbing some Glue n Seal over your card, letting it dry and then using your Distress Markers to add some colour and shadows to make the images pop. It works a dream and I love it. other gel mediums do work as well but in my experience Glue n Seal works the best.

Left the backs really simple again, like with the first set:

If you missed the first set of cards, and the inspiration and ideas behind them, you can find them here

Thank you for visiting and stay safe, warm and happy!!

Sweet Nothings

Hello everyone and lovely to have you visiting. Today, is yet again another sneak peek day....
I am sharing a project over at Our Creative Corner. It is a sponsor spotlight project for Nicecrane Design, who is our wonderful sponsor for this month. Anyone who plays in our challenge this month, could be the randomly chosen winner of a $20 voucher for Nicecrane Collage sheets.
Here is a sneak peek of what I made:

If you want to see the full project, please click here.

If you have not played in the challenge yet, but would like a chance to win this wonderful prize, HERE are all the details of the challenge and there is still plenty of time.  Of course we would love it if you played along with us. Thank you for dropping by here today and see you next time

A New Little Venture

Hi everyone and lovely to have you dropping in here. Today I am sharing something new that I started doing and that has been great fun.
Over the last few weeks I have been inspired by seeing little cards created following Stephanie Ackerman's 52 Card Pick-up classes. I loved them so much, I wanted to do my own. One of the places I saw them first was on Anne Kristine's beautiful blog.

Stephanie started this a year ago, so I am running a year behind, but who cares. I am having fun, and to me that is what this is all about.
You can find out more about this project HERE if you are interested. Basically you alter a pack of 52 playing cards, one for each week of the year so to speak, but of course you can do them when you want. I am making them in batches of four cards and will be sharing them as such.

This is the first. All of the cards use the same kind of mixed media techniques, collage, background stamping etc. etc. Just things I love to mess about with. Stephanie gives lots of ideas (plus down loads and ideas for words and sayings if you want). ..

Hearts are a recurring theme in her example and I decided to follow that, finding my own words and sayings however.

The pack I am altering is just under ATC size, so they are quick to do really, specially if you do them more or less in batches. They are also a great way of using up some of these left overs we have all flying around.

Stephanie punches holes in hers to put them on a book ring. For the time being I have decided to keep mine just as loose cards. I may put them together at some later stage.
I am keeping the backs of mine really simple, - just covered with some scrapbook paper and their number, so I know in what order I have created them and what was going on in my mind at the time.

Here you can see the backs of them.
What is the point of these cards you may ask????
Stephanie gives many reasons, here are just a few of them, in her words:

That is why I created this class.

52 hand-created cards of encouragement to reflect on, to look at, to share, to use as support and as reminders for ourselves and for others.   

That is why I created this class.

Whether you create one card a month, one card a week or all at once, the important thing is that you stop and take time to create C.A.R.D.S:
Create something based on what is on your mind, in your heart and/or in your prayers. 
Add quotes or verses that apply to your thoughts and prayers. 
Reflect and remember WHY you are creating & WHAT you are creating. 
Decide to make “that choice” “a change” or say a prayer for what your card represents. 
Share it with others...and then keep on going.  

Well, there you have it, - that is also why I started to make these cards....

I am going to add these cards to the Moo Mania challenge, where the theme is old book paper.
Hope you are having a good week and make a little time to be creative!!

February Friday Freebie

Hello everyone, welcome to you all and thank you for visiting!
Happy Valentines day to you all! May your day be filled with love, happiness and creativity!

This is my little Valentines gift to you, - this month's freebie, definitely inspired by Tim Holtz's wonderful new paper collection Wallflower. Can't wait for this collection to hit the shelves.

Anyway, meanwhile, here are two little 6 x 6 papers and matching tags, - enjoy! I will post them here as jpeg images, if you want individual png files, just email me.

My TOUs are simple: You may print the images as often as you like and use them for your own creative enjoyment. You are welcome to sell what you make, no need to give me credit for anything, as I use images etc that others have freely donated. The only thing I ask is that you don't sell the papers as they are. I am sorry I keep spelling this out, but there are several people that sell my sheets on ebay and other places and it just makes me sad.

Enough of that, enjoy and have a wonderful day!

40 years of love....

Hello everyone thank you for dropping in today.
Tomorrow is Valentine's day as you all know of course....

 It's also my hubby's birthday. We've been married for 40 years this year.....
I'll share a sneak peek of the card I made him. The full thing can be seen over on the Artistic Stamper

Thank you for taking the time to visit and I hope you'll all have a day filled with love tomorrow!!

Tim Holtz 12 tag February

Hello everyone and  I hope you have had a good weekend!
Sunday usually means some arty play time for me and I decided to have a go at Tim's February tag.
Here is the original:

To see exactly how Tim made his, just click HERE

Like usual, I had to improvise as I do not have many of the products he used, but I did have some.Here is my version:

I did my background in exactly the same way, but as I don't have the heart stencil (yet) I used the dot one. I wanted a darker, more burgundy red, so I used Festive Berries and Black Soot to stencil through the folder. I then clear embossed, like Tim suggests.

 As I don't own the sentiment stamp he used, I used one from the Way with Words set. Luckily I had all the stuff to do the chalk board technique, which he first demonstrated in Creative Chemistry 102.

As you can see, I can do with some practice to perfect this technique...

I decided to mount all my size 8 tags onto size 10 ones and label the months at the top. I did that with my January one too and will make them into a little book when I have done all 12. 

Because a size 10 has more space I could play around a bit with the embellishments as you can see. 

I mounted the heart, wrapped with some rusty wire, onto a black rosette.

The little cherub was covered in Brushed Pewter Distress Paint.

I dyed some seam binding to match the tag, tied some at the top, and a bit around the cherub's neck, just for fun, I added a little rusty bell and that was pretty much it. 

I finished it like Tim with a little metal strip at the bottom, but because I don't have these peel of thingies he used, I cut a strip  with a Spellbinders on the edge die and added a tiny bit of Black Soot DP to make it less shiny..

Well, that was my version and I hope hope you like it.

Can't wait for the March tag now, - what will he be using??? Some of those new Wallflower elements perhaps? Anyway, thank you for visiting and have a good week!!