Weekly Challenge Winner - Backgrounds

Morning everyone,

Hope you are all well.

Today is Weekly Challenge Winner day and we had
15 fabulous entries.

You are all so clever, it is so nice to see them all.

Thank you so much to all those who joined in!

So here we go....

as usual we use the Random Generator

and the winner is....

........no. 14




KRISTIINA

Congratulations to you, please get in touch

so that I can send you your prize voucher.

I'll be back on Wednesday with the next two words
for The Calendar Challenge.
Any guesses yet as to what the next two words will be???

See you then,

Jane x

Weekly Challenge

Hellooooo,

How many of you forgot to change your clocks??

I hate this one as we lose an hour in bed.....yawn, yawn!!

So it's challenge day and what shall we do this week??

Hmmm let me think.....


.......think it's going to be something to do with stamping!

Well, how about.....

in Dawn's post she mentioned a technique called "Retiform".

Check it out here

Dawn said -

 "The idea is you split your card into sections (any shape and size) 

using ink and a mask to mark out sections, (copy paper or post

 it notes work well), then you stamp an image into each section".

I think this sounds fun....so let's see what you can do!

Ok, you know the rules, you have one week, entries via the link

and that will close at midnight Sunday 5th April.

The winner will be picked by Random Generator and will be announced

on Tuesday 7th April, there will be a £10 voucher
up for grabs!

Have fun, enjoy the rest of your weekend!

See you Tuesday with the winner of 

last weeks Background Challenge.

So if you haven't got your March page finished for the 
Calendar Challenge, you only have a couple more days.

Jane x

An InLinkz Link-up

Stamping Master Class Week - Pauline Wheeler

Happy Weekend everyone!

Hope you have a great weekend planned but don't forget the clocks 

change tonight, so one hour less in bed ......yawn, yawn!!

So today is our last day of stamping tutorials.

Hope you have enjoyed them so far and today it's

Pauline's turn.

Pauline has made a beautiful card using the masking technique.

Start by stamping your forward image onto the cardstock and 

again onto either a post it note, or masking roll, and cut out

 two images together.

Cover the stamped
image with one of the cut outs and stamp the flower again slightly

 to the left hand side of the first image.

Leave the cut out on the flower and cover the second image with 

the other cut out. Always make sure your stamped images are

 dry before you do this as they will smudge if they aren't.

                            Now take the tall flower stem and stamp
                           it three times over the two flower images

It always looks a mess at this stage but don't worry
Now remove the paper masks.

You can now see how the tall stems and the second flower are

 all behind the first image.

Now stamp the border and the wording
Start to colour in with your chosen colours of distress markers - either

 by adding colour into a block and water colouring in or direct to

 the stamped image.

When finished ink the edges of the card with Distress Inks 

and a Blending Tool.

Add the panel to a folded card and apply Glossy Accents

 to the small circles and to the centre of the main flower.


Love these stamps and colours.  Thank you Pauline!

If you want to use the same as Pauline, this

is what you will need -

JOFY Stamps - Sets 13 and 14

Distress Inks - Wild Honey and Worn Lipstick

Distress Markers - Wild Honey, Worn Lipstick, Barn Door,

Crushed Olive, Abandoned Coral

Versafine Ink - Onyx Black

Blending Tool

Stamping Card

So that wraps up another week here on the blog!

I'll be back tomorrow with another Weekly Challenge......

.......going to involve stamping me thinks?

You'll just have to wait and see!

See you tomorrow!

Jane x

Stamping Master Class Week - Neil Walker

Morning all,

Welcome to day two of our Stamping Master Class week.

It is Neil's turn today and he is 'stamp flipping'!!

Neil says .....

"Stamps are so versatile, there are so many different images and

 styles around I'm sure we all have loads in our crafty stash.

 Every now and again though, I look at a stamp and wish I 

had it facing the other way. (I know, there's no pleasing some

 folks is there?!) so today I thought I'd share how

 I "flip" my stamps 

Begin by stamping your chosen image onto white paper in archival ink

 and cut it out.

Brush a layer of Gesso onto the surface and while wet press your

 stamped image face down. Press down well and leave

 to dry thoroughly.

When dry, spritz with water and gently begin to rub the paper off to

 reveal the image. The keyword is gently! If you rub too hard

 you are liable to rub off the image too. 

If you stamp your image again directly onto the surface you can

 see how you have a mirror image which I think is pretty cool.

I think it's a fun technique to do though I will finish off with a 

few suggestions which hopefully will minimize any frustrations......

Remember that by doing this with a stamp you are reversing

 it so writing will not work.

Also remember that your reversed image is not going to be as

 crisp as the original so I would personally recommend that

 you use them separately as putting them together on one 

project kind of "highlights" the fade making it look shabbier than

 if you used it on it's own.

So, to illustrate my point; I used both images on this card.....

You can see that the image on the left is faded much more than the

 image on the right which is stamped onto the dry gesso.

I've coloured both images with the same Distress Marker and the one

 on the left has not blended as smoothly as the right because

 it reacts differently. The reason being that it is effectively a 

different surface to the gesso as it still has paper residue on it

 which both absorbs color into the fibres causing bleeding and making

 it harder to blend.

So generally not a very successful card. 

However, if we then split the images (Literally, I just sliced the card

 in half!) and use the pieces individually I can make a card

 using the flipped image which I think looks so much better

 because it is no longer competing with the crisper image.

The other piece mounted onto a 10" tag covered in Tim Holtz

 Tissue paper makes a very pretty matching gift tag too.

This is beautiful Neil and a great tutorial, thank you.

If you fancy having a go, here is what you need -

300g Card - Ice White

Gesso

Distress Ink - Vintage Photo

Archival Ink - Jet Black

Tim Holtz Stamps - Runway

Tim Holtz Stamps - Haberdashery

Distress Markers
Double Sided Tape
Kraft Card

Ribbon

Lace 

White paper

I'm loving those Runway Stamps, funny how

until you see something actually used, you don't always

see their full potential!

Ok, well I shall be back tomorrow with our

third tutorial for our 

Stamping Master Class.

See you then,

Jane x

Stamping Master Class Week - Dawn Heald

Hello everyone,

Another week already, time is flying and isn't lovely that

it isn't getting dark as early.....but that will change Sunday 

when we put the clocks forward!

Do all our bloggers not in Britain have to change their clocks too??

So, this week we are looking at Stamping.  The first thing I

ever learnt and at The Craft Barn too.  A lovely lady showed

me how to stamp and then heat emboss.....must have been

nearly 20 years ago and it is probably still one of my favourite 

areas of crafting.  We have come a long way from there,

thank goodness. 

Dawn is here today to show us what she has been up to.

"For our topic this week I decided to go back to using just basic

 supplies. Card blanks, stamps and ink. Simple. I thought it would

 be good for those starting out on their stamping journey and as

 a reminder for those of us further along.

My first project uses solid stamp shapes, you can use lined

 shapes too.

I chose some Distress Inks, as they are dye inks, dry quickly and are transparent. 

Begin by stamping your image with one colour, clean stamp, ink

 it up again with a different colour and hover over the first stamped

 image and rotate it slightly and stamp. Continue like this using 

your chosen colours. Do the same for the stem and around the

 edges of card blank. Add a stamped sentiment towards the 

bottom and embellish with buttons and a few gems. Can you 

spot where the washi tape I've used?  

That's it really. I experimented with different orders of colours as

 shown in pictures.

Next up, similar to the first project is shadow stamping. I've done
 two different style of cards using the same technique. 

     

Using this technique, the first card I've made is a scene style card

 using Lavinia Stamps and some scrap paper masks for hills. I 

used an ink duster brush to sweep my ink ( Distress Inks - Dusty

 Concord, Black Soot) on the card before adding stamped

 images. (Dusty Concord, Versafine Onyx black) 

 It didn't work out too well but I know next time to leave 

just a small amount of colour showing for this style of card. 

I added a few clear gems around the border.

(Jane says - I think it looks lovely!)

           Here I have stamped my image in colour then wiped stamp and
          inked up again with black ink. This time hover over the first image
           lining it up the same, then slightly move your stamp up (or down) 

                  and to the side a little and stamp. You can have a lot of
                                     colour showing or just a little.

         The second card is a simple, bright card using PaperArtsy Lin Brown
             stamps and Lavinia Butterflies stamps. Stamping as described
              above. I've stamped a sentiment in bottom corner. Then as a
             background, I added some dots of colour from Distress markers.

               Tip: If your black image isn't dark enough for you, use Black
                          Soot Distress marker to colour over the top.

For this card, it's another simple technique that you can alter and use

 different variations of inks and stamps.

This technique has a posh name (well I think so) it's called Retiform.

 The idea is you split your card into sections ( any shape and size) 

using ink and a mask to mark out sections, (copy paper or post

 it notes work well) then you stamp an image into each section.

For this card, I started with an A6 card blank and lightly covered 

it all with Scattered Straw Distress Ink and the edges with Gathered 

Twigs. Then I used a post it note, placed onto card and inked along

 the edge with Gathered Twigs Distress ink. Next I replaced the

 edge mask elsewhere on the card and inked along edge again. I

 repeated this til I had enough sections.

Use your masks again to mark out each section and stamp into it with

 your chosen image and Gathered Twigs ink.

That's all from me this week, I do hope you'll have a try of some 

of the techniques and ideas from all the team".

Another brilliant tutorial from Dawn, thank you!

Hope you are all feeling inspired to get those stamps and 

inks out!

Here is the list of what Dawn used -

PaperArtsy Stamps - Lin Brown 01 and 04

Kaisercraft Stamps - Telegraph Road

Lavinia Stamps

Tim Holtz Stamps - Nature Walk

Distress Inks - Dusty Concord, Black Soot,

Scattered Straw, Gathered Twigs 

Archival Ink - Sepia

Versafine Ink - Onyx Black

Distress Markers

Buttons

Clear Gems

White Stamping Card

So that is our first day of Stamping,don't forget to let us

 know what you think.

See you tomorrow,

Jane x

Weekly Challenge Winner - Something Flowery

Morning everyone, 

It's Tuesday and you know what that means......

.....Challenge Winner Day.

Today I am going to announce the winner of last
weeks Something Flowery challenge.

We had 14 fabulous entries, thank you so much 
to all of you who took part but only one of you can 
be a winner.

As usual, we have used a random generator.

So, the winner is ........

........no. 11.......



BUTTERFLIECRAFTER

, 

Congratulations Butterfliecrafter, please
get in touch so that I can send you you
prize voucher.

I'm so glad you enjoyed the Brusho week, last week on 
the blog.  So many of you left lovely comments which 
means a lot to us!!  
Thank you for taking the time to do that.

Ok, see you on Thursday with a new DT week here 
on the blog.
More exciting projects for you!


Jane x

Weekly Challenge

Helloooo,

Here we are again, can't believe how quick another week has gone!

Well you know what today is.....

the beginning of a new weekly challenge.

By now you must have guessed that we like to set a challenge

that has something to do with the weeks projects

and this last week has been all about Brusho.

Now I know in an ideal world you probably would all like

 to have Brusho's but hey, this isn't an ideal world and you won't

all be that lucky!

So, this weeks challenge is going to be about

creating an interesting background with either Inks,

Brusho's or Paints.
That gives you a bit of room to play!

Is that ok?

Can't wait to see you come up with this week.

You know the rules by now,

as many entries as you like, and entry by the link below.

You have one week to participate and entries will close at

 midnight on March 29th.

The winner will be announced on 31st March.

Good luck everyone!

Thank you to all those who made beautiful flowers 

for last weeks challenge!

I'll be back Tuesday to announce the winner.

Jane x

An InLinkz Link-up

Brusho Week - Dawn Heald

Hi everyone,

Well what an exciting week I've had....

the new Sizzix order arrived at the shop and I came home with

my new Big Shot Plus!!  Bigger than the normal Big Shot,

it takes up to A4 size.  Just need time to get it out of the box!!

Can't wait to have a play!
Please call the shop if you are interested as they are not 
showing on the website yet! 

Anyway, today is our last day of the fabulous Brusho.

Dawn has a fantastic tutorial for you.

Dawn says -

"I decided to really experiment with Brusho's and show their versatility. 

 The only thing I didn't get on to are resist techniques.

They mixed with everything I tried and stayed put, as long as the

 colour crystals are fixed with thickener, water, mediums, they stay.

         To make a sprinkler, I've shown below how to put some paper over,
             tape round with masking tape and poke a few holes in the top.
             The lids do fit back on without having to remove your sprinkler
                                                    each time.

First off i made a colour swatch of all the pots, Mixed with water

 and then Brusho Thickener. As you only need small amounts of colour

 crystals I used a straw that I cut into a V scoop shape at the end to

 take colour out of the pot.

Brusho Thickener tip, if you are having trouble getting it to dissolve

 in the water heat in microwave for ten seconds. It works. I made up 

a smaller batch using 150ml water to 5 grams of thickener 

powder.

Here's an art journal page I made using various ways to apply Brushos.

I really do recommend these pots of wonderful colour".

Well I hope you found this really interesting.

Thank you Dawn for all your hard work!

I think you will find these Brusho's are amazing!

So this is what Dawn used -

Brusho Crystal Colour 24 Set
Brusho Thickener 
Spiral bound journal
White paper
Versamark Ink
Clear Embossing Powder
Tando Creative Stencil
Grunge Paste
Spray bottles

For the Art Journal page Dawn used -

Brusho's and Thickener

PaperArtsy Stamps - Lin Brown

Stazon Ink - Jet Black

Clear Acetate

Acrylic Paint - White

Crafters Workshop Stencil - Spinning Top

Brayer

So just a little of what you can do with Brusho's.

I hope you have been inspired to have a go with them.

You will not be disappointed!

Tomorrow is Weekly Challenge Day....

what shall it be I wonder....

Jane x