Up the Wall

Up the Wall

Morning!  How's it going?

I know, some of you won't see

this until evening!  I just feel

if I say Good Evening it will

seem as though I've only just

remembered to do the blog

...............ooops!

Craftyfield is here today with

a super card reminiscent of

travels to sunnier climes.....

..........and times.....

"Despite the many options available to create a wall texture,

 I chose to represent the rendered walls so popular in Europe.

 Shame really as The Craft Barn has many stencils and stamps

 to fake the look of bricks, stones, wood and more...

 It could have been so easy... 

But no I persevered!

To complete the look I needed to create a window 

for my wall and some sort of gate, maybe with a bicyle...

To create my window I cut 4 rectangles from

 a piece of white cardstock. 

I then used an embossing tool and a foam mat 

to emboss lines around the frame

For colour I settled on a blue base, 

which I distress in the next step.

I mixed the colour from Frescos in 

South Pacific and Lavender.

I applied a thin layer of diluted crackle and

 overpainted with white paint

 I used double sided tape to affix a piece of 

acetate for my window panes

The wall texture was built in layers.

 I started with a layer of gesso and painted mixes of colours

 over the top to establish a background colour. 

Then with a sponge and tinted Grunge paste I "stamped" the stucco texture. 

I must say I wasn't sure if this would work, but it does, brilliantly in fact!

 I considered giving my window some curtains

but decided a dark colour would leave more to the imagination. 

I roughly drew in my panes with Inktense pencils 

mixing the colours on the paper. 

I then applied (a little) water with a wet brush.

To distress my wall I added some crackle, 

mixing grey and black ink directly on the stamp 

on top of Antique linen Distress ink.

 The Distress allows the inks to mix more 

readily with each other.

Finally the garden was stamped, fussy cut 

and coloured with Inktense pencils.

I tried to take some picture in natural lighting 

and this one does show the wall texture, 

very true to life I think

And another close up showing the subtle crackle 

and my impulse addition of a flowering branch 

coming down the wall, 

which I also painted with pencils."

Supplies:

Acetate:
Ultra clear double sided tape: 
Fresco paints: 
Crackle medium:
Grunge paste:
DecoArt paints:
Garden stamp:
Inktense Pencils: 
Crackle stamp:[I used an old stamp from my collection, no longer available]
Memento inks:

That stucco effect is amazing Craftyfield

Thank you for showing us how to do that

Think I'll go and see if I can

achieve at least a reasonable 

resemblance to stucco

'Till tomorrow

Mickie xx

Hearts and Flowers

Hearts and Flowers

Hi There!

It is Burns Night, hope you

have got your kilt aired,

bagpipes ready and the Haggis

standing by -

Here's the first line of Robbie Burns

address to get you started............. 

Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face, 

Great chieftain o the puddin'-race!

Aboon them a' ye tak your place,

Painch, tripe, or thairm:

Weel are ye worthy o' a grace

As lang's my arm.

On the other hand, here at The Craft Barn

we have a new theme for the week and

to start us off, here is Craftyfield:

"Nothing like being prepared, so I thought I would make

 a love themed card either for Valentine's day or just in case...

 The Honeydoo flower stamps call for a CAS style, 

so that is what I made. 

I used coloured inks rather than black and, in the end, 

the stamped image looked more than enough 

so I didn't feel the need to add any colouring 

with pencils or markers.

When I placed each stamp on my block I slightly changed

 the angle of the stem in relation to the flower head 

to create that stylised heart between the 2 flower stems. 

This is something you can do with clear stamps.

I inked the sentiment with pink, violet and blue inks 

by just touching the edge of the pad on each area 

of the sentiment for an ombre look.

I matted my image on pink cardstock and 

layered it onto a white 6x6 card base. 

3 little hearts from my scrap box 

(waste from a die-cut If I remember correctly) 

add the final touch.

I love how the flower design has the shadowed areas 

already built in: it's easy to add colour if you want 

but lovely just on its own too."

Supplies:
Honey Doo Crafts Clear Stamps: Lilies
Kaisercraft Love This :
Memento inks: (Black, Rose Bud, Bamboo Leaves) 

Thank you Craftyfield for a gorgeous CAS card 

to start us off

'Till tomorrow

Mickie xx

Zinsky

Zinsky

Hello Everyone

We have a treat for you today

We haven't forgotten that at

this time of year people have

birthdays too

Here's a set of cards to cheer

anyone's day from Claire Jackson

Cut a piece of white card to 4.5” x 6.5” and stamp 

the focal image(s) in Memento ink 

(as it won’t bleed with alcohol markers)

Make a mask to cover the stamping. 

I used masking paper but sticky notes would do

Stencil over the background using two colours of Distress Ink.

Use the small stamps on the background in black ink. 

Remove the masks

Colour the images (I used ProMarkers).

I used a light grey to outline the main images t

o give a slight shadow effect and add subtle depth

Add a computer generated greeting and 

mount on black card on a 5” x 7” card blank.

For a little extra depth I used glossy accents on some of the details

The new Zinski stamps are great for adults and children alike. 

These cards would be very easy to add a number to for a child’s birthday

Materials used:

White card
Memento Ink 
Zinski ZA01
Carabelle Studio masks
Distress Ink
ProMarkers
Black Card
Card blank: 5” x 7”

Thank you Claire for a

A fantastic set of cards 

They do make me smile

in fact

I might be smiling all day .......

Back again tomorrow 

Mickie xx

Pumpkin, Scarecrow & Halloween

Pumpkin Scarecrow & Halloween

Halloo!

We continue the Halloween theme today with

Crafty Field

who is going to show us her super spooky card

I made a spooky scene with items that aren't necessarily Halloween themed.

First, for my moonlit background, I selected Glossy paper

 and cut out a circle from masking sheet to protect the moon.

Using Distress inks I then brayered the night sky, darker at the top.

 I used this menacing Branches stamp by Impression Obsession. 

The picture shows Versafine ink and standard cardstock as I made the fatal mistake of forgetting to take off the moon mask before stamping! 

For my second try I switched to Glossy paper to get a deeper tone 

as the texture of the standard card gets in the way. 

When using Glossy card stock Dye ink is a better choice so 

I switched from Versafine to Memento dye ink.

I stamped the Boo sentiment with an old alphabet stamp .

(To make sure the letters are spaced correctly I used the "U"

 as a place holder as it is the same width as the "O".)

Last, but not least, I stamped a "crow", a bird from the CI-329 stamp set.

To make it pop off the page I used Archival ink. 

For finishing touches I darkened the corners of the image 

with black ink and cut the excess cardstock.

Against that dark and eerie background 

I needed a colourful and fun addition

 and settled on Pumpkins. 

I made those with hand cut ovals but you could use dies, if you have them. 

I coloured the cardstock with Distress inks, 

adding Walnut around all the ovals of the big pumpkin. 

I also added a die-cut leaf from my bits & bobs jar

4. The finished project

Materials used:

Glossy Cardstock

Masking Sheet

Speedball Brayer

 Impression Obsession Cover a Card Stamp

Crafty Individuals Stamps

Distress Inks

Memento Ink Pads

Many thanks Crafty Field for a fun card

That's all for today folks.. Enjoy!

Mickie xx