Friday Focus at Frilly & Funkie !

Thank goodness it's Friday ! This week seems to have taken forever and for some bizarre reason I've been a day ahead of myself so actually today should be Saturday !

It's my turn to do the Friday Focus over at Frilly and Funkie and this time I'm playing with Artistic Outpost stamps !

You'll find all the details of my card here.

Alter it with FSC !

Welcome to the next challenge for The Fashionable Stamping challenge. The lovely Silvia has challenged us to alter something. This challenge is superbly timed as the altered item I'm sharing is a book that I made on the recent 2 day workshop with the lovely and uber talented Lin Brown.

 The book is a hardback book that I sanded and then stuck the embellishments to. The letters of the word 'life' are made from Grunge Paper and so are the two pieces of laurel leaves. The letters for the word 'my' are grunge board letters mounted onto squares of grunge board. Then I added some Ferro texture paint and dried it with a heat gun. The whole cover was then painted with black Fresco Finish paint and dried with a heat gun. The word 'artful' is made from Tim Holtz Game Pieces. They've been turned over so the red side is stuck to the book and then the flat side has been painted with Fresco Finish paint and then stamped using an alphabet stamp set.

 Then Treasure Gold was used to age the cover, this stuff is absolutely gorgeous and is at the top of my wish list ! Some Ideaology was added to the letters and a Curio Knob to the cover.

Then we moved on to the inside of the book. Now this is a new thing for me, I've long admired the gorgeous work that Lin has been doing on her journal pages. I've used lots of Fresco Finish paints, stencils and stamps. I was also introduced to washi tape !

One of the techniques that Lin showed us was 'bumping' which is how the shadow is created on the flower. I need a little more practice at this as I got a little carried away with the amount of paint to use which is why the centre is a little squishy !

The beautiful piece in the little recess is a cold resin piece, which unfortunately due to me being held up in traffic, I didn't get to make so Lin very kindly made this for me.

This is an ongoing project and I have 2 other pages that have been started and I will share when I've finished them.

I'm also entering this project into the Simon Says Stamp and Show challenge which is Tape it Up (I've used Washi tape).

I hope you get chance to join us for this challenge and do make sure you check out the rest of the DT's fabulous projects.

Fall into Fall !

It's time for the next challenge over at Frilly and Funkie and Linda has chosen Fall into Fall. Here's what Linda has to say:

It's my absolute favourite season!  I love the rich colors of nature and the bounty of the harvest. Celebrate Autumn with us this week by using a fall color palette in your work (suggestions - brown, orange, olive, rust, cranberry, harvest gold).

I absolutely love these colours so this challenge was right up my street !

I decided to use one of the jumbo manilla tags that Linda sells in her shop. I've just attended a fabulous 2 day workshop with the lovely Lin Brown where we used lots of Fresco Finish paints so they were high on my list of things to use. I'll share what we made at the workshop on another post, it's still a work in progress ! I gave the tag several layers of paint blending lots of different colours. I then used the Chicken Wire stencil and used a mixture of Claret and Pumpkin Soup Fresco Finish paint. I stamped the bird from the Artistic Outpost Birds of a Feather stamp set using black Archival ink.

I stamped the text from the same stamp set onto a piece of plain paper from an old book and then used Tea Dye, Vintage Photo and Walnut Stain DI over it. The quote is from a Serendipity stamp set that I've stamped onto a piece of cotton fabric and then I heat set the text and sprayed the fabrc with water. I then let some Fresco Finish paint bleed into the fabric. I've used a Prima button with some thread and stuck on top of a Filigree metal piece. The seam binding was dyed using re-inkers using Ripe Persimmon, Wild Honey and Shabby Shutters.

I hope you get chance to join us for this challenge.

Step x Step and a visitor !

Happy Saturday everyone! It's my turn to share a Step x Step project over at Frilly and Funkie so to find out more about how I made this project hop over there.

I'm also entering this project into the Crafty Individuals challenge which is The Last Days of Summer. Having just come back from a very lovely, sunny week in Norfolk and spent some time at the seaside, the inspiration was there for this project when I got back ! I used Crafty Individuals stamps CI-119, CI-182 and CI-278.

I also wanted to show you this photo which I took when the lovely Cec from CW Card Creations came to spend the day with me on Monday of last week. I was blown away when Cec dropped me a note to say she would be over in the UK from Canada and could she come and spend the day with me. We had a lovely day chatting about crafting and I showed Cec lots of different, inky techniques. I couldn't believe how fast the day went either! Hope you had a good trip home Cec !

One last thing, Linda has moved The Funkie Junkie Boutique to a brand new .com store and the grand opening is this week end. To celebrate Linda is offering 10% off her already low prices between 14 - 17 September. There's lots of new goodies so make sure you check it out and grab yourself a bargain !

First signs of Autumn !

It's certainly starting to cool off here in the UK and the leaves on the trees are starting to turn which is what inspired me to make this card for my Katzelkraft DT project.

I blended DI over the background then stamped the leaves which had been spritzed with water. I then stamped over the same area using DI. The vertical strip is from an old book that I've blended DI over and then done some Spritz and Flick. The leaves are cut from Tim Holtz Tissue Wrap using the Tattered Leaves die and then I've blended DI over them. The main image is stamped onto white card then I blended more DI over it and some more Spritz and Flick !

I cut some more leaves from shrink plastic and then embossed them in the Tim Holtz Honeycomb EF. When they shrink it still leaves some of the pattern in the leaves, which you can just make out on the photo.

The stamps that I've used are the Automne Demie Plaque and are available exclusively from The Craft Barn in the UK and from Katzelkraft in France.

Good things come in small packages !

Well I hope you've all been enjoying the lovely weather, if you're in the UK. We've just come back from a week in Norfolk and couldn't have wished for better weather, and that's not something you can say very often in the UK!

It's also time for the next challenge over at The Fashionable Stamping Challenge. The lovely Claire has challenged us with the theme 'Good things come in small packages'. Now, you can interpret this any way you like as long as you include some stamping on your work.

I have to say this did have me scratching my head for a while and having thrown out the first few ideas I settled on a little lavendar pouch.

Apologies for the photo's but white on white is not good to take pictures of ! I started by cutting a piece of white cotton fabric and stamping the lavendar image from the Artistic Outpost Flower Market set with black Archival ink. I heat set it then used Dusty Concord Distress Stains to paint the flowers. The leaves were painted with Fresco Finish Hey Pesto paint which was watered down.

The little girl is also from the Flower Market set and I've stamped her on a separate piece of fabric, heat set her and then painted her using Victorian Velvet Distress Stains. I then frayed the edges of the fabric and used a little wadding behind her before stitching her to the main piece of fabric. I've stitched the lace which is from The Funkie Junkie Boutique across the top of the pouch. The large heart is cut from Grunge Paper that is covered with sticky back canvas and then I've rubbed Milled Lavender DI around the edge. The smaller heart is made from shrink plastic that's been embossed with the Tim Holtz Honeycomb EF and then cut out then shrunk ! It keeps some of the pattern from the EF even though it's been melted !

I threaded some white ribbon through the top of the pouch and I shall put some lavendar sachets inside it to finish it off.

Do make sure you hop over to the main blog to check out the rest of the DT's fabulous projects.

I'm also entering this into the Artistic Outpost September Referral which is Anything Goes. 

Hot summer colours !

It's time for the next challenge at The Stamp Man and this time Jill has chosen the theme of hot summer colours ! As usual there is the prize of the £10 voucher to spend online for the winner.
This post is scheduled and hopefully it has worked OK as it's the second one this week as we're away in what I'm hoping is sunny Norfolk !

I started with the background and blended Barn Door, Spiced Marmalade, Ripe Persimmon and Fired Brick DI over some white card stock. I then stamped using the Tim Holtz Mixed Media stamp set. For the vertical panel I used the same colours and also used the Tim Holtz Allegro mask and very lightly blended Black Soot DI over it.

The trumpet is from the Aspect of Design Classical Instruments stamp set is stamped onto Speciality Stamping Paper then I've blended DI around the edge but leaving it a little rough so look like paint strokes. The word jazz is made using the Tim Holtz WordPlay die and I've blended Black Soot DI over the letters and then  used a Gold Mixative over the top. I added a type charm, button and pearls to finish.

I hope you get chance to join us for this challenge.

The Great Outdoors !

It's time for the next challenge over at Frilly and Funkie and Linda has challenged us to create a project with the theme of the Great Outdoors and also to include a quote about the great outdoors/nature too! Do make sure you hop over to the main blog and check out the rest of the DT's fabulous work !

I have to admit I was a little stumped when I saw the challenge theme then I remembered a set of Aspects of Design stamps I had stashed away in a drawer. I blended some DI over white card stock and then stamped onto it. The quote is cut out using the Movers & Shapers Mini Labels die and I've added some eyelets and twine. The map was downloaded from the Graphics Fairy and I've distressed it with DI.

I've used the Tim Holtz Filmstrip die and blended Walnut Stain DI over it. The word Postcard is from the Artistic Outpost Ephemera stamp set and I've masked off the rest of the stamp as I only wanted the words. The background is stamped with a stamp from the Tim Holtz Curiosities stamp stamp and I've stamped over the top with the Stampin' up Sanded stamp.

I hope you get chance to join us for this challenge.

Step x Step at Frilly and Funkie

Just a quick post today to say it's my turn for the Step x Step over at Frilly and Funkie ! I've shared this tag recently but thought it would be good to show how it came to life !

Hope you all have a great week end !