Make Do and Mend

Hello everyone, and welcome to my first post of the month for March. As you read this post, I will be on my way to Hochanda for the first of our TV shows for this month, with another show tomorrow. I do hope that you can watch or record the shows to see what Lesley and I have in store for you. The Design Team have created more beautiful projects to inspire you once again.

For my post today, I am taking you back to last month's TV shows, when I created some fabric samples, using the fabulous Haberdashery range of stamps, and want to share a couple of those with you. I have used stamps from Haberdashery, The Sewing Room, and Floral Mannequins stamp sets.

I created a card background using a damp tea bag, which I wiped over a piece of drawing cartridge, then sprinkled some sea salt on top, leaving the background to dry. Once I had wiped the sea salt away, I stamped a range of the little worker stamps from the sets over the background using dark  brown Archival ink. I created a tag using scraps of fabric and book paper, then added a mannequin which I had stamped onto kraft card using white embossing powder. I coloured the image with Koh-I-Noor paints, which colour on kraft card so well. The little sentiment was stamped onto a scrap of fabric.

The large tag would make a gift in its own right it is so pretty, I made another one in a softer colour option, it feels more vintage in these colours. If you are like me, you have lots of little scraps, and these tags are perfect for adding all of your little bits and pieces. For my TV demo, I simply used double sided tape to attach everything, and did not sew the pieces as I have done in these photographs.

My second project is a little needle case, using lots of the little worker stamps in the stamp sets. I stamped the images onto plain cream fabric using brown Archival Ink, and coloured them with Inktense pencils and a water brush. I added some pretty floral fabric which matched my colours to create the needle case, plus felt for the inside 'pages'.

This was a faily quick project to make and is a great way of using up little pieces of fabric.

I hope that you have enjoyed my projects today, and will try stamping on fabric. As I said during my TV demo, just hold the stamp on the fabric a bit longer than you would on card or paper, there is no need to press any more firmly.

Thanks for stopping by, xx

Lots to show you!

Hello everyone, my post is a dual purpose one today, as I have a Design Team project to show you first of all, and then I would like to show you a little something that I have made for the challenge blog.

My card uses stamps taken from the Sewing Room/Floral Mannequins multi-buy stamp set plus the Dressmaking Collage clear stamp. I have combined these stamps with an older stamp set: Haberdashery, to create a collaged card. I have chosen to cut the Dressmaking Collage stamp up into individual stamps, but you can leave it as one piece if you like, the choice is yours.

I started to make my background by stamping the buttons in two corners of a piece of watercolour paper using Versafine Onyx Black ink. As I was using a mixture of both clear and rubber images, I set the rubber buttons out on a block first, stamped those in each corner, and then set the clear buttons on the block next before removing the rubber images, so that I could work out where to place them. When I stamped the clear images on my card, I could line them up to the rubber images to complete the corners without any problems. I coloured the images with pencils, and then painted the images with Acrylic Wax to protect them. I spritzed two pieces of tissue paper with red and orange Dylusions spray, crumpled them up, and dabbed the background to create a mottled effect.

I stamped and embossed the silhouette mannequin onto the background, and then stamped and embossed the floral bodice onto a spare piece of card. I coloured the bodice using Distress markers and a water brush. I coloured another piece of card firstly with orange and red Distress inks and stamped and embossed the lace flower twice, which I cut out and layered together. I then coloured the card with Scattered Straw Distress Ink to create a little banner for the sentiment.

I added some background stamping using one of the border images, and finally added some hand drawn stitching, before placing the background onto a black card blank.

 This week over on the Chocolate Baroque Challenge Blog, we have a free digital download. I have made a card to provide you with a little bit of inspiration.This paper made me think of tranquility and oriental imagery, so I decided to use stamps from the Tranquility and Serenity rubber stamp sets to complete my card. I stamped the flower and main image onto white card, and coloured these with Polychromos pencils. I coloured the wisteria images with Distress Markers and stamped them onto the background, embossing them with clear embossing powder. I edged the card with Seedless Preserves Distress Ink, before matting onto a black card blank.

Hop over to the blog to collect the free download paper and see a fabulous card made by Florence.

Thanks for stopping by, Judith xx

Fragmented background

Hi Folks, I have another sample to show you using the new Nature Fragment stamps from Chocolate Baroque. I have chosen to alter a small papier mache plaque which I have painted, and then covered the front with some scrapbook paper. Before attaching the paper, I stamped the large hessian (burlap) stamp using gold embossing powder across the middle of the panel, and added a piece of cerise ribbon. I used another stamp from the stamp set and Lilac Posies Memento ink to add some random stamping across the background. I then used a fragment stamp from the Lace Fragment stamp set to fill in any areas left, using Iced Spruce Distress Ink. I softened these areas with a pearl spray.

I stamped and embossed several images from the Haberdashery stamp set, using white embossing powder, and coloured them using the Memento Ink, or the Distress Ink as before. I also embossed a pair of scissors using gold embossing powder onto a piece of gold pearlised card. Finally, I cut a small tag shape, which I coloured with Iced Spruce Distress Ink, keeping the die cut in place, so that the edges remained white, in keeping with the other embossed pieces, and stamped a sentiment from the haberdashery stamp set onto the tag.

Thanks for stopping by, Judith xx

New stamps at Chocolate Baroque

Hi Folks, Glenda has just released some gorgeous new stamps over at Chocolate Baroque Firstly there is Haberdashery, a sewing themed plate, full of mannequins, scissors, bobbins, buttons and all things sewing related. The scissors are really decorative and unusual, and the mannequins are all really different.

Secondly, there is Lace Fragments, a mixture of lace strips and swatches of lace. There is also a beautiful flower made of lace. I love this stamp plate, and the samples that the Design Team have come up with are just amazing.

I have a sample on the Design Team Blog today, so pop over there to take a look at the full instructions. I really enjoyed making this piece. Glenda is also offering a set of each of these stamps in a prize draw, so if you leave a comment on the DT blog, you stand a chance of winning them!

Hopefully, I'll be back a bit later with my Forgotten Friday post. It's been a hectic week this week! Thanks for stopping by, xx