Retired Birds

Hello everyone, I hope that you are keeping well. I have some projects to share with you featuring some of the fabulous retired stamps that we brought to last month's TV shows on Create and Craft. These stamps are no longer available on the website, but if you were lucky enough to purchase these stamps in our whirlwind shows, or from the website itself, then hopefully you will be inspired this month with the projects from the Design Team.

 My first two projects we created in much the same way, I placed two colours of Distress Oxide onto a large square acrylic block and spritzed this with water. I pressed the block onto a piece of textured card to colour the background. Once the card was dry, I added images from Dawn Chorus, Wise Owl and Let Your Heart Sing.

On the first card I added a sentiment from Amazing Mackintosh Words:

To complete the second card, I used a fineliner pen to lengthen the stalks and add more berries and flowers. Do not be afraid to embellish your images and create a picture. Silhouettes are a great way to do this, as all you need is a black pen. The sentiment is from Sing Your Song.

Finally here is an older card that I made some time ago which is in keeping with the general theme of my two previous cards. I made a Distress ink background for both layers, used brown ink for the stamping. I added some white charcoal to create a dreamy feel to the top layer. The image is from Let Your Heart Sing and the sentiment is from Fly Away With Me.

Thanks so much for stopping by, I will be back later in the month with more projects to share with you.

Take care, xx

Using Up Your Scrap Papers

Hello everyone, I am back with my final project using the lovely bird stamps featured in last month's TV shows on Hochanda. I have created two cards using scrap pieces of paper as the main feature, to show that sometimes what might be considered as something to throw away, can be made into a great feature for your cards and other projects.

For my first card, I made a background using Distress Oxides in three different colours, and then stamped some foliage from the Nature Swirls stamp set to create a scene using coordinating Versafine Clair inks. I stamped and embossed some of the images from Sing Your Song and Live Out Loud, using Versamark and some two tone embossing powders onto scraps of Lesley's My Floral Soul papers. I cut the images out, and added then to the scene. These papers are so lovely, I want to use up every last inch of them!

For this project, I decided to use the large owl from the Wise Owl stamp set as my focal image.

I had been making some gelli print backgrounds, and had a scrap piece of paper that I had cleaned the brayer with. The multi coloured greens looked lovely, and the paper was too good to waste. I stamped the owl using Versamark, and added two different shades of embossing powder before heat embossing, a copper and a verdigris. I then stamped some of the swirls from Let Your Heart Sing and Dawn Chorus, using Versafine Onyx Black ink, and added some flowers from Orchard Design A Tree, which I coloured using Distress Markers. I also added the sentiment from the Live Out Loud stamp set.

For the background, I used a gelli print created with green Distress Ink and bubble wrap, and stamped some of the feathers from Wise Owl and Dawn Chorus with Versamark, and swirled some mica powder over the top. I added matting layers of black card to complete the project.

Thanks for stopping by, xx

Speedy Anniversary Card

Hello everyone I have a quick card to share with you today, which forms part of our larger monthly Fifteen Minute blog post on the Chocolate Baroque Design Team blog.
 
I have used a Brusho background from my stash, created with red, yellow and orange Brushos, plus a bit of Gold Sprinkle It for added shimmer. I then added a mixture of images from Sing Your Song, Wise Owl, and Let Your Heart Sing, simply using Versafine Onyx Black ink. I added a sentiment to create a quick and easy Anniversary card.

Do head over to the Design Team blog to see what my Team mates have created. Thanks for stopping by, xx

Sunset Sky

Hello everyone, it's the final week of the current Colour Challenge, over on the Chocolate Baroque Challenge Blog. I am adding my own piece of inspiration to the blog this week in the form of a card. I always enjoy making cards for the Challenge when I have the time, as it gives me an opportunity to use often forgotten or unused stamps to create a project. I have a vast collection of Chocolate Baroque stamps, having been a fan for many years, and on the Design Team for a loooong time as well.

I have chosen a bird theme for my card, and decided that a sunset would be perfect using these colours. I cut a small piece of hot pressed watercolour card, and created a wash over the card, masking off a circle for the sun. I used the turquoise at the top, and the red at the bottom, which became more pink as it was diluted. I used water based markers, scribbled onto my craft mat to create the wash, and a large paintbrush, spritzing extra water on the mat, to get a watery effect.

I removed the circle, and coloured in the sun, using a yellow marker, then added streaks of red to give the sunset effect. I also added some white charcoal, blending it slightly, to give an airy feeling to the sky.

I stamped the silhouette image from the Let Your Heart Sing stamp set, using Potting Soil Archival Ink, and added some brown pen, to ground the image. I diluted the pen slightly with a water brush.

I created the larger background by blending Broken China, Fired Brick and Fossilized Amber Distress Oxide Inks over a larger piece of watercolour paper, and spritzing them with water, before drying with a heat gun. I edged both backgrounds with the brown Archival Ink, and attached the smaller background to the larger one, before stamping the sentiment from the Fly Away with Me stamp set. I attached the background to a large kraft card blank.

There is still plenty of time to enter the Colour Challenge, so do pop over to the blog, and see the inspiration provided by my Team Mates. This week, we are also taking a look at some of the fabulous entries we have received so far.

Thanks for stopping by, xx