Trio of Trees

Hello everyone, I hope you are all keeping well and not feeling too frantic as we approach Christmas Day itself. I would like to wish you all a happy, peaceful festive season, and hope that you enjoy the days ahead, whatever you are doing.

I have a few final projects to share with you this month, showcasing stamps from last month's TV shows. My first project was created by inking a large square acrylic block with Distress Oxide ink, spritzing it with water, and pressing it onto a piece of textured card. I had placed a circle mask onto the card first, to block out an area for a sun or moon, which I painted yellow. I left the card to dry naturally, and once it was dry, I stamped the tree from the Harmony Tree set. I added the words around the tree in first and second generation stamping. I added some colour to the tree with Distress Ink and water, also grounding the tree by adding some shading underneath.

 My second project was also created on textured card using Distress Ink this time. I added a circle mask once again, choosing two colours for the background, and stamped the tree from the Remembrance Tree stamp set. I added the sentiment, and then drew in two birds with a fineliner pen using a stencil.

I added colour under the tree with Distress Ink and a water brush to ground the tree, then added pops of colour to represent a field of poppies or other flowers.

My final card was created with the Harmony Tree stamp set once again. I created a background using Drawing Cartridge, and Distress Ink. I then stamped the wording randomly over the background. I made a strap from Drawing Cartridge which I attached to the card. I stamped a whiteboard heart with the Harmony Tree and coloured this with Distress Ink and a waterbrush, then accentuated the details with pencils. The heart can be slotted into the heart but removed and kept as a memento.

Thanks for stopping by, I hope that you have enjoyed my projects this month, and will try out some of my ideas. Take care, xx

Coaster Journal

Hello everyone, I have a project to share today showcasing lots of the stamps featutred on last month's TV shows on Hochanda. If you did not catch the shows, then you will be in for a treat this month as the DT share their beautiful projects with you on the blog.

I have made a little handmade journal using a couple of coasters which were no longer wanted, and some Drawing Cartrige for the inside pages. I painted the coasters with some clear gesso, to give them a base to work on, and once this was dry, I added some acrylic paint. I stamped the Remembrance Tree on one coaster and the Harmony Tree on the other coaster, using Archival ink.

I cut strips of Drawing Cartridge just slightly smaller that the coasters, and scored them to make pages. Each strip made three pages, and I stuck them together with other strips to make one longer strip so that I had lots of pages to decorate. I added gelli print backgrounds, printed papers, or simply used Distress Inks to colour the pages.

I used the pages to try out ideas that could then go on to make bigger cards if I liked the ideas. These little journal are a great place to experiment and play. A small space gives you freedom to try something and move on. Sometimes a big space can feel a bit daunting.

Once I had decorated the pages, I added some ribbon inside the front cover, and attached the covers to the front and back blank pages. You could construct the book and decorate it afterwards if you want to. It depends how messy you are!

Here are a couple of the card ideas that came from the little book itself. A set of little note cards, useful for any occasion:

A film strip idea, expanding on the version in my little journal:

I hope that I have given you lots of ideas, and that you will try them out. Thanks for stopping by, xx