Part 1 - Journal Cover

I've just had a week off, which I've spent keeping busy and doing as much crafting as I could.  Most of the week has been spent finishing my sister's 50th mini book, ok her birthday was last July so its a wee bit late, but never used to see her that often and then she got a job in Saudi Arabia and this Easter is the first time we will be catching up with her and her busy lifestyle, so had to pull finger out and get book finished.  It took ages and I hope she loves it, because even thought we dont see each other often she is my sister and I love her and doing this book bought back some great memories.  Will try and post some pics this week but havent scanned it yet.

Anyway once that was done could do something for me, have been reading Craft Stamper and their Art Journal series, on Friday manged to get some cheap mountboard from the framers not quite free, but only a couple of quid for enough for lots of covers.  So with my new Claudine Hellmuth paints away I went, I-pod on and creativity on high, so here is the front cover, had to resist doing an exact copy of Kate Cranes, as hers is so yumptious, and then discovered that I follow her blog, well worth a visit to the Kathryn Wheel.  Tis true its hard to let go, but I tried not too judge myself too harshly and let the creativity flow, used some collage images from ITKupilli and Lisa's altered Art, both of whom do some lovely dark and gruesome but cute images.  Im quite chuffed Ill make an artist yet, LOL.  I never did art as a subject at school for "O" level (that shows me age for a start), so feel I have missed out on lots of the art basics, but experimentation seems to work most of the time.

Anyway enough warbling, Desperate Housewives has just finished and its time for bed, Grrr finished on a cliff hanger and not back for two weeks, grrrrrr.

GSC46 - frosting challenge

Over at Gingersnap Creations the challenge is to add a little bit of frosting to your challenge, so I made my mothers day card, first of all using my new fave book "Compendium of Curiosities" to make some grunge paper flowers, didnt have any die cuts I wanted too use, so I stamped flowers using a free stamp from Craft Stamper, (last year some time I think, its a great stamp and I use it a lot), then cut out and distressed as instructed, oh put some dictionary paper on the grunge paper before I started, though I liked the flowers they defn needed some frosting so using my new best friend Diamond Glaze, I stuck some seed beads onto each stamen, not to fiddly, as I put a bit of glue on the end of a pokey tool and picked up and positioned using that, and then decorated the centre with some contrasting micro beads.  Then postioned on some nice bright paper, a little  bit of sparkly letters and voila . .

I expect my mum will like it and then give it back to me when I next visit, well its better that being thrown away I suppose, obviously mum's not a cherisher of my work, oh well its the thought that counts.

Can anyone tell me why my scanner doesnt seem to want to scan all my card, its on auto scan so you would think it would pick it all up, something stupid I expect, LOL

Must also mention its GingerSnap Creations birthday month and they have a great blog candy up for the taking, see here.

Elsewhere am still struggling with my ATC swap Wild Romance, need to be in Australia by end March, so need to pull my finger out on that one and also need to do two 70th anniversary cards for a friend.  Am counting the days to Ally Pally, and will be saving my birthday money so I can have a good splurge, will be meeting my good friend Rusty Cage there, anyone else going on the saturday??

Toodle pip  :)

DPT Mo's Challenge 21

Decided to join in at Mo's challenge, didnt know she did one until I visited Jenni's blog, had the perfect image of hers previously coloured which fitted the challenge them of brown, blue and one neutral, so rooted throught the stash for papers to set it off and here it is.  Did this image pre xmas but was so chuffed with my promarker colouring, wanted to use it for a really good cause, so for Mo's and then to go to a very good  (ok my bestest) friend of mine, to cheer her up and let her know she has friends who love her dearly, she has been dumped by her OH this week, because he wants to go clubbing and live with his friends, he is 39 and they have two young girls, mid life crisis or what.  She is dealing with it amazingly and I am so proud of her, he doesnt deserve her at all, she is convinced its his anti depressants he is taking as he is showing all the signs mentioned in side effects, convinced him to go to Dr's who prescribed him another months suppy.  WTF!!

Rest of this weekend need to do mothers day cards and some 70th anniversary cards, so shall have to resist Tim's bible, but have Wednesday off as worked today, so shall have a playday.  Hope you are all having a great weekend.

Stampotique Designers Challenge 2 (SDC2)

I luurve stampotique stamps, dont know where I first saw them but just love their unique quirkyness, have taken lots of inspiration from the lovely Jo Capper-Sandon, who does absolutely brilliant work with them and others.

So was chuffed to hear about the stampotique challenge from SDC, slightly thrown by the cheery spring colours of rose, yellow and moss green, but have managed to use them by stamping onto some paper I had that fitted the critieria.

Decided my girl needed lamposts so googled some lampost images and came up with this great parisian scene which I image transfered for a more grungy look, thought my image disappeared into the scene a bit so used some torn white vellum to lift her out a bit using my new fave toy, Tims mini stapler, (glad I ordered some refills going thru them at a rapid pace), LOL, then tried various things to put on as an accent, flowers didnt seem right but these scrunched up circles that you can use to make flowers, worked for me and couldnt resist putting some more stampotique images on, and then the title Rain drops came to me. I hope you like, I really, really enjoyed making this.

all hail the god Tim . . .

Got Tims fantastic new book last week from QVC, was supposed to save it for my birthday (17/3) but was unable to do that once the box was sitting in my house, twas a lot smaller that I expected, but sat and played with some techniques yesterday and had great fun using distress inks and fragments and a spot of perfect pearls, managed to get very messy fingers, so am submitting this tag for Tuesday Taggers, Messy Fingers challenge, sponsored by The Craft Barn.

so distress ink background with a stampotique stamp, then a bit of distress crackle with more ink rubbed into the cracks, would have crackled a bit more if Id been a bit more patient and hadnt taken the heat gun to it, love the colours on it and defn following the god on the grunge principles.

Also made this ATC, not for anything in particular just part of my Tim Holtz paly day, if only I didnt have to

work, I could have played again allday today.