Kate Crane at the Artistic Stamper

"This is a paint brush"

painty background layer 1

Layer two

inky face (note point at page even when trying to clean)

Layer 3

Page two

a wee bit overkill, (wait till you see the next one)

do you think thats enough

you cant say I didnt try every technique ( at least theee times)

preparing layer 3

"point at page and spray"

and again with colour two

Kate 

dont know what shes laughing at, I cleaned the Ink off my face

The whole group showing their inky pages

(except me I left it inside...oops)

Can I just say a massive thanks to Kate Crane for journeying down "sarf" and to Jennie and Mal at the Artistic Stamper for hosting the class and for having a fab shop with lots of great items in it, many of which are now at home with me.

Oh and if you go to a class there have the lunch, it looked fab, I had bought sarnies (DOH)!

ps if you were at the class please comment so I can visit your blogs.

PPS. Will post finished pages when they are done

Can't beat a friendly crafter

A few years ago I had the luck to get a place on a the Paper Artsy weekend featuring Tim Holtz, I was so lucky, but went along on my own.  Now us crafters are a friendly lot, but I really hit the jackpot when I sat on the table that Jeannette and Gillian (sisters) were on, we got on like a house on fire and they made a brilliant weekend something very special, we were like sisters from another mother. Unfortunately the girls are Belfast lasses and Im in Kent so we havent seen each other since. (in the photo L -R Me, Gillian, Jeannette).  Check out Tim photobombing in the background . . LOL. 

Recently, I was extremely sad to hear that Jeannette was in hospital awaiting a major operation, so promised to send her a card. She replied she would love to receive one of my works of art (no pressure).  So I really had to put my thinking hat on, following an article in Craft Stamper I had purchased some slide mailers, so decided to see what I could come up with. Working full time doesn't leave much time for crafting and I did a bit each night, which worked out well as I looked at it with fresh eyes each day.

As we met at Paper Artsy I decided to use their products as the starting point, now I absolutely adore these stamps by Lynn Perrella, though her previous sets hadn't appealed to my style, but these did so I set to work to create a base with fresco paints.

Followed by distress ink stencilling, gold embossing, tissue paper stamping, glossy accents, grunge paste, treasure gold etc etc.... you name it I thought about using it.

So here is the finished product which Jeannette was really pleased with, phewee.

Time Flies . . .

Wow .... I have been gone a long time.

I have been doing crafting in that time but inspiration has been sparse, so here are a number of projects I've done in the last year that I havent blogged, "I can do Pretty" is the latest, finished only yesterday.

Many are family cards, projects or a part of Doodle Arts & Letters & Letter Love 101 by Joanne Sharpe, great online classes, I would recommend them.

I'm due to take a class with Kate Crane next month which I am really looking forward to at the Artistic Stamper in Kent, which I hope will kick start my mojo ready for the christmas card onslaught.

Whilst not being prodigious with my art I have been prodigious with my crafty spending online for when my mojo returns and have got many new stamps and masks (too many) ready for some inky play, dont you just love it, being able to shop whenever the need strikes.

Anyway I hope you enjoy my photo heavy blog.

  

 

   

 

 

 

      

Would really appreciate it if you take the time to comment. Thank You

A posy of flowers

 

A card for my fellow 1963 buddy, who turned 50 this week. As my craft room upheavals are virtually over I decided to let it all go for this.  I had a vision in my mind for what I wanted to produce and in the end I didnt veer off too much. Biggest bugbear was getting the flowers to stay put, realised I needed a flower oasis,but had to use a sponge instead as sunday afternoon and too late to nip out.

Hope you like it, Sharon loved it.

I'm no artist . . . .

. . .  but I like to give it a try, This journal page evolved into me playing around with layers of inktense block and pencils and prismacolour pencils to build layers, and create light and shade. I bought together various things I have learnt on the web in the last year, like yellow for the base colour of the skin. I enjoyed playing with this and spent a number of evenings adding yet more layers.  In the end I had to stop as I went through the paper in the the right eye,oops, so was unable to add the highlight LOL.

I used a face mask as the guide for my face shape and features, but then drew my ownfeatures in, still a lot to learn on drawing but immensely satisfying to get something that looks vaguely human. I then used a Tim Holtz stamp to create a headdress by stamping it twice.

Here's some close ups so you can see the layers and the mistakes, definitely need to do some more work on nose definition, and eyelashes how do you do them!!! Loving my scouse brows though. LOL

Of course didn't help myself by starting with a layered green background, ho hum, its all a learning curve.

Lynn Perrella piece

Looking at Paper Artsy blog and saw this brilliant piece accompanied by a photographic walk through by Sue Carrington, so decided to have a go this weekend.

 

two pictures, left without flash, right with. Couldn't decide which one showed the piece best. I had different ideas for the piece was thinking willow pattern for colour, and major embossing on the fish kites, however when I went to glue down the piece the fish took on a life of their own and decided to fly, loved the look so this is what I went with.

Playing with new stuff

Been playing with my new grunge paste, treasure gold and Paper Artsy fresco paints and stencils.  Took inspiration from Paper Artsy blog, Leandra demo at Ally Pally and Linda Brown blog.

Now it has to be said they make it look dead easy and I cant tell you how many layers of paint there are on these pieces of paper, because I would get something good and then mess it up by trying something on top of it, which then meant repainting the whole thing, it was however great fun and done over many nights, have stuck them to two card fronts but dont quite know who if anyone shall receive them, shall just add them to my stash of prepared cards.

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Next week Im off to Ireland for a girlie weekend, my lovely friends are taking me to see our other friend for my significant birthday (just gone). I believe it will include shopping, gossiping, eating and drinking  . .  yee hah!!

Stencil girl

Found a great american stencil maker via Facebook (Stencil Girl), lusted over all of the stencils but managed to stop at three for the first visit, they have lots of different artists creating them so there is an eclectic selection to choose from, below is my first card using one of them.  I tried to brayer through the stencil but just left a layer of ink on the actual stencil with little or nothing on the card below  perhaps a softer brayer would work, anyway decided to just brush the ink onto the paper through the mask and I think it worked, added a few water splashes and the job is done.

The great news is that you can now buy some of the stencils from Thats Crafty who have started to stock them and also Viva Las Vegas stamps which I also found on facebook from Sue Roddis, wonderful quirky stamps.  So well done to That's Crafty for shopping outside the box, and free P & P over £20.00 whats not to love.

 Decided to carry on with the brayer and inked up this stamp, for another quick and simple make.

Hope you are all enjoing the may bank Holiday and the sunshine .. mwah!