Oh Boy, on my own this time!

Hello and welcome,

Thanks to you all for your visit by my blog especially if you've detoured via the fabulous PaperArtsy Blog.  For anyone that's come straight here, I was so chuffed to have the chance to share some Christmas cards, on the PaperArtsy Blog, that I created using the beautiful bauble stamps from Elizabeth Borer's stamps sets that I helped to launch at the end of August.  The main aim of my designs was to show people who are fairly new to stamping that it's relatively easy to create elegant cards with beautiful stamps and just a few other basic products.

Careful matting and layering with co-ordinating coloured cardstock featured on all three cards to create a frame to display the lovely baubles but there is only one card, as you can see, which uses the stamp as  traditional baubles.

Card #1  

 I stamped a 'flower' from the slim bauble by stamping in a circle and masking to create the illusion of petal layers.  I coloured the petals using Fibralo pens and then cut it out.  I also stamped, coloured and cut out a few individual baubles and after shaping them slightly with a bone folder I layered them over the flower with a little silicone glue.  

I often mock up my designs on scrap paper before committing them to cardstock and I'm really glad I did in this case as firstly I decided that my original was a bit too much (see below) and I also didn't like it centred on the card so the final piece was cut out and attached to one side as you can see and I trimmed some of the petals to fit to the corner.

 

I finished the card off with a metal flower and threaded narrow ribbon through a button and tied a dinky bow for the centre.  The sentiment is an Inkylicious stamp from my stash as I don't yet have any PaperArtsy Christmas sentiments.

Card #2

For this card I created a different style of flower using another of the bauble stamps.  This time I stamped in Versamark and embossed with a metallic blue embossing powder before colouring with my Fibralo pens and cutting each petal out.

To form the flowers I stuck a hole reinforcer to a punched circle of card (this made it easy to keep the petals balanced equally and also gave just a little dimension) and then arranged the 'petals' as shown below.

I created a co-ordinating card matt by scribbling the same colour Fibralos as I used on the bauble onto my craft mat, spritzing with water and then loading this onto a paintbrush to flick onto a sheet of card.  I dried each colour with a heat gun before applying the next one.

I used the same splattered card to die cut the snowflake rosettes and punch out some separate snowflakes and then dabbed them all with 'dries clear' glue before dipping into clear glitter.

Card #3

For my final card I love the shape of this bauble so wanted to use it in the traditional manner which meant I needed something to hang my baubles from.  I stamped out the beautiful art deco style mistletoe border twice and after colouring I cut them out and applied them to the card with 3D foam.  This time the sentiment is a Chocolate Baroque stamp.

 The baubles were shaped slightly from the back with the acrylic wire working tool you can see in the photo.  I've hardly done any wire work but that tool is so handy to have in my kit, lol!  I attached the baubles to the card with silicone glue to keep some dimension.

I created another layer of card to matt again scribbling Fibralos onto my craft matt and spritzing with water but this time I picked it up with a piece of natural sponge and dabbed it onto the card.  This is such a simple technique but very effective.

The photo below shows this layer perfectly and also the dimension to the border and  baubles.  Oh, nearly forgot to mention I put little dots of the Ranger white enamel stuff on the mistletoe berries and dots of white Posca pen on the baubles...... love my white Posca pen, thanks for telling me about them Sam ;-)!

So now I have three beautiful cards to kick off my Christmas card making this year ....... wow, that's early for  me so something else I have to thank Darcy and Leandra for, lol!  I hope you'll agree they do look rather elegant ;D!

Thanks so much Darcy and Leandra for letting me loose on the blog tonight and once again I hope I showed these lovely stamps off as they deserve.  I need to crack on with more Christmas cards now before I lose momentum, lol!

Thanks for your visit folks and if you haven't already been by the PaperArtsy blog do hop over as there's lot more fabulous inspiration as well as my cards.   See you again soon!

Quick Post? Me???

Morning Everyone and thanks for stopping by.

I had a lovely day on Sunday at the StampMagic Show held at Doncaster Dome.  Lots of fab exhibitors including my favourite, PaperArtsy, but also it's the perfect opportunity to meet up with quite a few of my Twitter and Facebook friends and have a good catch up.  I'm useless as taking photos on these occasions but if you would like to see some nice ones hop over to my friend Sam's blog where she posted some smashing ones.

And ...... speaking of Sam, yesterday was her birthday so I can now share the card I made for her.  I had planned on making something painty and inky last week but life threw a bit of a curve ball and it was Saturday evening before I got chance to make her card, hence it ended up in CAS style. 

I diecut two of the Tim Holtz/Sizzix leaf sprays from different shades of green card (green is Sam's fave colour so she ended up with lots of green cards from her crafting friends, lol) stamping a PaperArtsy script over the top layer.  I then layered one over the other before adding to the card.  I matted and layered onto the base card and stamped the sentiment which is a lovely Chocololate Baroque stamp.

When I'd finished I thought the top layer didn't have enough definition so I used a toning green pencil to carefully add a fine outline all the way round.  It's hardly visible but definitely had the desired effect I think and created more dimension.

 

At StampMagic Darcy and Emma were giving fab demos on the PaperArtsy stand and Darcy showed us how to make a sheet of copy paper with Fresco Finish paints and PaperArtsy stamps into the gorgeous bow you see above, which she then very kindly gave to me along with the strip left over.  So, when I got home I created the little card and gift tag using the scrap piece.  I used Darcy's set shown on her blog as inspiration and she is going to be making a little video which I assume will be added to the other brilliant PaperArtsy videos, showing how to make the bow.  I'm really glad about that as I want to make some myself and can't remember the measurements for cutting the strips, lol!

That's my blog post for today and I now need to get some chores underway.  I have Grandaughter Alexa coming for TWO (she keeps stressing the two to make sure she's not short changed, lol) sleepovers at the beginning of next week and then Izzy and Charlie for two nights at the end of the week.  There definitely wont be any blogging next week that's for sure, lol!

Till next time..............

Hugs

Lesley  Xx

'Morning Monday ........ here's a bit of cheer!

Hi Everyone,

I really, really hope not many of you have the horrible weather we have here this morning but I think if you're in the UK we're all in the same boat!  It's dark, rainy and very blowy .... roll on the weekend when we are supposed to have a mini heatwave!  At this time of the year that won't be mega hot so I will be able to enjoy it if it happens, lol!  Anyway, I have a quick tag to share today which I hope adds a bit of cheerfulness to your day.

Regular visitors may remember at the end of August I spent a lovely weekend with my PAtwit buddies and the equally lovely Lin Brown where she taught us many things and we got the chance to play with lots of stuff new to us.  On the Sunday we all made lots of tags using different products and techniques but as usual I didn't finish any of mine at that time.  Having a bit of a tidy of my workdesk this weekend I found the pile of tags which I'd covered up to protect them from the lethal sunlight in my craftroom (aka conservatory) and this is the first one I decided to finish off because it made me smile and sort of summed up the way the weekend made me feel. 

Lin's friend Karen shared the workshops with us and kindly brought in her full set of Spectrum Noir pencils for us to have a try with so I'd stamped some PaperArtsy images from the latest smashing Darcy sets (hoping to buy these next Sunday ;D) and started the colouring but didn't finish it.  I did like the Spectrum Noir but can't really say I saw any difference between them and my Derwent Coloursoft.  I would love a full range of pencils though but no idea which to choose ...... I see lots of people singing the praises of Polychromos (spelling?) and Prisma.  If anyone has a preference or can tell me the difference I'd love to hear what you think.

Anyway, I'm waffling again, lol!  I used my Coloursoft pencils and Derwent blender pencil to complete the colouring on my tag and added a bit of background stamping using a couple of my JoFY sets from PaperArtsy.  I stamped out the words from some cheap little peg alpha stamps I bought in the supermarket years ago, doodled round them and cut them out to complete the tag together with a bit of ribbon and some paper covered wire.  The wire is my latest Eureka! buy as I've wanted some of it for ages but could only find it online until last week when I visited a local wholesalers and found a big roll of it in their floristry section.  It will cerainly last my lifetime I think, lol!

I hope my tag cheers up your Monday morning.  See you again soon.  Oooh yes, nearly forgot it's the StampMagic show at Doncaster Dome next Sunday........can't wait!

Hugs
Lesley  Xx

Last minute card request from my Other Half!

Morning All,

Ppfft!  We are certainly back down to earth with a bump as far as the weather is concerned aren't we?  I do not mind the drop in temperature one bit (except of course for the heating bill) but this miserable 36 hrs+ of rain can take a hike.....had enough of it for a few days now, lol!

Anyway, I have something to share today somewhat sooner than I thought I would as yesterday Hubby asked me if I could make a card for him to give to the physiotherapy team at the breathing clinic he's been attending for the past 6 weeks. Of course, he leaves it till the last minute to ask me as tomorrow is his last session, lol! 

I have become a Pinterest addict and I pinned this lovely card to my CAS board from HERE which gave me the inspiration for my card below.  Gayatri Murali has a lot of style!

This card was a pleasure to create but deceptively tricky to get the positioning of the cut out and the stamped image balanced but I think that's true of 'clean and simple' style cards in general and because of their CAS style there is no hiding place for stamping errors, etc., lol!  I think it's fairly obvious how it was made but if you have any questions please ask away.  The lovely dandelion seeded head image is an IndigoBlu stamp and I used Archival Aquamarine to stamp it.  I can't tell you whose the embossing folder is because there is no name on it and I keep very little in the packaging ...... not enough space in my craftroom as it is without packaging, lol!

Wow, that's short and sweet from me today after my long post last time ;-).  Thank you for all the lovely comments on my box, I really appreciate every one.  Off to get some less enjoyable tasks done now before a visit to check on Mum.  See you again soon.

Hugs
Lesley  Xx

PaperArtsy Blog Challenge..........but I missed it :-(

Hi Everyone,

I hope you all had a lovely weekend, especially my buddies who were lucky enough to go to the Happy Stampers North West show at Port Sunlight.  I love that show and the venue but it's a loooooong drive from here so means an overnighter which I couldn't run to this year sadly but from tweets and blog posts I know they all had a fabulous time.  Instead my OH and I met our Son and grandaughter Alexa and went to see the illuminations and fireworks at Matlock Bath.  Luckily after a bad start to the day the weather decided to be kind and was dry and not really cold (although OH reckoned it was) but there is a lot of hanging about and queueing and even we got bored let alone Alexa, lol!  Never mind we did have a nice meal, the fireworks were good and it was lovely to spend time with them.

Last month saw a change in the way the blog challenge works over on the PaperArtsy blog and instead of weekly it is now monthly.  You would think that would give me more time to make an entry but it didn't seem to work that way for me.  I got bogged down with all the wonderful inspiration from Guest Designers, Signature Designers, Guest Bloggers, etc., and right at the last minute the lovely Lin Brown shared a project HERE which involved metal work (at which she is simply The Best) which I really wanted to have a go at.  I made a start but knew I had no chance of finishing it in time so it got left on my workdesk all last week.  I really wanted to finish it though and so I spent today doing just that.

I had a framed canvas like the one Lin used but mine was much bigger but then I found a fab box with a canvas to set into the lid.  I'm pretty sure I bought this from PaperArtsy at one of the shows and although it's still 2 cm bigger than Lin's square that just gave me scope to change it a little.

I removed the clasp and hinges before I started working on the box.

 

This is the metal adhered to the canvas square but before adding Fresco paint and Treasure Gold

 

Painted, buffed off and then the beginnings of adding Treasure Gold.  At this point I thought what a bl.....y mess!

 

Finished with the TG but not polished.

Polished off, corners added and attached into the lid recess. The Treasure Gold colours I used were Sapphire, Onyxite and Royal Amethyst.

 

I toyed with the idea of adding stencilled Grunge Paste or lots more stamping round the sides but decided against it as I liked the whole focus being on the metalwork, so I just stamped one of Lin's quotes  and highlighted with some Treasure Gold.

I lined the top and bottom with pieces of PaperArtsy's Chatsworth paper over which I'd added a wash of Fresco to tone it in with the Baltic Blue and Squid Ink Frescos I'd used.  I don't yet have Lin's new limited edition paints for the gorgeous colour she used but hope to rectify that in 2 weeks time at the StampMagic show ;-). 

 

I'm really pleased with how this turned out in the end especially as at one point I thought the metal looked awful, lol!  Must try harder this month to get a project finished for the October challenge.  I love tonight's canvas from Gillian and my buddy Helen did a lovely journal page the other night......however, I don't do journalling, lol!  Could always do a tag instead perhaps!

Whatever, have a great week everyone and see you again soon........ hopefully with a shorter gap between posts than the last one, lol!

Hugs
Lesley  Xx