Surprising myself!

Good Morning All,

Whoever has the sunshine this morning please send me a few gentle rays, lol!  Apparently it should be ok later (although chilly) but at the moment we have rain......the fine, gentle stuff we only seem to get here in the UK and usually in the summer..... it wets you through before you properly realise it's even raining ;-)

Anyway, on to the business of the day and it's tag and ATC swap time!  I got very close to the wire this month and almost thought I wouldn't make it which would really have bugged me as I want a full set of swaps, lol!  The theme for July was stencils of which I have a fair few (ahem) and I set myself a challenge of not using flowers or leaves ...... very difficult for me as I have hundreds in one way or another in my stash.....so here we go......

TAGS

I used Distress Inks on the background and a honeycomb stencil from TCW then Lin Brown's leafy stencil for PaperArtsy using Prima clear crackle paste (also bought from PA).

On my screen this photo shows the colours better.  In the top left corner I used PaperArtsy Fresco Finish paints through part of a Rebekah Meier stencil design for TCW and finally stamped and embossed the Tim Holtz blueprint dragonfly onto card, painted it with Viva Precious Metal to give a gorgeous soft shimmery hint of colour.  Added half of it, plus some of the wording, to the tag along with some pieces of diecut honeycomb from the Tim Holtz thinlits die.

For the second tag I again used Distress Inks for the background through a Tim Holtz flourish stencil, followed by PaperArtsy Grungepaste through another Rebekah Meier design which I highlighted with Treasure Gold.

  

Finally I stamped some images from a selection of Paris stamps from Chocolate Baroque directly onto the tag with the 'Bonjour' being stamped separately a cut out to add to the tag.

ATCs

I almost 'lost it' with the ATCs because I wanted to do a good few layers and nearly obliterated the bottom ones, lol!  In fact the bumping of the dark circles needs a sharp eye to see it ;D.  I used layers of PaperArtsy Fresco Finish chalk paints for most of the stencilling starting with a small dotty one right in the background, then a paint wash then the different sized circles bumped and another thin wash.

The next stencil was Tim Holtz Damask and finally PaperArtsy's new numbers stencil using Grungepaste and Treasure Gold.  I added a bit of script stamping and stamped the quote onto separate card to cut out and stick to the ATCs.  I went round each piece of card with a graphite stick and finally gave them a coat of Colourcraft Acrylic Wax.  I got this from Chocolate Baroque a few weeks ago and it's the first time I've used it.  It gave a lovely soft sheen when it was buffed up and I think a second coat would have looked even better.  There are lots more uses for this product apparently which I will have to explore.

Once again I started off without a clue what I was going to do and ended up having a really nice play.  I can't wait to receive my swaps from my buddies now!

It's nearly weekend folks so have fun whatever you have planned.  Last Saturday I went to a workshop taught by the lovely Sue Carrington.  I thoroughly enjoyed a very relaxing day with lovely ladies and learned lots from Sue but as always I couldn't rush and am now getting a lot of pleasure from painting all the details and embellishments and I'm hoping to have it finished by weekend to show you.

See you soon.

Hugs

Lesley  Xx