Christmas

Hello to anyone who is reading my blog and a Happy Christmas to you.

I have actually made some Christmas cards again this year.
I usually leave it so late that I just don't get them finished!

I bought a lovely Stampendous stamp which is suitable for winter birthdays and Christmas. I found it could be a robin or a blue tit or any other little bird actually.
One of the cards was coloured to look like a long tailed tit.
I think it's a very pretty stamp and have enjoyed using it.

This one was stamped onto a wooden laser cut bauble, by Artcuts. It could be taken off the card to hang as a decoration as there was a message stamped underneath as well.

On the back I stamped a lovely Christmas verse from Hobby Art.

 

 

The delicate shimmer on the cards was created with a Wink of Stella clear pen, from Hobby Art.

 

Best wishes to you all for 2015.

Carole

A present to myself

Hello to anyone reading my blog and thank you for visiting.


I have been having a play with metal again and decided to finish altering a box that I have had for ages.
 I made one similar for a friend ages ago but didn't get around to finishing mine.

This lovely wooden square box was given to me as a gift, it was filled with a gorgeous Belgian chocolate cake. The cake was delicious but I was equally excited about the lovely box it came in!
Perfect as a base for a metal embossed lid and perfect to store my sampler pieces of embossed metal I was working on.

So here it is.

I am really pleased with the finished result and am planning to cover the lid of  another box I have if I can find the time.
 Embossing metal is a technique I really enjoy and I certainly should do more of it.

I planned out the design on a piece of paper first, to make sure  the words fitted on well and left room for the dragon.
The dragon was stamped onto the metal with StazOn black ink first  and then the words were fitted around. I coloured the dragon with alcohol ink.
Once it was embossed and coloured, I in filled  the back with quick drying filler so that the raised embossing did not get flattened when handled.

It was then stuck on with strong double sided adhesive and a strong glue.
 I used  a very old Creative Expression dragon stamp, die cut letters and an embossing folder to create the design.


Until next time.
Carole

card for a friend

Hello.


Just a quick post today as I've just realized when my last one was put up!!

My  card making has been very spasmodic recently but I have managed a few cards recently.
I made this one as a wedding card, using a favourite Chocolate baroque stamp. The heart could be taken off as a decoration.

 

 

 Hope you like it.

Time for tea.

Teatime plaque

Hello again.
Welcome to anyone I met at the Handmade fair on Friday, at Hampton Court.
What an amazing venue!
I had a great time speaking to new, and experienced crafters, and there was loads of interest in the Artcuts products.

I hope everyone who came had an enjoyable day and thank you for all the positive feedback.

Just a quick post today to show a plaque that quite a few people admired.

 

 

The board was painted with the pink coloured acrylic paint, left to dry, then a crackle glaze put on top. When this was dry, I painted over with the light colour and left it to dry and crackle.

 

 

The teapot and cups were painted and when dry, I scuffed the edges.

The heart shapes and letters were stuck down with full strength PVA glue.

The stamping was done with a Versafine black inkpad, using stamps from Hobby Art.

 

Seeing the photo of the plaque now, I think it would have looked better if the flowers had been stamped with a pink colour rather than black.

Next time!! 

 

Thanks for visiting

Carole

 

 

 

 

 

Artcuts Dog

Hello everyone.

I've been having great fun playing again with the wooden shapes.

On a previous post I showed you a cat that I had made with various shapes, and I felt that the dog enthusiasts were being left out.

So,  here are the dog samples I did for the Stamparama show in Stevenage recently, and I think they turned out really cute.
It's a toss up as to which I prefer.

The black dog's body  had a design stamped onto it and embossed with silver embossing powder. I used an Inkylicious  butterfly stamp for this as it has a lovely flourish design for the wings.
It was then painted over with a watered down acrylic paint. Some areas were then covered with a silver metallic pen and ,when this was dry, sanded back.


The brown dog was coloured with Distress stains.
These are lovely on the wood as they are transparent and you can still see the patterns of the wood grain underneath, which I like to see.
The ears and tails are different shapes in both dogs and the eyes are slightly different sizes. The bone added a finishing touch.


The dogs were quite well received, particularly with the youngsters who attended the show.

I always  enjoy chatting to people when I am demonstrating  and getting feedback from them. I particularly like to listen to the children as they are always very open with their comments.

 One young lad wanted to make the brown dog and we discussed how it was put together and he took a photo to remind him. I explained to him how I always take ages to find the expression that I like. By moving the eyes and nose into different positions the expression can be changed.

I usually draw around the shapes and put the facial elements into different positions to see which expression I like best. I "waste" so much time doing this, but time well spent I feel!

He agreed that this was a good idea and said that he wanted a sad dog.  I showed him how the eye position can be changed to achieve this. He also observed that the head piece on each dog was a different way around. Again this changes the look of the face.

As he went away he thanked me and earnestly told me that he thought he would be spending quite a long time making the dog to get it just right.

That made my day!
To think that he was going to get so much enjoyment out of making the dog, just as I had done.



I asked him to take a photo to show me next time. I hope he is able to as I'd love to see what he did.

Since writing this the young man  mentioned above has sent Artcuts a photo of his work. He did a good job . It looks great , well done to him.

Hope you like them too.
Enjoy
Carole

More Artcuts hearts

Stamping onto wooden hearts by Artcuts

 I thought you might like to see a few more hearts stamped with some of my favourite stamps.

I generally like to use fairly bold designs, as you can see. They are stamps from various companies.
 Chocolate Baroque, Indigo Blu, Woodware, being the main stamps I like to use.

This is one of my particular favourites by indigo Blu. I have done several things with this stamp and am in the process of making a necklace pendant at the moment.

 

He just needs some crowns to go either side of him, to complete the banner.

It's so sweet.

 

 

 

 

I have stamped straight onto the wood with Versafine and then coloured. with watercolour pencils. The background colour is done with a variety of mediums, Versamagic and Brilliance inkpads are my favourite way of colouring the backgrounds but slightly watered down acrylic paint gives a lovely light  wash effect, and can look good too.

 

 

This is a close up of one of my favourite cards. it is stamped with a gorgeous fushia stamp by Chocolate Baroque. The background paper is one of the lovely handmade screen printed papers that Artcuts sells.

 

 

 

 

I have overlaid a smaller heart over the big heart, although it is difficult to see this in the photo.

 

Thank you for visiting.

 

Carole

Flower pot card for a friend

Hello to anyone reading this .

Welcome to my blog and thank you for visiting.

Haven't been around blogging for a while as I have recently had a cataract operation and crafting and blogging has been a challenge, as my eyes are unbalanced at the moment.
An interesting experience!!


The card I am showing today is a flower pot card that I have made for a friend who likes gardening.
I really like this design which has been around for ages, but I have only made it once before.

It took me quite a long time  to cut  the  flowers out and put them together, but I think it was worth it.

The pot was cut from an embossed piece of card and the size adjusted to fit well with the large flowers.


The flowers are made with Heartfelt Creations stamps and dies.
The leaf flourish is a Marianne D die I think.

A message is written on the card  which pulls up from inside the pot.

Below is another version which is smaller in size and I used a poinsettia die.

The photo does not do the colours justice as they look a bit washed out! Terrible photography on my part.

 

 

Can't stop making them now and find making the flowers quite therapeutic.

At least it uses up papers that I have had in my stash for years!!!

 

Hope you have enjoyed looking.

Please visit again sometime.

 

Carole