Good bye September

Well here we are at the end of the month and outside its Brilliant sunshine and quite warm by day! I realised I had not blogged all my cards from the last clarity weekend which was at the start of this month so I am just going to put them on here for you now!

Firstly this one featuring the 3 kings set.
I started off cutting baubles using a spellbinders set and used white and purple embossing powder.

On the larger bauble I stamped the music ramdomly and then heat embossed in black sparkle wow powder.









This one was my attempt to combine the christmas sets and create a Nativity scene.



After all the christmas stamps we had been given recently it came as a refreshing change to get other things to work with including some stencils of the tree scape.

So out came the gelli plate and Backgrounds were created!

I then used them with different stamps to create different cards.
This one I made an aperture and then stamped the cottage and trees to create a cottage in the woods scene.
I did like the softness to the colours on this one.


Ducks and trees were the order of the month and so I made another treescape print on th eGelli plate but this time no aperture. I then stamped the ducks onto Theuva card and coloured them in with promarkers. I cut them out. The sentiment that came with the ducks I stamped onto another piece of card and made a banner out of it. I blended some ink round the edge of this so that it did not look too stark when it was put on to the picture. I used two brads in the banner to make it look more authentic.




My idea was that the ducks were flying out of the forest in search of the lake!
I was pleased how the two stencils had lined up quite well and I had used Barbara Gray's tip of putting a piece of the card under the gelli plate to line everything up....how does she know these things!!

The next one with the ducks was done on a gelliplate back ground I had left over from making samples for Maria's show. I used the sapling trees and the ducks in the aperture. This time I stamped the sentiment and used a spellbinders label to cut it out. I then drew round the die onto the card I had got from creating the aperture to make the mat for it.
The grasses are one of the spellbinders delites. Round the outside of the card I blended ink then wrote then words quack quack and joined it all up with a wiggly line to finish it off.

The next one I made was using the silhouette ducks and the sapling trees. I stamped and embossed the trees and ducks in black. I made sure I had used an anti static bag before I did this so to avoid unwanted black dots. I then used brushes to blend ink around the edges bringing in to the centre but leaving the very centre white.

I used mustard seed first then spiced marmalade to get the really depth of colour I wanted.

The next two were using the next classroom stamps!

I love trees and think this helped when I got these stamps. I could have made many more samples but left it at just two. The first of these was to try and show how the seasons can change the look of a tree by using different colours of inks to represent the changing seasons.

The last card I did just popped into my head and is supposed to be a scene with a couple of big old trees in a field at sunrise or sunset which ever you want it to be!
I used the brayer to do the sky and make up sponge to do the hills and the sun. 

I really enjoyed these stamps and could have made many more so they will be being used again in the future.

I hope you enjoyed looking at the cards and reading about them.
I would appreciate it if you could leave me a comment. 

Happy Crafting

Jane xx 


 

Sweet Lilac Flowers Summertime Challenge

Good Evening
A really quick post to show you the card I have made for the Sweet Lilac Flowers Summertime Blog challenge. I have used the clarity Poppy stamp set and sending you sunshine sentiment but the flowers are all from Sweet lilac.

I hope you like it


Happy Crafting


Jane xx

We Three Kings!

Well one week into the new school year and all is OK ish! My voice had disappeared yesterday I think because it's been used so much this week! But having a rest yesterday and lots of steam doing the ironing this morning seems to have got it a bit better! Hopefully it will have reappeared completely by tomorrow!
Not only had my voice deserted me yesterday but my crafting mojo had also gone walkabouts! I am putting it down to tiredness and hope normal service will resume shortly!

Anyway I thought I had best start to put on my cards from last weekends show!

This one was using the We three Kings set.

 

I stamped the Music first then masked that off. I masked off the edge of the card. The star was stamped and embossed in clear powder. I used the hills mask and created a desert scene using Mountain Rose adirondack ink. I removed the mask from the edge of the card and sponged around the mask on the music stave. I then stamped the three kings into place and went round the scene with a black fineliner pen.

 

I matted and layered the topper onto black and gold before putting it onto a sand coloured cardstock card blank and finished it off with little black gems.

 

Hope you have a nice day!

 

Happy Crafting

 

Jane xx

Quack quack

Just a really quick post of one of the cards from todays show! It had to be done...as soon as I saw the ducks fall out of the envelope I just knew one of my samples had to be a take on Hilda Ogdens Ducks! (from Coronation street in days gone by for those of you who are too young to remember)

Here it is

 

One of the ducks was always wonky and usually it was the middle one! Heres a close up of the ducks!

 

I will also say I remember my Grandma having some of these and I inherited them and had them flying up my stairs!

 

 

Thanks for looking and please let me know what you think

 

Happy Crafting

 

Jane xx





Vintage

Well It is that time already and I am now planning my return to work! I can't believe the holidays have been and almost gone! At least I have had the clarity weekend to end my holiday on. A workshop with Maria Simms and Clarity NW and Barbara on the telly (I had to record the Classroom as I was at the workshop) But today I will be watching. I think you will all like the new stamps!

I also feel a bit dull with me getting rid of my pink hair and dying it a more respectable school teacher colour! However the pink didn't fully come out and it has given the brown a bit of a reddish tone!! Oh well it'll have to do!
 
Right enough about me and on with the challenge!
Last month we saw lots more fabulous entries all with animals. Well done to our winner and to the top five! It gets harder and harder each month as everyone seems to just get better and better!

This Month we have chosen VINTAGE as our theme and we would like you to come up with a project that fits in with that feel! It can be a card or a clock or a piece of altered art ...its up to you! All we ask is that the stamps you use must be only from clarity but you can use anything else you like in the way of embellishments, inks, paints or dies. And remember there is a prize for one of the entries picked at random of £50 to spend at Claritystamp so its well worth your while having a go! You never know it could be you!

If you go to the Challenge Blog you will see lots of inspiration and different ways that the DT have interpreted this theme!

Here is the card I made!

 

I started by stamping Kasha in place I then made a mask for her and then stamped the bike so it looked like it was behind her! I stamped in Adirondack Espresso. I then made a mask to look like bricks....Clarity did not have theirs when I made this card but that would be perfect for it now!... and using an ink duster I made a very pale background.

I made under the wheels of the bike darker and added shadow around Kasha's feet! I then stamped the vine above her head to finish off the picture. For Kasha herself I found a lovely piece of papre in my stash and thought it looked like old silk. I stamped her out on it then cut out the dress, hat and shoes from the paper and used this to colour her in! I inked under the lines on her dress to make it look like layers.

 

I added a rusty red colour to the bike frame and also to the berries on the vine and pale skin tones to Kasha's face hands and legs. I cut a curve in the top edge of the topper then darkened the edge with some walnut stain distress ink and also did some direct to paper inking with the edge of the distress ink pad!! Dont be frightened to to this but also know when to stop!!

Here is a closer view of the topper

 

I matted this onto a rectangle of brown and then diecut 2 corners from some gold miri card.

I found a piec of card stock that was cream but it looked like wood grain and I went over it lightly with the ink dusters and walnut stain distress ink and it picked out the pattern even more. I positioned the topper so it was well over towards the right of the card then found some beige ribbon and put a piece down the left hand side of the card. This was then mounted onto the 8 x 8 blank card. To finish off I made a bow form another piece of the same ribbon. I made some spiral flowers ou of the same paper I had used on Kasha's dress and diecut the fern leaves which I then arranged around the bow with two hat pins in there as well.

 

I hope you have enjoyed looking at my project and see how I made it!

The stamps I used were

Large Kasha

Bicycle

Hanging Vine

and the stencil you could use for the wall background is here 

 

Please have a go at the challenge for yourself and also visit the blogs of the DT where you can see more details about their individual projects!

 

Ok so thats it! Over to you!

 

Please leave me a comment to let me know what you thought of my project.

 

Happy Crafting

 

Jane xx