Quintessentially English

Well...I know I said that I wasn't active enough in doing challenges, but now all my waking thoughts are about challenges and ideas for them..... like it wasn't before!!!!!!!... I think I can remember reading somewhere that being a crafter is like having a thousand tabs open on your window at the same time!!! tis true!!!.
 So this leads me onto the next challenge I am entering... the Indigoblu just one layer challenge, I only have a few Indigoblu stamps to choose from and also one layer is just so hard for me. I started by stamping the Quintessentially English sentiment, then Sleeping George, I mean..how cute is he!!!  I masked him off, then loaded up the Union Jack with acrylic paint and stamped that.  I hope I win the challenge because the prize is more Indigoblu stamps, and I am totally adoring them!!!

Little Hoo Hoo's tight pants!!!

I love playing along in the Stampotique Designers Challenge, and this week the deliciously gothic girl  Arwen McCullen has set the challenge to combine an animals head with a human body!!!! oooohh great challenge....except that I don't have any Stampotique animals...YET... but |I do have the LITTLE HOO HOO monster that is quite animalish!!! and also he is clutching an owl...so I thought that he would qualify...improvisation and all that!!!  Anyway, I have paired him with ARE MY PANTS TOO TIGHT, and just used half his body as Little Hoo Hoo already has arms. et voila!!!

Monochromatic Mama

The Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers are having a  challenge to make a monochromatic card, or a card with one dominant colour, and as it is Mothers Day in America, it has to be a card for Mom. Well I like doing lots of different layers on my cards now so this certainly was a challenge for me.... I mean... you cannot have layers of the same colour can you!!! in the end I made the background by spraying one of my stencils with pink ink spray, then laying the cardstock on top of it...background done!! then I just added the wonderful Moth Fab stamp by Stampotique and printed out the sentiment on my computer... which is absolutely true for me, or when I look down at my hands and see my Mother!!...not that it is a nice thing!!...she has horrid boney fingers, much like the wicked Queen from Disney's Snow White...freaky!!!!

Stencils

This week at the Stampotique Designers Challenge Blogspot, the amazingly talented Corrrie Herriman has set this weeks challenge to use your stencils,  use them with paint, ink, modelling paste, or even gesso!!. well....as usual, I have a huge supply of stencils, and like always, too much choice leaves me with brain freeze!!! and then...which fabulous Stampotique stamped image to use with which stencil???....oh my Lord...the options are endless!!!! I finally chose to use the Memory Box Honeycomb stencil on some corrugated card, I had a riot with spray ink, brushos, acrylic paint, until I got the desired look.  To place my Stampotique MEDIUM BEES on the very uneven surface, I stamped them onto tissue, then adhered them to my surface with matte glaze, then stamped the wings onto parchment paper, cut them out and added them onto the bee image. The sentiment is computer generated.

Pink and Blue

While I was surfing around the net this week, wasting away a few hours, I came across the Lavinia Stamps Challenge Blog where their challenge this month  is "pink or blue or both!!"..... well, I can remember that a few years ago I went to the Doncaster Craft Show and bought a Lavinia Stamps clear stamp set called dandelions, I loved it, then did the usual.... got it home, played with it, put it in the drawer and ......forgot all about it. So coming across this site jogged my memory of this lovely stamp set, so I dug it out, made a background by spraying pink ink onto my craft mat, adding some water, then smooshing and mopping up the  ink with the paper, once it was dry I splattered blue ink, then stamped the beautiful dandelions then added some clear star gelli roll pen on the fronds to give a shimmery effect that you cannot see on the photo). I couldnt use any more stamps as I dont have any more Lavinia Stamps.....YET!!!!

2.3.4..tell the people what she wore!!

I really look forward to Wednesday mornings because there is always a new challenge over at the Stampotique Designers Challenge Blogspot, and this weeks challenge set by Sam Read is all about polka dots!!!..... soooooo I know this is probably the first thing that comes into everyone's mind...and sorry for being so predictable..... but it did make me chuckle when I made the itsy bitsy teeny weeny yellow polka dot bikini for REAR VIEW MIRROR to wear. :) :) :)

keeping it simple

My new favourite shop is That's Crafty.....because they stock my new love.....Carabelle Studio Stamps, especially the Birgit Koopsen Stamps.....ooooohhh they are so yummy, and the beautiful art she does to show off her stamps is amazing!!!!. I recently bought one of the XXL stamps, the art journal dream stamp which is so big that it comes on its own A4 acrylic block, it is a giant and I adore it. While I was browsing the That's Crafty online shop, I noticed they have a blog and also a fortnightly challenge blog where this fortnights challenge is to keep things simple, so I got my new stamp out, spritzed it with spray inks and placed my cardstock on the stamp, then dried it with my heatgun, then stamped the dragonfly stamp with stazon and added some stickles to his wings......simples.
I am feeling like I need to do more challenges now, I generally need a theme to get my brain whirring into action, it gives me a starting point, otherwise I feel like the proverbial author with the first blank page staring up at me!!! I am also entering this card in the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge which is an anything goes week.

OH CRAP!!!!!

This week the Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers are challenging you to make a quick card,  in ten minutes, well I hope they didn't include the thinking time in that too cos it took me a while to think of what to do within the ten minutes time slot. I know I had to keep it simple...obviously!!!, which you would think is easy to do, but I swear that the clean and simple look is the hardest thing to achieve, I will leave that talent to the likes of Debby Hughes who does amazing CAS work.

As it is a snarky stampers blog, I like to do cards for their challenges with a bit of snark or humour, I remembered that I have these DIRT PILE and OH CRAP!! rubber stamps from Hambo Stamps, their stamps always have an element of fun to them.
I started off with a drop of distress ink and water on my craft mat, smooshed the cardstock into it, added a few splatters, while that was drying I stamped the dirt pile image then coloured it and cut it out, layered the background onto some brown cardstock and stuck to my card base, glued some drywall tape, and the image on, and then added the sentiment. super easy and quick!!!

SDC191 Circles

For this weeks challenge over at the Stampotique Designers Challenge the absolutely amazingly talented Magda Polakow.....(oh the wonderful art that lady can produce with scraps of paper and painters tape!!!).....has challenged us all to use circles in our creations.
My mind went immediately to the fabulous Lin Brown Paperartsy stencil that I have, a stencil with different size circles and circle clusters, it is gorgeous. so I set off by using the stencil with some texture paste, leaving it to dry, and then using a mixture of paints and spray paints. WOW!!! I cannot even tell you how many changes I have made to the colours of this card, it is a wonder that the card didn't disintigrate with all the wet layers it went through. I wanted to achieve a shimmer around the circles, sounds easy... and yes I used tons of shimmer mist, but then it affected all the other areas...GRRRRRRRRRRR. at one point I got so frustrated that I was going to screw it up and throw it in the bin!!!!.... but after all the sprays and paint layers I just couldn't bring myself to, and in the end I am glad because my perseverance paid off, I love the background now... so I added the LARGE SHROOM and the cute BURU character, then when all was matted and dried, I proceeded to take photo's of my work!!!! well all you crafters that try to take a clear photo of a very shimmery image will know my frustration....AAAARRRRGGGGGGGHHHHH. you will just have to take my word for how much more  beautiful and shimmery this card is in real life.

Tim's April Tag

I have not played along in Sir Tim Holtz's Tag challenge for a while now, so I thought I would give it a go for this month.   HERE  is Tim's tag, he has used his beautiful new flower stamps, well...  haven't got them...YET!!, and I haven't got his new word dies...YET!!! I adore them, and they are on my list along with many other things!!!  whoever said that crafting was cheap...was an absolute fool!!!. so anyways, I have used the supplies that I have got, the word "life" is the first line from one of his "good thoughts" stamps, and the cage and bird are from the artful flight stamp set. plenty of splattering and sewing....oooohhh yummy...my two favourite things.

I'm in Stitches!!!!

I don't seem to be able to do a card now without adding some stitching around the edge with my sewing machine, it seems to help draw the card centre to the eye, so I was so glad when I saw that this weeks challenge at the Stampotique Designers Challenge Blogspot  is all about "stitches"....  Coby is the hostess this week and she says   "I love stitches in my creations, sometimes stamped, sometimes by hand, sometimes with the sewing machine".   so she is challenging us to use stitching in our creations.
I saw this quote and I thought it just perfect for this challenge, I do like to take things quite literally!!!, anyhow, I thought I would try it first on some copy paper that I have been using as a mat for a while so that I don't get lots of gunge and inks on my surface, I printed out the quote on the paper and then cut it right through the quote, crumpled up the cut edge slightly, then stuck the two pieces onto another piece of card, but offset the quote slightly, then hand stitched down the cut.  Well I liked it so much that I decided to use this "test piece" so I added the fabulous MOTH FAB image, then with my sewing machine I did some stitching round the edge. I love it when a plan comes together straight away instead of the usual three or four attempts to get it right!!!!...ah well...there is no such thing as a waste of paper, for every time I don't get it quite right, I just alter it with another layer of paint!!! I am so frugal when it comes to paper, I won't even let my partner throw away any waste copy paper he has.....and he always has loads with all the rubbish he is printing and making mistakes!!! ahh well...more for me.

"Just Kidding"

A couple of weeks ago I won the Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers go green challenge with THIS card, but as I was away on my holidays at the time,I couldn't be guest designer for the week afters challenge, so they have kindly let me join in on this weeks challenge which is all about "just kidding"....make a funny card!!!!.....so I took it quite literally and used the words in my quote....which I think is quite funny, it had me chuckling anyhow!!!!.   To join in this weeks fun challenge then you will find it here at the Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers blogspot.