A graduation card

My sister graduated last week and I wanted to make a card for her. She has worked very hard and like many mature students really enjoyed her studies. Sandi Toksvig is the Chancellor of her University and she gave a brilliant and rousing speech about what is important in life. It was a happy day!

 

I started with a white panel and added colour with Distress Inks. I know I am rather boring in choosing this colour scheme, but it is like putting on a comfy pair of shoes! I used a Memory Box stencil to make the sunrise. It is only one sided, so I had to flip it round. The image and sentiment are both Inkylicious stamps, stamped using Memento Luxe ink. I did something I haven't tried before which worked well with this ink. The girl's dress didn't stamp too well as I hadn't really let the background dry enough. I have in the past used a Memento dye ink pen to colour in the gaps, but it is visible. This time as I had used the pigment ink, so I got a new sponge eye make up applicator (20 in a pack from Poundland bought for inking not beautifying!) and I gently added some extra ink and it worked very nicely. I added the hills using some torn paper as a mask and more shading sponged around the edge.

I was going to make a wallet in the shape of a mortar board, but I remembered I had some 8 x 8 white card boxes, so I decorated one of those. Apologies for the dreadfully washed out pic. I think I should be writing a permanent apology on this blog to that effect lately!

We seem to have had quite a few duller, cold days recently. I have missed sitting in the garden for my lunch break with my radio programmes on I player and my crochet. I am working my way back through the archives of Ramblings and The Pallisers, which keeps me out of mischief. I hope you are continuing to enjoy the summer whatever you are up to.

Elaine

A Lavinia fairy card

It is one of my lovely crafty friends birthdays today and this is the card I sent her.

The main image is a Lavinia stamp and I used Memento Luxe ink which was recommended to me for its coverage for silhouette stamps, and I have to agree is very good, but takes a while to dry. I am not a great one for fairy images, but I think I have said before I love their little hats in this image, like the knitted hats we used to wear when we were tots! I am showing my age a bit now!

All other stamping and ink shading is done with Distress Inks in Crushed Pistachio (fast becoming a new favourite), Peacock Feathers and Chipped Sapphire.

The other plant images are a mixture of Lavinia, Inkadinkado and Inkylicious and the sentiment a cheapie I picked up at the Rubbernecker stand at Ally Pally sometime, probably for 50p.

It has been so hot here this week, I hope we are over the real peak of temperatures as we have a family barbecue to attend on Sunday which could be a trial otherwise! Being past midsummer does mean more is starting to happen in the veg patch now. We have had our first strawberries and some sun berries with our breakfast this morning and the first courgettes will be ready to pick in a day or two. This is where I hope we will start to reap the rewards of the extra work in the garden that retirement has allowed me!

Wishing you all a lovely weekend.

Elaine

Friends indeed!

I wanted to make a card for a friend to let her know I was thinking of her this week as she is going through a stressful time. I decided to use an Inkylicious sentiment I bought at Ally Pally.

I wanted to make quite a simple and unfussy card. The sentiment is the focal point here. I also bought the star embossed card at Ally Pally as I could see how well it would work with the sentiment. I added a bit of ink shading in various shades of Distress Ink - Tumbled Glass, Broken China and Chipped Sapphire. I am really loving my little round mini DI applicators, they may even tempt me away from my old favourite chunks of Cut and Dry!

 

While I was in the mood for making cards I decided to make a second to add to my box of cards for selling. This time I used a stencil to add ink to the card blank and then added some Imagination Sparkle medium using my finger.

 



I'll leave you with a pic of the lovely sight that greeted me outside the front door yesterday. This beautiful pink lily that has that amazing nutmeggy fragrance of lillies I love so much. The scent got stronger as the day went on.

Things are rather busy here. We are working on renovating the tiny space of an old larder which is only about 1m x 2m. I am going to trial it as a tiny indoor workspace. I have seen lots of cupboard and closet craft spaces and I think it should be as workable as my current winter arrangements in the living room.  There has been lots to do stripping old layers of paint, wallpaper, stuck on carpet and all the grime that goes with it. I have chosen new paint colours and am cooking up ideas of how to make the most of the space. The transformation will be revealed in due course.

Have a good week!

Elaine

Ally Pally

In September I made my regular pilgrimage to Alexandra Palace for the Big Stamping and Scrapbooking Show. I love this show, it is always a special time as I get the chance to catch up with special crafty friends from around the country, to do some fabulous shopping and enjoy the setting in a really special building. This year I had to dash off to the show the day after I got back from holiday and the strain showed when I got up late and had a massive dash! This pic shows the stash I managed to amass at the show, but also during holiday shopping at The Glitterpot and The Craft Barn. I was a very lucky girl!

 

I bought some bookmark tags from Inkylicious and here are my first two efforts. The main stamp image on the orange tag is an Inkylicious stamp called Tree of Life. The sentiment is from Stamp Camp, which I really love, what great rules to live by! I added shading with a Crafter's Workshop stencil. 

 

 

The blue bookmark uses one of the new Kaisercraft sentiment stamps with a pattern added from another Crafter's Workshop stencil. These words mean a lot to a friend of mine and me and I couldn't miss this stamp. I plan to make some more of these to add into Christmas pressies.

 

Elaine x

Valentine's Bunnies

This was the Valentine's card I made for my OH.

Rabbits feature a great deal in our lives, we love them and have wild rabbits in the garden who we feed and interact with. Our cards for each other often feature rabbits and they both did yesterday!

I resorted to the silhouette and ink shaded approach I love so much, working on a dye cut heart. I used Lavinia and Inkylicious stamps with Versafine ink and the sentiment is from a Studio G clear set that cost £1! I love this sentiment and use it so much. I used a mix of Paris Trunk, Adirondack dye and Distress Inks for the ink shading.

This was a little challenging to make as I had to make it while my OH was in the same room. Fortunately he rarely takes much notice of my crafty faffing, so I got away with it!, by doing a little more masking of the image while I was working that would normally be necessary!

Elaine x

A card with some backbone!

Recently my dear friend Debbie asked me to make a suitable card for her osteopath. She wanted a spinal theme in there somewhere and I must confess I was somewhat flummoxed. However, my OH rose to the challenge and suggested using the curve of the spine for a landscape - here is the result!

I started with a computer generated picture of a spine, which I carefully cut out. I inked the sky using the old favourite scalloped nestie masking technique and a masked sun. I added Crafty Individuals trees in suitable places and a swallow from an Artemio set. I used various green inks to colour the foreground and added grasses, ferns and flower heads with a selection of Crafty Individuals and Inkylicious stamps. I matted and layered a couple of times and finished off with a couple of little ready made butterfly embellishments.

Apparently the recipient loved the card, so job well done!

Elaine

Snuggly Pixies

This is a card I made recently for a friend to show I was thinking of her. It uses a lovely new stamp called Star Gazing from Lavinia, plus an old favourite sentiment from a Kaisercraft clear set.

I bought the stamp at Ally Pally and kept it on my craft desk until I actually used it for once! I love those little hats, they are like something from the 1950s best dressed toddler wear catalogue! If they weren't silhouettes I reckon these little ones would be clothed in hand knitted garments! I expect my Mum still has a suitable pattern in her Woman's Weekly archives!! So cute and nostalgic.  

The image and sentiment are stamped in black Versamark. The stamps around the edge are a mixture of Lavinia and Inkylicious grasses. The butterflies are Lavinia again. The background is inked with some Tumbled Glass DI, definitely some Denim Adirondack dye ink, plus something I can't remember! The wings have a little stickles on them.

I am currently being serenaded by a late black bird as the day draws to a close, it is competing with Katie Melua . It is a rather lovely combination!


Hope you are all planning something nice this weekend. Let's hope for a little sunshine. My heart needs a little lift I think, although our apple blossom is just starting to burst through which always makes me feel brighter, it is so beautiful.
 
Elaine x

A shaded landscape card

Life has been chucking a lot in the direction of me and my OH recently and two dear friends have helped us get through this time in so many ways - their love and support has been just wonderful. I wanted to make them a card to say thank you, but I had to wait until things settled down a bit to give me time to do some a decent job with my inking!



I love making cards in this way. I find building up the ink shading can be really soothing. This is an 8 x 8 card, one of my favourite sizes. I started by cutting a sun mask out of Eclipse tape with a small nestie die. Once in place, I added lilac ink from  Paris Trunk ink pad - this newish range has some gorgeous colours. All the ink shading is done with Cut 'n' Dry foam. Then I added a landscape inking over a torn piece of paper, first in Tumbled Glass and then in Stormy Sky Distress Ink. I added a little more Stormy Sky around the sun, before removing the mask.I added all the stamped images in black archival ink. The stamps are a mixture from different companies - one of my favourites the Lavinia vine edging the design, grasses, trees and small birds from Inkylicious, large bird stamp from Tim Holtz and the wording was a loose stamp I bought from the Rubbernecker stand at Ally Pally. I added a little more shading on the paler layer of landscape using my paper mask with just tiny areas of shading. Finally I added darker edging shading with Chipped Sapphire Distress Ink on the bottom half and Eggplant Adirondack dye ink on the top half. I finally matted the inked panel on black to give sharper contrast and definition.

We delivered the card yesterday and I am pleased to report they both really loved it and asked me how I had built up the image. I promised I would show them how it's done some time.

We are hoping life is beginning to settle down a little now and I might have a bit more time for crafting again really soon.

Thanks for popping by

Elaine xx