Steampunk beetle birthday

You may remember I was lucky enough to win a smashing prize from the Darkroom Door and Art Journey shared blog hop recently. I finally managed to get some ink onto one of the stamps for a birthday card for a 21 year old great nephew (phew does that make me feel old - in numbers if not in my head!). Anyway this is the result of my playing.

I started off ink shading with Mown Lawn, Salty Ocean and Tumbled Glass DIs. I then overstamped with the DD numbers background stamp in black archival ink. I used a sentiment from the very useful DD String Sentiments set on a panel shaded with the same inks which I mounted onto black. I also added some shading around the edge of the numbers panel with Chipped Sapphire DI. I was than a bit stumped as to what to do next.  Cards for men and boys always have me flummoxed! So I decided to go steampunk and used one of my favourite images from the Chocolate Baroque Steampunkery set. This also provided the small words I added. I fussy cut the image and then ink shaded with more DIs before adding some further shading with Prisma pencils in blue and white.  The final touch was a metal clock face from DoCrafts which fitted the design perfectly.

Even my OH liked this one which is very rare and said "oh its steampunk" - you could have knocked me down with one of the beetle's feathers because I didn't even think he knew what steampunk was!!!!

Hope you are all having a super weekend. Yesterday I made the trek up to the Big Stamping and Scrapbooking Show at Ally Pally and spent the day doing some fabulous shopping and catching up with some special friends Judith and Sue in our much needed refreshment breaks! These days always go far too quickly (despite leaving home before 8am and getting home after 8pm) and make me spend too much money, but they are always so enjoyable. I had another crafty friend to travel up with which always help the long journey go more quickly too.

I have to earn my keep today and get on with some housework! My lovely shopping will get unpacked at some point too though!

Whatever you are doing, I hope you enjoy a lovely autumn day.  I leave you with some amazing diamond raindrops on my macleaya plant in the garden that had me rushing into the garden with the camera one morning still in my pjs!

Elaine x

More Christmas In September

I am on a roll with these Christmas cards now and came up with a very quick idea I am thrilled with. A while back I bought the Dina Wakely Scribbly Birds stamps. These were a real extravagance because if I am honest it is only this image I really love! Then I got the new TH Christmas words set and in a moment of serendipity when I was tidying the sets on my desk I realised how wonderfully they match! This is the result!

As you can see I stamped the bird and sentiment on a craft card in black Versafine. Even that looked alright actually! Then I restamped the bird onto cream card and sponged ink - Vintage Photo and Barn Door DI before sticking it into place. I loved these little cards even though they are so simple and will no doubt make a few more. They are so quick. Even with the cutting out and sponging the whole design only takes a few minutes.

It is definitely the time of mists and mellow fruitfulness here. We picked our damsons this weekend, I have made elderberry syrup to ward off the coughs and colds and these hops are some of the largest I have ever seen.

 

Apparently it is another night when the Northern Lights may be visible from the north of England and Scotland, no good for us, but good luck if you are in the right areas you lucky things.

 

Have a great weekend

 

Elaine 

Christmas in September

I was determined to get ahead with my Christmas cards this year. I started off with good intentions in January to make 10 a month. It hasn't happened, but I am making reasonable progress with batches and now have 36 under my belt and more underway.

I have made a batch of these cards. Three different snowflakes (Personal Impressions - Let it Snow-flakes) stamped in three different shades of turquoise and blue. The sentiment is Inkylicious stamped in Versafine Majestic Blue and then the edge lighted shaded with Tumbled Glass DI. I finished off with some matching layers and a few gems.

I am really enjoying working in my new tiny craft area and I am amazed at how much I can squash in there. Everything is close at hand that is for sure and I find myself with lots of inspiration as I sit listening to the radio or podcasts! I have been busy indexing my ink pads. I know I have an addiction, but I am amazed at how many I have. I have been stamping each colour onto tiny tags to be kept on book rings.

It will be great to sort them into colour families so that I make much better use of them. I was very interested in how the different inks perform just how many amazing colours I have. I am especially pleased to have a reference of my much paler colours that I often forget to use. I think my final plan is to set up something like Jenifer Maguire here, a system one of my kind crafty friends pointed out to me.

Elaine

Be Happy!

I had to make a card for our young male apprentice at work who was leaving us. Never an easy task! This is what I came up with.

The Tim Holtz dragonfly stamp is so useful for male cards I feel because of the added lines like an architects drawing it seems less girly somehow! I coloured the image with my Peerless watercolour paints. I still can't get over their usefulness - all that colour in such a compact form. I splatted on some watered down Vintage Photo DI ink and then shaded the edges with Stormy Sky DI.

I die cut some dictionary paper with my new Stampin' Up Banner dies (I know these are going to get many outings). I actually chose the page that said journey on it. I overlaid that with some vellum so I could stamp the sentiment which comes from the same Woodware stamp I used on my little girl card a couple of posts ago. I finished off with two wooden scrabble tiles and a die cut "Happy" using an Avery Elle die. Looking at it now, maybe I should have straightened up the "h" in happy a bit more, but never mind!

I am looking forward to an unstructured bank holiday weekend with no real commitments, which feels like bliss! Have a fun one yourselves!

Elaine x

We do like to be Beside the Seaside!

I love Graphic 45 papers, but I am very bad at using the papers when I buy them. Making a birthday card for my special friend Jo who love miniature details provides a perfect excuse.

This is a 8 x 8 card with all the little elements fussy cut and layered up. I added some smashing shell embellishments from K & Co, these have glittered detail, but I felt they were a perfect addition to my design. You can see the sparkle here.

I am enjoying working in my new craft space. I gradually seem to be refining the organisation of my space and a green vegetable rack purchased in the Hospice furniture shop for £1 has given me three levels of extra useful space. I have made about 6 cards, including some Christmas cards this week, so my productivity seems to be pretty good at the moment, more of that later.

Hope you are enjoying your weekend. It is pretty chilly here today, such a shame as we are off to a garden party today, it is definitely feeling like autumn is in the air! I am glad we had our holiday when we did!

Elaine

A quick card and a holiday!

We have been away for a few days in west Dorset and had a lovely short break. Although the weather forecast wasn't great, in fact for the most part we were blessed with hot sunshine, almost too hot at times!

 

We stayed in this lovely converted railway carriage and it was super. The inside had been restored into beautiful comfy and very well appointed accommodation.

 

 

We also had the use of another van for extra space! This was the inside! It was a super place to sit and read!

 

 

We enjoyed some peaceful places off the beaten track where possible to avoid the busier places as it was peak school holiday season.

 

 

We also enjoyed some much needed R & R!

 

 

Evenings provided the opportunity to sit out in the garden and watch the sun go down.

 



 

After a detour to a lovely relaxed family wedding on the way home,  we got home late on Saturday. I have been pottering since making the most of my last couple of days before going back to work tomorrow. Here is a quick card I made, I seem to have loads of birthdays coming up through August and September.

 

I sponged through a Crafters Workshop stencil with Spiced Marmalade DI, and shaded the edges with Adirondack dye inks in Watermelon and Cranberry.  Quite a fruity recipe now I come to think of it! The balloon girl image is Hope by Bee Crafty stamps. I have to say it is not the easiest stamp to use as it has a lot of extra background polymer that catches the ink. The sentiment is from a Woodware set. The panel is mounted on black card measuring 4 x 4 inches.

 

Hope you are all safe and dry after the wet weather of the weekend. I think despite being down here on the south coast we escaped quite lightly thankfully.

 

Elaine

My new craft room!

Hope you are all having a good weekend. I am here with an update on my little mini indoor craft room! It may seem that I am making a big deal about my new space of 1 x 2 m in what was the old larder of our house, but I had completely given up hope of any dedicated indoor craft space of my own as our house is quite small. I had carved out a corner of the living room, but it made the room seem messy and cluttered. It was only when my OH asked for help to access the window in our old larder which was used to store cleaning materials and recycling I started to cook my idea! This picture shows the "before" state, after we had stripped off the old wallpaper and carpet. Although it looks awful I suspect anyone with an older house can relate to this sort of look! Our house was build in the 1890s.

My OH has been a trooper, patiently replacing skirting board, painting and wallpapering. This is the stage I showed last time with the wallpaper giving a clean, fresh blank canvas.

The colour I chose for the walls was a chalk paint in a pea green colour. It seemed very dark at first after the bright white, but I am used to it now. This pic shows how we were designing a two layer desk top. Note the spacers which are 4 jars of chutney and jam! Very technical approach there! I had wanted a two layer desk for ages so I could stow my guillotine under my work surface. This was something I have seen on Pinterest and pinned onto my Craft Room ideas board which has grown completely out of hand with over 800 pins!

The blue drawers don't match very well, but I was trying to recycle what I had as this is a trial at this stage to see how it works. This also means that we have not put any shelving onto the walls, but we will later if it all works out in the longer term. The four drawers each side hold Kitchen roll and baby wipes, folding boards and die cutting plates, watercolours, pan pastels, Treasure Gold, colouring pencils, adhesives, embossing supplies and heat guns, brushes and sponges and gems and embellishments.

This is the desk with all the "stuff"  added. Essential tools, pens and brushes are all close to hand. The lower shelf now holds the guillotine as planned and two wooden trays of work in progress. I can tuck my cutting and glass mats down the left side of the drawers and I have added a couple of plastic boxes of stamps in my knee hole, one of which provides a comfy foot rest. A caddy to the left on top of the ink pad racks holds essential cardstock supplies. The containers with telephone boxes are waiting to be painted black, but are a very useful size for brushes, scissors etc.

Once again my lovely cassette racks are pressed into service for my ink pads. They fit nicely against the wall and this one has all my acrylic blocks stowed above in an Ikea Perspex container.

Excuse this rather blurry pic, this is the unit you can see to the right against the wall in the pic above. I had to move it in order to take a photo! This was a little Ikea wooden drawer unit, currently minus its drawers which has been pressed into service as a narrow shelf unit. My OH has fitted it with castors for me so it can be moved easily. I am using it to house 6 x 6 pads, boxes of punches and most of my Bigz dies. My Distress Ink carousel is housed on the top. You can see my die cutting machine on the floor. I miss having space for my Big Shot, but am going to try and make myself use the new one as it is so much more compact as well as being able to cut up to A4. Not far away I have access to my die collection, coloured card and card blanks.

I finished off by adding a present from a special friend, a panel by Kelly Rae Roberts as this reminds me of the special friendships that crafting has blessed me with.

Hope you enjoyed the "tour" around my new tiny space. I think I have crammed in as much as I dare without making it all feel too cramped and cluttered! Before long I hope to be sharing some lovely things I have made there!!!

Elaine