Friday, August 26, 2011

The Stamp Man Challenge- Travel


The new challenge over at The Stamp Man challenge is travel.


I had to make something quickly before I went on my jolly holibobs, so I whipped up a quick bookmark. Hopefully, this scheduled post has worked, cos I'm back today and I'll be drowning in washing......

The background is sprayed inks, and the lovely car is from the Aspects of Design plate 10- Men's. Available from the Stamp Man as ever. I wanted to emboss the car and have it all glossy and black, but I have zero luck with black embossing powder. So............. tip of the week is....... ink your stamp up with a clear embossing ink pad, then straight away ink it up with your chosen colour- in my case Versafine onyx black. The use fine clear embossing powder. I'm particularly fond of this technique as it allows me to use my favourite Versafine and keep all it's clarity with fine details.


Righto, over to you, show us your travel stuff- there'll be loads of inspiration on the DT challenge blog as ever. My teamies are the most talented bunch :)

Friday, August 12, 2011

The Stamp Man Challenge- Anything goes.....with summer colours

Oooh, it's Stamp Man challenge time again!

This fortnight is my challenge and I want to see......Anything you like.....but in summery colours. So think ice creams, seaside, flowers, sunshine and bright summery days. OK, it may be raining outside my window, but a bit of summer crafting can lift the spirits!!!


I make no apologies for taking the inspiration and technique for my card from a gorgeous spread in Craft Stamper. It's a fabulous way of creating a feature panel. 

Firstly take watercolour paper and spritz lightly with water, then doodle over it with something waterbased- I used Aquatone sticks, but I would think watercolour pencils would be viable. In the article, they used the new Inktense blocks, but I've only got one of those, lol.


Then I lightly spritzed my stamp with water ( I used the fabulous butterfly from the Stamp Man's butterfly beauties set), and coloured over it with the colour sticks. When I stamped it, it bled out perfectly onto the paper. You can soften edges with a wet paint brush, so don't drench it all with water or it'll blur too much. Once you've got the look you're after, blast it with a heat gun to stop the colour spreading. I flicked a few droplets of colour onto the image from a paintbrush too, for that splatter effect.

Once dry I stamped a script stamp randomly with Bundled sage Distress Ink.


The sentiment is from the same stamp set, and I used a little offcut from the watercolour paper to co-ordinate.

A nice tip is to keep spritzing and stamping the stamp onto some more card, I've got another couple of gorgeous background sheets to use on other cards.

I'm entering this into the following challenges:

Stamp Something: Dog days of summer
Fussy and Fancy Friday: Use a lot (I used more than 3 sparkly gems)

Monday, August 8, 2011

This is what lack of sleep looks like......

........ I've been having insomnia bouts, but last week I managed to put one to good use..... well sort of good use.....it went a little bit weird.....




All made from the bits in my leftovers tub! Still rocking the Octopode and Stampotique images :)

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

WOYWW.....a new workmat.


Messy!!! I've covered up a birthday card I was working on, so that the recipient doesn't see it! Other than that, points for spotting.....

  • The big pink ATG monster. Wouldn't be without this, it saves oodles of time.
  • Martha Stewart punches- I'm trialling keeping a few out to punch scraps as I go along to add to my flowers and leaves boxes. It's working so far.....
  • A board book covered in old book pages
  • My birthday card from my lovely friend at work with a goooorgeous picture of Eric the vampire from True Blood.
Actually you can't see my new workmat, but here's my old one, now sadly retired...... I'm trying to work out if there's any bits I can cut up and use again.....



Right, hop over to Julia's Stamping Ground for more desks....

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

I can't resist adding skulls......

......I have a problem adding too many Stampotique skulls. Whoops.


The challenge on the Stampotique designer blog is Red, Yellow and Orange. 

I'm not telling how many candles I am.

Monday, August 1, 2011

Cards, cards, cards.....

I made lots of cards this weekend. Well it was my birthday last week, I was due a nice looong craft.



I'm entering this little House Mouse into the following challenges-

Crafty Cardmakers- flutterbies
Passion for Promarkers- Animal crackers
Crafts and me- ribbon


This little girl is my entry into the Lili of the Valley challenge sketch.



Finally, another House Mouse....

I'm entering this one into.....

Papertake Weekly- sketch
I <3 Promarkers- Anything goes

I'll try for a more interesting post tomorrow...... :)