More journal pages

Hi there;
I've been working in the studio almost all day but since I can't share those yet I thought I'd share the rest of my journal pages done recently.  I started by finishing one I'd started. Some of my class atendees will perhaps recognise it!

 Then it was haul out the pens time again; no, I was not bored, I enjoy doing this!

 Loads of Dylusions and Distress goodness.

 Another pen moment on a page, I think the Tim tape really blends in with doodling, Zentangle, sketching.... whatever you call it

 And this I really like; it turned out really really well in my humble opinion! Lots of vibrant colours and techniques, and the sentiment and the birds fit really well together!

 I confess to chopping the birds legs off and re drawing them to suit .....

Hope you are all having a good time too. I may pop out to the studio again....... inspiration has knocked so I'll catch up later.

Journal pages

Hi there folks.
I've been a bit busy trying to get all sorts done but inbetween things I've been working on a few journal pages so I thought I'd share them with you today and tomorrow. I really enjoyed doing this one. The background is Dylusions inks. I wrote out the words and then doodled my way around.

 This one, it's so bright I needed sunglasses to work on it! Dylusions pinks are PINK! I'm not sure if this is finished yet, Jury is still out! What do you lot think? Distress markers are great for this kind of detail work too. I use them a lot alongside the Dylusions inks.

 Last one for today, I'm pleased with the way she turned out; and I think the sentiment works well too!

Hope you like them and I'll see you tomorrow to share the next few pages....... have a blessed and creative time.

Sizzix at The Craft Barn

Good morning everyone
Hope you are all well. Over at The Craft Barn blog this week we've been looking at Sizzix dies and today is my turn. When I was looking at some of the new dies, Birds #3 popped out at me and I loved the quirky style of them.
I used the bigger bird on this journal page.

 The background for the page has been created using one of the techniques from my journalling #2 class to create a nice textured base. I stamped around this with Dylusions further around the edge stamp and coloured it in with inks

 The bird was cut out of white card and I stamped detail using Dylusions Doodle parts stamps before colouring in as before. What I like is that the die cuts everything separately so you can colour in details like the beak, eyes and feet easily. The beak and feet and the pupil of the eye have been coloured with Distress Marker (Wild Honey and Black Soot)

 The sentiment is from Dylusions Quintessential Quotes which I thought was appropriate for the page too.

The bird has been attached loosely to the page with a velcro fastener to allow for some hidden journalling too.
Hope you like it. For more Sizzix inspiration do pop on over to the blog and take a look at the weeks projects HERE


Materials links

Sizzix dies - Birds #3

Dylusions stamps - Further around the edge, doodle parts and quintessential quotes 

Dylusions spray inks - assorted colours

Waterbrushes (medium- I use them with the inks but you can use ordinary brushes and spray some ink onto a craft sheet.)

Gesso

Black pen

WOYWW 171

Good morning folks.
A bit of a change to my desk today; it's on my lap! I am working on some pages where the focus is on pens and doodling so I was working in front of the telly last night (CSI) and kinda continued this morning. I'm sure normal chaos will resume next time but this is my desk today!

 All the essentials are here; Journal with prepared backgrounds, my Dylusions ink in fillable brushes and distress markers and an assortment of black and white pens!

 This is the page I am doing at the moment.

Then I drew out these alphabets so when I feel "lazy" I don't have to think I can use them as a jumping board. Though if you compare them to the letters used on the page, they are not exactly the same!

So there's my little mobile desk this morning; I'm sure if you hop on over to Julia's at Stamping Ground you'll find many more exciting places. Have a good week folks.

Quick visit to the "Pool"

Hi there everyone.
Back home after a quick busy couple of days up North getting my eldest daughter settled into her first year at Uni up in Preston. She was so excited it was lovely to see so I managed not to be reduced to a blubbering wreck! Loads to unpack, huge notice board which made her very happy! So she's off on the next stage of her life.... Enjoy the journey.

 So that was on Sunday then on Monday before coming home I met up with Jo from Jozart (At last!) and had a cuppa and a chat. It was great to meet her and we could easily have chatted all day but alas I has a 5 hour drive to do so had to get going! Not before a picture though.

Jo also spoilt me with a goodie bag of treats to play with, I'm looking forward to playing with these! Thanks Jo.

Right, I'd better get off to work so I'll catch up later.

Upcoming class at The Craft Barn

Good morning everyone
Hope you're having a good weekend so far.
On Sunday 23rd September I'll be at the Craft Barn for my Funky embossed cards class; starting at 10:30 why don't you join me for a day of cardmaking fun?
We'll be using Embossing folders Dylusions and Distress inks and markers to create a bunch of funky cards in an assortment of ways. All the details are HERE if you are interested.

We'll even be making the folder to keep them in so it's ideal as a gift too!

 Have yourselves a blessed and creative day!

Quick journal page

Morning folks and welcome to the weekend!

This morning I thought I'd share this journal page with you.

 The pages have been inked with Dylusions inks and masks. Stamping on the page is done with Dylusions further around the edge stamps to add the border detail and leaves

 There's some freehand doodling going on too. The main image of the girl is from Katzelkraft, stamped onto board and coloured in with Distress Markers and stains before glazing.

Isn't it a lovely image. They are available direct from France HERE or if you are in the UK then they are available exclusively from The Craft Barn HERE (all the inks and Dylusions stamps are also available from The Craft Barn too!)

Tattered flowers

Hi there
The other morning I was sitting feeling pretty uninspired and couldn't quite get myself going; I know we all have times like that. Still, I didn't want to mess any of the stuff I was sort of working on up, neither did  I want to waste what time I had..... So I made flowers; quite a few actually. And as a bonus, because I was sort of casual about it I took photos along the way so you can do them too if you like.
Be warned though, If you don't like inky hands then wear gloves. It took me about 20 minutes to clean off my hands with a craft scrubby!

So here goes
To begin with you will need, Tim Holtz Alterations Tattered Floral Garland strip die, white card, Dylusions inks, small brads and water in a spray bottle.

So, I cut around 6 - 8 strips and popped them out giving me a nice pile to work with. Pop the leaves to one side as we won't  use them now.

 Then just start making flowers and fastening them together with a small brad. Be creative and combine different combinations and sizes. Aim for diversity!

Once you've done that then take a selection of the flowers and using a Dylusions stamp, stamp quickly onto the flowers.

Then, working in batches of say 4 - 5 flowers take your water bottle and spray liberally with water, don't be shy.

Follow this with a couple of sprays of Dylusions inks from experience I would suggest only two colours otherwise you end up with a dull green anyway (been there, done that!)

 Once you've done that, then scrunch them up into little soggy balls. Remember that they will be pretty fragile so take care with them. Using a pick/poky tool begin to carefully open them up.

Once you are happy with the look then carefully set aside to dry. I'd suggest leaving them overnight. Once fully dry they are not as fragile so easy to work with.

So, now you've made your first few; your hands are mucky anyway so you may as well carry on like I did..... there are 44 flowers here from one session. Different sizes and styles make them interesting I think.
That's why I really like this die. Endless possibilities and combinations from just the one die. You'd pay good money for these is you saw them in a shop but I think there's something really satisfying about making them yourself; and you can never have too many flowers......

Right. Hope you liked that, now I can find something to add these to!
Have a fab day guys

TAP project for The Craft Barn

Good morning folks

This week at The Craft Barn blog we're looking at Transfer Artist Paper (TAP) and this morning it's my turn.  I did this box as my project.

I wanted to try the paper on a non fabric surface to begin with and tried it directly onto the box but I'll be honest in that it didn't give me the result I was hoping for so had a re think and in the end discovered one thing that I like about TAP; and that is that by using it with stamps you can get a mirror image of your image which I think is pretty cool!

So what I did is stamp the owl onto the box in black archival ink and then stamped the image onto the TAP in the same ink and then transferred it onto white binding cloth and cut it out and adhered it over the messed up image! I really like the way the owls are facing opposite each other now. I used distress inks to add some colour to the main owl to tone in but still be lighter than the background image. Distress markers add the yellow highlights beautifully too.

The box was coloured with Distress inks, I used a Tando mask to add circle details with Inka gold and stamped the leaf image randomly around the edges too. Lastly to finish I adhered a "branch to the box with some old jewellery hanging from it.
For more ways of using TAP why don't you check out the rest of the fabulous projects at the blog HERE
Hope you like it. This is what I used to create it

Paper Mache box
TAP paper
Distress stain - Stormy sky
Distress ink - stormy sky and walnut stain
Tando circles mask
Inka gold - 909 old silver
Indigo Blu - Twit Twoo
Binding cloth - white

Also this week's special offer is 15% off Distress stains (which I love!) Just enter DISTRESS15 at the checkout.
Hope you have yourselves a lovely and creative day.

WOYWW #170

Good Morning; after my busy summer where my studio was to all intents and purposes covered in dust sheets and closed up; I'm back!
I've been busy catching up on deadlines and getting back into creative mode as my desk will show!
Here it is

Stuff all over! so what's what? On the left there are these new stamps

 I'm not big on Halloween but I like old vintage and steampunk stuff and I like this skull as it's not freaky, it looks more like an old engraving (Probably is!) and the script stamp is wonderful too so I can see a lot of use out of it all year round. Not to mention the labels too.
 Then, after I mentioned to a friend that you never see cigar boxes here in this country; look what
Mark Gould brought back as a gift for me from Vegas; two fab boxes as well as these Tim Holtz fractured dolls!
Thank you very much, I can't wait to get going on these!

 Then some fab postcards from London while we were taking visitors around.

Lastly, I had an aha moment the other day. I missed out on getting the Autumn distress inks when they came out last year but saw the re inkers and picked them up thinking I'll get those so when the pads come out again I at least already have the re inkers. Then while I was sitting in the studio over the weekend I looked at them and had a lightbulb moment - I have a sheet of custom stamp pad; these small tubs...... perhaps I can make a temporary set? Yes I can!      

I cut felt to fit the lids and stuck down with double sided tape and used the re inkers to make my own. When not in use the lids keep everything nice and safe. Brilliant; I was well chuffed with myself I must say and don't know why I didn't think of it earlier.

So there's my desk; Julia over at Stamping Ground is the host if you want to pop on by and see more.
Have yourselves a great day.