Look what arrived in my mail!

Isn't this just beautiful! This gorgous card was sent to me by Shirley who has a wonderful blog called Card Art, Etc. I love the card Shirley thank you very much. The leaves and shells and dragonflies have been stamped and painted with Twinkling H20s and then cut out and layered to give a lovely dimensional effect. Mind you I am not sure about how the Nautilus shell image was coloured because - I haven't seen an H20 quite like that one so I am wondering if it was a different product. It seems to be a more dimensional paint and has the most fabulous Mother of Pearl luster which I think the camera has managed to catch quite well in this photo.

If you have time I can recommend a LONG visit to Shirley's blog because she make absolutely beautiful cards.




I also have to say thank you to Anesha and Beryl who both passed on this award to me. I think what it stands for is a lovely idea.
What the award stands for:
This blog invests and believes the PROXIMITY- nearness in space, time and relationships. These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in prizes or self-aggrandizement . Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers. Deliver this award to 8 bloggers who may then pass it on.

Now I am already having trouble finding freinds who don't already have this awards so I am going to say if you are one of the lovely people who read my blog and leave kind comments, please feel free to take this award and share it onwards.

It looks so easy on T.V.

I invested in a Cuttlebug in the summer and have been having fun playing with it. One of the reasons I bought it was I love the effect created by colouring onto the embossed areas of their card. I have seen this demonstrated so often on televsion and they make it look very easy to do, but I think I still need some practice because I am not entirely happy with how this turned out, despite having several goes at it. It was a card for a swap on Craft Telly Forum where the theme was to make either a card with the theme "wide thing" or one suitable for a man. I liked the idea of this card because I felt the little bird is indeed a "wild thing" and the overall effect results in a card you could give to a man.

The the main image is from a Cuttlebug Embossing folder and coloured with chalks. The text is from Elusive Images and was stamped with an Adirondack Rainbow Inkpad. It's from the Words of Wisdom Themeplate. The background is was stamped and embossed with clear detail EP using another Elusive Images stamp, this time from the Wild Meadow themeplate.

Blog Candy

Thanks a friends blog I found my way to Debbie's blog. She has some lovely blog candy on offer right now, but even better she has some amazing work on show - well worth visiting for inspiration and ideas.

A change from Christmas Cards

It's getting to that time of the year where it's nice to make something that isn't Christmas themed. I was at the NEC last weekend and treated myself to one of Joanna Sheen's CDs - the Pamela West Collection. It's stuffed full of very pretty images and some rather cute ones too. Anyhow it was a nice change from Christmas stuff to make this card.

Just Right.

Do you ever play with your stamps, stamping on scrap paper just to see what happens? And do you ever find that sometimes you are really pleased about how your efforts look, but for some reason you never seem to be able go beyond the experiments on the scrap paper and make something? This happens to me quite often. Recently I bought some new stamps from Elusive Images. Members of the Graphicus Guild will have seen these already, but if you have not they will be on Create and Craft this Sunday. Anyhow, when I got my new stamps I got out some Adirondack dye ink pads and started to play. Some of the stamps have been designed to allow kiss stamping, with matched pairs of postive and negative impressions. By chance I had kiss stamped some of these using Butterscotch and Ginger inks and I thought the results looked lovely but could not decide on a project in which to use this.


Anyhow, today I found myself needing to make a card, and now I know why I had that block. As has happened in the past, fate had intervened and made me wait for the right reason to use something because that something was going to be "just right" for the card I needed to make.

The paper on the card is from the Artylicious Season's Greeting CD. The stamps are from the Autumn Hedgerow Themeplate. Inks were Adirondack Dye based ink in Butterscotch, Ginger, Espresso and a touch of Walnut Stain Distress ink blended round the edges.

Simply Stamping

The challenge this week on Stamp Somthing is called "Simple Somethings", and you are to only use one layer of cardstock for your project! Um well, somtimes stamping is not so simple, especially when you are a clutz like me! But the craft gods were smiling on me and despite droping the plastic cover from a Ranger Pigment ink pad on my card I managed not to get black ink all over 2 days of work and ruin it!

The card is simply an A5 piece of white card stock folded in half then stamped and inked. I first stamped and embossed the toadstools with black Adirondack Pigment Ink and used fine detail clear EP to emboss them. The Fairy was stamped and embossed in the same way, using a Stamp-a-ma-jig to help with postioning. These stamps are from Elusive Images, the Fairy is from the Dragonfly Faeries themeplate and the toadstools are from the new Autumn Table themeplate, which so far has only been released to Graphicus Guild members, but which will be on sale in about a week's time, this means that at the moment the stamp is not listed on the Graphicus web site so I can't give a link.

Next I coloured in the tops of thetoadstools with Tinkabella Inks and used an Ranger Inkssentials white pen to create the spots. The stems were coloured with Stampin' Up markers and the colour drawn out with a wet paint brush. Clear Crystal glitter was added to the faery's wings and then the whole lot was coated with Glossy Accents so as the images would resist the inks I was going to use in the background.

Once the Glossy Accents were dry, I left this over-night to be sure it was, I used torn paper masks and various colours of green inks applyed with sponges and a Colour Box blending tool to create the background. I used stamps from the Elusive Images Wild Meadow themeplate to create some texture in the grass in the foreground. The trees are from a set of stamp by The Angel Company and the text is from a set of stamps I recently was lucky enough to receive this weekend from Roni when she had a blog candy givaway on her Ink Stains blog. They are from a set by Crafty Secrets and are clear photopolymer, if you have any doubts about using clear stamps then I can vouch for this brand because they stamp beautifully.

Blog Candy Winner

After sorting out the list of people who left me comments to remove "extra" names where someone had commented more than once I came up with a list of 15 comments, here's the numbered list :

1 Inkfairy
2 Anne (1)
3 Shirley (1)
4 Veronica
5 Shirley (2)
6 Carol
7 Ed
8 Far North
9 Beryl
10 Sandra
11 Janet.vince
12 Alison
13 Artyjen
14 Jaqueleine TresBella
15 Anne (2)


Here's the draw














As you can see the winner is comment #3, Shirley (1) who said :

Shirley said...
Phree, I know you don't want any tagging, but this is an award acknowleging your art. I have it on 'the blog' waiting for you. If you do no more than accept it that is okay with me. I love your art and want more people to see it.

01 November 2008 19:29

Can you contact me with your snail mail address please Shirley so I can pop your CD in the mail to you.

Thank you Anne

Wow, I never really expected many people to take an interest in my blog. When I started it I thought that mainly it would be a sort of dairy for me. A place online where I could keep pictures and document a little information about how I made some of my favorite cards and things - safe because it can be retrieved if I ever lost my computer and back-ups. So I feel very honoured when others enjoy the things I post enough that they want to give me an award, so thank you Anne! If you have not visited Anne's blog Stargroves, then do take some time to have a wander round as she always has some beautiful work that covers a wide variety of styles and techniques.


The rules are for this award are:
1. The winner may put the logo on their blog.
2. Put a link to the person who sent you the award.
3. Nominate 5 blogs.
4. Put links to their blogs.
5. Leave a message for your nominees.

I will have to make some time tomorrow for thinking about who to pass this award on to.

Happy Challenge

The challenge this week on Theme Thursday is to use the word "happy" or "happiness" in a project. For my project I used one of the tags we made at the Graphicus Glimmer Mist Workshop I went to recently and combined it with stamps from Elusive Images. The tag has been spritzed with 2 colours of glimmer mist over a Glimmer Screen, unfortunately the photo is not really showing the shimmer that well. The bird stamp is from the Let Your Heart Sing themeplate and the text is from the Words of Wisdom Themeplate. Both were stamped in black then heat embossed with clear detail EP.

Craft Stamper's New Blog

Craft Stamper magazine has stared it's own blog - there are some cute stamps to be won to celebrate the launch of the blog.

Thank you Shirley

For honouring my blog with this award. If anyone reading this has not visited Shirley's blog Card Art, Etc... then it's well worth visiting because Shirley always has lots of lovely inspirational ideas over there.

The "rules" for the Arte y Pico award are:

1. If you are an award winner, show the award, the name of the person who gave it to you, and link back to his or her blog.
2. Pick 5 blogs you think deserve this award for their creativity, design, interesting material, and for contributing to the blogging community.
3. List the author's name and link to his or her blog.
4. Leave a message on the blogs of those you've selected.
5. Link back to the original Arte y Pico blog, so all will know the origin of the award.


So here are my choices to pass the award onto :

Christine - Sketching Stamper
Jenny - Craft Heaven
Sam - A Latte Stampin
Theresa – Crafting the Web

I got stuck @ 4 because it seems that all the other blogs I love to read aready have this award.

Halloween Card

The challenge this week on Daring Card Makers is to make a Halloween themed project. I hope this card counts, I actually made it about a week before Halloween for a Secret Swap over on Craft Telly Forum. The card had to be sent annonymously and the swap recipients posted pics in the forum on Halloween, then over the weekend we have had fun trying to guess who each "ghostly maker" was. Because of this I could not post pics on the blog until today, after we had all owned up to our cards.

Before I tell you how the card was made I need to give credit to 2 people, firstly my freind Fabyon who kindly sent me some halloween themed images stamped onto white card for me to use to create my swap as I don't own any Halloween themed stuff. The ghostie, pumpkins and spider web corners all came from Fab and are from stamps by The Angel Company. Secondly my inspiriation for the background - for that I must pay tribute to the amazing Michelle Zindorf, and in particular this fantastic card. If you have never visited Michelle's incredible blog then may I suggest you get on over there because her work is something else, and she posts the most wonderful step by step tutorials.

To make the card I created the background by very softly sponging on light orange ink from a Kaliedacolor ink pad in a rough circle to create a moon. I used a circle punched out from a post-it note pad to mask the orange area and sponged on dark inks - Adirondack Stonewashed, Denim, Aubergine and near the bottom of the card, Bottle. I removed the mask and sponged some streaky bits in the dark colours across the moon to simulate wisps of cloud. The tree and the small twiggy bits were stamped with black using stamps by Elusive Images which are from the Arboretum Themeplate and finally I sponged some black ink round the very outside edges and corners.

Next I coloured the stamped pumpkins with marker pens and then covered them and the ghost with Glossy Accents. Once the Glossy Accents was dry I cut these out and adhered them to my background with foam pads. I had chosen some lovely dark purple card stock from my stash to make my main card and I was really pleased to find Dusty Concord Distress Ink was a near perfect match for my main card when blended quite heavily onto white card. This let me first trace over the stamped outline of the spider web corners with a Sakura Clear Stardust pen to make them shimmery and then colour the white card on which Fabyon had stamped them so that the spaces between the strands of web would match my main card - these were cut out and adhered to the corners on the right hand side of the card.

I blended more of the Distress Ink onto white card and then using the Elusive Images Sketchy Alphabet stamps created the word "BOO" by spritzing the letters with water then stamping that onto the blended ink and after a few seconds blotting off the water with some kitchen towel. I then sponged a little more of the black ink round the corners and edges of this piece of card. Stamping with water onto distress ink, then blotting it off removes a lot of the ink and results in the misty and, I hope, ghostly look of the letters.

I had a lot of fun making this card, and kinda scared myself in the process too because the background I made turned out to be very sinister indeed, but thankfully Fab's jolly ghost and the brightly coloured pumpkins lighten the mood quite nicely.

My Birthday and 100 Posts Blog Candy

I thought it would be fun to give a present rather than receive one for my Birthday. It was my birthday during October but I decided that rather than reveal the actual date I would simply wait till the end of October. I also noticed my post count was nearing 100 and this post is my 100th! To celebrate both events I am giving away a brand new sealed copy of the Artylicious Filigree Fusion CD.

All you need to do to win this gorgous CD is leave me a comment on this post telling me why you would love to own this CD. You have until 7pm GMT on Sunday the 9th of November to leave your comment, after that a winner will be chosen in a random draw.

This Blog Candy has now been won.