My first scrapling!

I've never got round to making a "scrapling" so I thought it was about time I had a go. A what, some of you may be asking. A scrapling is just a little card made from the bit left over when you trim a standard sheet of cardstock to make a square card.

A very quick and simple one layer design - no colouring in! I used three inks sponged through a hole cut with a Nestie in a piece of scrap paper to get the "glow", stamped the hibiscus with the mask still in place and then removed the mask to stamp the dragonfly.
Two scored lines and a crystal brad add a touch of texture to finish off.

I love the bold, graphic look of this hibiscus - this set is actually made up of the same two images as the "Emerging Dragonfly" set but the sizes are reversed so the flower is the large stamp in this set where it's inchie-sized in the earlier one.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Emerging Hibiscus (Sara England line)

Paper:
Smooth white

Ink:
Tim Holtz Distress ink by Ranger (Mustard Seed, Wild Honey, Spiced Marmalade)
Versafine by Tsukineko (Onyx Black)

Other:
Classic Circle Nestabilities by Spellbinder
Crystal brad by Making Memories
Scor-It

Thanks for stopping by!

Ready, steady.... stamp!

It's challenge number 19 already over on Ready Steady Stamp. Nefertiti has set some tough ingredients for this one! If you fancy playing along, remember that the rules now make only three items mandatory if you really get stuck with all five. There's an extra incentive to try hard with this one though - there's the chance of a prize on offer if you manage all of them!

Those who know me will probably not be surprised to hear that I struggled more with the inclusion of pink than the rubber - I managed to sneak it in with the stitching! I decided "M" should be for mother and chose a sentiment that puts the emphasis on the word through the typography. I dry brushed gesso onto watercolour paper and spritzed with a home made glimmer mist for the background. Gesso acts as a resist so you get some subtle but interesting patterns from this technique. The rubber is a short offcut of rubber cord that forms a dimensional border between the green and black panels - I found gel Superglue stuck it down well and I didn't have to hold it in place for too long waiting for it to set. The card base is light purple Bazzill and the stitching is deep pink. I couldn't find a pearl or brad in the right kind of colour so I painted a Dew Drop with some Lilac Precious Metal paint which was a good match for the base colour.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Freesia flower
Mother's Day Centers (Mona Lisa Moments line)

Paper:
Bazzill
Simply Linen black (CHF)
Textured watercolour

Ink:
Adirondack dye ink by Ranger (Juniper reinker)
Versafine by Tsukineko (Onyx Black)

Other:
Perfect Pearls by Ranger (Patina Green)
Dew Drop by Robin's egg
Rubber cord
Precious Metal Paint by Viva Decor (Lilac)
Sewing machine and thread
Corner Chomper

Thanks for stopping by!

Je sais qu'il ya beaucoup de participantes françaises pour les challenge RSS - si vous voulez me laisser un commentaire, mais vous n'aimez pas le faire en Anglais, s'il vous plaît n'hésitez pas à le dire en Français! Je ne le parle pas bien, mais c'est OK pour la compréhension de commentaires court. Merci de votre visite!

A hopeful start!

Starting the week with a hopeful outlook is always a good thing, I reckon! There are a couple of new sets in the Sara England line of "emerging" images coming out tomorrow and I thought I'd share a card made with one of them.

I took a fairly clean and simple approach here. Many of these little sets have an image that's sized for an inchie - I've used that starfish image here and teamed it up with one of the sentiments from the set to make a card based on the first Inchie Inkling sketch from a couple of weeks back. A strong horizon line seemed appropriate for the wording so I've stitched on a chocolate brown strip and given it a sense of movement by slanting the end and letting it run off the side of the card.

I added interest to the lower part of the design both by sanding the Coredinations cardstock at the edges and stamping the Life Scrapblock text in an ink colour just a shade darker than the card.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Emerging Turtle set (Sara England line - releasing Tuesday 27 April)
Life Scrapblock

Paper:
Smooth white
Simply heavy chocolate (CHF)
Coredinations
White chipboard inchie

Ink:
Colorbox fluid chalk ink by Clearsnap (Bisque)
Adirondack dye ink by Ranger (Espresso)

Other:
Sewing machine and thread
Sandpaper

Thanks for stopping by, hope you have plenty of reasons to be hopeful this week!

Can you hear the wheels turning?

I've been playing with some new chippie shapes from Tando Creative - cogs in two different styles and sizes.

I managed a bonus project from these! I'm loving all the embossed metal that's around at the moment but I've been trying not to add another dimension to my papercrafting addiction by buying the moulds etc! I did have some sheet aluminium in my stash though and I own paper stumps for colouring so with the application of a little imagination, my chipboard cogs enabled me to make this ATC! I just laid my metal over the shapes (I did one at a time), rubbed over with the paper stump to get the basic shape to show through and then embossed fully with the tip of the stump. Easy peasy and you get to use the shape itself for something else :o)

Supplies:
Chipboard Cogs by Tando Creative
Aluminium sheet by AMACO
Train timetable stamp set (Cornish Heritage Farms)Ferro paint by Viva Decor (Graphite)
Chipboard ATC
Silver embossing powder
Black acrylic paint
Spring from inside a video cassette
And the something else I made in this case was this wall clock...

I bought a cheapo clock (£3.99 in Poundstretcher) a while ago with the idea of tarting it up for my craft room. The cogs seemed perfect for the project! This is a 30cm clock so you can see that the cogs are a decent size.

I dismantled the clock and pulled off the bright white plastic face. I used that as a template to cut a circle of watercolour paper which has a nice texture to it. I stamped some sheet music and some crackle and then used a Tim Holtz mask to sponge over for the clock face on the right.

The clock surround was really a bit on the nasty side - bright chromed plastic. I gave both it and the cogs the same kind of treatment to give them a pitted and corroded look. I gave them a coat of embossing powder (actually UTEE in the case of the surround) and then slathered black acrylic paint on there, let it dry and then rubbed it off the high spots. If you use a single coat of embossing powder or UTEE over a reasonably large area it tends to give an "orange peel" sort of texture which is perfect for ageing with acrylic paint like this.

Here's a little detail shot for you so you can see more of how that texture works out. I love how the teeth of the smaller cogs fit perfectly together. If you were very clever, I reckon you could use them to make an actual turning mechanism on a card or maybe a page in a mini album.

Supplies:
Chipboard cogs by Tando Creative
Aged Sheet music Scrapblock by Cornish Heritage Farms
Cracked Montana Earth Backgrounder by Cornish Heritage Farms
Watercolour paper
Tim Holtz Distress ink by Ranger (Black Soot and Weathered Wood)Silver embossing powder and UTEE
Black acrylic paint
Timeworks masks by Tim Holtz/Ideaology
Silver brads
Washers

Thanks for stopping by, happy crafting!

Which finger did he bite?

Yikes, I don't usually post twice in one day -sorry- but I just realised that somebody stole an entire week so today is the last day to play with the current Ready Steady Stamp challenge! Tricky one this although the rules have changed and you can now play with three or more of the ingredients if you don't have the materials (or inspiration!) to manage all five.

It was the oval that nearly did for me and I was about ready to settle for four out of five when I was struck by the idea of doing oval bubbles rather than circular ones!

So here it is, something a bit different for me!

The fish is printed on acetate and painted with Viva paints on the back so he has a nice shimmer but all the detail is retained. The acetate is folded and stuck at the back of the card. I traced the second wavy line onto it and trimmed it so it doesn't go all the way down to the bottom of the card as it seemed to lie better that way.

Numbers and shells are stamped and the lines, wording and bubbles are done freehand. I used Glossy Accents to fill in the two small areas at the base of the card and sprinkled dry builders' sand on there.

I'm hoping the RSS police will look kindly on me - I have printed an image from my computer as well as stamping. I'm hoping that "no digi" means no "digital stamps" and that a vintage text book illustration will sneak in under the wire.

Stamps:
Seaside Clear Art Stamps by Crafty Secrets
A&P Numbers by Ma Vinci's Reliquary

Paper:
Overhead transparency for inkjet printer
White

Ink:
Tim Holtz Distress ink by Ranger (Vintage Photo)

Other:
Fish image from Karen's Whimsy
Copic multiliner
Copic markers
Precious Metal paint by Viva Decor (Mother of Pearl, Blue Azure, Lilac)
Glossy Accents
Sand

Thanks for stopping by!

Je sais qu'il ya beaucoup de participantes françaises pour les challenge RSS - si vous voulez me laisser un commentaire, mais vous n'aimez pas le faire en Anglais, s'il vous plaît n'hésitez pas à le dire en Français! Je ne le parle pas bien, mais c'est OK pour la compréhension de commentaires court. Merci de votre visite!

Mica magic!

I bought Donna Kato's lovely book Polymer Clay: Creative Surface Effects a while back and one of the techniques in there is something called mica shift. I've just had a first play with it to make a pendant.

Some of you have probably heard me say before that one of the things that first drew me to Cornish Heritage Farms was the backgrounder stamps. Woodgrain has long been a particular favourite. You should have heard the squeals of excitement when Liz told the DT what was in store for the All Things Considered line of stamps - scaled down backgrounders! And to make it even better, woodgrain is in the first release, way hay! The smaller scale means they're perfect for things like jewellery projects as well as ATC stamping.

So, back to mica shifting. Metallic or pearl polymer clays contain mica particles. Some bright clayer worked out that if you condition the clay so that all the particles line up and then disturb them by pressing into the clay you can get a pattern that looks 3D even though it's completely smooth to the touch. I thought woodgrain would be the perfect pattern for experimenting with!

After running your clay over and over through a pasta machine (at least twenty times) you press a rubber stamp firmly into the surface. Then use a clay blade to gently slice away the raised portions of the clay. You can then flatten further with a roller but I confess I forgot to do that so I relied on sanding after the piece was baked to get the surface really smooth.

I thought this came out pretty well for a first attempt and I'll certainly be having another go with this technique.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms) :
Country Charm Textures (All Things Considered line)

Other:
Sculpey Premo polymer clay (Copper and black)
Cookie cutter and clay blade
Rubber cord


Thanks for stopping by!

Opulent inchies

It's my mum's birthday today - Happy Birthday Mum! I really struggled with a card for her this year for some reason, three attempts went into the circular file before I decided I'd use this week's sketch from Inchie INKlings and finally made something I felt I could put in an envelope and send!

I was trying for a rich and opulent look here - mums deserve a little luxury every now and again, don't you think? I used gold acrylic paint on the inchies and dry brushed a tiny bit of black on there to give a sort of aged, speckled appearance to the background. The poppies are coloured with Copics - it's a single stamp that was masked and repeated to give me two blooms on the design. I picked up a tiny bit of gold paint on my fingertip and rubbed over the Cuttlebug embossing as well. The base layer has a couple of the stamps from the set stamped in black on the chocolate brown for some subtle pattern.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Botanical Bliss (All Things Considered line)
Cursive Expressions (Mona Lisa Moments line)

Paper:
Simply Heavy Chocolate (CHF)
Simply Linen Natural (CHF)
White chipboard inchies

Ink:
Brilliance by Tsukineko (Graphite Black)

Other:
Gold acrylic paint
Copic markers
Embossing folder by Cuttlebug (Textile Texture)
Sewing machine and thread

Thanks for stopping by!

Inchie baby

Inchie Inklings is a blog that's been around for a while but has been sleeping for quite some time as its owner, Ellen Hutson, has been busy with other stuff. 'Mona' Lisa Strahl has just taken on the role of waking it up with regular updates including a weekly sketch challenge. I worked with Mona when she was Art Director at CHF and it's fun to see her indulging her passion for teeny weeny artwork!

Here's my take on the second Inchie Inklings sketch - a vintage baby card. Steering away from blue or pink means you can have some cards on hand for those babies whose gender is unknown before they're born (I think it's much more common in the US for you to know in advance - UK mums seem to opt for a surprise much more often!).

I softened the look of the the chocolate card base by stamping the Fine Houndstooth in sand pigment ink. A really quick and simple card since there's minimal colouring to do and splitting the image over two inchies adds just that little bit extra interest. Thanks for the sketch, Mona!

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Baby Dear (Rummage Bin line)
Fine Houndstooth Scrapblock

Paper:
Simply Heavy Chocolate (CHF)
Simply smooth Vanilla (CHF)
Chipboard inchies

Ink:
Brilliance by Tsukineko (Graphite Black)
Versacraft by Tsukineko (Sand)
Tim Holtz Distress ink by Ranger (Vintage Photo)

Other:
Copic markers
Threading water/Scalloped lace edge punch by Fiskars
Sewing machine and thread

Thanks for stopping by!

Bleached out

I've been feeling a bit bleached out this past week - I managed to pick up an awful cough and cold from somewhere so haven't felt much like blogging. It's getting better now though so I thought I'd share a bleached out project with you!

I do like these typographical Scrapblocks - you can use them as a feature in themselves or you can pick and choose elements and use them as individual sentiments just by doing a bit of selective inking. I went for a grungy look here though by doing a bit of bleach stamping with the whole stamp.

You never know quite what you're going to get with this technique as different cardstocks behave differently but this chocolate brown card gave me some interesting, warm and earthy colours. As well as using the bleach as "ink" on the stamp, I swiped some over an extra piece of card using a babywipe to make the panel for the sentiment.

The textural element was a fun little experiment. I have some plastic canvas shapes that I usually use as piercing templates. I used a circle here and spread Ferro into the holes. Once it was dry, I added a little Rub n Buff to the high spots. I think it's made a fun mosaic look! Just remember to wash your plastic canvas promptly to get rid of the Ferro and it will serve you many times over.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Life Scrapblock (releasing Friday 16th April)
Sentiment from Sweet Bee (Rummage Bin line)

Paper:
Simply Heavy Chocolate (CHF)
Scrap of vanilla

Ink:
Versafine by Tsukineko (Onyx Black)

Other:
Bleach
Sewing machine and thread
Ferro paint by Viva Decor (Gold Iron)
Rub n Buff by Amaco (Gold Leaf)
Plastic canvas circle (used as template)

Way cool!

Masculine cards seem to pose a challenge for most people. I'd probably include myself in that except that in certain moods I'm drawn to clean graphic lines and minimal fuss - qualities that lend themselves well to more masculine projects.

This one throws in a little whimsy as well. I dithered over whether or not to get the "Cool Dudes I" set and in the end I just couldn't resist it for this little tortoise in his shades! All the characters in this set are playing the cool role to the hilt with their sunnies at the fore! Really fast and fun to colour so you can have a card done in no time, too - love that!

I used Coredinations cardstock and did some scoring and sanding for textural interest that kept to the masculine "plainness" of the design.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Cool Dudes I (Tom Fun Collection - releasing Tuesday 6th April)

Paper:
Coredinations
Simply Smooth Vanilla

Ink:
Brilliance by Tsukineko (Graphite Black)

Other:
Copic markers
Scor-It
Sewing machine and thread
Corner Chomper
Sandpaper

Hope your week is cool! Thanks for stopping by.