Travelogue

Kathy is setting the challenge over at Daring Cardmakers this week - she’s sending us on a travelogue! Anything to do with travel whether that be aeroplanes or suitcases, cars or compasses - what does “travel” say to you?

I’m sharing a card I actually made for an event at Splitcoast Stampers recently since my skills of organisation have gone to pot! I can’t tell you what the challenge was there but I thought it fit the travel theme so here it is!

I think my adventurer has gone for a swim in a beautiful lake - let’s hope those boots are still there when he gets back!

There’s a useful tutorial here to help if you fancy stretching your stamps and putting them into watery or icy settings!

Stamps:
Combat Boots by Deep Red Stamps
Sentiment from Essential Messages by Hero Arts (I think it's retired)

Paper:
Bristol board

Ink:
Brilliance by Tsukineko (Graphite Black)
Tim Holtz Distress ink by Ranger (Tumbled Glass, Vintage Photo, Peeled Paint)

Other:
Copic markers
White paint pen by Posca
Corner Chomper
MISTI to help me get the sentiment straight!

Thanks for stopping by!

What’s cooking?

It’s my turn to set the challenge over on Daring Cardmakers this week. I’d like to see images of food or see you use something from the kitchen to make your project. Extra brownie points if you manage both, a food image and use of a kitchen item!

I raided the kitchen for food colouring and washing up liquid and had some fun making bubble backgrounds. I guess I could count the disposable plate, too!

I had some black food colouring that has been in my pantry forever (it had a best before date in 2003!) and I guessed it might look either grey or brown used for this technique. I think it turned out quite a stylish colour and I made a little stack of prints on different sorts of paper so I've got some to use in future projects.

The pear I chose for my food image is one of the very first stamps I bought and is a “no name” design. I used neutral Copics to keep the colour palette quite masculine, cut it out and stuck it down with gel glue so the leaves are a bit raised. A die cut and stamped sentiment and a doodled frame finish it off.

If you fancy having a go at bubble backgrounds you just need a colouring medium with plenty of pigment (ink, watercolour or acrylic paint, or food colouring should all work). Add it along with a bit of water and a generous squirt of washing up liquid onto a plate (I used a disposable one so I didn’t have to worry about staining) and stir it up. Use a straw to blow into the mixture and make plenty of bubbles - be careful not to suck! Then gently swipe paper over the bubbles so that they pop against the surface. You can repeat the blowing of bubbles as many times as you like and keep layering the prints until you have the effect you want. Every piece will be unique.

Stamps:
Pear (unnamed maker)
Happy Stamp n Cut and Essential Messages (Hero Arts)

Paper:
Bristol board

Ink:
Brilliance by Tsukineko (Pearlescent Chocolate)

Other:
Black food colouring
Washing up liquid (that’s dish soap to my American friends)
Copic markers
Brown fine liner
Pinflair glue gel

Thanks for stopping by!

Life on the ocean wave

Shabneez is setting the challenge over at Daring Cardmakers today and she'd like us to go nautical.

A few years back my hubby spotted some interesting printing blocks on a  stall in Covent Garden and bought a couple for me including this ship. I'm not sure how they're intended to be used but I found that with a little bit of jiggery-pokery it's possible to run them through the Big Shot as a kind of letterpress. The printing lines are etched into a metal plate so you can't just use it like a rubber stamp, it needs some pressure.

I've added just the slightest hint of colour around the ship using dots of Copic marker that get more widely space as they get further out. I thought the plank embossing could represent the ship's deck.

Supplies:
Printing block
Sentiment words from Say It Loud (Waltzingmouse Stamps, no longer with us)
Bristol board
Versafine by Tsukienko (Onyx Black) 
Memento Luxe by Tsukineko (Love Letter)
Copic marker
Silver mirror card
Pinewood Planks embossing folder (Stampin' Up!)
Rectangle Nestabilities by Spellbinder
White Enamel Accents by Ranger
Corner Chomper

Thanks for stopping by!

August Elements

It's the first Friday of a new month so that means an elemental challenge over at Daring Cardmakers. It's my turn to provide the inspiration picture this month - you'll find it at the end of this post if you haven't arrived from the DCM blog.

I chose lemon slice, raised and self-coloured writing (inspired by the tonic bottle), gold accents and bubbles.

I thought this would be a fun card for a G&T-drinking friend!

The lemon slice is from a bundle of vintage botanical images I got from a seller on Etsy. They'd be ideal for vintage work as they're "raw" scans from very old books so they have background colour but you can do some digital clean-up or get the scissors out and use them for collage etc. At under £4 for over 500 images I decided it was worth a punt!

I printed the slice and coloured it with Copic markers and a white paint pen, cut it out and popped it up slightly. Gold lines are done freehand with a glue pen and covered in MegaFlake once tacky. The gold "bubbles" are metal from a tomato paste tube, punched out with the two sides of my Crop-a-Dile. Rest the circles on some craft foam and dome with a stylus for cheap and cheerful embellishments!

Supplies:

Vintage printable (Botanicals from Etsy seller)
Happy Stamp & Cut and part sentiment from Essential Messages (Hero Arts)
Copic markers
White paint pen by Posca
Wink of Stella pen (clear)
Metal from tomato paste tube
Flitter Glu and Chariot of Fire Mega Flake (Indigo Blu)
Sakura Quickie glue pen
Pinflair glue gel
Corner Chomper

Here's our inspiration picture this month.

Thanks for stopping by!