Sketchy Ornamental Beauty

I don't play sketch challenges all that often but the mood struck me today and I decided to visit somewhere new so this card is based on Laura's Sketch 24 on the 2 Sketches 4 You blog - thanks Laura!

I've used a stamp set I got yesterday called Ornamental Beauty which is Julia Stainton's first design for CHF - I'm sure it won't be her last, it's lovely! You can click through for a bigger pic so you can see the intricate detailing on these designs - love it!

So many elements to play with too - everything here is from the set: roundel, corner scroll, border, journalling block and sentiment.

I used the roundel to make my focal point, stamping twice and cutting just the centre element from one and the full shape from the other. I've curved the edges up to give it some dimension and joined the layers with a touchy-feely velvet brad.

I wiped most of the ink away from the lines in the journalling block before stamping to give a faded out feel and make the sentiment more prominent.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Ornamental Beauty (the Rummage Bin line)

Ink:
Stazon by Tsukineko (Jet Black)
Versafine by Tsukineko (Satin Red)
Tim Holtz Distress by Ranger (Vintage Photo)

Paper:
Kraft, smooth white, black

Other:
Velvet brad (Making Memories)
Lace trim (Prima Marketing)

Thanks for visiting, I appreciate you taking the time. Hope you enjoyed it!

Yee haw - it's a new backgrounder!

Backgrounders were one of the things that first drew me to Cornish Heritage Farms and I now have, ahem, a few of them! Fine Gingham is releasing today and it's such a classic pattern I can see this one being used quite a bit.

I did a baby design and a country cherry design first and then decided to see if I could make it fit Nikki's masculine card challenge and this week's DCM (also a masculine theme). I thought a western shirt theme might be fun!

The pocket flap is cut by threading a strip of card through a Nestie so that it only cuts one end (just reverse the machine once the rollers have reached the end of where you want to cut so you don't end up with an impression of the rest of the die on your cardstock). The little finial stamp from the For the Men set proved to be a perfect shape to make the little "embroidered" flourishes to fit with the die cut outline.

I used a pearl snap pulled from an old shirt to give it an authentic-looking finish.

The flap lifts up and there's an insert to write on, with a little pop of colour for the greeting that's stamped on there.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Fine Gingham backgrounder
For the Men (Rummage Bin line)

Paper:
Smooth white, Epic Laid Black (Prism Papers)

Ink:
Stazon by Tsukineko (Jet Black)
Versamark by Tsukineko
Versafine by Tsukineko (Satin Red)

Other:
Sewing machine and thread
Labels 4 Nestabilities by Spellbinder
Corner rounder punch
White embossing powder
Pearl snap (from an old shirt)

Thanks for visiting today, hope you enjoyed the card!

Break out the brushes!

I've obviously had a bit of a watercolouring mood on over the last few days! I have a couple of things to share today that both use inks as watercolours and I just picked up a cute little stacked wheel palette of Koh-i-Noor watercolours when I popped out earlier today, too.

First up, a lovely new image from the Saturday Evening Post line - these images are all cover art from the magazine and I think this one is my favourite of the SEP releases so far! Aren't these lions just beautiful?

I used Adirondack Stonewashed ink for the sky - it's one of the very few Adirondacks I've found that breaks down in water and I chose it here for that reason. I thought the purplish tones coming out of the blues made for an interesting wash.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Lion and Lioness (Saturday Evening Post line)
Motivational Centers (Mona Lisa Moments line)
Finial under sentiment from For the Men (Rummage Bin line)

Paper: Smooth white (inked with Stazon around edge)
140lb hot press watercolor paper

Ink: Stazon by Tsukineko (Timber Brown)
Tim Holtz Distress by Ranger (Scattered Straw, Tea Dye, Vintage Photo, Walnut Stain, Black Soot, Spiced Marmalade)
Adirondack dye ink by Ranger (Stonewashed)

Other: Sewing machine and thread

Then I'd been itching to pair up this sentiment and the olive branch since I got the Vegetable Harvest stamps last week and the SCS "clean and simple" challenge this week gave me the perfect opportunity. The challenge is to make a monochrome card.

I've used only shades of green - even the bit that looks fairly black on the pic is actually Versafine Olympia Green, I filled the open space of the stems by squidging a little Versafine onto an old CD and then applying it with a paintbrush. The other greens are all dye inks used as watercolours.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Vegetable Harvest (Shady Tree Studio line)
Christmas Expressions (Mona Lisa Moments line)

Paper:
Watercolor paper

Ink:
Versafine by Tsukineko (Olympia Green)
Tim Holtz Distress by Ranger (Shabby Shutters, Peeled Paint)
Adirondack dye ink by Ranger (Willow)

Other:
Paper piercer

Although they both use watercolour techniques, these two cards use different papers - hot press for the lion image because the smoother surface is perfect for these more detailed stamps and a very textured one for the olives as the texture gives interest to the white space of the design. For those of you in the UK, it was a bargain buy from The Papermill but it was a while back - might still be worth a look though!

Thanks for stopping by, hope you enjoyed today's cards!

Celebrate spring!

Bek thought it would be fun to celebrate spring with a blog hop of some fresh and fun spring projects using our favourite spring-themed CHF stamps so welcome to my stop along the hoppity trail!

I love this little tulip girl from the Saturday Evening Post line, she's so sweet!

This is a super-fast project - a couple of score lines on a sealed envelope, selective colouring of the image, four eyelets to set and you're about done.

I followed the basic steps to make a bagalope (tutorial here if you want one) but left the top open and added eyelets and some twill tape handles to make a little gift tote. My envelope was a UK A5 size - I'm not sure how that translates for North America but it's the size you'd use if you folded a sheet of letter paper in half once. I just shredded some kraft wrap to make filling for the inside to protect a gift.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Tulip Girl (Saturday Evening Post line)
Birthday Centers (Mona Lisa Moments line)

Ink:
Adirondack dye ink by Ranger (Espresso)

Paper:
Ivory laid envelope
Kraft wrap

Other:
Copic markers
Extra large eyelets by We R Memory Keepers (antique brass)
Twill tape
Crop-o-dile
Scor-It

Others hippety hopping a spring celebration are Julia, Kristine, Lisa, Sherrie and Bek, why not pay a visit for more spring fun? The Be Creative blog is on the trail too and the winners of the recent challenge will be announced there as well.

Thanks for dropping by!

Dream home

There's a competition over on Fiskarettes to make a project with hidden eggs. I thought it would be fun to make something a bit different to the usual card for new home owners and came up with this little altered box!

I dowloaded the template for the large matchbox here (thanks Dee!), stamped the outside with Woodgrain and made a liner for the inside stamped with Weathered Wood. I cut a reverse mask for the ticket stamp so that I could add the birds inside the frame then added some little words with stamps.

Some raffia, twigs, skeleton leaves and a key charm finish off the panel and I've machine stitched round the edge. I used the same technique with the ivy as I did for the card in my last post but I cut these out once I'd "stamped" them.

I had fun with the inside! My hubby can only shake his head when he asks "What are you doing?" when I'm sitting on the step outside the shed in lovely sunshine and he gets the reply "Making a nest!". I soaked some birch twigs in warm water to make them a bit more pliable and then wove them together to make the tiny nest. It's lined with a feather and the eggs are jelly bean sweets. I added more ivy leaves, a sentiment strip and a feather.

The little scroll unties to provide space for the message to the new home owners.

Stamps (all Cornish Heritage Farms):
Tree Swallows
Wood grain backgrounder
Weathered Wood backgrounder
The Ticket Counter (Rummage Bin line)
Everyday Petites (Mona Lisa Moments line)
Script Essential Expressions (Mona Lisa Moments line)

Ink:
Adirondack dye ink by Ranger (Espresso and Stonewashed)
Tim Holtz Distress by Ranger (Vintage Photo)
Memento by Tsukineko (Bamboo Leaves)

Paper: smooth white and premium weight copy paper

Other:
Raffia
Key charm
Sewing machine and thread
Skeleton leaves
Birch twigs
Ivy leaves
Feathers

Thanks for visiting - I had fun making this, hope you had fun looking!

Cruel and unusual punishment?

I'm not sure what we did to deserve it but Nikki over on CBC banned stamps for her latest challenge! She asked us to imagine that all our stamps were suddenly off bounds but to find a way to stamp, nevertheless! I think that amounts to cruel and unusual, don't you?

Anyway, this idea popped in to my head while I was trying (and failing) to get to sleep last night and although I should have been doing a zillion other things today, it wouldn't go away until I'd tried it on paper. My main image is a download of a vintage photo (from the photo bit at Altered Bits), I've just sponged a little ink around the edges of a black and white print. Can you spot my "stamps"?

I added drop shadows to the leaves with a marker pen, some gold foil freehand swirls and a pre-printed quote (RAKed by Caroline - thank you!) to finish.

Did you get the non-stamps right? Here they are in all their glory - two ivy leaves and a piece of bubble wrap! Hee hee! I love the way the veins on the leaves have left a white "halo" effect even though I pressed down quite firmly (I rolled the fleshy part at the bottom of my thumb over the inked leaf) so you can still see some of the vein structure as well as the leaf shape.

The inks are all dye-based (Distress Shabby Shutters & Vintage Photo and Memento New Sprout & Bamboo Leaves) and I think everything else is obvious.

Thanks for dropping by, hope you're enjoying your weekend!

Make lemonade

Today's dare over on Daring Cardmakers is to use fruit on your project. I just got a new stamp set called "Fruit Basket" so the timing is perfect! My only problem was deciding which fruit since they're all lovely! (ETA - on revisiting the DCM blog to leave the link to this, I see Jo has added her sample and we've picked the same saying, how funny!).

I decided to make a "pick me up" card for somebody having a difficult time of it at the moment using the old saying "When life gives you lemons... make lemonade!" combining the DCM dare with the current "clean and simple" challenge on SCS which is a sketch.

I computer generated the sentiment (fonts are Baskerville Old Face and Lainie Day Script) and the lemons are coloured with Copics so this was a quick card (other than the fact I can dither for hours when trying to choose fonts!).

Stamps: Fruit Basket (Shady Tree Studio at Cornish Heritage Farms).

Ink: Brilliance by Tsukineko (Graphite Black)

Paper: Yellow (Bazzill), smooth white and Epic Laid Black (Prism)

Other:
Copic markers
Computer and printer
Classic Oval Nestabilities by Spellbinder
Paper piercer
Nail art gems

Thanks for stopping by - hope your day is more lemonade than lemons! I'm hoping mine will be as I'm entering this in the Charmed Cards blog candy!

Smouldering damask

Well, it could have been smouldering but in reality I did manage not to set light to anything here - soot stamping is a bit of an adventure, you know!

I love this new backgrounder stamp (it's being released on Friday, 27th March), it manages to be detailed and still pack a dramatic punch. I thought it would lend itself to a sultry kind of look and that soot stamping might be a good thing to try for that, too!

I actually did the negative soot stamping technique, stamping the backgrounder in Versamark first and then running the piece over the candle flame as you usually would. Once it's nicely coated in soot, you can wipe gently with a tissue and the soot sticks more to the Versamark than the rest of the piece and you get a nice variation in tone and a textural look, too. A quick blast with a spray sealant (or in my case, cheap hairspray!) and you're done.

If you're having a go at soot stamping yourself, I found the key thing is to keep the piece moving all the time and don't go right out to the edge since the edges are where it's most likely to catch light! You can always stamp on a piece of cardstock that's larger than you need and then trim to size once you've sealed the piece.

Stamps (all Cornish Heritage Farms):
Double Damask backgrounder (releasing Friday, 27th March)
Motivational Centers

Paper: Smooth white, Epic Laid Black (Prism)

Ink: Versamark by Tsukineko

Other:
Detail embossing powder (copper)
Vintage lace
Flowers by Prima Marketing
Crystal brad by Making Memories
Sewing machine and thread

Thanks for stopping by!

Tree Hugger!

It's "Ways to Use It" challenge day on SCS today and guest hostess Michele has asked us to go green. We could interpret that as the colour or to reuse/recycle or any combination of those!

We have young silver birch trees in our garden and just this morning I peeled off some of the loose, thin bark thinking it might be good for a papercraft project - so I think I have the ultimate "green" material here!

I washed it carefully and left it to dry between a couple of sheets of kitchen towel with our big AGA kettle on top to keep it flat! I then stuck it to some copy paper to make it sturdy enough to use and stamped the tree trunk and the sentiment words with Stazon.

I've reused by making the tree with scrap paper from my desk too, I just turned it over and used the back of experimental bits and pieces!

Stamps (all Cornish Heritage Farms):
Spring Trees (Kim Hughes collection)
Paisley Backgrounder
Everyday Petites (Mona Lisa Moments line)

Paper:
Kraft shipping tag
Silver birch bark!
Scrap copy paper

Ink:
Tim Holtz Distress ink by Ranger (Peeled Paint)
Stazon by Tsukineko (Timber Brown)

Other:
Glaze pen by Sakura (red)
Inkssentials white pen by Ranger
Prismacolor pencil
Jute twine

Thanks for stopping by, hope there are signs of spring in the air where you are (unless you're reading in the southern hemisphere in which case signs of spring would be worrying - I wish you a pleasant autumn instead!).

Make a Wish

Over on the Bubbly Funk forum, Karen has decided we need to be challenged out of our pure papercraft zone! The first challenge is to alter a tin. I scratched my head for a while as I didn't fancy tackling the great big tin that had amaretti biscuits in it last Christmas and then remembered I'd bought a little candle in a tin in Poundstretcher a while ago, intending to turn it into a little Christmas gift but didn't get round to it.

I'm going to start here with "things I have learned about tomato paste". I made a card last week using a tomato paste tube and uploaded it to Splitcoaststampers. I was feeling quite pleased with myself as I remembered to call in "tomato paste" rather than the more typically British term "tomato puree". Little did I realise that its name was the least of the differences!

Tomato paste in the US typically comes in cans so most people had no clue what I'd used. I did a little research and apparently some Italian grocery stores stock it in tubes and I even tracked it down on Amazon.com in the "gourmet foods" section - so, if you're reading this in North America and want to get your hands on this stuff, you now know where to try! It's much less wasteful than a can if you're cooking for small numbers, BTW - just pop the top back on and put it in the fridge for next time.

So, all that was by way of telling you that I used a tomato paste tube here! Just snip the top and bottom off your empty tube with kitchen scissors then slit up one side. Flatten it out and wash it and you're ready to go. I have yet to meet a tube that was not a rich gold colour inside - the acid from the tomatoes apparently oxidises the metal and turns it that colour. The circle for the lid here is cut with a Nestie and the whole lot is embossed and then sponged with Stazon which is then polished off the high spots. It's all glued down with Bostick.

I stamped a plain Prima hydrangea with a script stamp and sponged the edges with Vintage Photo ink.

Stamps (Cornish Heritage Farms):
Spanish Script backgrounder
Birthday Centers

Ink:
Stazon by Tsukineko (Timber Brown)
Tim Holtz Distress by Ranger (Vintage Photo)

Other:
Candle tin
Tomato paste tube
Cuttlebug Embossing folder (Textile Texture)
Hydrangea by Prima Marketing
Vintage button
Classic Circle Nestabilities by Spellbinder
Linen thread

If you're blowing out a candle today, don't forget to make a wish! Thanks for stopping by!