Roses, bunnies and Chalkola pens

It's time for our challenges at Stamping Sensations and Penny Black and More where our themes are 'Close to Nature' and 'Anything Goes'. As always there are wonderful prizes to be won at both.

It's a bit of a photo heavy post as one of my Penny Black shares was created using Chalkola pens, I was fortunate to be sent some recently and asked to try them out, so further down you can see what I created with them and my thoughts on the product.

My top Penny Black card uses some of the new stamp releases, the beautiful Rose called Red Blush and one of the sentiments from the Fairytale set. I repeat stamped the Rose onto a piece of Fabriano using Versamark black and clear emossing powder, then coloured in with Spectrum pencils and added some blue Pan Pastel shading around the blooms. After using the same ink to stamp the sentiment I matted and layered onto the base card, tied an organza bow down the side and a few pearls.

My stamping Sensation creation is one of those made for the Chocolate Baroque Spring shows on Hochanda a couple of weeks ago, no surprises that I adored working on samples for this show. For this one I created a background with Dylusions and mica spray and then stamped the Rabbit image from the Glorious Spring set and used just the top of the stamp to carry the foliage along the bottom. Next I stamped the willows from the Spring Foliage set followed by some stenciling using black paste medium. Finally I stamped the sentiment and cut into pieces and added randomly.

Now for something a little different. As mentioned above I was asked by Chalkola to try our their new chalk based pens and was sent two different sets to put through their paces. They were dispatched and speedily delivered to me via Amazon who are the companies major distributors and you will find several of the sets on their web site here.

They come in a wonderful range of bright and vibrant colours and although the advertising suggests use on non porous surfaces such as wood, glass, chalkboards etc., I was keen to know if I could apply them to my own style of crafting and use on cardstock. So I set about trying them on basic heavy cardstock coated in black gesso and also pages from the new Dylusions journals.

The card above has been made with a Dylusions 8 x 8 sheet.................yes I admit I have torn pages from the journal so my knuckles have been suitably rapped. It takes the mediums like a dream and there seemed to be no loss of vibrancy.

I started by stamping the PB image with versamark and white embossing powder. Next I set about adding some stenciling and I dabbed the liquid from the pens onto a craft sheet and used a make up sponge to lift the colour and work through the stencils. I was unsure if it would dry too quickly but it worked well and the pool of colour lasted several minutes on the craft mat before drying out.

Using the same technique I sponged some colour into the centres of the stamped image which really brought it to life. Next I applied the colour, again using the same sponge method to the sentiment stamp and again it worked well. To bring the stenciled flowers to life I used a fine paint brush and some on the white chalk pen, again dispensed onto a craft mat to outline the flowers and finally as I had some chalk liquid left I used the top of an embossing powder pot to add some circles.

Here's one of the samples I recently made for this weeks Create and Craft TV show using TL's Rare Earth stamps, not at all what I would normally select but they were fun and it's good be be dragged outside your comfort zone now and again.

I used the larger white chalk pen and applied directly to the stamps onto standard cardstock painted with black gesso, the image is not as clear as stamping with ink but works reasonably for this tryle of image I think. I then used a couple of stencils and applied the pens directly through the stencil to create the brick wall and green 'goo' for the purpose of the alien like images.

So would I recommend the pens, yes I would as they offer something very different to the crafter and I have only touched the surface of what is possible and will be playing and sharing more in due course. I particularly like the ease of use for stenciling and as something of a colour fan their vibrancy really appeals, that said there are some more subtle colours in the sets and I need to have a play with those as well. Thank you Chalkola for allowing me to play with your new products.

Below is one stamped and coloured in the conventional way and I realise now their have been aired on TV they are Ants not aliens !!

Happy weekend all and many thanks for popping in today.