Hot pink in Tuscany and a winner

Morning Peeps I'm sorry my blog visits have been patchy this week, lets just say it's not been the most straightforward of weeks and my time has been diverted elsewhere thanks to the malicious activities of one sad crafter spreading a net of inexactitude. If I needed reminding why I don't do FB, this was it. But myself and my team mates at my three challenges really appreciate the kind words of support we have received from so many of you. 

So time for a new challenge at Allsorts and this week Mervi would like to see cards for any 'Celebration' but not Birthdays. Our prize come from Chocolate Baroque and I have a few more CB shares further down from my post on the CB blog yesterday.

Lesley will be back on The Craft Store on Friday 4th June at 9am and 1pm with different stamps for both shows featuring old and new along with loads of inspiration using them.

When I made this one for a TV programme for Chocolate Baroque I was trying out some new Distress Glazes, this one Kitsch Flamingo added over the CB Tuscany scene stamped simply with Versafine black. 

Have to say I do rather like the effect they give but I think Ranger will see a good income from them as they don't go far at all. I have used the pot of Speckled Egg on just four creations and it's almost empty, but given the idea is to cover the whole image not too surprising I guess.

Around the borders I stamped one of the new CB Vertical Sentiments, matted onto coordinating card and an organza bow to finish.

Details of stamps used can be found on my post at the CB blog here.

Before I go, I need to announce the winner of the prize from last Saturday's post celebrating Allsorts 12th Birthday, the lucky recipient is Sarah (Mallows Crafty Bits), well done, please mail me with your full name and postal addy so I can send your goodies. 

Have a lovely weekend all, in the UK we have a long Bank Holiday weekend so fingers crossed the weather is on the up and the sun shines.

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Happy, Bright and Sunny colours and prizes to celebrate Allsorts 12th Birthday

Morning Peeps so time for a new challenge at Allsorts, this week we are celebrating our 12th Birthday and have a bumper giveaway with twelve prizes, so do pop over to the challenge blog and see what you could win by entering our 'Happy, Bright and Sunny Colours' theme.

We are so fortunate to have a lovely group of sponsors to whom we are most grateful, this weeks prizes come from the following craft stores: Craft Stash, Chloes Cards, Tattered Lace, Crafting.co.uk, Sizzix and Bee Crafty.

As it's a special week I have a little giveaway as well, a winner will be drawn from all those commenting on this post and announced next Saturday. There are some Chocolate Baroque black and white papers, coloured stamping cards and their lovely Poppy Ledger stamp.

My creation at the top is a background of various workers stamps, stencilling and washi tape, all done totally randomly to see that I ended up with. A large Chocolate Baroque Butterfly stamped into vellum with Versafine Clair and heat embossed with detail clear EP, cut out and placed over some black twine and sentiment from one of my own stamp sets.

My second share featured Stamp Addict Groovi Blooms stamped onto card inked with Oxides, an inky stencilled background onto which I drew the flower stems and then added the flowers and leaves and a die cut circle behind the large bloom. The sentiment is also SA.

I really do hope you will join in our Birthday celebrations, with so many prizes on offer why not!!

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Sunshine Fairy

Morning everyone, a bit of a bumper post form me today, it's mid month time at We Love Chocolate Baroque and Stamping Sensations, plus I have another share over at the brand new River of Creativity challenge and last but by no means least my creations from my post over at the Chocolate Baroque Blog at the weekend.

A reminder that we are looking for a new DT at both Allsorts and We Love Chocolate Baroque challenges, so do pop over to the challenge blogs to find out more.

My Fairy scene follows our Sunshine theme at River of Creativity, if you haven't found us yet then please click on the link to go check us out and join in this month challenge. An Oxide background and stencilled sun rays and lots of Lavinia stamps to build up the scene......and oh dear, I succumbed to another order at the weekend, all I was looking for was a specific stencil and you can guess the rest.

Above a tag using Chrysanthemum Blueprint, some torn paper and hessian onto an acrylic background, in this case the lush bright Dylusions.

This one uses Floribunda Net stamped onto a waste background from a brayer clean off and embossed with detail gold EP, I love the soft look this gives but forget to use it until I see a prompt out in blogland.

As with the above creation, another TV sample for The Craft Store/Hochanda, a stencilled background with a masked border, in this instance I used Oxide spray through the mask and dabbed it off to prevent it bleeding underneath. Stamped Harlequin Bouquet and a bit of colouring in.

All details for these two are over the the CB blog here.

Hope you all have a good Tuesday and my thanks as always for your kind visits and words of encouragement.

 

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Where flowers bloom........

Morning Peeps, time for a new challenge at Allsorts where I am your host and a nice and simple theme of Anything Goes. This weeks sponsor is WOWVOW offering a £15 store voucher.  

It's Penny Black creations for me today, both hidden away unused in one of my photo files. The top one a pretty simple creation with some watered down DI's swiped across a piece of watercolour card, the Orchid inked with Distress Markers, spritzed and stamped several times to build up the colours, a music score stamped randomly in the background, a little stencilling and the sentiment which is also Penny Black.

Next week it will be our twelfth Birthday and we are having a bit of a giveaway, so please share the above photo to help us spread the word. Also we will be introducing two new DT's and looking for one more, so if you think that might be you please pop over to the challenge blog to see that you need to do to be considered.

The background of this one is when I cleaned off the brayer when I was doing some Gelli prints with acrylic paint. A bit of texture added with a stencil and paste, the Penny Black flower stamped and cut out with the matching die and placed in a die cut circle. A couple of index clips and a sentiment from my Life is so much Better set available from Chocolate Baroque.

Have a good weekend.

 

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Away with the Fairies

Morning Peeps so time for a new challenge at Allsorts, this week Lynn would like us to create a landscape or scene. Our prize is a super A4 stamp set from Rare Earth. 

Comfort zone crafting for me this week and Fairies, I did intend digging out my Stampscapes box to create a scene or two, but inkiness won the day with Lavinia stamps. The background for the card above is the negative 'pull' from an alcohol lift session, I do rather like the hot pinks and randomness, then I just built up the scene with various stamps.

This one is back to Oxides for the background, the focal Fairy has been in my collection for years and joined by some newer stamps to finish the waterside scene.

Thanks as always for your kind visits and words of encouragement.

 

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Sunshine at River of Creativity

Morning everyone, today sees the start of a new challenge called River of Creativity, it's a monthly challenge which starts on the 5th of the month and ends the last day of each month. It's not just about cardmaking and we are encouraging all types of craft, so I do hope you will pop over to the challenge blog and see what it's all about and even better join in as well.

The challenge blog link is above and there is a presence on SM as well. Those who know me are aware I'm not into FB and other SM so I don't have a clue (or any interest in finding out come to that) about hashtags and the like, but I'm told this link will mean something to lots of you: #ROCsunshine01.

Zoe asked me if I would like to be a Guest Designer for the start of her challenge and I was happy to accept, that turned into an invitation to be a full time DT and as I love her concept for the challenge said a rather speedy yes please.

I was immediately drawn to the theme for the first challenge which is 'Sunshine' so had a lovely inky day creating and came up with this. It was inspired by a new Clarity sunray stencil although I have to admit to being very disappointed when it arrived. It was advertised as a 7x7 stencil, the heavy duty Mylar is indeed that size, but the actual stencil is a small pop out section in the middle measuring just 2.5" x 3.5"......misleading advertising comes to mind.

So I adapted my thinking a little and started by spraying Dylusions Pure Sunshine through the stencil onto some Chocolate Baroque black and white paper (very similar to rice paper but stronger) then stamped the CB Poppies around he edge using Versafine Clair Tulip and added a bit more colour with a Distress Marker. The sentiment is another from one of my own inspiration quote stamp sets available from Chocolate Baroque.

Also a reminder that Chocolate Baroque's Lesley will be on The Craft Store on Friday with shows at 9am and 1pm, above is one of my shares from the show.

Hope you all have a good Wednesday and I really hope you will join our challenge this month and will be popping round to see your entries.

 

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Dare to be Brave

It's the first Sunday of the month so time for our new challenges at We Love Chocolate Baroque and Stamping Sensations. Our themes for this month are 'Bright Sunny Colours' and 'Beautiful Blooms'. Prizes at both will be the winners choices of stamps from Chocolate Baroque

There seems to be rather a a lot of colour going on in this post, but crafting with bold and vivid palettes does make me happy! For the top card I brayered Dylusions paint onto textured card to achieve a more rustic finish. Next I stamped Canary Bird Rose focally, and heat embossed with detail clear EP as I find ink takes forever to dry on this paint. Then stamped a second time and coloured with the same Dylusions and paper pieced. Some numbers from Just Useful and Ace Card and sentiment from Life is so much Better.

After stencilling a background I repeat stamped using masking as I worked my way up using one of the blooms from Fresh Florals to create a spray of flowers, then coloured with sparkle pens. The harlequins in the background are from Decorative Edges stamped with Versavfine Clair and sentiment again from Life is so much Better.

On this one again an inked and stencilled background then stamped and coloured, stamped a second time and paper pieced. Two die cut circles to highlight the blooms the script worker stamp from Ace Card, it's one I seem to use over again again, and the single word from Sow the Seeds.

Finally, a bit of mixed media with an inky background stamping onto that and the chipboard shapes with worker stamps from Just Useful, Life is so much Better , Edgy Edges, Small Graph Paper, the the focal Butterfly is from Tangled Garden, sentiment again from Life is so much Better.......theres another set in the pipeline which I just might give some sneak peeks of soon.

Yesterday I shared some photos of Rosa, our new family member who is eight weeks old, she's forever on the move and I'm yet to get a decent front on photo of her. She loves the garden and here she is, smallest in the pack but clearly thinks she's as big as the rest. 

Such has been the week with our new Little Miss moving in that I forgot to share my cards from my post over at the Chocolate Baroque blog this week, so here they are, full details on my post here:

I do hope you will join us this month.

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Spring Blossoms and Rosa, the new kid on the block

Morning Peeps, so I've been rather quiet this week, the reason is below, she is adorable but oh my, I had forgotten just how time consuming an eight week old puppy can be. Her name is Rosa (Italian Pink Rose/Flower) which seemed fitting as her Dad Milo is Italian and our other girls all have floral names. We have had her for a week now and I am yet to get some decent photos as she is never still long enough and seem to find the camera a fun challenge and pounces at it each time it comes out.

At Allsorts our host this week is Ellie with the lovely seasonal theme of 'Spring Blossoms'. We have two limited edition stamps from Chocolate Baroque for prizes, they will be back on our screens on Friday 7th May on The Craft Show (Hochanda). Lesley has two shows at 9am and 1pm showcasing different stamps in both.

Another reminder about the new challenge called River of Creativity starting on Wednesday, more info over at the challenge blog. 

My shares today both feature the same stamp sets, Happy Flowers Day and my own Life is so much Better. I used a piece of linen card for the based of the top one and brayered it with Wilted Violet Oxide, I rather like how the textured card rebuffs colour in parts. Some background stamping with CB worker stamps and the Magnolia stamped twice to decoupage after colouring. I cut the sentiment into four, several on this set are quite long between 13cm and 16cm so lend themselves to using in this way..........that was my intention when creating them as it's one of my crafty fetishes!!

For this one I stamped the Magnolia, heat embossed with detail gold EP, coloured in and added some stencilled leaves before placing in a frame and adding the sentiment.

And here is Rosa, she's a real little moocher and loves the garden, especially a bit of mud, the second one was a nice wet spot where the greenhouse water butts overflowed.

It's the May Day bank holiday here in the UK so I wonder what the weather will throw our way, somehow I doubt barbies will feature if the forecast is right.

 

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