Glorious Hibiscus, a Snippet and a Birthday party

Morning Peeps, it's time for our new challenge at Allsorts and this week Helene would like to see something relating to 'Music' on our artwork. Our sponsor is Digistamp Boutique and we also have a second prize of a collection of lovely Tattered Lace musical instrument dies.

And here's a little heads up to what's coming up on 20th May, please feel free to grab the logo and share on your own blogs to help us spread the word.

Well, this is not what I had in mind but the Sheena Hibiscus flowers were sitting on my desk all coloured up ready with Spectrum Sparkle pens after I took apart another card which just didn't go as planned. So I inked up some watercolour card using DI's, used a music score and randomly stamped the base layer, some honeycomb stenciling to the top layer along with a Visible Image sentiment, layered it all up and placed the ready arranged flower spray and finito, a pretty quick and easy card. And as the Hibiscus blooms were all stamped onto offcuts I think this fits nicely into the current 279/280 Snippets Playground challenge.

Happy weekend all and I do hope you will join in our challenge this week and of course pop over to see the inspiration my teamies have on offer.

Food glorious food

Good morning to you all, it's time for our new challenge at Allsorts and this week Wendy is thinking all about 'Food. We have two super prizes on offer, the first from DigiStamp Boutique and the second from Stamp Addicts.

For my first piece I have gone to the source end of food and used a really old Judikins wheat stamp which I heat embossed with detail copper onto a background created with Oxide DI's. The really are so different from normal DI's and do exactly 'what it say's on the packet' which as Tim say's in his CHA video you don't end up with a "muddy finish". It's so easy to add colour on top of colour until you get the look you want, this one was a starting point really and I am still playing with them. The sentiment is Clarity which I cut into pieces to arrange on my tag and to finish a seam binding bow.

It's a touch of deja vous with my second share as again I am well outside my comfort zone finding myself going all twee and colouring up a Penny Black Mo Manning image called Carrot Collection, all that said I have to confess I did quite enjoy colouring this one with Spectrum pencils. The papers and sentiment are also Penny Black and the easel card created with Tattered Lace dies.

I do hope you can find a moment to pop over to the challenge blog as my teamies have some great inspiration to share.

Baroque hearts and roses and ooooops - running late

Good morning to you all, it's time for our new challenge at Allsorts and this week Susan would like to see 'Anything but a card'. This week we have a super set of stamps to be won from John Next Door. 

In this post I also have my mid month shares for Penny Black and More and Stamping Sensations..................and, knuckles suitably rapped and apologies to my teamies, some of my fifteen minute Chocolate Baroque shares which I should have blogged yesterday, they are on the DT blog here. So all in all it's a rather picture heavy post. Talking about CB, Lesley will be back on Hochanda on 24th and 24 March with a new One Day Special and believe me when I say it is indeed special with some amazing stamps.

I thoroughly enjoyed making this creation which was for one of the Chocolate Baroque programmes on Hochande back in January which was all about beautiful Rose stamps and I used several here. The frame is one I picked up on the reduced counter at Tesco for £5.00 which I treated to coatings of gesso, gilding wax, gilding polishes and actylic paints, no real plan to what I did, really I was just trying to highlight the lovely detail around the frame.

I stamped all of the images onto Fabriano cardstock and coloured with the same Spectrum pencils to carry the lilacs and greens and then liberally flicked cordinating DI's onto the backgrounds before mounting all into the frame. On the show Lesley suggested it would make a nice wedding gift and I guess it would and might try another in different colourways.

At Stamping Sensations the Design Team are currently taking it in turns to share 'my go to stamp', well there was never going to be any surprises what mine would be and I think most who know me could have predicted this one, it is of course Stampendous P107 Agapanthus Cluster. It was one of the very first stamps I bough many years ago and I even have a second one as back up - just in case it was ever discontinued. The photo below shows just how much the first has been used, but in my defence I did need a second one as I have been known to use it in class.

I probably cheated a bit here as I needed a sentiment to balance the stamping so my all time favourite Penny Black 2695J Dance Sing Love also got an airing. The background is Pan Pastels and these two are one of my favourite colour palettes.

Now onto my Penny Black make and I have used the new tree stamp Stately 40-520 which I inked with distress markers and spritzed with water before stamping onto Fabriano card. I then stamped the Deer and Bunnies and used ink dusters to add the background, finally stamping the birds, grasses and leaves, all of which are from different PB sets.

And now last but by no means least, those Chocolate Baroque shares, I won't go into detail as it's all on the DT blog along with links to the stamps I used.

If you are all still with me and not fallen asleep, then I wish you all a lovely weekend.

Yet more Poppies, Rudolph Day and Tattered Lace releases

Morning all you crafty Peeps, time for me to share another Guest Designer creation for Chocolate Baroque. As with the last couple of weeks I have written up all the details over at the DT blog here so it seems silly to bore you again with all the information a second time. 

Sorry my visits have been limited, not been a good week or so pain wise and avoiding the computer as much as possible, things can only improve !!

I used a couple more snippets of Fabriano so am off to the Playground where I am hoping for some Halloween fun with the other insouciant playmates. I found a recipe for gooey orange filled cupcakes which should go down well with some hooch up in the tree house, not a word to Miss Di mind you and Parsnip has vowed silence so long as he gets double dibs.

And here is this month's Rudolph Day's card, I am rather impressed with myself this year as I promised Mo I would try harder and apart from when we were on holiday I don't think I've missed a month. 

Looking at my card now the trees all look a bit drunk and at an angle, yet looking at the card itself they seem upright........your gonna have to believe me on this one. Maybe it's the angle I took the photo or maybe it's the north wind blowing !!

Using black archival I stamped a mix of different stamps, Inkylicious, Art Impressions, Lavinia to create the scene, then masked the sun and used distress inks, ink dusters and a piece of torn paper to add colour and finally some glitter on the snowy hills and shy.

And here are a few Tattered Lace makes, I've not done too much lately due to my slow progress on the crafty front, but the lovely wrought iron gates have been released on C&C this week so I am safe to share.

Many thanks for popping in today.

Poppies and wheat

Morning Peeps, my thanks for all your lovely comments on my last posts and also for all your good wished for our Anniversary, I am a little late with my thanks but all were much appreciated.

Today I am just popping in with this weeks Guest Designer creation for Chocolate Baroque, instead of a card I have decorated a photo frame which is now hanging in our conservatory. I have written up all the details over at the DT blog here so hope you will forgive me for not going into detail on my own blog as well as typing is still quite an issue, but on the positive side I am finding new ways of crafting with one gammy arm and hand so it's not all bad.