It's a Creative World

Inky Cards

 

I do not profess to be a great card maker however I decided to have a go at one of the tutorials on a Friday over at Emilie Chamels blog - here is the link and I think I have fallen in love with making them.  I made this card for my brother and as I didn't have paint dabbers I used a sponge and acrylic paint through a mask from a kaisercraft mini pad.  Instead of flowers I added a button and an October Afternoon stick flag, then had a go at inking a banner and used my Tim Holyz diamond stamp and weathered wood distress ink for that.  A few flicks of patina glimmer mist with some little dots of perfect pearls and a card I am proud of.  I loved the process and all the inkiness of it.  

I am still perfecting it though....here are some of the other inky attempts that I made in my play session - saving my best one for last (it does help if you print out the instructions rather than try and remember what you read on your computer downstairs :))

 

 

 

this final one is my basis for making this card.

 

Katherine

Back to School

Hello everyone.  How was the Bank Holiday ?  I hope you had a good rest.  Are you ready for school ? I am not but I will be next week LOL.

I am very fond of multipack of ephemera, something that I have built quite a large supply of.

I discovered this long lost sheet of monogram alphabets by Basic Grey in my stash...I think it must be 4 years old.  So much time has passed that I obviously don't miss or need the rest of the letters.  I removed a few other letters and decided that it would make a good base for my layout.

I cut out a large circle frame from white cardstock and used it frame the alphabet sheet.

Next, I layered a few journalling spots, cards and ephemera sheets across the middle.

I clipped on a photo of my son, on his last day of school and exam last June.

 Followed by a lot of embellishments.

I still have to do the journalling, it will most probably go in the envelope on the side but here is the finished layout.

Here are a couple of closeups of the embellishments.

If you haven't guessed, this layout is about Year 11, hence the repeated use of the number, even on the little metal clock to the side.

Enough from me this month.  Enjoy the rest of the school holiday and see you soon.

Blogged with love by Ifa.

 

 

 

New baby time.

Hi folks Erika here and today I thought I'd share another canvas I made this week for a friend of our family who has just had a little girl.  I am loving playing with this 6" canvasses I can feel a trend coming on with Christmas in mind!

The image is from Sugar Nellie stamps and is called Bambino, I just love it and it has been used so much in this house.  It is coloured with copics and then matted on pink sparkly gingham.  The canvas is coloured using my Distress ink Spun sugar and the frame is white acrylic paint, distressed with sandpaper and then inked with Vintage photo.  The little charm I picked up in the states.

I do hope my friend likes it and it is all set to go up on the nursery wall.  Whilst out in town I couldn't resist a little outfit too, with three males in this house it's a joy to buy something a little girlie for a change.

I hope you are all having a great time over the summer.  I'm finding with family off crafting time is fairly restricted.  Mind you with the great weather we've had the last couple of days in Scotland it's time to make the most of it.

 

CYCLIN' SUNDAY skirt to bag

Hello, Eleanor here.

I can't resist patterned corduroy, whether straight off the bolt, or made up, so whenever I see a little girl's skirt at a car boot sale or charity shop, I snap it up (while wishing I was 40 years younger).

Here's my first before re-fashioning:

It had too much fullness, so I made tucks at the base, which, whilst reducing the width, kept a good capacity. The handle is a length of leather from an old belt, punched with a hole through which to attach buttons.

The skirt was lined, so I just had a few seams to stitch, closing up the bottom hems, a couple of buttons to sew on and it was done!

I had another skirt tucked away, a little more challenging:

but I love the pattern and the embroidery at the waist so much that I thought it was worth tackling.

I needed to take out the elastication, and construct a strap. I removed the bottom couple of inches, including the orange lace strip, and found some acid green broderie anglaise. I chose some matching buttons, and attached the strap

and magnetic closure before stitching the bottom edge (curving the corners), and adding a simple lining.

I love it:

I popped into a local charity shop recently and found this, for £1.25!

Watch this space.

Bye for now.

 

 

 

SATURDAY SHARE

Have you ever visited Christie, at Grace is Overrated? She is sweet, and funny, and insightful.

She has made a collection of 'free for personal use' journal pages to download. 

I love them, I'm sure you will too.

In fact, just the sight of those Sharpies gives me a frisson of delight.

Do go and have a look, there are 50 pages!

 

 

A yummy treat

If you have ever had a Hob Nob biscuit here in the UK, then you'll know just how yummy and more-ish they are. Here's a recipe that makes a biscuit that has just the same satisfying crunch about it. Be warned..they won't last very long, and I'm not even going to begin to guess how many calories per biscuit.

Oaty Crunch Biscuits

8oz Self Raising flour

(or use plain flour and add 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder)

8oz sugar

8oz porridge oats

8oz margarine or butter(butter will be tastier)

1tbsp golden syrup

1tbsp hot water

 

Instructions

Mix the flour, sugar and oats together.

Melt the margarine and the syrup and the water, and then add to the dry mix.

Roll into small balls then put on a greased tray and flatten with a fork. The flatter you make the biscuit, the crunchier it will be. Make sure to leave ample room between the biscuits.

Bake at 180 degrees celcius for about 15 minutes or until they are a nice golden colour. (Don't leave them in too long like I did with one of my trays and I ended up with dark brown rather too crunchie biscuits - oops)

The recipe made loads. I didn't count how many exactly , but it must have been around 40 biscuits. Oh, and then a friend suggested I add some chocolate, and well, now they are even worse - or better depending on how you look at it!

Enjoy!

Doda x

THINKIN INKIN THURSDAY - ART JOURNAL MY WAY

Hello to you all, Virginia here with a quick post about my current style of art journalling.

I know lots of people love art journalling I also know a lot of people haven't tried it yet.  My style of art journalling has changed and altered quite a lot over the years but I find most of my pages now use very simple supplies which don't cost the earth.  Paper, paint and an image creating the page below. 

I'm often asked how I achieve the paint effect and when I tell people there honest answer is that I must have some secret trick up my sleeve so here is proof that I don't.  

So this is the finished result - a journal page completed somewhere to put down my thoughts and feelings on the day, I find the time putting the page together means I have time to think and reflect and being able to do that is quite a therapy in itself.  Now don't get me wrong I don't always document difficult days I document whatever mood I'm in it just so happened that this day had been particularly tough. 

I usually find obtuse images from magazines and books, sometimes printed images from my own collection, whatever I find lurking at the time.  When I was completing this I page I'd had the image sat on my desk for quite some time, thinking I would never use it 

So first of all I tear the image out, I don't cut with scissors as I find the torn edge much easier to deal with 

Then I stick it down with a glue stick, using a bone folder to really make sure it's stuck down well, that way I know when the paint comes out I'm hopefully not going to end up with too many edges moving away from the page. 

Then I gather my supplies, I tend to look at the image to pull out the main colours I can see in it in this case the colours of dark blue, black, white and a hint of green came to mind, but later on I also used a hint of yellow because the grey had a yellowish tinge.  Don't stress about the colours just keep working with them until you are happy. 

Then I set to with the paint and yes they are blobs all over the page straight from the tube

Then I start painting - with my fingers, yes you heard me right - not a paintbrush in sight at this point in time - now as you can see as I start the mix isn't perfect, but by adding little bits of blue and little bits of black the page starts to come together

Honestly - then I keep working the picture until I've covered the page from this 

to this, I often make the edges of the page darker with paint, it seems to make the page bolder 

and this is the proof of the paintbrush I used - it's really rather liberating if I'm honest! 

Once the page is a bit drier I sometimes extend the image, now before you all sigh and do the 'I can't draw and I can't paint' - the answer is neither can I - but you can look at what's before you and extend it a bit giving the illusion - and that's all it is 

See a close up - not perfect - it's not meant to be its supposed to be art - so enjoy it! 

Then I played a bit more by adding a title 

and then I added wiggly lines and coloured them in and put down my thoughts and feelings and there we have it the completed page.  

So next time you've had one of those days (or even if you haven't), find yourself an image and throw some paint at it - you'll be amazed at what you can create! 

ATC Swap

I recently joined an ATC swap through a friend, this month I wanted to try something different so I got my stamps out and used fabric for a change.

I prefer versafine for the image and once dry it seemed to be waterproof, and definitely did not smudge. I cut a piece of fabric the same size as  the atc but think next time I would try a larger piece and folding seams over to the back to stop fraying. I used strong pva glue to stick the stamped fabric to the card.

I added a little tape, and some diamond glaze to highlight the dragonfly wings and tiny clock.

Thanks for stopping by Its a Creative World

Debbie x

Toot Toot Tuesday -My new best friend!

                  

With Tuesday being our day to toot about things, I thought I'd do a mini review of my new best friend! My pretty pink slice by Making Memories. We arestill aquainting ourselves but I think we are getting along nicely!

Having a scrappy gadget is quite a novelty to me as I don't have a large budget for crafting and this is what has led me down the MM road. I've read several reiews which have all listed much the same pro's and cons.To me the cons are small- the blade, which I have yet to replace, doesn't alwas give aperfectly sharp cut. This some times depends on whats being cut and really only needs a small nick with scissors occasionally.It's a bit noisy and needs to be held- but to be honest I like the sound of my little friend whirring away as I hold on ( peering like a bit kid at the cutting!) The only other whinge is at my self as I haven't yet mnaged to guage where to place paper to maximise what I'm using. Not alot to complain about really!

But the pro's?

Well cost is great- I paid just under £100 ( birthday vouchers!) for the basic set. The design cards can be pricey but I'm checking out a certain auction site in the hop of bargains. With my basic card I have one font but it has 4 size going up to 4inches. It has lots of die cuts for me to use as well.So I can be patient till Christmas- I think!

Size - the size of the unit and the design cards is very dinky ( techinical sounding I know!)Just right for sitting on the desk- to hand but not taking up all the room! Even better is the fact it's portable! I can charge for an hour and it will sit with me and cut for approx 1 1/2 hours.

Designs- from what I can see, there are lots of design cards, which do have a strong american influence on some  such as fall and Thanksgiving phrases. You can also emboss and draw with it too now.

So for anyone that is still new to the die cutting side of things, wants an affordable gadget or something for on the go- I think this is perfect! Off to play again now!

 Laura  x

Wire and bead statement rings

I love playing around with beads and love these easy rings. They make great presents for friends who like a statement piece.

They are really simple and take just a few ingrediants; ring blank (some are expandable), a handfull of beads and some craft wire (I use silver plated wire about 0.4).

Just take a length of wire about 50cm long and thread it half way through a ring on the ring blank. I then just twist the wire once then start threading beads on and after each bead go through the ring on the ring blank to make it firm. I tend to use seed beads, freshwater pearls and some glass twinkly beads but you really can use anything as long as they are not too big.

When you are happy with it squeeze the beads together and wind the wire around the bases of the beads. I normally use a pair of round nosed pliers to twist it into a tight curl and squeeze it in again.

I'm not very delicate so these rings suit me well. The nice thing is that you can make lots of these with the remnants from other projects when you have a length of craft wire left that won't do for anything else.

Have a go and see what you can come up with.

Happy crafting

Bev