November Rudolph Days Challenge

Hi there.  Here we are round to the last Rudolph Days Challenge of the year...where did that year go?  It is run by the lovely Mo over at Scraps of Life by Scrappymo, and is open from the 25th to the end of each month, and will start again in the new year.

I decided to make a couple of cards to show this time as they are simple quick makes and I need to get more cards made .  These are both upcycled from last year's cards.  The penquins I thought were cute and I have just added a silver mat and an embossed and inked background.  The embossing folder is called Entwined Holly by Crafter's Companion which I bought recently and inked with Salty Ocean Oxide Ink on to a piece of white card.  I used a blending tool and lightly rubbed it over the embossed service.  It isn't too bad but some little bits did inevitably get on the background

The second card is a simple nativity scene which I die cut using a stitched square die, and which I have backed with gold card, and I have added a sentiment banner, again something I had saved.

I would just like to say a big thank you to Mo for all her hard work during the year in keeping the challenge going, and also to her lovely Design Team for all their great inspiration.

Thank you for joining me here today and I'll see you again soon.

I am also entering the following challenges:

Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge - No. 413 Anything Christmas Goes (optional twist - make your own background) - my penguin card has an embossed and inked background.
Sparkles Christmas Challenge - Embossing heat or dry (my penguin card has dry embossing).
Watercooler Wednesday - No. 198 Gail's "All About Holidays" Challenge.
Simon Says Wednesday Challenge - Anything Goes.

Using those Dies

Hi all.  You know sometimes it is difficult to break out of those creative ruts we get into, and I guess we all have our own style and it can become too easy just to do very similar styles of card all the time because that is what we feel safest doing.  Lately stamping and inking is what I do most and I have so many dies which are just not getting any use, so when I saw this card over at Ros's blog here, the second card on this particular post, though both are beautiful, it just gave me  a push to get my dies out and do something using similar dies.

I have a Tim Holtz Mixed Media set of dies which included this crackle corner and I cut it into a snippet of white card and used a Spellbinders scalloped edge Curved Borders 2 die to cut it.  I cut this down and added it to another snippet of white card cut with a Crealies Pierced Rectangle and the edge cut again into a curve using another of the edges from the Spellbinder set of dies.  I then mounted this on to a piece of craft foam before adding it to my white base card.  I then die cut some Sue Wilson Delicate Fronds and highlighted them randomly with some copper gilding wax and added them to the mat.  I finished with a large die cut sentiment cut with a piece of white card and I added the copper gilding wax over it.

Thank you for visiting my blog today and I hope to see you again soon.

I am entering the following challenges:

Pixie's Crafty Workshop - No. 340 - where we use our snippets of paper and card etc.
Happy Little Stampers November Anything Goes with Dies Challenge.

Twelve Tags of Christmas

Hi everyone.  Lovely Loll Thompson has been running her 5th annual tag challenge over on her blog Stamping with Loll and this is to be her last year.  Although she has actually finished showing all her tags, and those of her guests, the challenge is still open for another few days so do go and take a look, and enter if you can.

The tag has to be Mixed Media based and the required elements are Stamping + two additional elements of your choice.  My tag includes, stamping, colouring with alcohol inks, dry embossing, gilding polish and distress ink blending.

I decided to use a new embossing folder which I bought about a week ago which is from Sarah's Signature Collection and is called Entwined Holly, and embossed using a piece of white card which I then shaped into a tag.  I coloured it using first some Pebeo Silver Gilding Wax and then I applied some Broken China and Faded Jeans Distress Ink over the top to take the whiteness off using a blending tool.  As the material is a little shiny it didn't end up taking the ink all that well, even when I used Faded Jeans which is quite dark, but it has given it a sort of bluey grey colour, which nevertheless is quite pretty.

I stamped the Chocolate Baroque image Robin the Spruce on to a piece of acrylic using Black Archival Ink and left it until it was perfectly dry before adding some alcohol inks to the reverse side.  I used a piece of white card to back it and I creased it and wrapped the acrylic round the card and stuck it down and then adhered another piece of card over that for extra security.  I then cut a pierced rectangle from Silver Mirri card slightly larger than the image and layered it on to this before fixing it to the tag.

I finished the tag with a piece of sheer white ribbon which has a nice glittery look and then because it is difficult to stamp on to an embossed surface, and I didn't want to add another strip with the sentiment on I decided to use one of my very old silver peeloff sentiments.

Thank you to Loll for running this challenge for the past five years and for giving us some absolutely marvellous inspiration and great prizes too, with all the different mixed media techniques she always manages to include. Thank you for visiting today and I'll see you again soon.

p.s.  I was so thrilled to have been chosen as one of the Top Tags for this challenge, thank you Loll.

Handsome Buck

Hi everybody.  This Serendity Buck, or deer as we say here, is an image I have had for quite a while but haven't used it recently, and I needed a quick birthday card and although you can colour this image to within an inch of its life, just a bit of simple heat embossing will do equally as well.

I found a piece of packaging which came with an embossing folder and which I kept as I thought it might come in useful with its woodgrain look, and I used some Aged Mahogany Distress Ink around the edges and over the lines which as it is shiny didn't colour it as much as I had hoped but stained it slightly.  I then cut a snippet of kraft card with a square stitched die from The Works and then inked the stamp with Versamark and heat set it using WOW Metallic Copper Embossing Powder.  I finished by finding another snippet of black card and stamped and heat embossed the sentiment on to it again using the Metallic Copper EP, and cut it into a fishtail banner shape and rounded the other end.  I layered the topper on to the piece of background card and then wrapped some jute type string around it twice and knotted it before adding it to my 6" square white base card.  I then finished by adding the sentiment.

Thank you for stopping by today and I'll see you again soon.

I am entering this into the following challenge:

Pixie's Crafty Workshop - No. 339 where we use our snippets of card and paper etc.

We Will Remember Them

Hi everybody.  I'm sure there are not many people who haven't realised it is 100 years since the end of World War One today.

We went to a lovely concert last night which included a lot of wonderful music and singing, they even had a piper and a bugler, and it was really moving.  Though this year we especially remember WW1, on Remembrance Sunday here in the UK we remember those that have fought and given their lives in all conflicts.

Chocolate Baroque November TV

Hi there.  Here is a sneaky peek of some of what Chocolate Baroque have in store for you next week over on Hochanda ....

They will be on air on Tuesday 6th November at 11am and then again at 3pm, so if you want to get some crafty tips and see lots of inky tricks then please join Lesley and Judith then.

Butterfly Lady, Auricula Script and Floral Edges Landscape

Hi everyone.  These are three cards I made for the Chocolate Baroque September TV shows on Hochanda featuring the pretty Butterfly Dress, Auricula Script and Floral Edges stamps.

I started by making a spritzed ink background on a piece of white card.  I used Adirondack Stonewashed ink, and Twisted Citron and Cracked Pistachio Distress inks, laying the colours down approximately where I wanted them.   I then stamped one of the Floral Edges at the bottom using second generation Cracked Pistachio and another with leaves at the top using Lucky Clover.

I then stamped the image on to a piece of Drawing Cartridge paper using Versafine Smokey Gray ink and coloured with her using some watercolour pencils just as they are without any water.  I then cut her out leaving a border round the edge, and using a craft knife I cut round the largest butterfly on her skirt so that I could lift the wings for dimension.

I decided to frame the background then add the lady over the top.  I made the frame using another piece of white card and cut it using a Tonic scalloped edge die, but cut the internal square with a craft knife because none of my plain rectangle dies were the right shape and size.

I finished the card by stamping the lady's skirt again using my Smokey Gray ink and cut out and coloured some more of the flowers and added them to the corners of the frame. 

 My second card features the Auricula Script image which I stamped on to Velvet Card using Versamark ink and heat embossed with WOW Gold Metallic Embossing Powder.  I matted the image on to a piece of dark green card.  I then stamped the image again heat embossing with the WOW Gold EP and coloured just the flower using my Distress inks in Candied Apple and Carved Pumpkin on the flowers, and some Twisted Citron and Cracked Pistachio and also some Adirondack Bottle on the leaves and sepals round the flowers.  I then used Ground Espresso for the stem and to darken bits of the leaves.  I applied the inks with my waterbrush.  When dry I cut the flower out and using Pinflair Glue Gel I added it over the flower on the background.

For the background I used the flower image from the Floral Edges set stamped on to a rectangle die cut using a Crealies Pierced Edge die.  I stamped it on all four sides butting it up to the previous edge by masking just where I thought it might cross over by placing a piece of paper just over the edge of the previous image.  I then heat embossed using Versamark ink and heat embossed with the WOW Opaque Bright White EP.  I then blended with the green Distress Inks to complement the flower.  I added this to an approximately 7" x 5" white base card.

I am entering this card in the following challenge:

Pixies Crafty Workshop No. 338 - where we use our snippets of card and paper etc.

My last card was made using the Floral Edges.  I created a background using my gelli plate and Distress Inks in similar colours to those used on the previous cards, these seem to be my favourites at the moment.  I laid the inks down on the gelli plate and spritzed with water before pulling the print on to some Velvet card.  I then added the floral edge stamps to frame the scene and also added the hills and the sun in the background using a brush to blend.  I used Fossilised Amber for the sun and also some Mermaid Lagoon and Blueprint Sketch in the sky area, and the various greens already mentioned together with the Fossilised Amber for the foliage and flowers in the foreground, and the foliage around the top of the card.

Thank you for looking at my blog today and I'll see you again soon.