For a cause at Eclectic Ellapu

Good morning, October already so its time for a new challenge over at Eclectic Ellapu, and this time around we've got two fantastic themes lined up for you.On the pink team we want to see your projects created 'For a cause'. It won't be too long until we're all buying our poppies to raise funds for veterans.One of my friends collects for the Royal British Legion and I've been promising him a poppy for ages so here it is.

The poppy is made from ribbon and was a real labour of love as I am rubbish at sewing and my eyesight is terrible so it took ages. I have to confess I did cheat and use a hot glue gun for some bits lol. I made a tag to display the poppy by using a Sweet Poppy Stencil. I applied distress inks and then Maimeri Glassy Gel before removing the stencil and covering with microbeads. It gives a lovely shimmer but you can't see it too well on the pic.

I'm entering this project in the following challenges:

Crafting from the heart: anything goes

Creative Fingers: anything goes

Hiding in my craft room: freestyle

Not just cards: anything goes

Simon Says Stamp: anything goes

Thanks so much for visiting today

Claire xx

Sparkly poppies

Good morning, isn't it lovely to have such gorgeous sunny weather? The only downside is that our office is like the fires of hell with the sun streaming in the windows but I'd be complaining even more if it was raining so I'll stop moaning lol. Today's project is a tag made using a technique I fell in love with in Craft Stamper, you know those ideas that you see and think 'Wow I wish I'd thought of that' lol.

I've used a background made with Twinkling H2os and began by stamping some Lavinia stamps using Memento inks (Bamboo Leaves, Rhubard Stalk, Lady Bug and Tuxedo Black.

Next I used a Sweet Poppy stencil to create the poppies using Sparkle Medium from Imagination Crafts, adding colour with my Graph'It markers. I'd never have thought of colouring Sparkle medium with my markers but it works perfectly,  its really hard to get a pic of the effect though

I've added black enamel accents to the flowers and the butterfly and then some little flowers stamped with stamps from Indigo Blu and painted with h2os, I popped them up up on 3d foam pads and layered it all up on some black card. To finish off I added some red seam binding ribbon.

I'm entering this in the following challenges:

Artistic Stamper: Colour it red

Charisma: sparkle and shine

Dragonfly Dreams: things with wings

Fussy and Fancy: things with wings

Imagination Crafts: all that glitters

Live and Love Crafts: summer garden

Scrapbooker Phd: add texture

Well I'd better scoot off and get ready for work so have a great day and thanks for popping by
Claire xx

Happy New Year from Premium Craft Brands!

Good morning folks, hope you're having a good weekend. I'm all out of routine with Christmas and work and days off lol, still I'm not complaining as its lovely to have some time at home. Its time for our new challenge over at Premium Craft Brands and this week the theme is 'Anything Goes' and we've got a fab prize from our generous sponsor too. The DT are showcasing their favourite projects from the last year so do pop over  and have peek! I've picked my poppies project from our Floral Challenge in August, I really enjoyed making this

Here's a close up of the poppies:

You can find all the details  for this fun technique on my original post here

I'm entering this project in the Artistic Stamper challenge 'Highlight of your year'

Thanks for stopping by, I really appreciate you taking the time to visit

Claire xx

Floral challenge at PanPastel UK

Good morning my lovelies, what are you up to today? Its another sunny morning here so I'm hoping to sneak a couple of hour in the garden with my book later but first here's my DT project for our new challenge at PanPastel UK where our theme is 'Floral/Flowers'. As always there is a fab prize for our lucky winner, for those in the UK the prize is a PanPastel starter set from the lovely Berni at Your Creativity Store

My project was a bit of a happy accident lol. I was watching the lovely lady from Sweet Poppy stencils demoing at Summer Crafting and fell for this gorgeous poppy stencil. She used a technique with distress inks, translucent stencil paste and microbeads so I bought the stencil, thinking I had the paste at home - of course when I got home I could find white, pearl, black etc etc but no translucent. I had a bit of a brainwave and decided to try Maimeri glossy gel instead and it worked a treat.

I created the background with PanPastels, and then used Pans through the stencil, applied the Glossy gel through the stencil and removed the stencil, before applying the microbeads. I dropped the whole thing face down on the carpet - not to be recommended as it squished the beads a bit but overall I'm quite happy with the effect, you can see it a bit better in this pic:

Once it was dry I popped the scene in a collage frame that I'd coloured with Panpastels and added texture with Maimeri light modelling paste and a harlequin stencil. I used a bit of treasure gold to add some highlights.

I'm entering this one in the following challenges:

Alphabet Challenge: M is for micro/mini

(I've used microbeads on my project)

Creative Belli: Summer

Creative Moments: anything but a card

Inkspirational : anything goes

Sparkle and Sprinkle: anything but a card

Victorine Originals: Summer colours

Well i'm about to take the dogs for a nice long walk so I can have an hours peace in my craft room, Enjoy your day whatever you're doing 

Thanks for popping by today,

Claire xx