Oriental challenge at FSC

Hi there, we're going 'Oriental' on the catwalk at Fashionable Stamping Challenges this time. Our lovely teamie Paula has chosen the theme for this challenge and it was a great excuse to dust of my oriental stamps. As always we've got a great prize up for grabs from Marina, our generous sponsor from Cottage Crafts but don't forget we're a rubber stamping challenge so no digi stamps are allowed.

My tag has a distress ink background with lots of overstamping. The focal image is a Sweet Pea stamp by Ching Chou Kuik called 'Bamboo Serende'. I've coloured her with promarkers and then triple embossed the image. I've added some black lace and purple velvet ribbon (looks blue in the pic for some strange reason), a coin charm with a purple tassel (although that looks red in the pic lol, I really don't know how i can manage to take such dreadful photos).

 I've also added some die cut swirls, a couple of  gold embossed acetate butterflies and a little fan. The fan was made with an old wood mounted stamp I've had for years and never used. I made the flower with tissue paper coloured with distress ink and starbust stains. I die cut the tissue with tattered florals and popped a gorgeous button in the centre. I've just got these beautiful little buttons from Linda over at the Funkie Junkie and they are so pretty it was hard to bring myself to use one. 

Here's another pic to try and show some of the details:

I'm entering this tag in the following challenges:

Allsorts: in bloom

Charisma Cardz: anything goes

Crafty Cardmakers: create your own flowers

Crafty Catz: metal

Crafty mess challenge: Ribbon and lace

Crazy 4 Challenges: create a tag

Thanks for popping by today and all your lovely comments

Don't forget to check out my teamies blogs to see their gorgeous artwork

Claire xx

Pastel colours at PanPastel UK

Good morning folks,  its time for a new challenge at PanPastel UK and this week our theme is 'Pastel colours'.  You don't have to use pans to enter the challenge but of course we love it when you do. 

For my DT card I've used a Rose Fairy stamp from Joanna Sheen, she's coloured with distress markers and edged with permanent red tint.I love Joanna's fairy stamps, they were some of the first stamps I ever bought and I never get fed up of them. The bp is also from Joanna Sheen, distressed with some permanent green tint PanPastel. I've coloured the ribbon and lace with the same PanPastels, I wasnt sure how the lace would take the colour but it worked fine :-)

I made the flowers with watercolour paper die cut with tattered florals and coloured with permanent red tint and hansa yellow tint, the centres are little yellow seed beads from my stash. To finish off I've added some little green pearls in the corners.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

Alphabet challenge: Handmade flowers

Crafty Ribbons: flowers

Divas by Design: Tickled pink

Hotshot Crafts: Die cuts

Joanna Sheen: Happy birthday

Papertake weekly: In the garden

Sisterhood of Crafters: May flowers

Sparkle Creations rubber stamps: May flowers

Totally Gorjuss: Pink and green

Don't forget theres a fab prize up for grabs for our lucky winner, who will receive a PanPastel trial set from our lovely sponsor Berni at  Your Creativity Store! 

Brrrr its freezing here again today, I can't believe we're in the middle of May and I've still got the central heating on. Not much sign of many spring flowers either although the weeds are definitely thriving in my garden with all this rain lol. Still its perfect crafting weather so I think I'll spend the day in my craft room.

Have a great Sunday

Claire xx

Anything goes at PanPastel UK

Good morning folks, we've got a nice easy challenge for you this week at PanPastel UK, this time around our theme is 'Anything goes'! You don't have to use PanPastels to enter but of course we love it when you do :-)
This week we have a very special sponsor, my super talented teamie Linsday of LEJ Designs , make sure you check out the website as Lindsay has some amazing digis and our lucky winner this week will be able to choose 3 as their prize! I'd already made my card but pop over to the challenge blog as some of my teamies have used some LEJ Designs images and they are fab-u-lous. 

I've used lots of different warm reds, yellows and orange pans for this card, I began by creating a background by blending orange, hansa yellow and a little permanent red PanPastel on some white card and overstamped with the flower stamp (which comes from Chocolate Baroque's Pretty Birdcage stamp sheet). I used a pencil eraser to remove most of the colour from the flowers and leaves and then coloured with distress markers. The next layer is a digital paper designed by Lesley Wharton, printed off and then lightly coloured with yellow and orange pans. The focal image is from the same stamp sheet, I stamped it on some white card coloured with yellow and orange pans and again used an eraser ro remove the pans where I wanted to add colour with my distress markers. The large flower is made from crinoline fabric die cut using tattered florals and coloured with Pans, the smaller roses are made using tattered pinecones cut from kraft card and coloured with orange panpastel. To finish  off i've added some green pearls and a organza ribbon bow.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

Deep Ocean: Punches/dies

Hooked on Crafts: Flowers

Little Miss Muffet: Flowers

Paper Pretties: Flowers

The Stamp Man: Favourite technique 

(well mine changes from day to day but at the minute its experimenting with PanPastels)

There She Goes: May flowers

Tuesday Throwdown: In the garden

All these flowery challenges are making me feel guilty about the state of my poor old garden, the weeds are taking over but every time I think about putting my nose outside and doing some weeding the heavens open and I just have to shelter in my craft room. Ah well its bank holiday weekend so maybe tomorrow. Or then again maybe not as its bound to rain isn't it lol. 

Thanks for popping by

Claire xx

Add a flower at PanPastel UK

Look no stamps lol! Here's my DT card for our new challenge at PanPastel UK where our theme is 'Add a flower' and I haven't used a single stamp for my card. I can't remember the last time I made a card without any stamping but i got carried away making my background with PanPastels and masks and decided i didn't want to cover it up lol.

I started with a square of white card and applied Diarylide yellow, ultramarine blue and permanent green PanPastels over a layer of white PP. I used a gorgeous prima mask and applied Paynes Grey PP around the maske adding more green and a little Permanent red to pick out the foliage and flower. Next I used Tile Texture template from Crafters Workshop and applied more Paynes Grey, Blue and a little Permanent red PP here and there. I absolutely love the effect of this template, i seem to be using it on everything at the minute .

I used some gorgeous rose lace from Chocolate Baroque and added some red chiffon ribbon. To create my flower I die cut 3 flowers using some crinoline fabric and Tattered Florals and coloured with Permanent Red PanPastel. I layered them like the grungepaper roses, curling the petals as I went along and added the flower to my card. To finish off I added some faux pearls in the corners.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

Crazy Challenge: No designer papers

Creative Card Crew: Vintage

Flourishes: Lace and Scallops

As always our lovely sponsor Berni from Your Creativity Store has a fab prize up for grabs for our lucky winner! 

We've had some very exciting news this week too!! PanPastels are making their debut on Create and Craft next week, you can see them on Wednesday at 11am and then on Sunday at 3pm, what  a treat!!  . The lovely Kay from Indigo Blu will be demoing so its definitely not one to be missed!! 

Thanks for popping by

Claire xx

Girly/Mothers Day at PanPastel UK

Hi there, i'm back with my second post already today, this time my DT project for PanPastel UK where the theme is 'Girly/Mother's day'. I'd made this beaded bracelet for my MIL and decided to alter a PanPastel box to pop it in

Sorry about the blurry pic, my camera has given up the ghost so I had to borrow hubbys and I can't seem to suss out the settings at all. 

I crackled the box using purple emulsion paint, watered down pva glue and cream emulsion and distressed the edges with vintage photo distress ink. I made the flowers using fabric from my stash, the purple pompom flowers are coloured with violet panpastel.

To make the gift tag, I stamped a Chocolate Baroque background stamp on a kraft tag with versamark ink and applied Violet PanPastel with a sofft applicator. I used my scrummy new lattice spellbinder dies to create the embellies, again using violet PanPastel to highlight the diecuts. I love this colour, its my favourite at the minute. To finish off I added a little purple ribbon.

I'm entering this project in the following challenges:

Allsorts: Say it with flowers

Craft your days away: Mothers Day

Divas by Design: Favourite things (Panpastels, making flowers and kraft)

Fabulous Friday's:  kraft paper

One stop craft : Mothers day with ribbon

Paperplay: recycle it

Simon Says Stamp: Mothers day or special female

Totally Papercrafts: Favourite things (My PanPastels, making flowers and kraft)

Don't forget our lucky winner with receive a fabby PanPastel Trial set from Berni our lovely sponsor at Your Creativity Store!!

thanks for popping by 

hugs

Claire xx

Garden Patch challenge at Scrapbook Stamp Society

Hi there folks, I'm running late with this post, I've just had one of those days so i'll keep it quick and go and put my feet up with a glass of falling down water lol. There's a brand new challenge at Scrapbook Stamp Society Challenge at the theme is 'Garden Patch'. I've used this gorgeous image called 'Elf Flower' by Mogan Fitzsimons for my project.

I'd been playing around making tissue paper flowers so i decided to make a little wall hanging for my DT project. I used a Decorplate from Caroline's and gave it a crackle background with emulsion paint and pva glue. I'd already coloured the image with promarkers and decoupaged it so that the gorgeous elf is peeping out from the floral frame. I attached it to the decorplate and added my flowers around the edge, unfortunately i ran out of glue so i'll have to have a trip to the shop in the morning. Eeek how on earth did I run out of glue?? I bet i'll find loads when  I've bought some lol.

The flowers were made using white tissue paper (I always save tissue paper from packaging) die cut with tattered florals die and then coloured with glimmer mists. I scrunched them while wet and left them to dry before layering them up with a dot of glue, more glue in the centres to add assorted colours of seed beads.

I'm also entering this project in the following challenges:

Crafters Companion: spring

Cupcake Craftroom: spring bouquet

Joanna Sheen Challenge: spring or Easter

Just Hannah: something to hang

Scrapbook Sisters: Spring flowers

Wags'n'Whiskers: spring break

Don't forget to check out all the gorgeous images at Scrapbook Stamp Society, they are scrummy!!

Hope you're having a good weekend

hugs

Claire xx

Exciting news!!

Hi there,I'm back with my first DT project for Scrapbook Stamps Society. I was over the moon when I was invited to join such an exciting team, the hardest part was choosing the images to work with lol. For my first project I've made a little shadow box using a stunning digistamp by Heather Valentin called 'Butterfly Fae Fantaseyes' (you can find it here). I love to colour eyes so I couldn't resist this image.

I've coloured the image with promarkers and popped it in to the back of a canvas that I'd covered with glimmer misted scrunched paper to create a frame. I inked around the edges with some black versafine ink and added lots of flowers. The large black roses are made from grungepaper painted with Ranger crackle paint and a sprinkle of black glitter. All the smaller flowers started out white and were coloured with glimmer mists. I've added some black punched leaves and some gorgeous glittery green leaves. 

The little heart charm isn't showing too well in the pic, I made it by colouring translucent shrink plastic with green pigment ink and stamping over with a heart stamp before shrinking to size. Its attached with a couple of jump rings. 

The new challenge over at  Scrapbook Stamp Society Challenge  is open and the theme is 'Hearts and Flowers, there are some fab prizes on offer and some gorgeous freebies too

I'm also entering this project in the following challenges:

Crafty Emma's Challenge: anything but a card

Creative Belli: Fancy frames

Hotshot Crafts : Flowers

I love promarkers: anything goes

Stampin Sisters in Christ: Make a heart

Sunday Stamper: My eyes adored you 

Totally Papercrafts: Make your own flowers

Through the Craftroom Door: anything but a card plus make your own embellies

Truly Scrumptious: something forgotten 

(my canvas was gathering dust as were the flowers I coloured with glimmer mists)

Happy Crafting

Claire xx

GDT at Sugar Creek Hollow

Hi there, I'm so excited to be GDT at Sugar Creek Hollow for this weeks challenge, its a real pleasure to join such a talented team of ladies. I always admire their beautiful shabby chic and vintage projects so it was such an honour to be invited :-). This week's theme is 'Go Girly' and one lucky winner will receive a digi stamp of our choice and a winner's badge to display on their blog. In addition, the Design Team will choose one project as Card of the Week, the creator will receive a badge and be in the running for a Guest Designer spot!

For my GDT project I've used a gorgeous stamp from Crafty Individuals (a birthday pressie from my lovely MIL and FIL). I stamped the image with sepia versafine and watercoloured with distress inks (Tea dye, Vintage photo, Victorian Velvet). I made the background by stamping words onto card stock with distress inks, coating with gesso and then overlaying scrunched up tissue stamped with text stamp (from Chocolate Baroque's Paisley Elephant stamp sheet). To create the edge I cut the tissue paper larger than the card and once it was dry, ran a wet paint brush around about 1/2cm from the edge, this lets you tear the tissue in a straightish line but leaves a lovely feathery edge.  I've also added stitching with shimmery embroidery floss. 

I've gone to town with lots of girly embellies, pearls, iridescent gems, seam binding ribbon, lace, irridescent beaded trim and some lovely sparkly pins from Crafty Boots. The sentiment stamp is from Chocolate Baroque. I've added some hand made flowers too, rolled ribbon roses and the larger flowers were created with crinoline fabric from Linda, The Funky Junkie's Etsy store. I die cut the fabric using Crealies dies, coloured with Victorian velvet distress ink and scrunched up to dry. Once they flowers were dry, I layered them up and added iridescent seed beads to the centre. The punched leaves are made from kraft glassine.

The shimmery heart was made using a technique I saw on the Particraft blog,  (I think its on Sue's dvd too). This is the first time I've used it but definitely not the last as its so easy and really effective. To get the heart shape I stamped a heart stamp on some scrap card, cut out the shape and then spread pva glue over the reverse of the shape.  I added a good dusting of mica powders in pink and pearl and then blasted with my heat gun.  

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:
Clearly Inspired: Pastels
Crafters Companion: love is in the air
Crafty Creations: Valentine
Crop Stop: Distressed vintage or shabby
I brake for challenges: Fancy folds
Pretty Little Ribbon Shop: Be my valentine
Scrapbook Sisters: Sweet Valentine
Simply Create Too: love is in the air
Totally Papercrafts: Make your own flowers
Wags'n'Whiskers: Valentine/love


Thanks for calling by today. I hope you're having a good weekend
hugs
Claire xx

Trees and Baubles and Rainbow Lady's Challenge

Hi there, you may have a feeling of deja vue when you see this post lol, that's because I got totally confused and posted it last week by mistake. Anyway hopefully this time I've got myself organised for Rainbow Lady's challenge this week which is 'Trees and Baubles'

I've used one of my favourite Christmas stamps for this card, I love this quirky Christmas tree from 'Family Christmas' themeplate by Chocolate Baroque. I've painted the image with H2os and die cut it with nesties labels 11 and distressed with bundled sage distress ink. The bp is from the Artylicious cd, Seasons Greeting. This is one of my favourite papers and I didn't want to cover it up too much so I kept the layout pretty simple and just added some green organza ribbon, some die cut leaves and rolled ribbon roses.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

Christmas cards all year round: Anything goes

Craft Room Challenge: Make your own flowers

Come and get it: Anything Christmas

Fairy Tale: Christmas

Gingerloft: Winter or Christmas

Thanks for popping by

Claire xx

Rainbow Lady's 'Lady in Red' challenge

Hello there, its time for another challenge from our lovely Rainbow Lady  and this week Cynthia's theme is 'Lady in Red'. We also have  fab prize from our regular sponsor Joanna Sheen too so don't miss out :-)

For my card I've used a bp and one of the bookmarks from Artylicious 'Essence of Nature' cd. The blue bp and bookmark were distressed wth fired brick DI and edged with a gold krylon pen. I added some cuttlebugged red card and a couple of grungepaper roses (coloured with the same distress ink and some red stickles highlights).

The main image is a gorgeou stamp from Crafts and Me called 'Hiding' by Molly Harrison, the image is coloured with inktense pencils. To finish off I've added some royal blue seam binding ribbon and a couple of dew drops coloured with alcohol ink.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

Ambers Crafts and Stuff: Special Lady

CD Sunday: Stamping

Challenge up your life: bookmarks

Divas by design: anything goes

Flutter by Wednesday: Open challenge with butterfly angel or fairy

The Paper Variety: Let's get messy

Stamp something: something with wings

Thanks for popping by today, make sure you check out my teamies blogs as they have some amazing cards lined up this week

Claire xx

Sweet Treats with the Rainbow Lady

This week our challenge over at Rainbow Lady's Challenge is Sweet Treats for Easter! 

We have a really fab prize up for grabs too.... our lucky winner will receive stamps to the value of £15 from The Artistic Stamper!! Mmm I wonder if I can disguise myself and enter lol?

Now I don't normally make many Easter cards and only have a couple of Easter stamps in my stash so I didn't have a lot of choice for my DT card. I've used this gorgeous stamp - Fantasy Easter Ocean by Ching Chou Kuik from Sweet Pea Stamps for my card. The bunnies are so cute and there are some little Easter eggs there honest :-)

I've painted the image with distress inks, I love using these inks but it takes me sooooo long to do lol. This kept me out of mischief for hours. I've used a bp from Raspberry Road Designs and distressed it with a craft knife. I die cut the border with my cuttlebug and coloured it with wild honey distress ink. The leaves are stamped using Sheena Douglass stamps and made the flower by punching 6 flowers with a woodware punch using copier paper. I sprayed the punched flowers with starfish and yellow daisy glimmer mists and layered them up once the were dry.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

Creatalicious: Easter plus pink green yellow and blue

Creative Belli: Easter

Creative Inspirations: Easter

Creative Inspirations Paint: Inspired by eggs

Daring Cardmakers: Spring or Easter

Dream Valley: Easter

Fabulous Friday: homemade embellishment

I Did it creations: Easter

Pile it on: Use a rubber stamp

Scrappy Frogs: Easter

Sparkles Forum: Easter

The Crafty Pad: Easter

Thanks for calling by, I hope you're going to share your sweet treats with us this week.

I'm counting down now, one more day at work and then I have 11 days off :-) I know I keep going on about it but I'm soooo looking forward to some time off! Make sure you pop over to my teamies blogs and check out their beautiful work, they have come up with some fab inspiration again this week :-)

Claire xx

A song in your heart at CD Sunday

Its my second week as Guest Designer over at CD Sunday and this week there is another fab theme : a song in my heart. I'd got some music related sheets printed off from Joanna Sheen's cd 'Dancing with Shadows' (one of my all time favourite crafting cds) when I spotted this beautiful silhouette of a girl dancing, now she really does look like she has a song in her heart.

I printed the silhouette out on acetate and then used some glossy card, masked a sun and  brayered a spring sunset scene using B&J Soothing Sunset (of course lol) and over stamped with some foliage stamps from Chocolate Baroque. The acetate is attached to the scene with some pale green pearl brads. The bp is printed from another of my favourite cds, 'Essence of Nature' by Artylicious and is matted on some black card.

I  inked some scraps of white card with B&J foliage ink pad and sprized with water, then I stamped the leaves with Sheena Douglass stamps and once they were dry I cut them out and decoupage them up with silicone glue. The flower is made from the scrap paper from brayering the scene, I punched out about 6 flowers with a woodware punch, scrunched them up and then layered them, adding some stamens and glitter in the centre. I also added some little curls of memory thread.

The sentiment is from Joanna Sheen, stamped on some spare card from making the leaves, cut with a nestie and layered on some more black card.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

2 Sisters: Spring

Challenge up your life: Masking

Craft us Crazy: Easter or Spring

Crafty Cardmakers Spotlight: decoupage

Dutch Dare: spring has sprung

Fabulous Friday: brads

If the shoe fits: Spring is in the air

Make it colourful: Colouring skies (I love brayering skies as its such a quick and effective technique but I'm not sure if this technique counts so just delete my entry if it doesn't)

Simon Says Stamp: spring colour or easter

I hope i've inspired you to dust off your crafting cds and join our challenge at CD Sunday this week. I'm looking forward to seeing your creations :-). Its a lovely spring morning here today, blue sky and sunshine so i'm going to spend the morning weeding :-) For some reason I love weeding, and generally pottering round in the garden and of course its even better when the sun is shining. Have a good day

Claire xx

Romance/Valentines challenge at Let's Ink It Up!

Where did January go???We couldn't believe how many amazing entries we had for our last challenge at Let's Ink It Up, it was hard to choose the winner and top 5 I can tell you!! Thanks so much to everyone who entered and congratulations to the winner and Top 5.  I can't wait to see everyone's creations for our new challenge, the theme is Romance/Valentines!

As always we have a wonderful sponsor with a fab prize for the winner! This month our sponsor is Whiff of Joy and they are offering the lucky winner a gorgeous stamp 'Willow with Champagne'!

I've gone a bit shabby chic (well definitely shabby lol) for my DT card this time around.

I've used some embossed cream card for the base and made a background using distress inks (antique linen, tea dye and spun sugar) overstamped with big swirly corner stamps from Elusive Images. The vellum is stamped with a script stamp using tea dye DI and the hearts are also made using stamps from Elusive Images. I stamped them with cream pigment ink and embossed with clear EP and then added more of the same distress inks.

The butterflies are made using an Anna Griffin punch. The ribbons, lace (dyed with distress inks), pearls and tassel are all from my stash. The flower is made using a strip of the leftover bp, punched with a MS punch and concertina'd before layering it over some lace.

I love making cards that start out as plain white card, and I really enjoyed making this although its not my usual style at all.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

Allsorts: Love, love love

Artistic Stamper: Love is in the air

Bunny Zoe's Crafts: Love is in the air

Crafty Calendar: Love

Flourishes Timeless Tuesday: Valentines

If the Shoe Fits: Get your pink on

Polka Doodles: with hearts

Raise the Bar: Hearts

Simon Says Stamp and Show :Some love

Stampin for the Weekend: Valentines Day

The Shabby Tea Room: Get creative

Try it on Tuesday: Feel the luurve! (with a fab prize from One Stop Crafts)

Make sure you check out my teamies blogs, its the last challenge for the current DT and they've really pulled out all the stops and come up with the most amazing creations so pop over and leave them some love :-)

Thanks for popping by today, I hope our new challenge will put you in the mood for some love lol

Claire xx

This weeks challenge from Fairy Knoll

Don't you just love Fridays? Its nearly the weekend and its time for another fun challenge at Fairy Knoll!!This week our theme is 'Glitter' so we want to see some sparkle on your creations. You don't have to use a Fairy Knoll image but we'd love to see your creations if you do have any of Brandi's gorgeous images, why not have a look here and pick up a fab freebie or two.

I've used one of Brandi's fab new images 'Thoughtful' (available in the Fairy Knoll shop). I love this image, she's so elegant isn't she?

I've coloured the image with promarkers and added black sakura stardust to her sweater, bag and bangles for a little sparkle. The bp is from my raspberry road designs, stamped with a clarity corner stamp and embossed with tea dye distress EP. The swirly frame is made from 2 marianne die cut shapes joined with dst and then a little ribbon added to cover the join. I made the flowers from circles of  crumpled tissue paper and added seed beads and black glitter to the centres. I added a couple of die cut flourishes and to finish off a shrink plastic charm that reads' Friends' which I made using a HOTP stamp.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

Sentimental Sundays: celebrate friendship

One Stitch at a time: Anything goes

Catch the bug: Anything goes

Karber Weekly Challenge: Flowers

Lexi's Creations: Pink Winter birthday

Thanks for visiting today, I'm an early bird with this post as I'm dashing off to work.

Have a good day

Claire xx

GD spot at Sir Stampalot :-)

How excited was I to be asked to do a guest designer spot at Sir Stampalot Challenge?? Yep,you've guessed, VERY excited lol. Well the day has arrived to share my project for this month's theme which is 'A Winter's Tale', as usual there is an amazing prize from Sir Stampalot and this month the DT are having a blog hop so there are some extra goodies on offer!!

My project is a little shadow box, inspired by the lyrics to the Queen song 'A Winter's Tale' and also by the beautiful view of the wintery sky and frosty houses one morning before Christmas. I certainly had plenty of time to admire it as we had loads of snow and my bus to work was an hour late lol. The sky was the most gorgeous pale peachy, pinks and pastel blue with wispy clouds and a big white moon hanging in the sky. I created the sky with my brayer, masking the moon and making the clouds with versamark and clear EP. I stamped a couple of little birds on the sky too.

I painted the inside and outside edges of the frame with gold acrylic paint and made a frame with an assortment of distress inks and a crackle stamp embossed with sparkly white EP.

The houses and trees are stamps from Elusive Images, coloured with promarkers and glittered with Judikins prisma glitter before being cut out and attached to the frame so that they are overhanging the edges.

The flowers are made from printed copier paper, layered up with dew drops in the centre, The feathers are from my stash and have been lightly sprayed with glimmer mists. The flourishes are cut with a marianne die and glittered with white glitter.

I'm also entering my project in the following challenges:

Gingersnap Creations Spicy Supply Challenge GC 82: White glitter

Stamp Insanity: Sparkle

Pink Elephant: Winter Wonderland

Stamptacular Sunday challenge: Snow much fun

Craft Your Days Away: Punch it out

Stamp something: Something with glitter

Thanks for calling by today, I hope you're going to join in this months challenge from Sir Stampalot! You never know you could win a cracking prize. I couldn't believe it when I won a cricut in their first challenge so don't forget you've got to be in it to win it :-)

Thanks also to Brenda and the lovely team at Sir Stampalot for inviting me to be Guest Designer this month, i've really enjoyed making this little shadow box and  the uber talented DT will have some fab creations to share so make sure you don't miss out on the Sir Stampalot Blog Hop

Happy New Year, I hope you aren't feeling too delicate this morning. I'm fresh as a daisy as we had a quiet night in, oh dear not having a hangover on New Years Day sounds like a sign of getting old lol.

Claire xx

A new challenge at Michelle Perkett Studios!!

Its Tuesday again so that means a brand new challenge over at Michelle Perkett Studios!! This week we have a fabulous theme - 'Make Your Own Background'. I love all things inky so I had loads of fun making this card which features the beautiful 'Guinevere' available from Michelle's Etsy Store

Guinevere is coloured with promarkers and has some red stickles added for a little extra bling. I've distressed the edges and layer her on some red card. I've used a black base card and then added the background I made using cosmic shimmer sprays and glimmer mists.

I love these kind of backgrounds as they are so easy to make and looks so beautiful and shimmery. I sprayed lava red and black gold sprays on some plain white card and then rubbed them together with a plastic bag to blend them .Don't use your fingers or you'll look like you've been killing a pig lol - I know cos i've done it :-)

I dried the background with a heatgun and then stamped a HOTP swirl stamp around the edges and embossed with Firecracker red DP. I added some red/black wired ribbon from my stash and made a couple of twisted ribbon flowers to finish the card off, I wanted to keep the layout pretty simple as I didn't want to cover the background lol.

 I'm really pleased with the flowers, if you want to have a go i've used the same method as Lynne uses to make her famous grungepaper roses here. I've loved making these roses over the last few months  and thought I'd have a play with some ribbon too.

I'm entering Guinevere in the following challenges:

Fab'n'Funky: go with the flow

Charisma Cardz: One for the girls

Cute Card thursday: Blast from the Past (I've used the no designer papers challenge from 27/5)

For Fun challenge: Anything Goes

Tanda Teaser: Ladies only

Paper Pretties: Clean and Simple

Craft Your Passion: Monochrome

Thanks for visiting today, I hope you can join our challenge this week, if you don't have any of Michelle's gorgeous images yet you can pick up a freebie over at Michelle's group on SNR, PCP or CDAC

Claire xx

Recycling at Let's Ink It Up

Its time for a new challenge at Let's Ink It Up,

we had some wonderful entries in our last challenge so I can't wait to see what you have in store for us with our new challenge where the theme is

Recycling!!

We have two fabulous sponsors for our challenge, so 2 lucky entrants will win a prize!! Our sponsors are Whimsy Stamps who are are giving the generous prize of a $15 voucher to one lucky winner! Wags'n'Whiskers have kindly offered a wonderful prize of a £15 voucher for
 Bunny Zoe's Crafts!!

You don't want to miss out on a chance to win one of those fab prizes!! I love this kind of challenge and I decided to recyle a book for my DT project for this challenge, I used an old book that was destined for the tip - i've always been a real book worm so I hate the thought of defacing a book lol. But its all in a good cause! I won't go into too much detail as this is a long post already but if you fancy having a go, there is  a wonderful tutorial from Elina over at Gingersnap Creations for how to go about altering a book so pop over and have a look if you fancy having a go. Here's the inside:

and a closer look at the lady below, the opposite side hasn't shown up too well in the photo as its a versamark resist technique but I've used an inspirational quote stamp from Graphicus. I gave the book a coat of gesso and then splodged on some purple. teal and blue paint before giving it all a coat of  Viva turquoise precious metal paint. The lady is from Elusive Images 'Peacock Ladies' themeplate stamped onto glossy card and masked to brayer the background. I stamped her again and painted her dress with H20s and gave it a layer of stickles, cut it out and decoupaged it with some silicone glue. The corner tiles are stampbord inchies and all the gold flourish and border stamps are also by Elusive images embossed with Ranger Queens gold EP.

The flowers are more recycling, I used the left over sheets of copier paper I'd used to get the excess ink off my brayer, die cut them with an assortment of Marianne dies, scrunched them, sprayed them with glimmer mists and then layered them up to make the flowers.

Here's the front of the book (sorry for the dreadful pic, all the acetate, embossing and glitter has totally foxed my camera LOL) The bp is from Artylicious Peacock Summer Party Cd,  stamped roughly with a crackle stamp for a shabby look and embossed with gold EP. The main image is from the Elusive Images 'Peacock Ladies' themeplate. I stamped it on card, coloured the face with promarkers and made a painted background with twinkling H2Os and then added a layer of acetate stamped with the same image. This time i didn't colour the face but added various colours of glitter to the gorgeous headress. The frame is a stamp from Stamp'n'around and is embossed in Peacock EP on gold mirri. The tassel was a white one coloured with glimmer mists

The back of the book is covered with the same BP as the front. I made a brayered background again using Waterfall Big& Juicy inkpad and then stamps  beautiful Elusive Images peacock stamp and embossed with Gold EP. The words are hard to read because of my horrible photography skills but they read 'The Result  of a Horrible Stamping Accident'. I love this stamp, I'm not sure of the make but it always makes me giggle whenever i use it :-)

I'm entering this altered book in the following challenges:

Rainbow Lady's Challenge: Make a picture

Paper Romance: everything but the kitchen sink

Gingersnap Creations GC 77: Haute Couture

Inspiration Avenue: Happiness is... this

Ooh La La: Remember remember

Simon Says Stamp and Show: Something Shabby

Thanks for reading this post, i'm sorry its gone on forever lol. I do hope you'll find time to join in our recycling challenge at Let's Ink It Up, I'm looking forward to seeing all your ideas !!

You have until November 30th to get your entry in so plenty of time!!

Claire xx