A Little Light Metal - TIO 94

Time for a new round of DT themes at Dragons-Dream Tag it On - this time we are working from song titles and my teamie Elizabeth has chosen Bed of Roses by Bon Jovi and wants us to use !a little light metal".. 

So I took some hot diamond pink metal from Ten Second Studios and one of their flower molds.  I tried to do this through the Big Shot but couldn't get the 'sandwich' right so embossed it by hand - it hasn't come out very well because I stuck the humungo tape to the metal first... I think that was a mistake I won't repeat....

I stamped the gorgeous 'script sillhouette' stamp by Dina Wakley (Have I told you I LOVE this stamp...) on a spare tag that I coloured with archival ink 'magenta hue' mixed with picket fence distress stain (have I told you I LOVE... ok, yes)

Stamped the sentiment (a Tim stamp) on the rest of the tag and made a metal flower with the two smaller Paperartsy grungy flower dies on silver metal, coloured with black dabber paint and raspberry alcohol ink.

Make sure you stop by Dragons-Dream today for some exciting news - (no, I won't spoil it for her) and hope to see you joining in the challenge.

Oh, and if you do join in, make sure you use at least one real, proper stamp on your tag!

WOYWW 117

Morning all (depending on where you are and when you get here, of course!) Hope you are all well and enjoying your tour of the workdesks of the universe hosted by the delectable Julia

By the time you read this I will be at work as usual - unfortunately! Only because I thought today was the start of a few days off, but I got the week wrong and it's actually from NEXT Wednesday I will be off... Grrrr!!  I was gutted when I realised on Tuesday.

So, what is on my floor today? Not a lot - well, that's a bare faced lie - it's covered with the usual craft stores - but not a lot crafty.  It's been a really unproductive time.  Perhaps I need to go shopping (lol! So far I've kept my pledge not to till Ally Pally - late September... will I make it? )

This really stoopid tag I made for the Everything Wendy Vecchi yahoo group challenge ('use a bottle or bottles') I was close to the deadline and couldn't think of anything 'proper' - was reluctant to use one of my Tim idea-ology bottles/vials - don't know why! so this was a bit of daftness!

Not sure what I will do with my days off - haven't got anything planned (just as well as I got the dates wrong!) - may have a day up in London - not been for a while and I love mooching around London. Just not having to get up at 5.30 and going to work will be break enough!  I don't have a car so I can't go far unless I can get there by bus or train.... or foot!

SS 169 Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep

Gosh, I can't believe today is the first time ALL week I've got anything crafty made! I had a really lazy week last week after work just vegging out in front of the TV.
So, today, Hels's guest theme setter for Sunday Stampers, Alfie-cat, has chosen "birds" for his theme. Hmm wonder why... Don't thinkyou'll find these two very tasty!

I decided to go for a canvas today instead of a tag, and took my inspiration from Lin's demo's at the recent Stevenage show, so thanks again, Lin for sparking off these ideas!

I coloured the canvas with black soot and walnut stain distress stains, blending with some picket fence and then spraying perfect copper perfect pearl spray over that.

For the stamps. I used the Paperartsy Hotpick 1107 plate - Steampunk Peter and Paul, and some cogs and a text.

I stuck some old book pages on some white card and coloured it with blue/green/orange distress stains before stamping the images and cutting them out. 

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday - and tomorrow, as England is enjoying a bank holiday - hurrah!!


Really glad to hear that Hurricane Irene is downgraded to a tropical storm - hope our American friends are not too badly affected.

WOYWW ? a bit of this and a bit of that

 Hi, fellow desk snoopers. Tis time for another Wednesday swoop round the workdesks of the world, thanks to Head Girl Julia.
Today you find me going on my travels - though sadly only in my dreams! At Dragons-Dream, it is Frankie's turn to set the theme for our Tag It On Challenge today - and the theme is travel.

I actually had most of this tag made before the theme was set, but hadn't blogged it, so just had to add a couple of finishing touches!  Result - don't you love it when that happens.  If you fancy joining us, we have a call out for DT members - check the Dragons-Dream blog for details.  Also, this week, travel is the theme at SimonSays Stamp and Show too - so this is my entry there too.

So, on this fine (probably not sunny) Wednesday, what is occurring chez H?  Well, no new stash - I MUST NOT buy anything else till Ally Pally in September -  but there is a new magazine though; waiting to be read - and a tag in progress for a swap I can't share yet  It's currently being weighed down to let some glue fix!

So, come over to Dragons-Dream and play with us - and catch up some far more creative workdesks than mine! Happy Wednesday.

Sunday Stampers 168 - Our House

Hels has created a masterpiece in wax today and set us off on a theme of houses/home for the Sunday Stampers this week. "Our house, in the middle of our street", (hums quietly to herself) I used to really like Madness. (the band, the band!)

I am having a lazy (spectator) sport day in front of the tv - bit of footie, bit of cricket - but made this quick tag.

Spritzed the tag with water before applying stormy sky distress stain, but the row of houses (Tim's die) in sticky back canvas and coloured with distress stains, stuck to the tag.  Cut out the Wendy car on a scrap of paper from the Kraft paperstack, the 'sun' is a Wendy flower coloured with paperartsy paint 'haystack'

Ok, back to the cricket - see you later!

Stampotique - Alter a Book

I haven't taken part in a Stampotique challenge for ages - time to put that right!  The current challenge is to Alter a Book - any kind of book, and it's a non compulsary Stampotique week - though I have used some of my (far too few) Stampotique images.

I decided it was high time to have a go at another page in my "journal" so here we go!

I started with a rough layer of gesso, then applied distress stains in spiced marmalade and tumbled glass, added some torn book pages, another layer of stains, spritzed with blue patina perfect pearls and started stamping!  The 'grungy circles' are Dina Wakley and the script on the flower is my fave Stamp in the Hand.

Check out the other fab entries at Stampotique - one lucky person will win a $30 gift certificate.

Dragon's Dream -Children

Welcome to another Tag it On with Dragon'sDream.... this week my teamie Janet has set the theme - Children. I have gone simple this week, (again!).

I took a jumbo sized tag and some Penny Black stamps - stamped the children swinging in the tree directly to the tag and the others - they are actually 3 in total - but I stamped them on scraps of a tag and only had room for 2 - and cut them out so they are playing round the tree.   Printed off some words on the computer to cut out.

Hope you enjoy this week's theme - I think we all found last week quite hard! Thanks for your entries.
 Oh, suppose you want to see the new tag... lol

WOYWW 115 - new stash!

Truth be told, most of it is put away (not tidily though, you KNOW I don't do tidy! it can be seen here though - I had a great time at Stevenage even though I will regret spending quite so much when the credit card bill arrives in a couple of weeks...

So, what IS on my desk?  Well, the prep for my threefer challenge - which can be seen here in its full glory

And yes, they are my knees, and you can see the toll taken on the left trouser leg  - it's always the left and only the left - that goes holey! This hole is spreading though! I may have to turn them into shorts soon... See, I really DO work on the floor!

So here's a proper stash shot - some of my new bottles and potions - you'll see I have put coloured labels on the tops of my distress stains so I don't have to pick all of them up to find the one I want. I did that when I got home on Sunday, after mounting up my new Paperartsy stamps (which are FABBER than ever!!)

That's it from me today, thanks for dropping by.
In case you've made it right to the end without knowing what I am showing you my ripped trackie trousers for, pop over here where Queen Julia will explain everything!

A Threefer!!

Hi all. With being out at the Stevenage show on Sunday I didn't have time to do Hels' Sunday Stampers challenge (White) so have managed to combine it with Linda's Grungy Monday - Distress Stickle Party - and Simon Says Stamp and Show - some BLING. How lucky is that!

For a change I did a canvas - painted white (Paperartsy fresco paint) - Sunday Stampers - tick!

Spritzed with Perfect Pearls spray - in pearl - Bling   tick one!

Stamped the 'silhouette script' by Dina Wakley (magenta hue archival - scrummy!) and added some crystal gems - bling tick two!

Stamped the Dina Wakley 'create with abandon' in bundled sage distress stain on the canvas and used a flower mask and the same ink (pad this time)

Cut a rosette (Tim's die) and fixed to the corner, with a pearl from an old necklace - bling tick 3!

Took chip letters to spell dream, coloured in bundle sage distress stain, and covered with milled lavender distress stickles - GM tick!

Phew! Be sure to check out the other fab entries - and of course Sir Tim for the inspiration.

Stamperama - FAB day out!

I spent a lovely few hours at Stevenage today at the Stamperama show. I met my friend Joy at Kings Cross and my first port of call was, of course, Lin at LB Crafts.... I could stand and watch Lin all day.

She was making some fabulous works of art using the new Paperartsy stamps - oh boy!!!! and was kind enough to give me this one:

 stamping with fresco paints to give a resist under distress stains, pan pastels (about the only thing I didn't buy today...) and other yumminess! Love this Lin, thank you!!  Thanks for all the great ideas.

And a couple of my tags playing with my new stash haul.... these are stormy sky and spiced marmalade stains which were too bright/dark so I used picket fence over the top.

This looks a bit fuzzy, sorry! Crushed olive and spiced marmalade stains. The script is Dina Wakley - love it!!

And my "treat" to myself - did go a bit mad - but heck, so what!! It's been a tough couple of weeks... and I won't get a holiday....

Pile one....

Pile too - see, Karen, only took 2 pics to show it all!!

Think I'm too tired to play more tonight, going to watch some golf and then an early night - not had enough sleep this weekend!!  Thanks for looking.

Everything Wendy Vecchi Challenge - & a Birthday Card

This week, our lovely EWV yahoo group Host Lori, challenges us to create a piece of art based on the first book, page 22 - but if you don't have the book - it's out of print and hard to find - you just need to use at least one scallop edge and two border strips.  This finishes us off in book one! So, come over, join up and join in.  Rumour has it there is a random prize this week!

So, I have made this card   - the book project is a card but that't not essential as long as you use the ingredients above  - and some distress inks and stains - bundled sage, tumbled glass, picket fence and broken china.

The border strips I used are the dotty backround from Seriously Art and the lacy one is from Art in Bloom. 
The grungepaper flowers are from She Created Art and the sentiment Celestial Art. The scallop edge is an Art Part and I trimmed the card base to fit it.

It is also my nephew's birthday this coming week - he'll be 15 and I made him this steampunk themed card. I had to drop it in to him on my way to work yesterday as they've gone away for a week and I wanted him to have it on time.

I can post it here now as he won't see it before Wednesday!

Faffing about with stains

Wow, have you seen Tim's new video about Distress Stains?  How cool is this?  And do I want all the colours?  Oh yes.....

So this evening I was messing about with a tag and some stains (fired brick, wild honey and broken china, with a bit of picket fence thrown in for good measure).  Used the wrinkle free method on the craft sheet.

Spritzed it with some perfect pearl spray for some shimmer and stamped Wendy's stars in coffee archival.  Had a snippet of left over tag from a reject tag that I used for the sentiment that I coloured with some of the same stains.   Made a very bad flower from glassline paper. (am very out of practice at these flowers!) It looks a bit better in the photo than real life....

Thanks for looking.

WOYWW 114? a TIO tag!

Hi all - hope you are safe and secure and not caught up in the madness that seems to have erupted in England this week! Even Sutton is preparing for possible trouble, when I came home from work on Tuesday the shops were closed early, shutters pulled down and bracing for - who knows what -  it is at times like this that I wish there was someone else in the flat.... Monday night I went to bed with the sound of police sirens in the distance - there were minor disturbances at the other end of the High Street to me, but nothing on the scale of what's happened elsewhere (thank goodness!)

Anyhow, this week I am combining my posts for WOYWW with my DT piece for Dragons-Dream Tag it On - Zoe has set us on a challenge I found really hard - the theme is Equestrian - and I couldn't find a single 'real' horse stamp at all (in any of my 1500 plus stamps...) horses are not a subject I have ever been "into" . So I totally had to improvise.

I had torn out a Yellow Pages ad for a local stables and was about to stick it to a tag - when I remembered I did have this stamp....

Well, actually two - the carousel at the front is a slightly larger version of the one that appears in the middle of the image that is stamped on the tag.  They are very old because they are by PSX who went out of business quite a few years ago now!
So, Zoe, sorry but I couldn't do better this week!

And to those of you who left comforting comments on my Sunday Stampers post on Sunday - thank you - Mum is settling in well to the care home.
Hope you have a good day, stay safe!!  Try to find time to catch some desks at Julia's!!  All being well, on various fronts, I am going to the show at Stevenage on Sunday so shopping to share next week I hope!
Edit - Wednesday am - all quiet down here!!

Grungy Monday & Simon Says

Hurrah! Another Monday twofer!! Simon Says Stamp and Show - any Tim Holtz technique - and Grungy Monday takes us to  this fab technique from December 2010

I took the birdcage die and cut it twice, once in a piece from the Kraft resist stack and once from a piece of plastic idea-ology packing, as per the Tim Technique.  I then ran the plastic cage through a texture fade and coloured it with copper alcohol ink to enhance it and fitted it over the bird and to the bottom birdcage.

Found some toning background paper (Basic Grey) and adhered it to a blank cardbase.

Wish - a personal tale

Hels' Sunday Stampers today is called "Wish You Were Here" and challenges us to 'wish'.  I have been dithering about all day but decided to go ahead with this wish.  Forgive me!

My wish is for my Mum.  My brother and I have just had to take the very hard decision to find a care home for her - she has dementia and has been struggling to look after herself and the house and latterly has been refusing to get up.  So; hard as it has been I - we - think it is for the best, as neither of us have the room or expertise to look after her properly.  She is now much closer to us.

She moved in yesterday at least for a trial run and my wish is that she finds comfort in being well looked after - they are lovely people running the home and I feel sure she will be happy, when she gets used to it!  My wish is also for my brother and his wife - they have borne the brunt of sorting things out so far, dashing backwards and forwards to Sussex - and I feel very guilty about that - so thanks and love to them too.  I know this isn't the sort of thing I usually write on here, so I hope you (and they) forgive me.

The tag uses distress stains (on the tissue tape and the flower trim) distress inks everywhere else; as I don't have the full range of stains yet.

Distress with Picket Fence

Well yesterday I received my Picket Fence distress stain - and had to play; though I didn't have time to blog them.

When I got home from work tonight I had to carry on playing!  Like it - like it a lot - and need some more colours to try!!

I have played really, rather than particularly finishing off any tags - so no embellishments, just some stamping. 

Left to right - tumbled glass with picket fence both under and over the tumbled glass; applied in a scribbling motion
Antique linen and walnut stain
Dusty confcord and fired brick.

Top - picket fence on the tag, and tumbled glass over the top, and then more picket fence and tumbled glass again left without blending.

Bottom -Wild honey  applied roughtly and picket fence again left without blending other than spritzing with water - love how the stain wicks and bleeds.

Used some new stamps (had them a couple of weeks, but haven't inked them before so it was a good excuse!)

I have also managed to damage the picket fence applicator - it's torn - I don't remember if it was when I opened it, or if I have been too rough - but, hey it still applies the stain, so no probs!

Off to play again now.

TIO - Nature's Bounty

This week, at Dragon's Dream, we are dreaming of Nature's Bounty, a theme chosen by my Teamie Wanda - and I have made a tag with some of Tim's leaves from his tattered leaf die.

I started with a sheet of watercolour paper that I coloured with various distress inks - wild honey, peeled paint, mustard seed, barn door, fired brick and spiced marmalade and stamped them with various Paperartsy stamps from their Minis series - direct to paper technique from years ago!!  It was kind of pretty before I die cut it!!  I gave it a bit of shimmer with Irridescent Gold glimmer mist.

Had a couple of false starts with the tag background before I settled on a plain blue one (leaves tumbling against the sky) I used a small daisy punch too, for some extra impact. Couldn't find a little leaf punch! The 'beauty' stamp is by Claritystamps

the starting piece!
Do come and see what the rest of the team have done, and we hope to see you join in too!

WOYWW? Happy Anniversary!

August?  What do you mean it's August...... welcome to another Wednesday where we join in the world-wide blog hop that is What's on Your Workdesk Wednesday lovingly co-ordinated by the fabulous Julia - check out the link for the info.

Whilst I was making my entry for Grungy Monday and Simon Says Stamp and Show a tag - on Monday (scroll down or click here - I needed a piece of red ribbon.... I knew the one I wanted was in the ribbon box somewhere - only look what's happened to the box.... oops!

 I also need to go through my box of scraps - it's got a bit messy too - look!  Although I wouldn't want you to think it's a BIG box -

- it sits on top of another box with my Adirondack Dabbers - but it does overflow regularly!










1st August was my brother and sister-in-law's wedding anniversary and I made this card for them which also met the latest challenge at Everything Wendy Vecchi, yahoo group!  (since prepping this post the challenge has closed but I couldn't show you before they got the card, now could I?!)

We had to use 4 differently decorated squares to make one background.  I have used Victorian Velvet DI and some Wendy stamps.  Couldn't find a 'happy anniversary' stamp the right size in my stash (I am sure I had one...) so used the 'with love' instead!

Oh, and don't forget to check out Dragon's Dream Tag it On for another great challenge today - click here to be transported there!   Honestly, it's a wonder I ever get anything done on a Wednesday...... don't tell the boss!!

Simon Says - Show Grungy Monday a Tag

For Grungy Monday today we are working on techniques from Tim's Christmas tags again - this time it's 2009 - click the link for the details straight from the Master. And check out Linda and her Guest Designers for some fab samples at Studio L3

I had to rummage for my vellum, as I wasn't sure which box of papers I'd put it back in the last time I followed this technique... oh, what a mess!

Anyhow, I made a tag using a Hero Arts stamp "woman writing" rather than copying Tim's music theme.

I stamped Wendy's large script background on the vellum, inked it and heated it according to Tim's instructions and scrunched it up a bit, causing cracks and creases.  Folded it roughly and tied it up with a piece of velvet ribbon - well, it is a love letter!!

Thanks to Tim for the inspiration, and Linda for running these fab challenges. Link up at the Tim Yahoo group too

I am sure I have done something very similar to this before, but I promise it's new - and I didn't have the pen nib idea-ology before!! And, as I have used a tag, and Simon Says' theme this week is 'a tag' I am entering it for that challenge too. There is a $50 prize for a random winneer, courtesy of Simon Says Stamp.