Play Date Cafe Challenge 14

This week's Play Date challenge has 5 colours - dark green, white, lilac, orange and dusky pink; inspired by Sarah's sister's garden design.  GULP!  So most people probably thought straight of flowers, right?! But I wanted to do something different. 

When I was reading the Saturday paper, there was an article about the artist Mondrian who uses bright bold blocks of colour and whose work I love.  So I thought maybe I could do something  - very very vaguely - along those lines - in the challenge colours.  I have several Hero Arts shadow stamps of various sizes but decided on just two - an oblong and a small square.  I rummaged around in my drawers of ink pads and found the green, orange and lilac but was really struggling for a dusky pink.  I decided the gaps I'd leave would count for the white.   I took a piece of thickish white card and played around with the inks, adding a few black for some contrast (not sure whose stamp that is, there isn't a label).  I left it overnight, not sure how to finish it for the challenge.

Until a few hours ago the piece didn't have any pink in at all and I was going to throw in the towel, then I found a Rangers Antiquities inkpad called Chinese Red - which isn't red at all, but pinkish. It's a bit tenuous, but I hope it will do.  Then I had to decide what to do with it - it measured just slightly over 8 inches by 6 and a half,  I overstamped the "may all your dreams" by Penny Black randomly over the card and spent some time trying to find something to put on top - I couldn't just enter a piece of home-made background paper!!  Eventually I decided to trim it to fit an 8x8 inch card (yes, another one) which I covered with a piece of white/black spotty paper.  I found some retro bloom chips (Craftwork cards) which I painted with Claudine Helmuth purple palette paint and when they were dry, stuck on some lilac buttons that I had threaded with lilac glittery thread, added a bit of glitter and "done" as Gordon Ramsay would say.

I've turned it into a birthday card for my best friend Claire for later this week. I hope she - and the Play Date Cafe - like it!!

Sunday Stampers - Hearts - Two Hearts in fact!

As Hels used the Tim Holtz Rock Star heart in her fab shadow box for her challenge post, I thought I'd better find a different one - this is from Impression Obsession and looked like it had never been inked before.... I wonder how many more stamps I've got that have never been used...... best not think too hard!)

I started with fired brick and spiced marmalade inks on the craft sheet and spritzed with one of my perfect pearls/distress re-inker shimmers, and covered the tag - the larger square tag first, but because there was so much ink left I used some of the leftovers on the smaller tag.  I've dug out some sequin waste to overprint a pattern with the same colour inks. I've seen this used a lot recently and again, had some in my stash.   I stamped the heart in black versafine on some scrap card -this is about the 3rd attempt at colouring it to my satisfaction (used a variety of pens/gel pens before going back to coloured pencils)  At this stage I couldn't decide which of the tags to use - I only intended to use one, really.  Then I saw some red velvet gathering dust (literally!) in a box next to the computer and wondered what the stamp would look like on that.... stuck it to the smaller tag with glossy accents.

Still couldn't decide which to use so tried sticking them together for a bit of "tag on tag" action (hope I'm allowed to use a phrase like that!).  Stamped some text to each tag and edged both hearts with star dust glitter from stickles.
Now I've got to try and finish my Play Date entry - am stuck part way through this week (check out the link on the side bar for this week's colour challenge. I didn't want to do flowers.... check back later, in case I have had success...

Big Tag

Well, I said yesterday this was going to be a bit different for me, but looking at the component parts, it doesn't seem it turned out that way!!.  This is the finished article. Once again, I've had trouble scanning it (my trick learned from Hels seems to have stopped working!)  And, damn, you can see where bits of the sparkly stuff have come off on the scanner when I've moved it trying to get it to scan properly.... yikes, too late now! (too impatient to wait for the glossy accents to dry).

I started with the mask.   I stamped Judikins "lion mask" stamp on barn red metal, emobssed, refined and sanded, added some black dabber paint to age/distress. its stuck on a piece of card with humungo tape.  I have been meaning to try this stamp on metal for months...

I punched a couple of holes and tied various ribbons and fibres through them. I painted the eyes white with Claudine Helmuth paint and when it was dry (just, I was getting impatient!) I used a black gel pen for the pupils.

I cut a large tag from grungeboard, coloured it with fired brick distress and walnut stain round the edges, added a couple of text stamps (Paperartsy and Tim!)  That's where I got to last night, and it looked like this.  (This is the new bit for me!  I haven't cut my own tag shape before - although I cheated, I have a template...)  You can see bits of the fibres from the mask clinging to the ferro where I kept checking my positioning!! Oh, well - call it ART.

Then today, I sprayed some perfect pearls/distress reinker mixes over for a bit of shimmer, stuck some glitzy bits from a pot I hadn't even opened - but must have had well over 5 years - called Stamp Art Confections. The Wendy Vecchi leaf and flower are of course grungepaper - I've had the flower made up for ages and not been sure what to put it on, and  there's a small Maya Road flower at the top to hide the tag hole. (I know, I know, I could have not bothered punching it out as it's custom made... wasn't sure yesterday what I was going to do with the tag bit though.  That's my answer and I'm sticking to it!!)

Heck, this is a long long post. Hope you're all still awake. Thanks for looking!

Coming soon - Monday!!

No, silly, I mean something special is coming soon - I know Monday is coming!

Brenda has a special blog hop/challenge on 1st February - click on the picture in the side bar for full details, this is sponsored by Sir Stampalot and there is a very grand sounding, (still-mysterious prize!) up for grabs.

I'll be back with a proper post later (I hope)
(EDIT)  Didn't finish what I was working on, (got distracted by the football on tv) and I've got to go to bed now, so I will try and get it sorted tomorrow.... it's something a bit different for me... hope I've got you intrigued, please come back to find out!!

18th Birthday card

My late sister's middle son Peter is 18 on Monday - where does time go!! I always struggle with boy's and men's cards, despite having 4 nephews and a brother!  Anyhow, I hope he likes it - my sister would be proud of him - he is at catering college (the same one Jamie Oliver went to no less) - happy birthday, Peter.

I had a couple of near disasters with this card - first of all I traced round the 8 the wrong way round on the patterned paper - spent ages trying to decide if it looked totally wrong before covering the other (right) side. Then when I embossed the "celebrate" the card curled up badly - must be the paper I covered the base card with, I've not embossed on it before. Luckily it seems to have flattened out now!  It also looks a more girly colour on the scan than it does in the flesh - its quite a dark dusky colour; not pink really, honest!

Then I had to decide what else to fill the card with - the numbers were just too big to fit on a 6x6 inch card so this is 8x8 - first time I've done one this big!  I had the champagne bottle, cork and glasses (Hobby Art) which I embossed on scrap card and coloured with tombow pens, and trusty gold krylon pen for the label. . Eventually I decided on the swirly "happy day" stamp (Stampendous) which I use a lot. I drew round the numbers with star dust stickles, cos you can't have an 18th birthday card without a bit of sparkle, can you?!

Sunday Stamper - Squares

This week's Sunday Stamper challenge from Hels, is "squares".  A few days ago I came across this set of squares (Block It) that I'd stamped out years ago but not done anything with- must be fate!! I masked the edges and filled the squares with Paperartsy clock/time images from the Clocks and Ding and Dong ranges. I stamped the middle square again on its own to layer over the top.

All I did then was add a bit of glitter to some of the images, sponged some dusty concord and scattered straw inks on the base card and the squares, although I left the middle one white so it "popped" and stamped the words at the bottom (also paperartsy)

Alphabet Challenge - M is for Mouse

I love the House Mouse designs and have several so immediately knew I could fulfil this week's Alphabet Challenge! - it was just deciding which to use.  In the end I couldn't, so made two birthday cards.

I've stamped and embossed this one and coloured it with pencils.

This one is stamped on the base cardstock and then I have stamped and embossed the balloon and mouse separately and layered it with 3d foam dots, again it's coloured with pencils and I've added glitter to the balloon.

One of my nephews is 18 soon and I need to make a suitable card, but am stuck for boy ideas! If all else fails I may use the fishing mice!