Crafty Individuals Balloons

Hi there! Although it is wet and gusty outside, I'm thinking of better weather and I'm sharing some more of my Crafty Individuals samples that were on Hochanda a couple of weeks ago. Most of these were made with the new Ellie Mulligan balloon set which you can find here on the Crafty Individuals website

Finally here is a card made with the older Balloon stamp on a shaving foam marbled background.

I loved playing with these and revisiting some techniques I hadn't done for ages! There is a discount on the website at the moment, so pop them in your basket soon. If you join the Crafty Individuals Facebook group you can join in the monthly challenges and benefit from other offers too. (Link in side bar)
Thanks for looking!

Boys to Men and a digi from Dora

 The Challenge over at Allsorts this week is to share a card for boys or men. I was asked by one of my karate buddies to make a thank you card for our Sensei. I don't have any Karate themed stamps (even finding digis for adults is dificult) so I googled clip art and found these free images. I then used inks and stencils to create the background. The scrabble tiles looked much straighter in real life, lol. Here is a picture of me with him. If you know of any martial Arts themed stamps please let me know. I have digis from Mo Manning and Kenny K which are great for kids but not really suitable for adults.

My second card should have been on my blog on 24th September, but with one thing and another I am afraid I forgot. Sorry Dora! Better late than never! This was my DT card for Dora's digis that you can find here.  The papers were some I made ages ago using the shaving foam marbling technique and Distress reinkers made into sprays. I've been doing quite a bit of pencil colouring on grey and kraft card as it makes the paler colours pop.
Thanks for looking and for all your lovely comments x

February Mid month inspiration

In our mid month posts at Stamping Sensations, we are going to showcase for you a technique that we have tried out. I saw some wonderful samples from Visible Image, our sponsors this month, using shaving foam marbling technique and I knew I had to have a go. I have marbled with shaving foam before using a variety of inks and dyes, including re-inkers and food colouring, but not half as effectively as the samples I saw. They had used Dylusions sprayed onto the foam. The colours were amazing!

So, if you want to have a go yourself, you need shaving foam, a tray, a ruler and some inks, sprays or dies.

• First spray the foam into a tray and smooth over the surface so it is larger than your paper.

• Next spray the foam with your inks. Use a cocktail stick or paintbrush handle to mix up the colours a bit. 
• After that, lay your paper or card onto the shaving foam, pressing down so colour touches all of the paper surface
• Lift the paper off and use the ruler to scrape off the shaving foam
• Leave to dry

Here are a few samples using a mixture of Visible Image and Inkylicious stamps

I hope that has inspired you to have a go yourself! Thanks for looking!

February at Stamping Sensations

Good Morning! It is the first Sunday of the month, so time for our February challenge at Stamping Sensations, where this month we have a nice and simple theme of........

********Anything Goes********

For my card I created a shaving foam marbled background using Dylusions, and stamped and embossed the Jazz it up saxophonist and the sentiment from the Play it loud set. These stamps are all available from Visible Image (see the link below). The adhesive Music border is from Be Creative.  The Usual rules apply, you can enter up to three times, combine with other challenges, use any make of stamp......but can I please remind you we are a stamping challenge and stamping must be the focal/predominant element of your work. Conventional rubber/acrylic stamps and digital images are acceptable, but pre-coloured digital images and toppers are not. It so upsets us to see names come out in the draw who are not eligible for the prize because they have not read the rules. 
Now onto the sponsor and prize this month

Visible Image Visible Image is a clear stamp designer and manufacturer based in South Wales, UK. Their stamps are hand poured and hand cut using the finest photopolymer available. Each stamp is deeply etched, 4mm thick, to ensure a crisp clear perfectly stamped image. They are offering one lucky winner a fabulous £35 store voucher. How great is that?
Do pop over to the Challenge blog and take a look at the inspiration from my multi-talented teamies, and I look forward to visiting your fabulous entries!

Inky playtime

A few weeks ago I had a play with dylusions and shaving foam to make some backgrounds. I had asked about some of the wonderful samples on the Visible Image stall at Doncaster Stamp Magic, and Helen and Mark told me that this was the technique used. I couldn't wait to try it! Thank you for the inspiration, Theresa Morgan! You can check out her blog here. Both of my pieces were done using the shaving foam and dylusions onto copier card. I stamped the wonderful Visible image stamps in memento luxe ink and embossed with clear  powder. This technique bleached very easily, and I added a little pastel blue promarker to shape the eye. I also added a little white gel pen to help the sentiment stand out from the background. I gave this card to Meg.
I was a little more pleased with the second attempt, as I managed to make the marbling streak free. I asked a few people what they thought I should do with it, and the majority said 'Frame it!', so I did. Whilst shopping for Meg at Ikea yesterday, two square frames 'fell' into the trolley!

Not sure where to put it now!
Thanks for looking, and I hope to be round to visit you all soon.