Inkylicious Ink Duster Tutorial

After a little persuasion from Meg we have made a video tutorial and I now have my very own You tube channel! I am popping it on here and it is also on my Tips for Ink Dusters page if you want to find it quickly.
All filming and editing has been done by Meg, and I have to say I think she has done a great job! Now I know how long it takes and what it all entails I will do some more, eventually! It is of a quality that will stand being seen at full screen too. Here is the finished card that I made.

 and a couple of close ups to show the sparkle from stickles and a silver gel pen.

It is a little different to the one shown on the end of the video, as that was my practice run before Meg recorded it. I hope this makes it clearer how I use my ink dusters, and how easy they are to use. There are more hints and tips on the ink duster page here.
Edit: For anyone overseas who likes Inkylicious products, there are some available on the Joanna Sheen website - just type inkylicious into the search box.
Thanks for looking and feel free to subscribe and share!

Thank You, Crafty Individuals!

Well, I've been having a little play with my new goodies from Crafty Individuals and here are the results.

The picture is a miniature from People and Places 2 and the frame was inked with Ripe persimmon and Fired Brick distress inks before embossing and rubbing with treasure brass.The flowery paper was made with memento Ink and some tiny flower stamps and the cream base card was stamped with a flourish in Antique linen distress ink.
My next card is very CAS. I used spring Distress inks and my ink dusters to create the panel before stamping in black

I added a touch of glitter on each of the butterflies and a sentiment from Inkylicious.
Right, I'd better go and start on my Anniversary card. It will be 24 years ago on Monday that we got married.
Thanks for looking!

Blog Candy Winner and a few bits and pieces

It has been a whole week since my last post and to be honest I have done very little besides go to work. The heat left me rather lethargic. The weekend has brought a reduction in temperatures here and I have felt a little more creative. I have completed a few small cards including this one.

The flower stamp is one of the Inkylicious Twinchies, a bargain at £1, but only currently available at shows. I stamped and them coloured in with promarkers, thinking of the Bellis that Steve's Dad grew until a couple of years ago. I love any daisy-type flowers and I knew this would be lovely as a background or a focal image. I can see I will use it lots!
So onto the Blog Candy. I put the names in a pot and pulled out a winner.  The winner is... Mags! Please email me with your postal address, Mags, so I can send you the Molly Blooms stamps. My email is on my profile page.  I have been rather lucky on the Candy front today myself, winning a huge stash of Crafty individuals products, so a big thank you to Jean and Malcolm. Perfect timing to be having a play too!
Finally, I will share a few sunset photos with you, taken in our garden as I have been trying to cool off a bit!

Thanks for looking! I will be having some more blog candy (not cute this time!) very soon.

Some photos in my garden, a couple of cards and some follower candy

I hope you have managed to stay cool enough this weekend. I have spent a good part of yesterday and a bit of today at Gedling Book festival. It was brilliant! Meg was volunteering there, so I thought I would pop over and see what was happening. I sat in on four talks/ workshops. They were in Marquees with a through draught, so perfect for the weather! Anyway, this hot weather has brought the flowers out on my pot marjoram and shasta daisies, so I thought I would share a couple of photos.

I also had a couple of cards to make, one for a colleague going on maternity leave...

 I coloured the Mo manning image with promarkers, cut out with a nestie and mounted on some polkadot paper from Pink Petticoat. The sentiment is from Inkylicious.

My second card was one that I really didn't know what to put on it. I eventually settled on this for a chap who has been covering my class each Wednesday whilst I do management stuff (Technical term, that!). I used Kaleidacolor fresh greens and stamps from Inkylicious. It took me all of 10 minutes, tops!
Finally I promised Candy. This is the first of several I think. I am having a clear out and getting rid of things I don't use. First up is a bunch of 7 Molly Blooms stamps that have been used once or never. They are not to my taste at all, but I was asked to make a couple of cards to promote them some time ago.

It seems sensible to let them go to a good home. Leave a message below if you are interested and a follower. There will be some more follower candy soon.
Thanks for looking!

Finished!

I'm here in blog land briefly to share with you the card I asked for advice on last week. I went with the added sentiment - not very big and quite simple. I chose this die cut because it reminded me of an old fashioned street name plate, and it looked good against the bricks.
I'll tell you a bit more about how I made it now too. I used the brick stencil (Stamposaurus) and the Wheat template (Kaisercraft) with Paper Artsy's grunge paste.  When it was dry I stamped the sunflowers (Inkylicious) and embossed with embossing powder. Any EP will do. Next I painted over the whole thing with Fresco finish paints in Baltic Blue, Bora Bora (both opaque) and Eggplant (semi-opaque) using vertical and horizontal strokes and a flat brush. Once the paint was dry I rubbed Treasure Brass over the grunge paste and embossing to bring out the texture. Finally, I added the spellbinders die cut with a sentiment (Inkylicious) and a couple of blobs of liquid pearls.
Whilst I am here I will share another card I have made since Doncaster featuring my favourite colours - Teal Zeal and Grape Jelly Memento inks this time.

The background card on the left is the faux mother of pearl technique and tumbled glass distress ink. The background card on the right is stamped with the two inks and stamps from inkylicious. The main image was stamped with Archival ink and dusted with a variety of distress inks. I pierced around the edge with my poky tool, and coloured the lips and eyes with Distress markers. The tiny bit of paper in between was a snippet coloured with Starburst Stains many moons ago!
Here is a close up of the shimmer

Please excuse me if I don't manage to visit you until the weekend. I am due to move classrooms next Wednesday, and after 7 years with the same age group and 4 years in the same classroom, it is a bit like moving house, but just to next door and with 29 children around as you are trying to pack!!! I am looking forward to having some real fun next year with younger children and a much more creative classroom. I've been buying up pegs and lolly sticks by the shed load!!! Well, I'd better go. I have two leaving cards to make too, before Monday. We break up a week tomorrow, so not long to go.
Thanks for looking!

A sketch at Stamping Sensations

Good Morning! It is the first Sunday of the Month, so time for a new Challenge at Stamping Sensations. Our lovely Teamie Tracy has created a sketch for us to follow this month, and asked us to use Summer Colours. Here is my take on the Sketch:

I used the stamp set Cherish, Hugs and dream from Little Claire, who are our sponsors this month.The Papers were created with one of the lovely butterfly stamps from the set, Ink Dusters and soothing sunset big and juicy ink. I coloured the main image with promarkers and added some stickles too.
Do pop over to the challenge blog for a closer look at the sketch and some fabulous inspiration from the DT. Here is a picture of the wonderful prize on offer.

 

Doesn't it look fabulous?  Talking of things looking fabulous, I wanted to quickly share a photo of Meg as she had her Prom on Friday night. I am such a proud Mum!

Thanks for looking and I hope you will enter the challenge this month!

Your opinion please...

I have been having a play with some purchases I made at Doncaster. These include grunge paste, stencils, stamps, fresco finish paints and Treasure Brass, but it looks unfinished to me. Any suggestions gratefully received! Thanks for looking!

A bit of Lavender and Lace

 I am finally able to find the time to enter a challenge this week! When I saw the Allsorts challenge on Saturday I just had to have a go. I had a lovely play with a 'new-to-me' technique. Not sure if anyone else has tried this, but thought I would share anyway. I have a bottle of indenting fluid that I bought in the 1990s and I still haven't used more than a quarter of it! I had seen some faux mother of pearl techniques with other products (Shimmer paint and Liquid pearls), so thought I would try experimenting to see what happened. I got a piece if scrunched up paper, dabbing it gently in a small blob of indenting fluid and then dabbed it across the satin card stock. Once this was dry I used my ink dusters to apply some colour (Shaded Lilac Distress Ink). The indenting fluid leaves a pearlised finish and acts as a resist to the ink too.

Once this was dry I stamped the Sweet Pea from Inkylicious in Archival Black and coloured it with Tombows. I added a bit of a shadow with a tumbled glass distress marker too. The panel was mounted onto a base card with a border of embossed pearlised card and some lovely white lace. The base card was stamped with Delicate Vines, also from Inkylicious This is for the Allsorts challenge this week, as I said earlier.
I also tried another card with the offcut from this one, this time using a Hero Arts stamp called Dogwood and colouring with promarkers. The colouring looks very messy compared to the first card. I think I am better sticking with water-based markers on this sort of card!

 and here is a side view to try and catch that sheen.

The centres of the flowers were dotted with Cotton Candy distress stickles. Before I go, a big welcome and a wave to my new followers. Glad you have joined me and keep popping in as I will be doing some follower candy very soon! Thanks for looking x