My September card for Dora

 Here is a card I made with the wonderful Dark Turtle designed by Dora. This is available as a digi on Dora's blog here or as a Crafty Individuals stamp here.

I used the Crafty Individuals stamp. I stamped and masked it, stencilling the turtle (inkylicious) and stamping the text (Crafty Individuals) and splatter (Inkylicious). Once the mask was removed I coloured the turtle and fish with my Arteza watercolour pencils, adding a grey shadow around the images. I really am enjoying colouring with pencils at the moment. Practice has definitely improved my blending.

I hope you are keeping well and enjoying some crafty time!

Thanks for looking!

A Bee Crafty bit of Autumn inspiration

 Good morning! It seems we have entered the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, so another Autumn inspired card was a must. after all, it is my favourite season! 

To make this card I have used:

Queen Bee Journalling Autumn botanicals

Wordage - Small words

Stencil tape/ low tack masking tape

Versafine clair in Acorn, Fallen Leaves, Shady Lane and Tulip

Tea dye Distress ink 

A blending brush

Liquid pearls in Garnet, buttercup and Avacado

Here is a step by step to explain what I did. 

First place a piece of stencil tape across your card blank at a jaunty angle and use the brush to apply ink along both sides of the tape. Apply around the edge of the card too if you want to.

Next, stamp the lovely Autumnal botanicals with their stems overlapping the tape in the different shades of Versafine Clair ink. I tend to stamp the same stamps opposite each other, but it isn't necessary. Random stamping is equally effective.

Now stamp more foliage in the tea dye ink to fill out the background.

Carefully remove the tape and stamp the sentiment. I used versafine clair Acorn ink for this.

Finally add some dots of liquid pearls as berries and (shhh, don't tell anyone!) to cover any fingerprints 😉 The Splat stamp is also brilliant for this.

Here is a last look at the finished card

 There are two days left to add an Autumn themed make to the Bee Crafty Stamps facebook group challenge, so why not join in the fun! 

Thanks for looking and for all your lovely comments!

Rudolf Days for September

 We are galloping towards the end of September so it is time for another Rudolf day's Challenge. I have made two very simple cards using Woodware Stamps this month.

First is a DL sized card simply stamped with sky blue pearlescent Brilliance ink.

Second is a Woodware wreath stamped in versafine clair on to Kraft and coloured with arteza colouring pencils. I added some stickles to the Honesty and glossy accents to the berries.

Do pop over to Scrappy Mo's blog and take a look at the wonderful Christmas inspiration. Thanks to you all for motivating me every month xxx

Just like buses, there will be a few daily posts here due to how my DT posts have fallen. I do hope you can visit and see them! Thanks for looking! 

Seahorse samples from Crafty Individuals

Hi there!  I am very much playing catch-up at the moment. I realised that although I've shared my last lot of Crafty Individuals samples on both Instagram and Facebook, I'd prepared the post but not published it here. I need to put that right, so prepare yourself for a few little trips to the Seaside!  Here are a some of the most recently released stamps from Crafty Individuals. There are Beautiful Seahorses designed by Ellie Mulligan, as well as some using the older stamp set CI-272. You can find all of Ellie's stamps on the website here

One of my lockdown projects was to organise and use some older stash, and here is a brooch made with a piece of stamp board and an old broken necklace.                                           

There will be more seaside-themed creations very soon. I will also say that you should be saving up those pennies as the next release from Crafty Individuals is so exciting and absolutely wonderful! More details of that soon too!

Thanks for looking!

Samples for Bee Crafty Bee Monarchy

 

Good morning! Did you see Bev on Hochanda last Thursday? She had the wonderful Bee Monarchy collection with Stamps, matching dies, coordinating dinkables and the most wonderful MDF that I absolutely fell in love with! These are my samples from the show.

Quite a lot of the products sold out quickly, but Bev was still able to do some excellent demos. You can still catch them on the HOCHANDA website and look for the show on the schedule for Thursday 17th September at 11am. Alternatively click this link...

https://www.hochanda.com/cinema/45420

For a closer look at Bee Crafty products visit the Bee Crafty website

Before I go thank you so much for all the really lovely comments on my last blog post. I cannot tell you enough how much I appreciate you all.  Thanks for looking!

Things I am thankful for

It has been a bit of an emotional rollercoaster of a week for me this week. I won't go into details, but I wanted to make myself think of the positives rather than the negatives, so decided I would write a post in celebration of the things that have made me feel positive throughout lockdown and in some cases for much longer than that.

First I am going to mention Karate. I volunteered at the beginning of lockdown to run a zoom class each week,  as well as training with my Sensei on Tuesdays and my friend Yvonne on Wednesdays. Not only have I kept fit and kept up my level of karate, but I have made new friends from other regions who came on Zoom to train with me. Thank you, SK, Yvonne, Andy, Richard, Karen and all of my 'karate family'. You are all truly appreciated.

Appreciation has been instrumental in making me feel more positive. Crafting-wise appreciation has come from our lovely Jean and Malcolm at Crafty Individuals, Our Bev and Sam and the Bee crafty team, and some lovely bloggers, facebookers and instagrammers who always give me that warm fuzzy feeling with their lovely supportive comments. I'd like to mention Pat, Faith, Kate, Sue, Joan, Sandra, Lynne and Viv particularly. Thank you all for your encouragement. I was also  presented with a lovely certificate by my Sensei for supporting my karate club too. 

 Next up is crafting. I have stamped, sewn, crocheted, embroidered and needlefelted my heart out, and felt a sense of wellbeing because of it. 

Next I am going to talk about Friends. There are lots of you out there that I really consider to be my friends, even though some of us have never met. I really do appreciate you all. One person has been my friend for 17 years as well as the best crafting buddy you could ever wish for. She has encouraged me and helped me, as well as introducing me to new crafts, like needlefelting at a very stressful time in my life, when stabbing something over and over was better than any therapy. We are each other's alibi for crafty shopping and we have each other's backs through thick and thin. Thank you, Lynne. You are the sister I never had x

Finally I am going to mention family. My wonderful husband puts up with such a lot and he is my best friend and soulmate. Our family means the world to me. I am so proud of our wonderful daughter and so happy to see her and her partner settled in their first house in a wonderful part of the Derbyshire countryside. 

Thanks for reading this and for being a part of what I am thankful for xxx

Stamping on fabric for Bee Crafty

 

Good morning! I am here with a little Bee Crafty DT project and to bust a few myths, lol! Let's start with those. Firstly you don't need special ink to stamp on fabric unless you are going to wash it. If it is going on a card it isn't going to be washed, so most inks will work well. I have used versafine, versafine clair, memento luxe, stazon, brilliance and versamagic. All worked fine, but I was particularly impressed with the versafine clair, which is not waterbased and can be coloured and dampened after stamping without it changing.

Secondly, you can colour your fabric with most mediums. All those sprays like dylusions and distress oxides can be sprayed on fabric. It would wash out, but for a card they are wonderful. You can also colour with inktense pencils and blocks which I am told can be heat set, becoming permenant after ironing. You will need to iron your fabric a couple of times during the process. You can also use a range of fabric. The best thing to do is experiment and see!

Let's get on shall we?

I used dylusions spray inks, Beautanicals large branch and tree stamps, Wordage small words, Brown Versafine clair ink, sequins, seed beads and green embroidery threads

First I started with a piece of calico and sprayed with dylusions and water. Once it was almost dry I ironed it. I've also used poly cotton pillow cases and curtain lining which also worked well. I tend to rip the fabric to give a frayed edge along the weave so it is straight.

I placed the flat coloured fabric in my stamp platform and stamped the tree using versafine Clair. If you want to use an embroidery hoop make sure your fabric is big enough and you stamp centrally. You can always make it smaller afterwards.

Next you can use up some of the little stuff from your stash! I sewed on small seed beads in the middle of sequins. Check your needle is narrow enough to pass through your beads before you thread it, lol.

Next I added some smaller and larger seed beads on their own.

To ground my tree I added 'grass' which is just straight stitch in 2 different shades of green. It doesn't have to be neat and it can be all different lengths, just like grass. Just keep going until the gaps are filled. I used single strands of embroidery thread for my grass. You could add some embroidery to the tree too. Single Chain stitch makes good leaves and french knots also look good. There are plenty of you tube videos for these. Once you have finished, iron your fabric again taking care around the embellishments.

Mat and layer your fabric to your card. Double sided tape works well, or use a good glue stick to stick fabric to paper. You could even sew it together! 

Finally add a sentiment...

I am really enjoying getting back into needlework at the moment. I've realised there are lots of stamps I can use for this sort of project and it is good to experiment, mixing paper, card and fabric, as well as inks and sprays!

Before I go, just out of curiosity, would you be interested in doing something like this as an online workshop? A little kit to sit and stitch together? It would have to be via facebook I think, or possibly zoom. If so leave me a comment as it is something I am thinking about 😀

Thanks for looking!

A Bee Crafty mini Journal

 

Make yourself a cuppa and have a read (it is a bit of a long one).  I have had this mini mdf journal in my stash for a long time and thought it was about time that I decorated it and put it to proper use. It is ideally sized to make pages from left over bits of gelli prints and other backgrounds too. 

I used 

mdf mini journal

Mandala 7 inkable 

Art Journal words stamp

 I also used White gesso, modelling paste, acrylic paints, gilding wax, sandpaper, gold posca pen, versamark ink and gold embossing powder. 

This is one of those projects that I have completed over several evenings, not because it is hard to do, but to let it dry properly between each stage. I started off by painting all the mdf on both sides with gesso and leaving to dry.

Then I applied modelling paste through the mandala stencil and left to dry overnight.

I chose 2 colours of chalk finish acrylic paint and dry-brushed it over the mdf on both sides, first the blue...

and then the purple

When that was dry I sanded it down with the sandpaper and then applied some gold gilding wax.

Finally I stamped the words in versamark ink and heat embossed in gold. 

Here is the finished journal, although I will be tying some ribbons to the metal rings and adding more pages.  I have also gone around the edges of the mdf with a gold posca pen.

If you haven't had a play with MDF before I hope this has encouraged you to have a go.

Thanks for looking!

September at Stamping Sensations

 

It is the first Sunday of the month and time for a new challenge at Stamping Sensations. This month our challenge theme is 

***The Great Outdoors***

I used stamps from Bee Crafty  in their Beautanical range to make my tree scene. I do love seeing the heather turn the hills purple at this time of year!

Please remember we are a stamping challenge and the focal element of your work must reflect the theme (i.e. makes suitable for boys and men). Whist we prefer conventional stamping, digital images are allowed. You can check out the challenge rules here.

Do go to the challenge blog to check out the breathtaking creations from my multi-talented teamies. You can also find details of the fantastic prize! 

Thanks for looking!