Trees and mantles

Hello again. Today's card is one I made for a friend's birthday. It's a similar technique to what Barbara did on classroom last time.

I started with a piece of water colour card. I spritzed card with water. i then inked the mantle with rusty hinge distress ink and added little bits of aged mahogany and mustard seed. I stamped on copy paper first and then on card twice getting a more faded effect the second time. I did same with the other mantle, but this time I added a bit of peeled paint. The last mantle i stamped in peeled paint. As I had spritzed paper and the inks are water based they ran slightly giving a more mottled effect.

Using potting soil archival ink I stamped the trunks on mantles. I added the slopes with the border stamp on same set. I inked with rusty hinge and dabbed a little mustard seed and peeled paint.

Then using the fab stencil brushes from Clarity stamp, I added some shading at bottom of card with peeled paint. At the top, I added shading with aged mahogany. The birds I drew in brown micron pen.

I matted topper on Tim Holtz co'ordinations craft core card. However the card looked bare like this so I decided to add some twine and jute. I coloured the jute with peeled paint distress ink and spritzed with water for a more even colour. Then I thought that it still needed something as it was still bare. So I thought I could add some leaves from autumn set.

I wanted to use shrink plastic but i'm impatient so I thought I'd try to use promarkers to stamp with. ................And it worked! And it dries a lot quicker than archival. So I cut out 3 of the larger leaves and punched a hole before I heated them. Using jump rings I connected all 3 together and threaded twine and jute through.

Finally I was happy with finished result and it seems so was the recipient!

All for now, Theresa xx

Christmas - Sweet Lilac flowers dt and Clarityblog challenge

Well it's that time of month again when the new Sweet lilac challenge is set. This month it is Christmas.

This was another commissioned card that I was asked to do. A male Christmas card.

All I knew is that i was going to make it on kraft card and it was going to have brown tones. So I had a nice rummage through my Clarity stamps to see what I could make.

The harbour set is one of my favourite sets as it is very versatile. It goes really well with the church set, So out they both came along with the large well stamp.

I started by stamping the roof of the well in lower left corner and then stamped large seagull on top. Next I stamped the two flying seagulls and masked them off. I stamped one row of houses, masked them off and restamped another row.  I used memento brown ink for stamping as I was going to colour in with promarkers. Then I stamped the church and the little boat. I masked all the images so I could work on background.

To create the sea, I scrunched a piece of copy paper and dipped it in versamark ink and used it to stamp over water area. I embossed it with stardust embossing powder. I put a moon mask behind the steeple and set to colour sky and sea with brown tone distress inks and brushes. I used the sepia tones promarkers to colour in the stamped images. Using the fine nib and umber promarker i drew a wall under houses.

For the sentiment I used the banner set and cut out 2 of them. I wrote sentiment inside and added shading with same distress inks. I mounted these on foam pads.

Then I coloured 3 poinsettias from Sweet lilac flowers with the brown promarker and added pebeo renaissance gold gilding wax to stamens and some highlights to leaves. I edged topper and base card with same wax to add to vintage feel.

I matted topper on black card and mounted it on 8x8 kraft card.

Since I used clarity stamps I thought I would also enter it into the Clarity Christmas challenge.

I hope you like my effort as much as the recipient did. All for now, Theresa xx

ink on gelli plate

Recently I've been hearing a lot about ink on gelli plate. Last week when i met Sam Crowe and she was playing with my gelli plate, i saw what she was doing with inks. I thought finally I might get to use adirondaks that i have sitting in a cupboard.

Sam applies ink directly to gelli plate but i used brayer to apply it. The inks were butterscotch, wild plum, eggplant and denim. Before I applied any ink i stamped butterfly from classroom, cut it out and applied it to gelli on opposite side of where i wanted it on print. (remember it will be a mirror image). Then I applied inks and this was followed by stamping.

This part was total experimenting as I didn't know what would happen. I used several Clarity stamps and using coloured archivals by Wendy Vecchi I stamped directly on gelli plate creating a background. When I was satisfied with the stamping I pulled a print. It looks brighter than what you see on gelli plate.

Then i stamped butterfly in area that was left blank aligning it as much as possible. I coloured it with a waterbrush picking up ink directly from ink-pad. I also coloured around it with slate thus creating a shadow.

The little dots are liquid pearls opal white and the glitter is jones tones fine diamantina.

I trimmed print and matted it on black,yellow and black and stuck it on an 8x8 card.

The tag I made from a little of-cut of card. Sentiment is stamped in black archival and clear embossed. Around perimeter i used same stamps and inks as on print. Matted it on black. Ribbon is american sea binding that I coloured with distress inks and spritzed with water. I added some liquid pearls and glitter to it to complete.

I hope you enjoy this and would welcome any comments, Theresa xx

clarity meets spellbinders

I was asked to make a wedding card and this is what I came up with. I like the idea of white on white for weddings and this is what i start with.

I started with the stately circles die and cut out the first die with GC and then embossed it. With the card still in die i stamped the Clarity lily in versamark and brushed with confetti white perfect pearls. I overstamped sentiment in black archival and embossed with detail clear. I traced around the die and cut with scissors. I inked around with versamark and brushed with confetti white perfect pearls.

For base layer i cut a piece of card 13cm wide and cut the lower border with scalloped borders and embossed. I stamped the 2 clarity sentiments one on upper and other on lower border, in black archival and embossed with detail clear. I then used lattice heart embossing folder and embossed the background leaving a half inch gap from border.

Using american seam binding, I wrapped some around card where I had left gap. I made a triple bow and used a Tim Holtz accoutrements button on knot. I cut 3 sprigs and with card still in die, I inked with versamark an brushed with confetti white. Then after putting topper, I stuck sprigs around bow.

Finally using cosmic shimmer pearl glue i dropped 'pearls' on the embossed hearts on background.

Finished card is A5.

This is another one I made as i was asked for another one the next day. only difference is the button, otherwise same ingredients used.

Hope you enjoy your day wherever you are and thanks for any comments, Theresa xx

Massimo's homework

This is card that Massimo sent in this time. Although you might think he copied mine, I hadn't shown him mine.

I asked him what he wanted to do and he said it was going to be blue. So i gave him blue distress inks. Weathered wood for snow; tumbled glass, stormy sky, faded jeans and chipped sapphire for sky. He loves the magic of the reveal when he lifts the moon mask. He thinks it's magic and squeals every time.

The stamps are in cobalt blue archival ink.

Once he'd finished he got all upset as he said it looked like winter and he wanted Christmas. I couldn't console him and he didn't believe me when I said Christmas came in winter. If you ask him now he'll say it's not true!

Finally I managed to convince him to ome and put some glitter on the snow and then he thought it looked better. He didn't want a sentiment on though. So I left it like he wanted it.

You should have seen his little face when barb showed it on TV!

Hope it gives you same pleasure to see as it does me when I see his creations. Thanks for stopping by, Theresa xx

trees and mantle clarity homework

This was my favourite card that i made with the trees but unfortunately it was missed. It is a technique i saw Sue Wilson demo on c&c and it is on her blog particraft.blogspot.com. Basically you mask off an area of the card and ink the other parts with distress inks. i used peacock feathers, rusty hinge and mustard seeds. I then added mica powder to inked areas (golden one). Then i removed mask and stamped leaves from the autumn set in versamark. i added mica powder to these (green). Using same leaves, I stamped them again in black archival. I stamped the smaller tree twice in the gap left, after blotting. Then i added the sentiment in black archival,matted on black and on A5 white base card. In real life the card shimmers loads but is really difficult to photograph. 

 Another shot hopefully to see shimmer.

This is inside of card.

This was a shown card that was done with cobalt blue archival ink and blue distress inks: weathered wood for snow; tumbled glass, stormy sky, faded jeans, chipped sapphire for sky. Stamps from lesson 21 and 14. Sentiment is embossed with stardust embossing powder.

This was a second card that i sent in. It is stamped with black archival. Stamps used are from lesson 21 and bauble set. Sentiment is embossed with stardust embossing powder.

Well i apologize for the length of this post. Hope you stayed with till the end. Enjoy yourselves, Theresa xx

clarity stencil and homework

Well last month Barbara set a challenge: to see what we could come up with using the stencil that came with lesson 22. Here are some things i came up with.

In the first card i used hills as sand dunes and used distress inks and brushes to colour them in. I used other side of stencil on sky.

I stamped the 3 wise men from lesson 5 and the star and finished it off with the sentiment.

Here i used the same stencil and made trees out of hills. The hardest bit is the masking to make sure that lines are kept clean. Again done with distress inks and brushes. The other side i used to create snowy ground. Dear are from another lesson i think 14.

I added some glitter to finish it off.

This was another topper I made with stencil. Similar to first card. When Massimo saw this he wanted to make one. His is the left one and i think it's better than mine!

This was the first thing i made but i forgot to send it in. I embossed one of the 'hills' using my GC. Then i turned it over to do other side thus creating a bauble. Then i covered all embossed areas with versamark ink using pen and embossed them with red tinsel glitter powder. At the join i added double sided tape and sprinkled gold glitter. I punched a hole at the top and added some twine and a bow.

I finished bauble off with a red poinsettia from Sweet lilac flowers.

I hope you enjoy my post as much as i enjoyed all these makes. Take care, Theresa xx