New Home Card

Andrea is moving house shortly, so I made her this new home card. I made the new home template using the cricut design studio and storybook cartridge. I was quite pleased with it as it was my first attempt. I used the design as a mask on the front of the card using peeled paint distress ink, and then topped it up with spiced marmalade. Added a strip of card and paper and a bit of ribbon. Added a layered flower and finally mounted the piece I'd cut and been using as a mask and stapled another piece of ribbon and added a couple of tiny flowers. Oh and last but not least, I used my PINK Zutter corner rounder to round off the edges. And I must thank Hilda for reminding me that I had one!!!!

More Pressies

I went to Hilda's for the day yesterday. Caz also took the bull by the horns and drove for 4 hours and met up with us too. We had a brilliant day. Caz got the messiest and Hilda got the wettest (threw blue paint all over herself!!)

Anyway, more gifts were to be swapped and Hilda had made me this stunning altered book

Isn't it just fantastic - thank you

Caz has been stroking her fabulous papers for a while now and decided that it was about time she used them for something (she's been making lots of assertive decisions lately!!) So she made boxes just by folding the paper - cool. They are so sturdy - thanks Caz

And although I took my camera, I never actually got it out. So, sorry no photos of us playing!!!

Spoon Swap

Ang over on Lotstodo forum is hosting a wooden spoon swap. I received my fab spoon from Ju this morning. I love the slide mailer - thanks Ju

Lotstodo Week 35 - Words

This was very simple to make. I cut a few words with my Cricut machine, glued them to a thin canvas and covered the whole thing with a piece of sticky silver foil. Using my Ten Second Studio tools I etched around the words so they stood out. I used a patterened wheel to go around the outside edge, then using eggplant and wild plum alcohol inks I covered the whole canvas. I was going to remove the ink from the words, but I quite like how it's turned out. It does actually look better IRL but the foil makes it so shiny and hard to photograph.

Mega Swap - Lotstodo

Ellen was my mega swap maker and this is the fantastic altered frame that I received from her today. Thank you, it's stunning, I love it

Mega Swap - Lotstodo

This is the mega swap piece that I made for the swap on the Lotstodo Forum which Andrea arranged. My maker is Ellen and my reciever is Ju. Andrea set the criteria for the swap and mine was to use, a canvas the wrong way round, incorporate brown and silver, use a word and a number and a piece of metal. The background is a tumble dryer sheet sprayed with glimmer mist and distressed re-inkers. I painted the top of the canvas silver and the sides brown. I added the image, the various metal pieces, the silver bow and the gems to the crown. I cut a piece of wire mesh to fit the canvas and stapled it to the wood, added the 4 brown buttons, cut the letters from brown card with my new storybook cartridge for the cricut machine to spell out No1 Prince.

Gothic Arch Challenge - Cities

I joined in with the Gothic arch challenge again this week as the theme was cities. I created a background using peeled paint, shabby shutters and mustard seed distressed inks and sprayed them with a mix of mustard seed and water distressed re-inkers and another mixture of perfect pearls and gum arabic, this gave it a shine. Once dried I sprayed with wild plum adirondack colour wash spray, not before covering my hands in it first!!! I stamped my image three times over the paper, drew an arch around one of them to use as my base and then cut several pieces out of the other two so I could build them up onto the first image. I then added the word 'cities' down the right. You don't really get the 3d effect from this photo!!!!

Lotstodo Week 34 - Paper Craze

This weeks Lotstodo Challenge was to use papers. I've chosen this scrapbook page which I recently made as part of an album for a work colleagues wedding as Iused lots of different papers to create it. The large brown flower was cut from a 12 x 12 page, the piece across the middle was torn from a different 12 x 12 page, the background is a 12 x 12 page and the letters were cut from a sheet of blue paper.

Gifts

I met up with Andrea, Pete and Lauren earlier this week. Lauren had created this stunning canvas for me whilst playing in Hilda's craft haven.

Andrea had altered this fab tin using tin foil

Thanks guys they are both just fab and in my favourite colour too xxxx

Fraser & Daisy

We met a lovely couple at the Rufford Park Beardie day called Sue and Paul. They are professional photographers, which is evident from this photo which they kindly sent to us. To see more of the day check out their flickr site and also check out their photography site.

Gothic Arch Challenge - Little Boys

I received an email from the Gothic Arch site yesterday to let me know that this weeks theme was Little Boys, so I decided to play been as I haven't entered anyone elses challenges for absolutely ages. The only problem is, I have no idea how to link to their site, so if anyone is in the know, please would you let me know - ta.

The background is melted wax crayons, quite liked the bright look and texture of them. This time I printed the Lisa Altered Art image onto photo paper to make it glossy, added the gems and the words, the crown and the wand and that was it.

Altered Tin

Maz gave us all a tin to alter, but unfortunately I forgot to take a photo of it naked!!!! Been as though it was given to me by Maz I thought I would carry through the theme from the step. I cut the letters using the cuttlebug, stuck them onto the lid and covered it in sticky backed silver foil. Using a paper stump I carefully smoothed out the foil and traced around the letters. Using meadow, juniper, lettuce and willow alcohol inks I coloured the lid. Once dry I used my black stazon pad to hi-lite the letters.


The inside of the lid is covered in a piece of road map, and the quote is stamped directly onto it, again using black stazon. I then masked this off and stamped the hands over it (again carrying on with the step tradition) using olive green stazon. For the bottom I stamped the same car image 3 times and decoupaged the car and stamped journey down the right hand side in peeled paint distressed ink.


Hilda kindly sent me some printed words on Safmat, so I used 4 of them around the edges of the tin - journey, dream, travel, destiny

....... life is a journey

Quick Cards

Made these 4 quick cards by stamping onto glossy card with black stazon, then adding the lights alcohol inks to create the colour on the background. Cut some shapes with the Cricut, used distressed inks spritzed with water to colour them, attached to the base card and stamped happy birthday. The flowers were cut with the cuttlebug.

Altered Lids

Been collecting jar lids again. This is what I did with them.

Alison, do you have any left to swap or have they all gone now? When you asked I didn't have any, but as you can see I have now!!!! Let me know and we'll sort something out

Lotstodo Week 33 - Free Theme

Polly set us all yet another challenge. This is the bird house that she gave me to alter. Apologies too as she gave me it weeks ago, but I've only just got around to playing with it. Worth the wait though, I think!!!


I covered the whole thing in corrugated cardboard, ript and tore the top layer, painted them with acrylic dabbers and when dry added some metalic. I cut 'windows' out of the front panel and added some images behind. Added the flowers. I used my versamark pen to draw the squiggles freehand and I used black soot distressed embossing powder to colour them. The word 'hope' and the row of black splodges along the top were made with the Cricut machine.


This is a side shot so you get a better idea of the corrugated sides.

Atc Swap - Moo

On this months swap on UKStampers forum you have to include a moo on your atc. The moo has to include the colours yellow and orange.

Rufford Park 2009

Fraser met up with his brother Fergus, again today at the annual Beardie fun day at Rufford Park

Fergus has a younger playmate, also called Fraser, so here we have Fraser and Fraser

And here we have Daisy who Fraser took a liking too, but she was a bit of a tease!!!!

Atc Swap - Time

Hilda is hosting an ATC swap on the Lotstodo forum. The theme is time.

Tag Set

Hilda is hosting a tag swap on the Lotstodo forum. They had to include the word 'art'.

Lotstodo Week 32 - Stunning Stampbord

This weeks Lotstodo Challenge is to use stampbord. This is an atc sized piece which I covered with shabby shutters, dried marigold and fired brick red distressed inks using a piece of cut n dry foam. I then stamped the face, word and flower heads using black stazon ink. Then using a scrapy tool, I scraped away parts of the stamped images to reveal the white underneath.

Scrapbook Pages

These are the photos that I scrapped of my colleagues wedding. I gave her the album today and I'm pleased to say that she was totally thrilled with it. But I need to thank, Ruth, Sue, Polly and Kate for inspiration taken off their blogs and also to Maz and Sue (again) who gave me loads of great ideas and lent me loads of things to make it happen - thanks guys, you've made two people very happy xxxx

Lotstodo Week 31 - Recycled

The canvas's for all the above are made from a cardboard box. I tore pieces of the top layer to reveal the corrugated underneath and covered them with gesso. To the top 2 I added black acrylic paint and some stamping using black stazon and the to the bottom one I used gold acrylic paint and stamped some flourishes and lines in gold brilliance ink. The images are from Lisa's Altered Art. Recycled bits on the top one include the arrow which is part of a coke can, the wire for the hanger and the lace is from an old piece of net curtain. The bottom 2 just have an old hinge on the top to hang them from!!! German scrap, rub ons, gems, ribbon, were all added. Some dies were cut including the letters using the cuttlebug, some pieces were then embossed like the copper wings and the silver arrow.

They were made for Maz, Polly and Sue. Maz and Sue have lent me loads of stuff over the last few weeks, mainly to assist me with my wedding album and both Sue and Polly keep showering me with items to alter for a challenge, so I just wanted to say 'thank you' to them all.