Author: Catherine

Today I am back to working in my journal just for me… And my page transformed quite a bit from the start to the end.

It wasn’t a clean page I started with as there was already a fair amount of wipe off on the page. I added a little bit of stamping and some masking tape onto it and then some modelling paste through a stencil. The picture above is whilst I waited for it to dry.

Next I added distress stain, lots of it!

And left it to dry… after a couple of hours it was almost dry… (yes it was that much distress stain)…

I decided to work with the pink paint that was peeking through the stain and I added more stain in the picked raspberry just in a few spots…

The next morning it was completely dry so I carried on playing.

I decided to create some large pink flowers so painted some pink patterned paper with neon pink paint that was translucent so showed the patterned through and then stamped and cut out the big Jofy flowers.

I added some stems for the flowers using a white posca pen and then glued down the flower heads.

I decided they needed to be bolder so took a dark brown Pitt big brush pen and added definition and shading.

I carried on doodling using both the Pitt pen and a white posca paint pen.

Then worked on the background a bit more with some more stamping in paint and doodling with the pens.

The sentiment I created using stickers and alpha stamps and this brought it all together… And this next one shows the page in the light.

When I started I had no plan… certainly no idea pink flowers would be the final result. But so happy with this bold and funky finished page.

Happy crafting

Catherine

Howdy readers…

This week we have a technique based challenge over at Back to Basics and Beyond … salt technique.

I haven’t used salt with my watercolours as a background very often so it was fun to experiment and ended up with three panels…

I cut them down and used each in a different way. One I used an indigo Blu stamp set and heat embossed the fish and the sentiment.

I then added a little more colour onto the fish using distress oxide and my waterbrush.

Then I added layers under the panel in contrasting colours including the ribbon and the pearls.

Now the second card I kept quite simple with a silhouette stamp and added gold edging and some patterned paper and then sequins to finish.

Then the final one I used as a piece of actual patterned paper.

I added the stamped image and some other layers of patterned paper. I added the kraft tag to balance the kraft in the coffee cup colouring.

Love all three of these cards… And love being reminded of what a lovely effect the addition of salt is to the watercolour background.

Can’t wait to see how everyone else used the salt technique in their creations! Here is the blog.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Today I have some bunting to share which is for the UK stampers forum swap. The theme for this swap is Monochrome, so I went for the turquoise colours as my monochrome.

I stamped the beach hut from Marlene using the archival inks and then used distress crayons to watercolour the image. I also added some ink blending round the edge and a little bit of stamping to provide some texture. I then splattered the art alchemy sparks paints to give it some shimmer. Next I added the hand stamped sentiment and edged it with some Inktense.

I love this image and the gentle finish this bunting had.

It’s been a fun swap to get involved in and I’ve loved creating the flags and receiving some fun bunting in return.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

I decided to join in on a map twinchies swap where the rule was to make 4 twinchies with a map theme.

I have quite a lot of old atlas pages in my stash so used some snippets of those as the starting point cutting each to 1.75″ square as I wanted to mount them with a frame.

Then I added a thin layer of gesso and then distress oxides in aged mahogany, vintage photo and walnut stain.

Next I took a stencil and sprayed the distress resist through the stencil and this creates an interesting texture and meant when I added more oxide it created pattern too as it resisted the colour where the spray was.

Then I added some sepia archival to the edge of each panel.

Next for the mounts I created a panel with alcohol inks and the mixative to create a shiny and metallic red and brown background and cut that into 2″ squares.

I mounted the map pieces onto the alcohol ink background twinchies.

Next to choose my images for my twinchies… I chose a Creative Stamping magazine travel themed stamp set.

After stamping I used my Prismacolour to add colour to them…

Then I did some fussy cutting…

Then I added the compass image onto each of the map pieces…

And arranged the pieces I had as focal images to check I was happy with them before adhering them and in the case of the signpost snipping off the extra bit.

I decided that the words needed some more emphasis so tool leftover of the alcohol ink panel and mounted them onto this and then jobs a good’un!!!

Super happy with my map themed twinchies… And hope the recipient likes them too!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Today I have the three coins I made for the UK stampers forum swap this month.

I kept them similar to the ones I made for the swap I host in terms of the theme of words to live by… and they had gelli printed bookprint as the background.

This time I added so.e white posca pen to define the stencilled pattern on each coin once I had adhered them.

Then added some stamping onto each using the leaves from Petal Palette and some inking using vintage photo round the edge.

Then I had a hunt in my box of scraps and found some quotes I had printed ages ago but they worked perfectly for these I thought…

I thought these made lovely coins and really loved the colour scheme I chose with those paints on the gelli prints.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Well the coin group started off on another theme on the 1st January… words to live by. I thought it would be good to see positive words and phrases … it’s going to be interesting seeing everyone’s response and interpretation.

I was a little late making mine as I usually make mine just before the month starts but just didn’t get a chance over the festive season.

But here they are…

My word is Grow… I chose this word a couple of years ago and this year it rang true when I was thinking of this challenge. So grow it is…

I gelli printed some bookprint with a few colours of Paperartsy fresco finish paints and used a stencil to get some pattern in the background. Then I used an old but favourite stampin up stamp to get the tree onto the bookprint.

Next I adhered these to the wooden coins I have a stash of and used sandpaper to ensure a nice smooth edge. I edged them with black and the used my white posca pen to make the trees white with lots of white blossom.

I decided they needed more colour so out came pink paint to add pink blossom. I did this using the end of a plastic paintbrush to add the tiny dots.

Next I used the same pink paint to paint some edges of the book paper and stamped grow onto it using black ink. I cut these out and adhered them onto the coins adding black to the edge to frame the sentiment.

Love how these came out! Hope the recipients in the swaps like them too.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Another circle journal page, this time for Claire and I fancied playing with texture… lots and lots of texture.

I started with some gesso to provide a sketchy backdrop. I loved the kraft cardstock that the journal was made from so wanted to preserve that for the edge of the pages.

Once that was dry I added texture paste through a stencil and left it to dry.

Next I added some more texture using the glass bead gel and again left that to dry.

Then I added colour using the distress stains in twisted citron, cracked pistachio and peacock feathers. I then added some strips of papers and some twine. I also added some other stamping in the background to add some different areas of colour.

I also added the cute wooden birds which I added colour to using the oxide and some clear embossing powder to add shine.

I wanted to add some darker colour so I added some Inktense and some splashes of black ink in places to add a different contrast.

Then created the focal point of the stamped element and the sentiments for the titles with embossing and inking.

Super happy with the way this came out and how different it is from my previous pages using these colours… it’s amazing how the colours can lend themselves to these different pages.

And if you are interested I made a video of the process… here it is.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

I was still in the zone thinking about tropical stuff (My theme for this month’s ATC swap) and had played with glimmer paste onto a piece of glossy cardstock I had added some mop up of distress oxide to…

And figured this was a good starting point for a postcard.

Once the glimmer paste was dry I added more oxides to give the background more colour.

Then I trimmed it down. I felt it needed another layer and so took another piece of the glossy cardstock and did the same technique but with more ink and deeper colours so it would contrast the top layer. Once that was dry I sewed them together to add another type of texture.

At this point there was no stamping… and that is pretty much the only criteria of the swap… so out came my trusty Lawn Fawn aloha set. I stamped and embossed on the oxide background I had made on watercolour card in perfect pineapple colours. And then the sentiment onto black cardstock strip. I adhered the strip down and added a gold staple to add another texture. Then I added the pineapple and added lots of Wink of Stella on top to make it sparkly.

I then cut a piece of mountboard and coated it in black gesso (front and back) and glued the whole piece to that… keeping to the wonky angles.

Finally I added some white enamel accents dots to add some more texture.

I then added some stamping on the other side of the card… I used distress oxides and then embossed them to provide a border.

Super happy with all of this.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

This month I fancied using a big flower embellishment on my tag using some different flowers I have been gifted over the years as extras in swaps. So that meant my background had to work with this bold feature. Decided to do some subtle stamping using a few different SU sets.

I love how it turned out. Gentle and pretty. And that blue ribbon works so well in pulling it all together.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Not blogged for a couple of days as been busy and not had much chance to craft but up early today so thought I would get my post up early for you.

I have another set of christmas cards to share… this time I actually did some drawing… Scary! But actually turned out to be fun.

I stamped some Penny Black images onto cardstock using versafine and then drew a strip behind the image and stamped the sentiments too.

I love these funky 12 days of Christmas images… so cute.

Then I used my micron black pen (#31productchallenge) to add some details to the image and the backgrounds.

Then I got out my Spectrum Noir pencils (yes another #31productchallenge) and coloured in the image and the strip.

Absolutely loved adding colour to these little images.

I then outlined the panels and this finished off the toppers.

I then added wink of Stella to a few parts of the images to add sparkle and shine. I mounted them on Tranquil Tide cardstock and mounted them onto the card blanks. I then edged the mount with glitter glue to add more sparkle.

I adore how these came out, and because the panels were only small it didn’t take too long to colour them in. Might have to assess what other stamps I’ve got that I can apply this technique with.

Entering this into the Anything goes challenge at PennyBFriends Saturday challenge blog

Happy crafting!

Catherine