Author: Catherine

So another project for the challenge and this time I grabbed my Rub Ons to finish off this card.

I used the gelli plate to create the background using distress oxides and then stamped the house using a Claritystamps stamp. Unfortunately I didn’t do a brilliant job of the stamping so to cover that up I grabbed the rub ons.

I love these fun rub ons from Tim Holtz and how they helped change this from something which was a mess up into something cool.

Love that the #31productchallenge made me think outside of the box!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

So yesterday I shared six Halloween inchies but then I realised that the challenge was to produce nine… so three more required! Doh!

So I decided to get out another product and use another of those backgrounds to do these three.

So the background was one of this batch… and then I used the same Tim Holtz stamp for the background… this time with green ink…

And then used some more of the Tim Holtz stamps to create the focal images…

So here is the full set!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

As promised another #31productchallenge… and another swap … this time inchies… and six Halloween themed ones.

Started with the backgrounds I made on 1st October for the start of the challenge and chose two of them to cut into inchies.

So day 8 my product was my Stampin Up dye based inks to add the text stamping in the backgrounds in two different colours. I love these inks for stamping.

Then I finished off the inchies with embossed stamping and then realised they needed some frame so added the ink to the edge of them all.

So only one days contribution to the #31productchallenge but happy to be able to use a couple of those additional backgrounds I had created and love.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

So the circle journal group is off and running for another year and this time the challenge was to choose the colours you want to use and then only use those colours with neutrals for each page you complete.

I chose Teal and Lime as my combo and here is the journal I made…

As I handmade my journal and have bound it with book rings it should be easy for people to complete their pages out of the book and then rebind it before passing it on.

I had lots of fun making my journal covers with the limited colour palette…

And using different materials and textures to create the journal!

Looking forward to this colour challenge over the full year and how I can vary it from one page to another.

The covers I kept to the black gesso as the consistent element to help cover the greyboard I had used as the cover substrate.

The feather part I probably worked longest on but decided it was too delicate as an outside cover so ended up with it as an inside page.

I started with a few stencils and modelling paste and then once dry I added black gesso as the base. Then I layered up colours with a mix of paints … art alchemy, fresco finish paint, and Dylusions.

Then once I was happy with the background I started cutting small pieces of different patterned papers in teal, turquoise and lime greens. I stuck these to a feather template I had made and created the feather.

I gave it a coat of versamark and clear embossing powder to add texture and give strength and then adhered it to the background.

Love all the different colours I got in my covers whilst remaining true to the original colour choice.

Love how these little snippets work together in this collage too.

Looking forward to working in the next circle journal I get too… and seeing how I use these colours again!

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Today I have six ATCs to share with you which I made of over a few days at the beginning of the month for a swap but also as part of the #31productchallenge on Instagram that Birgit Koopsen is hosting. The idea is to use a different product every day for the challenge… so this was the first project I worked on for the challenge.

I started with the mini gelli plate and used distress oxides to create these backgrounds … I love this technique and it is so addictive once you get started! Hence the more than 6 backgrounds!

So day one was distress oxides.

Day two was versamark and clear embossing through stencils… ok that’s more than one product but you can’t clear emboss without versamark and I wanted to stencil not stamp! I did do 6 but only pictures of 4 of them here…

… next I wanted to add the black in and have the clear embossing as a resist. So I chose Versafine to add black in with the blending tool.

This resulted in some dramatic backgrounds and it was at this point I had cut the mountboard to the ATC size.

Next it was day 4 and I decided to grab my copper acrylic ink and use that…

I splashed some on the backgrounds of three and also cut and painted some dried baby wipe to add as a layer on these three cards.

Day five I added copper thread and the focal images for these three cards.

I love how these were coming together…

Day 6 I decided to grab a gel pen and do some doodling on these three cards and also added some to the other three backgrounds.

Day 7… time to work on the other three cards and this time I grabbed some different embossing powders…. white and green … so although I had used clear embossing earlier I decided these were used differently and are obviously coloured so they count as a different product!

And so this is the finished ATCs I made over the course of 7 days using a different product each day…

The photo above was taken with the flash on at night which shows some of the texture and shine… but the next one was in daylight and they look so much better in the real light.

Hope you enjoyed this walk through.

I’m still going with the challenge … and for the next project I used a couple of those backgrounds I made but for a different project.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Today I have a video to share of the making of these coins for the UK stampers forum group swap.

I used a few colours of Paperartsy fresco finish paints and one Paperartsy stamp set and had fun making the set of coins.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

So the artist trading coins swaps have all been posted off and I can now share the twinchies I made to accompany them! Last month I underestimated the number who would join in and had to make a few more last minute. This time I decided to go with 20! Spoiler alert it wasn’t enough!

I created a distress oxide panel and then cut it into 20 1.75inch squares. Then I used two Tim Holtz stamps to create the images.

I love that these stamps are the perfect size for this!

Once stamped I edged each one with the black soot ink to give it a finished appearance. Next I cut the twinchies from pink and blue cardstock so I could create 4 sets of 5.

I layered them up and then stamped the sentiment using alphas and cut each one out. I stuck them down and then edged the sentiment in black pen. Next I added black enamel dots on each one.

Love how these all look. And that they were quite simple to achieve.

I think using the different coloured cardstock also helped bring out the different colours of the ink in the background.

Now as I said above it turned out 20 was not enough…

… there were an amazing 25 artists joining me on the swap… the basket was full of lovely coins by the time I got to the end of the month…

… so another 5 twinchies had to be made …

I chose to use some scraps of backgrounds that were on my desk and the Badass artchick girl image to make the remaining 5 twinchies.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

I used leftover from a masterboard I made some coins from to make some inchies.

I kept it simple with the addition of the shrink plastic sentiment as there was so much going on for the background.

Happy crafting!

Catherine

Today I have a strange one to share… a postcard that came from a playtime reorganising my inks!

I decided to check my Stampin Up inks as I hadn’t really been using them much so took a wood mounted stamp I got from James Sharpe Art and stamped it multiple times onto a piece of Very Vanilla cardstock using all of my yellow, orange, pink, red and purple inks.

This created a fab piece of inky patterned paper. I also added a few Timeless Textures splats too in purple. Then I roughly edged the panel.

Next I found a title for the card thinking of the eyes are the window to my soul….

I mounted it onto mountboard and a nice simple postcard was made for this month’s UK Stampers Forum swap.

Happy crafting!

Catherine