Especially For You.........

Good morning!

Well, as you can see, I went for lovely pale pinks and a wonderful main stamp from Bee Crafty here. I have made this more feminine by adding some fine lace;

So here is my start;

and here is how I envisaged the lace being put through the stamped image - I have cut out where I wanted the lace to be.

Here I have added some musical notes to tie in with the lady playing the violin.

I attached just a simple doily to the back (I had blended some pink ink over it).

Bring it all together and this is what we've got! Two butterflies have been 3'd and that lace makes for a lovely feminine lady.

Thanks for stopping by today,

Leanne x

Thinking of You.................Lavender and Lace at Allsorts Challenges........

Good morning!

Sharing a card that I've made to join in the fun over at the Allsorts Challenge this week. The theme is Lavender and Lace.

I started this piece with just one colour of distress oxide (wilted violet) and then came in with Lulu Lavender Memento ink - just swiping it across the page very lightly.

I then stamped the lovely lady (Bee Crafty) using my misti (stamping it once with the distress oxide ink (wilted violet) and then over the top with milled lavender distress ink to give me some definition. I have cut out sections of her dress so that I could pop some beautiful lavender coloured lace through it to enhance her dress and "bring her to life".

I have sponged the milled lavender distress ink through several stencils to build up that background and I have also used the wilted violet oxide through some of them too.

Thinking of you has ben stamped in the same way using the two inks.

Some Rubber Dance stamps are on there too and have been coloured in with a white pen.

Mat and layered and have added some lace trim down one edge, the back mat I have coloured with the lulu lavender Memento ink and a sponge.

All mounted on to an 8 x 8 white card blank to give it a clean feeling for lavender and lace.

I hope you like this piece. I have actually produced two pieces with this stamp, similar in design so I'll share the other one with you next week - you'll have to wait 'til then!

Thanks for stopping by today,

Leanne xx

I would like to enter this in to the Allsorts Challenge of "Lavender and Lace":-

http://allsortschallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2017/07/week-424-lavender-and-lace.html

Love Makes The Wildest Spirit Tame.............

Good morning!

Well here we are with a card that I've made for the current Cards in Envy challenge of "Motherly Love".

Having had Mother's Day here in the UK back in March I chose to put a twist on this theme and use a wonderful Imagination Crafts art stamp of a Mummy elephant with her two babies - well, it's Motherly Love isn't it?!!!!

I started with a blank piece of watercolour card and swept some of the new distress oxides (diluted) across and down the page.  This gave me a nice, calm colour on which to build my elephants colours on to.

I then stamped the main image with perfect medium and heat embossed with black detail embossing powder.

I then used distress oxide ink (again, diluted) to paint in what I needed on the elephants to give them some depth and shadow.

The hills were produced from torn copy paper and a couple of Momento inks and the sun was lifted out with water, as too, were the clouds.

The foliage was stamped in one of the Momento inks at the front (Bee Crafty) and the bird was added at the top and shaded in and the sentiment stamped ( both Pollyanna Pickering).

Mat and layered. 

I would like to enter this in to the current Cards in Envy challenge "Motherly Love":-

http://cardsinenvy.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/motherly-love-card-challenge.html

Thanks for stopping by today,

Leanne x

Discover....

Good morning!

A change of scheduled post this week as I've made this card as my contribution to the current Cards in Envy challenge of "Black and white" and I want to get it entered! - Cards in Envy is my absolute favourite challenge blog!.

I know that you automatically think of die cutting when you think of black and white but of course, I'm a stamper! So here is a stampers version of black and white!

I have only used white Sheena Stamping card, a black Momento ink pad, white structure paste, black gesso and an amber illustrator marker for the whole card which was fun.

So, from my blank piece of stamping card I stamped my focal image of the wonderful balloon in black Momento (Bee Crafty Art Stamp).  From there is was to concentrate on my background which has been done by simple wiping the ink pad across the page from both directions, pressing and drawing that ink pad inwards.  I just stamped some of the clouds from the main image (being careful not to catch the basket) and extended the clouds a little bit both sides.

The birds are from Lavinia Stamp.

Then structure paste (white) was pressed through an Indigoblu dinky stencil and some black gesso through another stencil (which was a great big swirl and I've used on a small portion of it).

The sentiments are cut down from some art journalling stamps by Indigoblu.

I then highlighted those with a bit of colour as the challenge suggested with an amber illustrator marker.

Another masculine card! Wahay!!!

Mat and layered with black and white card stock.

I would like to enter this in to the Cards in Envy challenge of "Black and White":-

http://cardsinenvy.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/black-white-card-challenge.html

Hope you've enjoyed a lesson in black and white today!

Thanks for dropping by today,

Leanne xx

Nature postcard.............

Good morning!

Thought I'd pop this one on to my blog as a mid week post for you this week.  I was prompted to make this postcard (6 x 4 inch) when I came across a lovely blog called Sunday Postcard Art.  Their theme at the moment is "sepia" so I thought I'd join in!

I started with some speciality stamping card and "swooshed" my card in to some distress inks on my craft mat that I'd sprayed with water, then dried with my heat tool.

I then decided where I wanted to stamp the main image (a light patch to light up her face) and stamped her in walnut stain and rusty hinge distress inks. (The stamp is one from Joy! Crafts).

The left hand side edge was then stamped with an edge stamp from Bee Crafty and the sentiment was stamped at the bottom. The swirls on the right hand side and at the top are actually part of the main images' hair!!!!! - well, you don't have to use a whole stamp do you!

I then wanted to bring nature in to this so stamped some butterflies (one in her hair), a dragonfly and some normal flies on there too.

All in sepia tones, I enjoyed my play today!!!!!

Happy with that and of course, if I don't want to leave it as a postcard size, I could always mat and layer it and turn it into a card or another project! I thought this was quite "on trend" - I'll probably lose it to one of my daughters first!!!!!

Hope you like it, thanks for stopping by,

Leanne x

Happy Christmas........

Good morning!

It's a new challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges today with the theme "Anything Goes" - (well, I had to do Christmas then didn't I?!!!!). Come and join us, with such an "open" theme it's easy to have lots of fun and show us what you can create!

http://www.fashionablestampingchallenges.com/2016/12/11/challenge-118-anything-goes/

OK, lets take our journey shall we.....

Isn't this a stunner of a stamp? It's the Impression Obsession J7042 Santa Horses stamp.

I started with my usual plain white Sheena stamping card and stamped the horses in Archival watering can.  I coloured their hats in with Spectrum Noir colouring pencils (you will see this on the next photo).  I then pressed some perfect medium through a stars stencil and embossed with clear embossing powder.

I then blended the background with distress ink (weathered wood) to show the white stars more clearly.

I cut two black mats and a silver one and passed the black mats through my Platinum machine with an embossing folder that looked like snow falling by Leonie Pujol. (I had to pass them through twice as my card was wider than the 5 x 7 embossing folder so I hotched the folder over a bit and ran it through again!).

I then stroked the embossed card with a tiny bit of Pebeo silver gilding wax to highlight the snow falling - it looks so metallic!

The sentiment was stamped "Happy Christmas" (Bee Crafty) and edged with the weathered wood distress ink and matted on to black card stock.

Here I was playing with the idea of a nice red ribbon? - Yes, I think that works well!!!

There, who said that you can't do monochrome for Christmas?!!!!

Matted and layered up and red felt ribbon and bow to finish with some die cut ivy leaves (Sue Wilson - Creative Expressions) which I also finished with a touch of silver gilding wax.

I thought this was really classy! I shall choose someone special to receive this one I think!

Do come along and join us at Fashionable Stamping Challenges with our new theme of 

"Anything Goes".

http://www.fashionablestampingchallenges.com/2016/12/11/challenge-118-anything-goes/

May I wish all at Fashionable Stamping Challenges, the Design Team and all you out there who enter and make the challenges such fun for us all a very Merry Christmas!

I would like to enter this in to The Artistic Stamper Creative Team blog challenge "Christmas":-

http://theartisticstampercreativeteam.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/decembers-creative-challenge-christmas.html

Thanks for stopping by,

Leanne x

Graffiti Happy Birthday.......

Good morning! Off on a different tangent this time! Graffiti!!!!

This was loads of fun!!!  Started with a piece of craft card and embossed it with a brick wall effect embossing folder.  Darkened the edges with walnut Distress Ink then started to play!

The rubber graffiti stamps are from Woodware so stamped those randomly and coloured in with alcohol pens for a nice solid colour.  Stamped the spray can from a set from Bee Crafty and glittered it up to be a bit different! Cut it out and with some 3D tape attached it to the card.  Added some spray paints to make a mess and added some chunky embossing powders around the edge.  This was a more simple card but turned out exactly how I had it in my mind and I was very happy with it.

Well, that was week one for my blog - hope I've done ok?  I've enjoyed it!!!  I will now be posting a couple of times a week I hope (due to the running of several businesses and two teenage children - and I don't suppose I'm alone but some days I just can't get to that craft desk, no matter how hard I try - I run out of hours / stamina!!!!!

I hope I've given you a sneak peek in to my world of stamping and inks and paints (we've still lots to explore) - stay with me,  hence - "a brush with a stamper"..........

Thanks for stopping by,
Leanne x