New Challenge at Penny Black and More - All Creatures Great and Small........

Good morning!

It's a new challenge over at Penny Black and More today and the new theme is " All Creatures Great and Small".  Do go over and check it out, there are prizes to be had too!!!

My design for this challenge has been made using the Penny Black 40-312 Sunny Pair, the sentiment is the 30-419 Happy Wishes set, the beautiful butterfly is the 40-099 Soft Wings and the floral background border is 40-100 Fanciful.

I started with a piece of Sheena Stamping Card and painted it with black gesso.  I then popped a layer of weathered wood on there (letting each layer dry completely in between).  When this was dry I painted on two lovely shades of purple and very light blue chalk paint and watched it crack before my eyes!!!!  Sealed then with Decoart Matte Medium. This formed my background and I was ready to start!

I stamped the Sunny Pair first with black versafine and topped it with clear embossing powder to set it. I've painted in the lovely sunflowers with some acrylics. The floral border was then stamped at the edges, just lightly so that you could see that it is there but subtly in the background.

The butterfly was stamped on to sheet music and stiffened by backing it onto very thick black card stock - I glued the sheet music to the black card with Americana Decoupage glue. Cut out the butterfly and painted it lightly with the same chalk paints but this time diluted down a touch.

The sentiment of Happy Happy Wishes was stamped with the Versafine ink and set with clear embossing powder.

Mat and layered on to a lovely periwinkle that I found, white and black.

I enjoyed making this one and I just love the quality of the stamps!!

I hope that you will join us at Penny Black and More this month and good luck!!!!

Thanks for stopping by,

Leanne xx

The greatest revelation is stillness.....

Good morning!

I've had a go at the current Chocolate Baroque challenge with their colour swatch and inspiration:

http://chocolatebaroquechallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/challenge-thirty-two.html

Had fun with this one but boy, am I untidy and messy when paints come out of the drawers!!!!

I've taken a few photo's along the way so lets take our journey and see how I got there with this one.

I started with a piece of Sheena Stamping Card and painted a complete layer of green chalk paint over it to give me a base.  I then started stamping, stencilling and simply sponging with some mixed media stamps and the other two colours from the recommended colour swatch - also in chalk paint.

OK, at this point I had stamped my Buddha (Chocolate Baroque)  and embossed in Copper Wow embossing powder.  I felt I needed to give her a sense of stillness of her own so I used some Indigoblu Luscious powder mixed in to their ultra thick slap it on paste and stencilled all around her.  Some Luscious powder was mixed with water and I painted in her robes in the same colour (Penny Dreadful - a beautiful copper).

My mats and layers also needed to match the colour swatch so I used the same Luscious powder to paint the first mat and one of the chalk paints to paint the outer mat.

The joy of using metallic colours!!!! They look fantastic but taking photo's of them is a different story!!!!!  I've popped this one on so that you can see the beautiful shine from the copper metallics used on here. I added some stamped Lotus flowers and the sentiment (all Chocolate Baroque).

There, that's as good as I could get!!  You can now see those lovely mats and layers all matching in.

She looks peaceful and still don't you think?

Well, I hope you enjoyed how I got there, I should have taken a photo of my craft table when I'd finished!!!!! ooooh, some cleaning up and wiping down to do I think!!!!

I would like to enter this in to the Chocolate Baroque Challenge 32 :-

http://chocolatebaroquechallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/challenge-thirty-two.html

Thanks for stopping by,

Leanne xx

Take time for all things.........

Good morning!

Thanks for popping in.  I have been having a play with a new Sheena Douglass stamp from her Time Traveller collection.  A whopper of a stamp but stamps beautifully.  I've done a step by step on this one so shall we take a crafty journey today? - Come with me.....

I started with a watercolour block pad (love a professional pad where the edges of the paper are sealed - the paper can't move no matter how much water to throw at it!).  I pencilled in a 7 x 7 square - this just gives me a loose idea of where I am with my design.

OK, I got out my Aqua Tints this time, three colours and using plenty of water, blended them as I went down the page and allowed this to dry naturally so that I didn't lose any of the colour tones.

I then stamped my man using a rocker block (it's such a big stamp, I find a rocker block helps).  I then lifted some colour back off of his face with water.

So, using the same Aqua Tint colours as the background, I enhanced his features slightly, and his hair and brought in a little chalk paint to highlight his face.

I have now added some background detail with an Andy Skinner stencil and used the chalk paints to enhance a  leaf Clarity Stamp stencil. (If you are wondering what on earth is going on in the bottom right hand corner - this is simply where I've used the wet chalk paints on the watercolour paper as a palette but to avoid putting my arm in the wet paint, I simply cut it away! What you can see is a scrap piece of paper to stop me marking the rest of the watercolour pad beneath this one!).

There we go - finished with a Sheena Douglass die cut of a pocket watch and chain.

Mat and layered.

I wanted to bring his face right out of the page and I think I achieved this - pleased with this one!

I would like to enter this in to the Stamping Sensations challenge "Coffee and cream":-

http://sirstampalotchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2017/01/january-coffee-and-cream.html

Thanks for stopping by.

Leanne xx

Kind hearts are the gardens.......

Good morning!!

I was inspired to make this card for the current Clarity Stamps challenge "In The Garden".

I remembered to take photo's as I went along on this one so you can come on the journey with me?

I started with my usual piece of white card stock and stamped the Agapanthus (Clarity Stamps Clarity Club stamp March 15) and covered the petals with drawing gum.

Then I stuck down the bird table art stencil (Clarity Stamps) and sponged in some chalk paint.

I always seem to get a very "flat" image from this stencil so I've used some chalks paints and added to the stencil to give it some definition - I was pleased with this look. At this stage the Agapanthus are still covered in the drawing gum and I have painted drawing gum now over the bird table to keep that to the forefront of the garden as well.

Then came the fun!!!!!!!

With those Agapanthus still covered I could go mad with the garden and not worry about them, they would still be at the front of the garden no matter what I did!!!

I added hills, trees, some lovely flowers round a lawn and lots of garden friends (all Clarity Stamps) and lastly the lovely couple on the bench from one of the Clarity Wee Folk sets.

I rubbed off the drawing gum from the bird table and the Agapanthus and stamped the squirrel and fussy cut him out and stuck him to the bird table to make it look like he was actually sitting there.

Lastly, I coloured in the Agapanthus petals and popped some Glossy Accents on them and placed a further flower that I had stamped out and coloured in on sticky pads and stuck that on too to bring it nearer to me.

Matted and layered.

There are lots of things to look at in this garden but isn't that what we want to see in a garden? It's a home for the flowers and all the little feathery and furry people too - we sit in it and it is respected and belongs to all that visit it......

Happy with that!

I would like to enter this in to the Clarity Stamp Challenge - In The Garden.

https://claritystampchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2016/09/clarity-challenge-43-in-garden.html

Thanks for stopping by,

Leanne x