Merry Christmas!!

Hi Honey I'm home! Back from my lovely holiday - in fact after 2 or 3 days at home it's as if it never happened. Never mind, at least there's Christmas to look forward to. Speaking of which, it's my turn to show my second Country View Crafts Christmas piece, so here it is.

I started by making my background for the Crazy Dogs with some of my favourite Basic Grey papers and snowy acetate.

Then I stamped and die cut the dogs and presents from the Tim Holtz Mini Crazy Cats and Dogs, and Mini Bird Crazy and Things stamps and dies. I love these sets, but I do wish there was some way of identifying the dies for the cats and dogs. It would be really nice if Sizzix had colour coded them for us, or even a number etched into the die.

So, Distress Markers and Ice Stickles at the ready, time to start colouring!

Who could resist these guys?

There we are, all finished and with a frosty background kindly provided by the Great British weather. I wonder if it will be a white Christmas... When I was younger I loved snow at Christmas, now I just think of people driving and hope it stays away. Older, wiser, but not so much fun :-)

So here we are with the last Country View challenge of the year. A huge thank you to everyone who has entered and a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all.
Have a wonderful time and thanks very much for looking xx

Stand Out!

Good morning and happy Tuesday. I've left the Christmas preparations behind and set off in search of sunshine, so this is a scheduled post. Helen and Mark recently had a Black Friday weekend sale over at Visible Image, and this is one of the sets that fell into my basket :-)

I started by giving my monolith and stand a couple of layers of white gesso so that the alcohol inks would have a slicker surface to move on, then I just blew them through a straw.

Then I made a total mess of the stamping. I've just re-inked my Versamark and I don't seem to have much luck with re-inked ink pads - I think in future I'll just buy a new one. Anyhow instead of binning it and sulking which is what I wanted to do, I gave it a couple of coats of white acrylic. I quite liked how this knocked back the brick wall embossing that I'd used from the Teenage Kicks plate.

So I huffed and puffed and re-blew the alcohol ink, and just stamped the brick wall a little around the edges then rubbed off some of the bronze embossing powder before heating it.
The legs from Teenage Kicks have been embossed in black, and the quote is actually purple and black but it doesn't show up so well here. Then it was a bit of bottle top stamping and all done.

I really enjoyed the start and the end - the bit in the middle not so much lol but I'm happy how it's turned out, there's actually quite a bit of texture in there which is always good.
Don't forget to check out the website which will lead you to the shop and lots of inspiration.
There's also our facebook group and we love it when you share your Visible Image creations with us here. Then there's  our facebook page,  and of course Pinterest with lots more to look at.
Have a wonderful week, and thanks very much for looking x

I'm Late I'm Late, I'm Late

In January, I made a half hearted resolution to be more organised at Christmas time. Maybe next year....  So I need some cards, and fast. This calls for stamps and dies and lots of Distress. Luckily it also ties in with our Christmas challenge at Country View Crafts this month.

I thought I would make a mini assembly line, so I stamped the background cards and all the elements, and cut them out with the corresponding dies. They are all Tim Holtz sets and have matching stamps and dies.

These have  been stamped on watercolour paper and coloured with Distress Inks and a water brush.

Same again for this one plus lots of  Distress Stickles. These are fab 'cos you can dry them with a heat gun so there's no hanging around for it to dry. There's also some snowy acetate on top. 

This one's been made on an alcohol ink  background. I guess I'm not much good at batch card making!
So if you're like me, and Christmas has crept up suddenly, don't forget to join in with our challenge and share your Christmas makes.

I'll not be around for the next couple of weeks, we're jetting off for some sunshine (though the weather forecast isn't looking too good) so I will catch up with you all when I get back. Have a fun week, and thanks very much for looking x