A Christmas Robin for Lost Coast Designs

Good afternoon and happy Sunday. Here's my second piece for the Tip Your Hat event at Lost Coast Designs.

Here's a close up of the lovely Megan's Christmas Bird. I think this is such a pretty stamp, I'm not sure if it is a Robin, but today it is :-)

So put your thinking caps on (sorry but I couldn't resist that one) and join in with our event over on the Portal.

I'm also entering this into the Happy Little Stampers Christmas challenge.

Thanks very much for looking and have a great day xx

You Can Keep Your Hat On.

Good afternoon and happy Saturday. We have a fun new event over on the Portal called Tip Your Hat. So here are my dashing chappies.

This was made with two Lost Coast stamps, Tres Caballeros and Party Hats 2.

So please put on your party hats and join us in our event. You don't have to use Lost Coast/Carmen's Veranda stamps, but we love it when you do.

Have a great day, and thanks very much for looking x

Greens and Blues for Country View Crafts

Good morning and happy Friday, the weekend starts here! I'm really happy to be sharing my second 'blues and greens' piece with you today. It's something very new for me so please be kind ;-) 

I recently went on a Powertex workshop which I enjoyed very much, so I was keen to try it out at home before I forgot everything that I'd learned. 

These are my 'ingredients', I've  bought some moulds so I've been busy making plaster of Paris fairies (I'm not really a fairy person but they do look nice). The cloth is a loosely woven cheesecloth, and I'm using Ivory Powertex. The tags are from the MDF Man and the base tag is HUGE.

So everything stuck down and dried. Time to add the blues and greens.

This is a Powertex colour mixed with a waterproof varnish. This green is looking a bit scary, what have I done!

I added some blue Powertex colour - maybe I should paint it all white and start again!

I'm not going to go into details because I'm not Powertex trained, but there's lots of dry brushing with paler blues and greens, and on the bottom tag I've started to add some metallic colour.
 It did look 'nice' when it was finished, but it wasn't really me!

It definitely needed grunging up a bit! So I've gone round the edges with some Prima Rust Paste.

I've also hit the textured areas with  Finnabair Alchemy Waxes.

That's better! There's also some embossing with a patina embossing powder and  Frantage.

Although a non-fairy person I do like these.

I coloured the ribbon with Distress Inks for the top of the tag.

And we're all done! I added on of my P of P suns that had been painted with White Fire Fresco.

I really enjoyed making this, especially when I added a little bit of 'me' to it. There's still a week for you to enter our challenge, so please get out your blues and greens and join in.

Enjoy your weekend, and thanks very much for looking xx

You Can't Be Serious!

Good morning and happy Wednesday. I've been having a play with my DecoArt paints and mediums, and Lost Coast Designs stamps.

We have lots of mega crackle going on with Weathered Wood and Crackle paint, lots of background stamping with the LC stamps, and finally a wash of blue.

I am partial to a bit of crackle!

and borders - I love borders, this one is from Lost Coast.

This is a Lost Coast's Medium Elk Skull that's been stamped on to tissue paper and coloured with sharpies.

Then I had a little bit of a 'kitchen sink' moment and threw everything at it. The sentiment is from Carmen's Veranda. If you haven't seen these you really should - you will laugh until you cry!

I'm entering this into the Mixed Media Monthly challenge. I love these colourful flowers against the white background, just like my elk.

I'm also entering it into the Happy Little Stampers Mixed Media challenge which is to use tissue paper, and Simon Says Stamp Work it Wednesday. 

Have a fun week, and thanks very much for looking x

Take Risks

Good afternoon and happy Tuesday. It's a really grey day here, warm but no sunshine at all - August eh! Happy Little Stampers have an ATC challenge running, and the theme this time is 'doodling' I love to see doodling, but the reason I have more than a few (waaaaay more unless Neil is looking) rubber stamps is that I can't draw, and I can't doodle at. all.! It's no use saying that everyone can draw, and it's only practice blah blah 'cos I really can't.  I did a well known 30 day course, and the difference between day 1 and day 30 was zip, zilch, nada,  noooo difference at all. I have a cup that my son bought for my birthday with a face on it that I drew on a course - you know when something is sooo bad that the tutor has to mutter and move on - well this stares at me every day as I eat my tea. I would show you but it would break the internet...
Anyway what's a challenge if not challenging, so here are my doodles (be grateful it's only ATC size :-)  )

Even Pic Monkey is having a laugh, it's telling me that my 'masterpiece has been saved' The lovely stamps are from AALL & Create, the doodles are all mine lol.
I'm also linking this to Simon Says Stamp Monday's ATC challenge.
Have a great week, and thanks very much for looking xx

Paint With All The Colours

Good morning, I hope you're enjoying your weekend. I'm happy to be sharing a journal page this morning over at Rubber Dance. I'd love it if you joined me by clicking here, where you will see more of this

Our current 'embossing' challenge is still running, so I hope you'll join in for the chance to win some wonderful free rubber.

Have a fab week, and thanks very much for looking x

Raven Love

Good afternoon and happy Tuesday. We have a fun stencil challenge running over at Lost Coast Designs and this is my second piece.

This was made using Carmen's Veranda stamps Edgar Allan Poe and Dogs Like Me.

Please pop on over to the Portal for lots more inspiration from my teamies and then play along yourself.

Have a great day, and thanks very much for looking x

Come Fly With Me

Good morning and happy Tuesday. It's time for our new themed challenge over at Rubber Dance and this month it's 'embossing'.

 I can't imagine a project that doesn't contain embossing of some sort. When I first started crafting it was heat embossing that made me want to give it a go, and I still love seeing that powder turn shiny! Here's what I've made.

I started out by die cutting several of the Tim Holtz pocket watches, then pushing out the middles of some of them. Take no notice of the green one - it ended up in the big blue filling cabinet under my desk!

Next I squidged Versamark over my bottom copy and gave it a good coat of UTEE - mostly platinum, with a sprinkle of red and green. Ah a squidge and a sprinkle, it sounds a bit like my baking. 

Stamp at the ready, inked and ready to go when the UTEE is all melted.

I love this stamp, it's called La Mappa and it looks great, even when it's er upside down! I could have just re-heated it and stamped again, but then there would be swirls of black ink in the embossing, and to be fair you wouldn't have know it was upside down if I hadn't told you ;-)

Anyway, moving on from the upsidedown-ness, I cut and embossed a piece of TSS metal for the frame, and sanded it back. I also stamped and heat embossed Phone Home and Flying Ink Bottle.

Phone Home and the large bee from Buzzy Bees have been stamped onto shrink plastic (one of my very favourite things), coloured, and cut out.

And we're all done! 'Fly' has been cut out of the same metal sheet - I think I must have been having a bit of a green mood which is strange as it's not a colour I use that often.

Please join in with our challenge, any type of embossing is good, folders, paste, whatever.

I'm also entering my flying ladies into the That's Crafty 'anything but a card' challenge.

As always if you need more rubber, quote SDFreeship for orders of 15 Euros's or over for free worldwide P&P.
Thank you very much for looking, and have a fun week x
                                        
Stamps used

                                                    

 

La Mappa

 

Phone Home

 

Flying Ink Bottle

 

Buzzy Bees

                                        


                                       

                                       



                                       


                                       

                                       

It's Spike Friday!

Good morning and happy Friday. The sun shone for about 30 seconds, so Spike said he wanted to go outside.

This has been made with the Rubber Dance Textured Flowers set, lots of  Distress Ink, and embossing powder.

I love these colours!

I'm entering my flower into the That's Crafty anything but a card challenge, and Happy Little Stampers Watercolour and Anything Goes With Dies challenges.

Have a great weekend, and thanks very much for looking x

Whale Hello There

Good morning and happy Wednesday. I'm very happy to be sharing my first piece with you over on the Rubber Dance blog. Here's a peak....

I'd love it if you would join me over there. As always just quote SDFreeShip for free worldwide postage on orders of 15 Euro's and over.

Don't forget we have a colour challenge running, and you have until the 14th to join in.
Have a great day, and thanks very much for looking x

Twinkle Twinkle Starry Cat

Good afternoon and happy Monday. It's time for a new challenge over at Lost Coast Designs, and this time around it's one of my favourites - stencils. Here's what I've made.

I started by stencilling my stars with some silver texture paste. I then sprayed with some home made shimmer spray to make my universe. I die cut the moon, stars and Earth - wow think big eh!

Then I made a Distress Ink background and stamped Cat Star Wings. She's been coloured with glitter and white pen.

I printed my sentiment on the computer.

And all done.

So please join in and play with your stencils. They don't have to be bought, home made stencils are fine and so much fun.
Thanks very much for looking and have a great week.

A Tim Birthday Card

Good morning, happy Tuesday, and happy August! How did we get here so soon, the last time I looked it was the beginning of July! A new month always means a new challenge at Country View Crafts and this time around it's two of my favourite colours, Blue and Green. 

I started by making a background with Distress Oxides in Faded Jeans, Peeled Paint, Cracked Pistachio, and Broken China.

Then I added stencilling with Distress Inks in Cracked Pistachio, Mermaid Lagoon, and Twisted Citron. I used the TH mini stencils, sets 5, 9, and 10. Then I stamped the background with Halftone & Rings - this is my very favourite background set.

I wanted a nice 'blokey' stamp for my main image, so I've used this one from Sideshow, together with the numbers stamp. I've also used dies from Mixed Media, and Mixed Media 3 to chop into the background.

And we're all done! I love how these dies look when they are layered over the black card.
The 'happy birthday' is from my favourite Celebration set.

This card was in an envelope and in the post almost before the ink had dried lol.

Have a very happy August, and don't forget to join in with our challenge with your blues and greens.
Thanks very much for looking x

TH Celebration Words	TH Stamping Platform	TH Halftone and Rings	TH Sideshow	DI Twisted Citron
DI Cracked Pistachio	D I Peacock Feathers	TH mixed media 3	TH mixed media	TH mini stencils 10
TH mini stencils 9	TH mini stencils 5	dox Broken China	dox Peeled Paint	dox Faded Jeans
dox Cracked Pistachio