Christmas Cards - With thanks to JOFY!

At the end of November, I went on a brilliant Jo Firth Young weekend, over at my favourite place, The Stamp Attic.  We made a whole bunch of Christmas cards on the Saturday, and a Christmas piccie on the Sunday.

Jo showed us a few different ways to use her stamps (which are GORGEOUS, and really easy to use), and I focussed in on a couple of her samples to make my Christmas cards. 

Never been a one for fussy cutting.  Tho to be fair, now that I have invested in a pair of Lord Timmy's lovely scissors, maybe I'll learn to love it.  Or at least, detest it less.  But, whatever, Jo's Christmas trees are easy to cut out, even for me.  So I made a bunch of my cards in Jo's style, using different papers, and possibly, just a little more stickles!!














I also love Jo's Snowmen, both full and half size!!  Lovely to stamp, and colour in, using (mostly) Distress Inks, with just a little extra doodling.























My other style of card I picked up from the NEC.  The lovely lady from Card-io was making a similar card, and I had forgotten how much I love montage stamping!  So I did a few cards in this style, having bought a couple of the Majestix stamp sets.  And added some stickles...



Hope you like!

I is for...Craft Barn Challenge

I is a whole lot easier than X!!  In my world, I is for Imagine, Italy, Index, Italic, and Indigo.  And there's a whole load of ink in there too!

So I started off by painting my centura pearl card with water, and then with the most amazing acrylic ink, iridescent metallic green, yum.  I may never need to buy metallic card ever again!

I dried that off, and then stamped my italic text in indigo (OK it was manganese blue, but hey, a blind man would be glad to see it, as my mum would have said!).














Did you know that that pointy finger is really a printer's mark called a fist or an index? No, nor did I, but I do now.  And it's included, pointing at Imagine (never liked that song, sorry...).

I added the other Italian images, and finished the main piece off by adding a little distress ink around the edges.























 


This is the last of the Craft Barn letters, so I now have a binder of most of the letters.  I missed out on the first few (M&V), and I will probably catch up at some point.  It's been really good fun.  Wonder what they will throw at us next year!

Hope you like!




Resources

Ink and Paint
FW Liquid Acrylic: Silver Moss
Archival Ink: Jet Black, Fern Green, Potting Soil, Manganese Blue, Watering Can
Distress Ink: Chipped Sapphire, Walnut stain

Stamps
TJ Designs: Viva Italia
Visible Image: Imagine
Artistic Outpost: London Elements
Image Tree: Text stamp

X is for...Craft Barn Challenge

X.  X!  X? Well we all knew it had to happen.  X.  Who knew there would be so few usable words in my dictionary!!  I very nearly went for Xenon (colourless, odourless gas), but a bit difficult to depict.  Opted finally for xanthochroism - a condition in certain animals (esp goldfish) in which all skin pigments other than yellow and orange disappear.  Recently treated myself to a whole bunch of Pebeo fantasy paints, and thought of a carp, a koi carp.

It may not be normal to immediately think of fish, but I have had a strange life...

Anyway.  I cut my Centura pearl to the standard size, with a slight overhang.  I masked off the edges of the shiny side, and stamped bubbles.  Bravely, I drew freehand the koi, using transparent glitter relief paste.  Gotta have glitter, right!?  This is meant to retain the paint, but note to self, build the retaining walls higher next time.

I stirred the paints (all the magic gunky stuff settles at the bottom), and dripped in orange and yellow.  I also outlined a couple of the bubbles in paste, and dripped in silver paints, and set it aside to dry (and flow slightly over one edge...).

When I removed the masking tape, I drew a freehand deckle edge with a lovely glittery sakura pen.

As the paste dried, I noticed that it drew up some of the Distress Ink into itself, which I guess, being water based, is to be expected. 

I have taken a couple of close ups of the bubbles, to try and show the glorious effect you get with these paints.  Think Cloisonné, but without the wires.  Just amazing!












Hope you like!

Resources

Paint and Ink
Pebeo Fantasy:  Prisme - Ash Blue, Buttercup, Tangerine  Moon - Veil of Smoke, Apricot
Pebeo Cerne Relief: Imitation Lead
Marabu Relief Paste: Transparent silver glitter

Stamps
Darkroom Door: Circles DDBS036
Distress Ink: Peacock Feathers

Bling and Stuff
Sakura Gelly Roll pen: Indigo sparkle

S is for...Craft Barn Challenge

Well, it's December!  Where did THAT go?!?  This fortnight the letter set by the Craft Barn Challenge is S.  So small a page, so many different things to get on there!!

I decided on S is for: Skyline, Smoke, Sisters, Shimmer, Stamp (of course!!), Stencil, and Stars.  Will my tag be big enough??!

I started by cutting a base of Centura Pearl, which would fold out.  I laid down a roof tops mask - oops, stencil, and then London skyline stencil, and smudged a little distress ink to give me a sunset.  I laid down the other half of both of those stencils to provide a dark outline.

I added tiny drops of stickles to be stars, almost shooting stars in the sky.



On a separate piece of card, I stamped my sisters in versafine, and painted over with Cosmic Shimmer watercolour paints.  Definite Shimmer, or Shine!  This is attached to the front flap.

In my usual way, I added my definitions to the tag, which has the letter added, and it slides down between the base page and the picture.  This time I had to use BOTH sides of the tag!!

Hope you like!


Resources

Paint and Ink
Distress inks: Black Soot, Stormy Sky, Chipped Sapphire, Weathered Wood, Spiced Marmalade, Worn Lipstick
Versafine: Vintage Sepia
Brilliance: Mineral, Lightening Black

Stamps and Masks
ClarityMasks: Rooftops, London skyline
Darkroom Door: Friends Collage Stamp DDCS001
Amy Wilson: Alpha stamps

Bling and other stuff
Stickles: Star dust
Cosmic Shimmer Watercolour paints: lots of them!!