Gingersnaps Challenge - better late than never!

This is my entry for the Shades of Blue Gingersnaps challenge. I found this little drawer set in a pound store and it happens to be just the right size to hold the foam pads for my Inkessentials blending tool. I’ve altered it (appropriately) with Distress-inked panels decorated with a fab bird stamp from PaperArtsy.

Materials…
PaperArtsy Flora and Fauna 4
Technique Tuesday: Home stamps (frame)
Fancy Pants stamps (‘create art’)
Stamper’s Anonymous: Urban Tapestry (dotty texture)
Mini drawer unit
Gesso
Black and brown acrylic paint
Distress Inks: Tumbled Glass; Broken China; Faded Jeans; Rusty Hinge; Wild Honey; Shabby Shutters; Peeled Paint
Archival Ink: Coffee
Ink applicator or Cut-n-Dry foam
Water brush
Dymo and transparent tape (or use Safmat or rub-on letters)

1 Gesso the drawers then when dry paint with a layer of black paint then brown paint. Leave to dry.

2 Cut white card to fit the drawers and colour with all three blue Distress Inks. Stamp the dotty background around the edge in Broken China. Stamp the bird in Coffee ink and then stamp just the leaves from the bird around the edges.

3 Stamp the bird again three times and paint with the Distress Inks and a water brush. Cut out the leaves and birds and add to the inked panels. On the top panel stamp ‘create art’ left of the bird. Tape panels in place with strong tape.

4 Stamp the Technique Tuesday frame five times onto blue inked card, cut in half and stamp with the dotty texture and then the small branch as shown. Add a Dymo label to each panel and stick to the drawer fronts.

Hope you like it :). The other girls have made lovely stuff too, so do pop on over.

Katy x

Poor neglected blog!

Oh dear I have been neglecting this bloggie toooooooooooooo much, but I have been very busy and also not making a whole lot unfortunately! Today a quick card I made for a very lovely person for her birthday. I love this owl stamp, it has such a cute look on its little face! The stamp is a Papermania one and the branch is from Hero Arts. I just paper pieced the owl so a really simple card.

It must be love

How soppy is my other half over our dog? The answer is very, very soppy. Here he is giving the little monkey a kiss when we were out on a spring walk back in March.

I was waiting for the right papers for this LO and these MME ones seemed to fit the bill. I was in a silly mood when I made this so bottom left you'll see a squirrel saying 'nuts about you'! He's a stamp (as is the owl) from a Hampton Arts set I got in Micheals in the US last time we were there.

I've been neglecting the blog recently - just seem to have lost all will (and ability) to craft at the moment. If anyone has borrowed my mojo would they kindly return it???

Will try to be back for WOYWW as I didn't manage it last week...

Thanks for stopping by. :)

Katy x

Gingersnaps - Wings

Here's my entry for today's Gingersnaps challenge theme, which is 'wings'. Nice easy one this, so no excuse for not playing along!

My project is an altered noticeboard to hang in my craft room on which to write all my projects pending and notes to self (memory like a sieve...). I got the noticeboard for about £1.20 reduced in Morrisons supermarket. I forgot to take a picture of before, but trust me it was truly minging!

Of course although I made this over a week ago I am still waiting for OH to put it up for me... Why am I not surprised???

Here's how I made it in case you'd like to know ;).

Materials...
Prima frame stamps (sorry I don't know the name - they are frames and borders but I chucked the packaging)
Prima stamp: Notary (script)

Hero Arts stamp: Silhouette Grass

Tim Holtz stamps: Slight Alterations

StazOn Ink: Timber Brown

Distress Inks: Broken China; Tumbled Glass

Glimmer Mist: Gold

Brilliance Ink: Gold

Paper flowers

Cream and white card

Ink blending tool

Pearls

Chipboard letters (Thickers)

Krylon pen: Gold

White acyrlic paint

First of all, I sanded the inside edge of the original picture in the top part of the frame and then created a border with gold Krylon. Then I used a baby wipe to apply a wash of white paint to the wood. I then left this to dry. When dry, I stamped the corners with StazOn.

I coloured a piece of cardstock with the two blue Distress Inks then over-stamped with the Tumbled Glass using the Notary stamp and one of the Tim Holtz background images from Slight Alterations. With the Notary stamp, I inked in up really randomly in the middle of the stamp so I didn't get edges on the stamping (i.e. I stamped an incomplete image each time).

I then stamped the Silhouette Grass, varying the height so it didn't look too uniform. I followed this with the corners and butterflies from the Prima set.

I stamped the butterflies (including the ones on the corners) again onto cream card. After cutting out, I added them with Silicone glue so the wings are lifted as if they are flying off the page.

I finished by painting all the heads of wheat and butterfly centres in gold Glimmer Mist (this makes them catch the light but is still subtle). I embellished with pearls and paper flowers. Finally I stamped a border in gold and added the lettering along it.

I look forward to seeing your creations over on Gingersnaps :).

Katy x

Gingersnaps - burgundy, black and ivory

My entry for this week's Gingersnaps challenge. Follow the link to see what my talented teamies made with this striking colour scheme. The stamp is Penny Black and coloured with my fave Coloursoft pencils. The background is simply a piece of card Cuttlebugged (Textile Texture folder) and scrap of book page (a nod towards the altered book theme running through Gingersnaps this month).

Hope you like :). I love this poppy stamp muchly :).

I cut it up!

Yep, I finally cut up my Basic Grey Origins, which I must have had at least 3 months... I was inspired to make that first cut after seeing some lovely LOs using these papers on my friend Isabelle's blog.

Simple LO using a picture I took of chipmunk in New England. I thought these little critters were so adorable and cute (I am sure they are so common as to be unexceptional in the US but I'd only seen one once before in California so for me it was interesting enough to get out the camera!). I must say I do like the spring-like colours of these papers. No stamping on this LO for once - I just used the BG papers and stickers apart from the lettering

We had an amazing day yesterday at the Birdland zoo. I took loads of pics with my new compact camera (bday pressie from my dearest darling) so plenty of scrapping opportunities there!

(ETA I took this pic in the garden and it appears a small bug has alighted on my page! That isn't part of the design LOL).

WOYWW - oh the shame.........

I've never participated in WOYWW before although I know lots of peeps who do. Why you ask? Well, because my workdesk generally looks like this - i.e. like a bomb has gone off... Also on a Wed I work from home so am often working on stuff for publication that I can't show (but honestly, mostly the first one...).

I am thinking that perhaps publically shaming myself might encourage me to tidy it up!! Also trying to make a 12x12 scrapbook page on 5" of desk can be a wee bit tricky......

Perhaps next week it will be pristine. Or perhaps not....