Craft range Christmas Party samples

Last night was there was a bit of a Christmas party night over at the Craft Range - I wasn't doing any demonstrating but a couple of weeks ago,  Janet Banks chucked some white circles at me (not literally but almost lol) and asked me would I do a few samples as she would be demoing the system.

I went over last night, sat and watched and heckled her demoing he he he  then had a nosey around talking to other crafters, mince pie, fruit punch - I enjoyed my little self. I then got a phone call today to say I have won a raffle prize - there were quite a few goody bags so I will have to wait and see what I get.

Anyway  I just thought I would share what I made with you  - I am off to my last fair of the year tomorrow at a Nursery attached to Chorley Hospital 9 - 1 so then I can put all my fair stuff away until next year. When I come home I will have to sit down and write my Christmas cards with the stock I have left in order to catch the last post on Monday by the  Scouts who deliver in the local town for just 20p - cheaper - which is cheaper than petrol costs for driving round lol .  What will I do if I haven't enough cards left I here you ask....well I will do what lots of other card makers do ----go out and buy some stupid isn't it.

Happy crafting xxx

circles birds

I have just been looking at the fussy and fancy blog  and they have a call out for a new design team member so I thought I would re schedule this post in order to link it back.

Hello there strangers ...It's been a while hasn't it ?

Hey ho that's how it goes I have been busy crafting  but don't seem to have had the time to take the pics and load them up and then blog them but that's life I guess - it gets in the way of crafting lol.

So what have I been up to since last time?  Well I did the fair at Oswaldtwhistle Civic Hall and it  was a good day and they have a craft club on a Wednesday so  I will be doing a demo/card making session with them next March, so I am looking forward to that.  I have been in conversation with Janet from the Craft Range and I will again be doing workshops there next year but we are going to try Wednesdays and Saturdays and see how they go .

On Saturday I had a craftilicious day at the Claritystamp Northwest  workshop with Maria Simms - we always have a great time with fabby projects ...such fun xx

I made this card the other week using one of the new Claritystamp aperture stencils - just and easy one I just used the aperture and then offset the inner to one side.  I used two tones of purple to ink with my clairity stencil brushes then added a couple of stamps.  I then took the "edge" off the edges before mounting on the card.

Hopefully If I get chance I will schedule a few more posts in the coming days.  but I have a busy week ahead I have a Christmas fair this Thursday evening at Crown Paints here in Darwen (where I used to work) and then  I have another fair over in Houghton on Saturday so its all go.

Last workshop of the year

It's the last Wednesday in the month tomorrow so I will be at the Craftrange running my monthly workshop.   Just got the morning session this month but it is full so if you are not booked already - you are too late.

This will be the last one of the year - but like Arnold - I will be back

probably around the last Wednesday in January - we are also planning some for Saturday's so fingers crossed.

Thanks to all my lovely ladies who have helped to make the workshops a success by keep coming back for more of my bossiness!! Have a great Christmas and a Happy New Year to those of you I won't see and hopefully see some of you on Thursday evening at the shop's Christmas Party !!

Here are the two cards we will be making tomorrow.

This months theme is based on a set of  travel stamps from Clearly impressions I thought they would come in handy for men's cards.  The top one focuses on the train but you could easily change the central image!

The second card is inspired by the lovely Tracey Dutton from Lavinia stamps  so I hope it passes muster!!

 I have also used elements from the Andy Skinners set of stamps .. A Winters tale that we have used before.

For this workshop I have used :-

Black archival ink

and the following Adirondak dye based inkpads

BLACK

STONEWASH

DENIM

EGGPLANT

but you could use distress inks - black, pale blue, darker blue, purple.

I have also used a make up sponge or you could used ink brushes - please bring your favourite and of course your trusty brayer and splodgeaway or ink blending mat.

Hope to see you all there ... happy crafting Linda xx

gelli ladies

I don't think I have blogged these two lovely ladies so here they are.

I did these some time ago and came across them when I was faffing with the other gelli prints so I  have turned these into cards too.

These were a couple of my first attempts with ink on the gelli plate after seeing Tracey Dutton using inks .

I tried stamped the lady on a mask, sticking it onto the gelli and then doing the ink, then stamping her in the space but I found it left too much of a halo for me so I stamped her on the card and masked her first.  then I inked up the gelli and pulled a print - that's why she is white ( I have coloured her in now lol ) 

I tried stamping the sprigs and lupins on the gelli on the lilac one but decided they were better stamped directly onto the card so the lilac one is a mix whilst the bottom on is stamped directly onto the card.

no gelli just ink

Here I am again  I am like a bus (I know literally as I am big lol) nothing for yonks then loads a posts all at once.

Another inky print I made into a card and forgot to photograph.

I inked through the aperture stencil to form the middle of the oval, then I inked through the trellis stencil leaving it lighter around the oval.  I used the middle of the oval aperture and added some brown adirondak to leave the pattern and then I stamped  the tree over the top in the same ink but  you could really see the lines through the tree so I overstamped with archival ink and that was better - if you look close you can still see but as my dear old Mum used to say - a man on a galloping horse will never notice !

 I stamped around the edge with the little sprig and archival.  I think when I made it into a card I distressed the edges with some more brown ink

more inky gelli

Two more prints for today - two more I made into cards and forgot to  take pics.

for this first one I covered the gelli in pink - added the trellis and pulled the print then I pulled the ghost which is the one I have used.  I then put the stencil back onto the print  and added some pink to one side and blue to the other with a stencil brush I removed the stencil and added blue all around the edge, stamped with archival inks on the top .

I love this one don't know why but I do.  I randomly splodged some ink on the gelli, then I stamped the leafy swirl in the middle , pulled a print.  I took the middle of the square aperture stencil from Clarity  and inked through with some more red ink to add the hexagons .

Gelli inks

Morning as promised here 's another post from me.

I did these prints when I was at the craft club and I have since made them into cards but forgot to photograph them and now they are all wrapped in cellophane bags - too reflective to take piccies !

If you look the second pick is a ghost of the first one - I used adirondaks on the gelli with a couple of Clarity stencils then I used archival ink to stamp directly onto the pulled prints.  I used the same ink as the gelli print to colour a scrap of paper to make the rolled rose in the middle of the top pic.  I did think about colouring in the floxgloves but I quite like them as they are.  I will post a couple more for tomorrow xx

purple butterfly

Good morning  I was up at the crack of doom today so after spending time on Fb and catching up on other blog posts I have just made another cuppa and time to share some cards with you.  I had hoped to do these yesterday but time ran away, so here I am now and I will schedule a few as its going to be a busy few days coming up.  

I have a friend coming for coffee this morning  and I need to run an errand this afternoon, tomorrow I have a stall at a Christmas Market at Crown Paints - where I used to work - then I have another fair on Saturday and oh the dreaded weekly shop to fit in and the prep for my next workshop over at Craftrange next Wednesday - you can see what we will be doing if you hit the craftrange tab at the top!.

So this is a card I made for my lil Sis her birthday was at the weekend.

I got out the lovely gelli plate and used some lilac's white pearl silver metallic and some purple metallics now don't ask in what order I did what as I have no idea   I haven't had much time to play with them (yes I have two) but I love it and just go with my instincts till It's either a keep or a whizzy lol

So I made the background on the 6 x 6 and then I used the ghost but this was a bit patchy for the square in the middle.  I cleaned the plate with double sided sticky - I wanted this - I do love this trick.  I then stamped and embossed in silver the montage, twice and the smaller butterfly once and stuck them onto the ds stuff, added talc to the sticky side so it was good to go and added a few flowers and bit of purple ribbon.  

monochrome again

I think this might be my last Christmas card for a bit - feeling a bit like I could do with doing something else and I know I have a few family birthdays later this month and next so I may put my Christmas stuff to one side for a bit - well unless of course I am mega busy on Saturday at the craft and and table top sale over at Oswaldtwhistle Civic Hall. - if you are nearby - bob in and see me it would be nice to have a chat x.

Another background made with that woodware stamp - I love it  - makes a great peice of paper - in fact I did just that then cut it up to cover  a box to sell as a gift box.  the tree is from Indigoble and the snowflake is a Claritystamp one x

Noel

Another card in the series designed so I can add a special verse at the point of sale

I embossed the Noel with clear embossing on top of cobalt blue archival - you gotta be quick lol.  I ten just built up the scene and matted and layered on another piece of card and random stamped second generation cobalt with the snowflake

jig saw

I have been a bit tardy on my blog so a short pit stop to schedule a couple of posts whilst I continue to make stuff for my up coming christmas craft fairs.

I have made lots of cards and also a few gift boxes and candles so lets hope they are busy lol.

This card was inspired by a sample (on one of the Claritystamp shows) by Lynne Hammond It is all on one level and the "cut out" piece isn't cut out but a separate stamp.

I stamped using cobalt blue archival and used some stone wash for the "hillocks" I added a bit of glitter on the hillocks too but it doesn't really show in the pic xx

Clarity challenge November - Christmas

Well here we are again the 1st of the month and time to post my inspiration for the Claritystamp Challenge blog.  What a month it has been .... First of all it was The great Northern Papercraft Extravaganza in Harrogate then the following week it was that fantastic Clarity weekend on the telly then some lucky people went to the Dome in Doncaster and finally this last weekend it was the SECC in Glasgow - all in all a very busy week for team Clarity and then to top it all  our Barbara launched her own blog - and wow what a blog ..fantastic inspiration and instructions on a daily basis - magic and finally the Challenge blog got a whole new facelift with a direct link to Barbara's blog &  her workshop listings together with all manner of other links.

Wow last month's entries - what to say except WOW WOW & WOW... such an amazing set of entries; how to pick my favourite 5 nigh on impossible; I spent ages and ages looking, gazing reading the blogs and just generally studying form so to speak.. but my contribution to the top 5 gets added to the other design team members top 5 and eventually they are selected.  So if you are one of them many congratulations and to the winner too.

So far this month's theme Christmas .......sometime ago I went to a workshop where I made a star book and as I have finally ..after several years of collecting...amassed the whole collection of the twas the night stamps so I thought I would combine the two and here is my effort.

The book itself is made in Navy blue card stock with an inner sleeve of silver mirri card.  each section was layered with two ripped pieces of white card each edge with a bit of blue and several sponged hillocks in blue and I added glitter, and some fir trees.  the "sky" was stamped with snowflakes, embossed in white and a gem in each one.  I then stamped,coloured matted and layered all  10 stamps and put them in order within the book. the back of the book was just stamped and embossed in silver whilst I made a separate topper for the front and used the letter box kit to make the title.  I threaded random bits of white and silver ribbon through the spine and tied them in a knot at the top.