'Tis the Season

My weekly challenge that I am trying to keep taking part in, due to the chance of winning a MASSIVE prize at the end of the year for competing is that of Through the Purple Haze Challenges. This week is sketchy week. To make a project with the following sketch as inspiration.

I had two goes at this. The first, although I followed the sketch, wasn't exactly out of this world.
A Christmas card for my stack.

The stamps used are both Indigo Blu, the snow flake on the green circle was stamped with glue and gilding flakes applied after masking off the sentiment that is also gilded. The little snowman was stamped with green stazon onto parchment. The paper is from my miscellaneous  "Christmas papers" box.. The punched snowflakes are double layered, punched from scraps and topped with the same vellum as the snowman. Some tiny gems, fibres and ribbon from stash. All adhered to a 6" card blank that was edged with DI.

My second attempt - still following the same basic sketch but with my own interpretations added.

A Hallowe'en card therefore still seasonal.

 A "Spring Card" where the base and centre panels are folded to allow the card front to spring up.
The bats have taken the place of the "vertical ribbon" The die cut fence is instead of the broader horizontal band. The three "spots" on the right are charms - an owl, a howling wolf and a tiny flying witch. The four "spots" on the right of the sketch are two pins from a flower and a little gem. Ok, I added another trio of gems to balance and the base has a couple of extra flowers for decoration, but then the sketch is only a starting point after all. The paper is from a DCWV stack "La Creme"

The central image is from Delicious Doodles - the Gravestone Scene. Attached to a cream coloured circle that has been ink distressed with black soot. The sentiment is from Prickly Pear as are the bats. The spider web over the sentiment is part of a Lavinia stamp.

I am entering this duo of cards into the challenge at

Through the Purple Haze - Their Sketch

I'd like to enter card#2 into the challenge at

CCEE Stampers - Fun Folds

Dream on sunshine

As part of a daily challenge over at the Facebook Group for Craftymess, today's challenge was to include pink in our work. **faint**. My usual followers know that pink doesn't feature much in my work. It's not a colour I feel very happy using at all, but the word stressed here is "Challenge"!
Quick think as I finish cutting out my new Steam Punk and Gothic stamps. Sunsets have pink! Eureka!!
Out come the DI 's and a piece of white card cut to ATC size. Very inky fingers later, this emerges

A base coat of Tattered Rose DI then went in with shades of blue, lilac, purple, green and orange and some torn paper with a circle for the setting sun as masks.
The stamps - the mushrooms are Lavinia stamps and the bats and the balloon are from De Stempelwinkel. Two different plates, gothic and steampunk.

I am entering this into the challenge over at
Craftymess Challenges - Sun or Moon

To Fear or Not To Fear

For too long now I have been away from Frankie's Tag it on challenges at DragonsDream. I really ought to have been making a couple of boxes last night but wanted to play with some stamps I found in my collection the other day. This challenge was the ideal opportunity. The theme this last fortnight has been "Don't Fear".
A couple of other requirements - use purple, add texture and use a scary image. Of course the main requirement - at least one real stamp - not digi.
This is the tag I came up with

All the stamps are real. There's the tree stump from De Stempelwinkel stamped with brushed corduroy DI.
Spider's web, little spiders and tree line from Lavinia stamps using walnut and black DI, some skeletal trees from Elusive Designs in walnut DI. The big spider - I don't know the origin - but that was heat embossed in purple and cut out. Spiders web dry embossed in one corner. The BG - more distress inks. The words - more stamps this time from a couple of Studio G sets I have. A bit of web like mesh for the tie.
Done
I would like to enter this into the challenge over at
DragonsDream Tag it on - this fortnight's "Don't Fear" challenge

Grimms' Brothers and two tales

Haunted Design House this week have challenged us to pick a tale from the collection that the brothers' Grimm collected and published and create something that depicted it. Pick just one tale from the 200+ ? That in itself was a challenge. The grimest have already been depicted by the minions and their artwork is so fantastic I had to choose something else. I also had to go with the images that I have, aarrgghhh.I finally came up with this.
It comes with two tales, because I needed something to fill the pages on the other side. A domino book. The base of the book is black core-dinations. I used a mixture of rubber and digi images.

"The Moon" story.
The domino here was coloured with alcohol inks and the partial image of a moon (with bat) and another bat were stamped using stazon on top of that. Then coated with glossy accents to protect.
The sides were polished with gold rub on paste



The story unfolds inside

The backgrounds were brayered and there are images from Lavinia stamps, Third Coast and Delicious Doodles. The entire story is there as well (font size 3) legible to read as well.

On the other side we have "The White Snake"

Here the image is from the 'net printed onto card. Coloured with promarkers and stuck onto the domino with glossy accents. a very thin film was applied over the image to ensure the colours did not bleed when a heavier coat was added. The edges given a lick of DI. A thicker coat of glossy accents then used to cover the image and before it had a chance to set, some little pearls were embedded to portray the white snake, including two little red gem eyes and the golden apple from the tree of life added to the branches.
More gold rubbing paste down the sides.




Again, the story is inside

  images from Smeared Ink and the 'net

 Images here from Delicious Doodles and Smeared Ink

The story is again there so it can be enjoyed.
Some 3mm ribbon attached to the dominos before sticking in to book, so that it can be tied up safely.

That's about it I think

I am entering this into the challenge over at
Haunted Design House - They set the challenge that caused this book to be made
Craft Us Crazy - Altered item - dominos
Divas By Design - Stamp Something
My Mum's Craft Shop - Stamp It. Use a rubber stamp - there are a few used here

Disney's Villians

Over at Haunted Design House this week the theme is "Evil Empire". Dedicated to those lovable rogues - the villians. So many to choose from made this project more difficult as I couldn't decide on one to begin with. I was going to try for them all. Then it all started getting messy. Scrap that idea.
I went with just the one. Ursula from the Little Mermaid. I love the way she slithers.
Next poser was "What to Make?" Nothing too complicated as the meds I'm on at the moment haven't left me with many brain cells that are awake. A book mark, that's easy enough for even me :-)
So we have the theme and the image.

This was lifted from google and coloured in by hand with promarkers. My son says the skin tone is "real to life" but the pics can't seem to capture this too well.

The BP was taken from a CD from Jem's Designs, Underworld. I spritzed this with a home made green shimmer.
The extra green seaween foliage is stamped using a Lavina Stamps image. Backed onto pearlised grey/green card. The cord is made by twisting different green embroidary silks together, the tassel made with the same colours.
The back is fairly plain

I used the offcuts from a die cutting done earlier to form a mask and spritzed the same green as on the front, this time to produce a swirl.
The cord can then be adjusted round the book whilst the image section will be marking the page.


I am entering this into the challenge over at
Haunted Design House - Evil Empire

Oval Stepper Card

It's been a few days since I last blogged anything, I know. Not that I have been slacking. Helping a friend colour loads of images for a marathon card making session took up most of last weekend. Then there's babies being born left, right and centre. Of course these all had to have a card.
Anyway.
This was one of the projects that I was working on for Stampin Dymonz Scrap Shack. There's a tutorial to go with it as well.

The background was brayered with DIs before stamping onto. Stamps are from Lavinia Stamps.
The little dragons and plantlife were stamped using DI, the fairy with stazon. This also gave it an extra bit of shine. This was backed with lace before sticking to the base card.

The papers on the front 2 steps are from "Dancing with Fairies" range from Crafty Chaos, the pink at the back is from old stash.
Sentiment from LOTV.






No I didn't forget the inside.
The oval panel here was embossed with a sissix plate then highlighted the butterflies with more DI.