decorate a tag with The Stampman Challenge#12

I'm still in Christmas mode at my making table, I don't give up on snowflakes that easily, and I'm a bit of a last minuter so still have cards and gifts to make before the big day :)  Of Tim's tags my favourite was day 9; I just loved that colour combo so decided to use something similar for mine.

[apologies for the shadows, the sun was out when I took these!]

I stamped this gorgeous Big Snowflake from Hero Arts [on offer now over at The Stampman!] with white acrylic paint, then used Starburst Stains and my Mica Paint palette to add a shimmery, watercolour background.

Moonglow embossing powder around the edge of the tag adds some more dimension.  I used the same powder to stamp and emboss the snowflake on some dark brown card followed by lots of fussy cutting!  That's only one snowflake on there so not too much cutting out.

Check out the rest of The StampMan DT tags

HERE

and don't forget to make and add yours :)

I just wanted to say THaNK You to my new followers - there's something so nice about crossing the 200 boundary of followers - I truly, truly appreciate it!

On a different note entirely - anyone had side effects from a Ventolin inhaler?  I've had the flu this week (swine or not we neither know or care, it was just nasty!) and I've been left with an annoying cough.  The doctor gave me an inhaler yesterday which worked wonders, but then I couldn't get to sleep and have been jittery ever since.  Aaaaagh, I just need to be well to get on with stuff!!!

Sorry, thanks for listening ;)

EDIT:  It's snowing :) :) :)

bring on the sunshine... it's a play date colour splash!

Colour splash challenges are our most popular and Julie's chosen us a great colour to work with in these dark wintry days - YeLLoW!  

I had a lovely surprise when I picked up the 7 gypsies music paper [Kilburn] from the Paddington range - it's black and white with a splash of yellow :) [Available in the UK at The Stamp Attic].  I used my new die by Joy, from a new little craft shop I found in Chorlton, to cut the butterflies on a paper ribbon.

A rectangle of cuttlebugged paper, some lace and pearls and my card was done!  One of the quickest I've made but I'm really pleased with it!  Don't forget to check out the inspiration from the rest of our design team

Andrea Ewen
Savannah O'Gwynn
Ruby 2 Shoes

Julie Ranae - senior designer

and head over to the Play Date Cafe  for info on the announcement of our new design team - woo hoo!  It was so, so hard to choose just 6 of you, we were inundated with fantastic submissions.  Thankyou to everyone who applied, and congratulations to our new team :)  We will be introducing them to you in the run up to Christmas next week :)

WOYWW? - the results of a Christmas gift idea!

This is the elegant, posed shot of the project ;)

Whilst this is what is underneath that calm exterior - I put some white paper on top of a box of inks to take the pic above!

I've had the idea in my head for this project for ages!  Lots of ink, snowflakes and glue later it's finally finished :)  Although I'm going to need a lie down now, I'm worn out.  Anyone else suffering with this nasty cough?  I spent all day Sunday and Monday asleep, and Tuesday am.  Not good when you've still got tonnes to do for Christmas!

I made this wintry piece as part of my design team brief over at The Stamp Attic (more photos and details over there) using Tim's filmstrip alteration die by Sizzix.  I love the versatility of this die, and it also punches great weeny rectangles which you can use on tags or cards :)

I was asked last week on WOYWW what was in my drawers [??!!] - nothing exciting I'm afraid, but here's a pic for the curious.  The plan is to store inkpads etc in there that are best kept at hand...

The trouble is, my distress inks and stazon are in separate boxes cos there's too many to go in a tray, and I keep losing my versamark pad and black memories pads.  Hopefully, with a home they'll stay put!

Happy Wednesday everyone :)

PDCC59 - inspired by...

One of my favourite things about teaching workshops is seeing what other colour combinations people come up with for the same project.  We all have our favourite colours, our 'comfortable colours to work with', and colours we want to try together and have decided that workshop day is the time to try them.  This makes for a great range of colour combos, and makes me think of other colour choices to try.

Whilst planning this week's play date cafe challenge  I was doing a bit of blog hopping and a piece of work on BonnieRose's blog just jumped out at me.  I'd been looking for an 'easier' colour combo as I feel like I've given you a fair challenge my last two choices!  Julie did chuckle when she heard this; I guess 'easy' or 'hard' depends on what our natural colour choices would be!!!

BonnieRose kindly said we could use an image of her artwork for our challenge this week - so thankyou  BonnieRose!  If you'd like to see more of her work, head over to her blog 'A Life UnRehearsed'.  I just AdOrE the colours in her blog banner :)

I got out my trusty Inkadinkadoo snowman from a couple of year back, and mounted him against a distress ink background.  The main background of the card is stamped with an impression obsession 'cover a card' stamp.  

As usual our design team have come up some stunning cards to inspire you...

Andrea Ewen
Savannah O'Gwynn
Ruby 2 Shoes

Julie Ranae - senior designer

And don't forget to head on over to the Play Date Cafe to see what's happening there this week :) 

WOYWW - settling in to my space in the attic :)

This is what my desk looked like a few weeks ago or so...far too sparse!

I spent quite a bit of time on Sunday unloading bags and organising my craft space, so that now my workdesk is workable on, and I have my essential crafting supplies to hand!

I had to laugh to myself though when I saw the full cup of tea in each of these shots!!!  I found it very difficult to work in the sparser space, although looking at the images, there isn't much difference!  I've moved the cuttlebug and it's gubbins onto a shelf elsewhere and the table shelf now has some wooden stamps and some pieces waiting to go to Julie in the States ;)  I must just prefer the look of wooden stamps to a cuttlebug!

I managed to squeeze in a tiny bit of me time last night - much easier when you are at the top of the house and the rest of the family are scattered about the house!  I used some 'I believe' reindeer paper by My Mind's Eye and decorated a little tag book.  For the main feature of the front cover I made a large tree in the style of the one printed on the paper whilst watching 'Miranda' - such a funny sitcom!

Have fun perusing the desks of those who choose to join in with, what is known in these circles as 

'WOYWW'

the stampman challenges you to...

make something Christmassy

with just

three colours

I'm in my colour comfort zone at the minute of blues and greens, and added a versamark 'vanilla' to my colour choice.  That last colour (neutral technically but hey!!) was a bit serendipitous, it was the easiest pad to get to and I just love how effective it is on the white card :)

I just LoVe that 'Fabulous Flourish' by Hero Arts, it's so, so versatile, and an exquisite image! 

I cut out my star using my friend's Sizzix die, but a punch or similar die would work just as well.  I distress inked it, and layered it over my moonglow paper made HERE.  Making batches of paper with Starburst Stains keeps the messy task separate from the card making and makes for a very clean card making process :)  There is a smidgeon of sequin waste (punchenella) sewn behind the star, along with a snippet of organza ribbon.

We're on Challenge #11 this week over at The StampMan.  Head over to the challenge site for some gorgeous inspiration from the design team, which includes

Michelle

Debbie

Jill

Frankie

Janet

Brenda

Lisa

Sue

Kay

Vix

then link up your own project so we can come and take a look at your work!!!  Have fun :)

PDCC58 Christmas is coming

I love the Play Date Cafe challenges, because they vary between really challenging, ie unusual colours to work with so take a bit of thinking about, to less challenging where the challenge may be with more familiar colours so you can add your own personal challenge to it eg trying something new, or just getting something done in an already busy week.  This week Julie has chosen us some lovely Christmassy colours to work with:

Although you are right Paul, it is really only one colour plus a neutral ;)

For me, getting something done was the challenge recently, as I've been busy recovering from accidents and incidents, preparing and helping at Christmas fairs,  and travelling between Manchester and Birmingham to train teachers in teaching maths using a structured apparatus called Numicon.  

For me, free machining a pattern on a felt heart wasn't a creative challenge as such, but I think trying to use just red and white on a journal page would have been.  I'd love to know what makes a challenge a challenge for you - let me know ;)  

We have a smaller design team this week whilst we wait for our new members to be chosen, but their work is great so head on over to take a look and be inspired

Andrea Ewen
Savannah O'Gwynn
Ruby 2 Shoes

Julie Ranae - senior designer

And don't forget to head on over to the Play Date Cafe to see what's happening there this week :)  Take care if you're struggling in the snow, it's hit the UK hard this week.  But look who I found in the Manchester Christmas markets this afternoon...

Now he MuST be the real Father Christmas!  I think he's hiding so he can get a bit of a rest in before the big night!!