Stampers Chef

Who Wants Candy!!!

2012-01-31T23:59:00.001Z

THIS POST WILL STAY AT THE TOP UNTIL THE BLOG CANDY TIME IS OVER

SO PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR NEW POSTS

I'm back again with my second post of the day with a subject I know will please you that has come about as I finally have all the bits for the candy I promised after reaching 500 posts on Christmas Eve. I took advantage of some of the free postage on offer to order some of the things as we don't have much left in the way of craft shops left locally due to the recession and I really wanted to share some vintage style goodies which I'm sure you all know how much I love.
I'm sure you're champing at the bit to see what I have for you so here's the pic:

Here's what I have included:
Papermania shaped chipboard album (I find these really great for wall hangings)
Pack 8 x 8 kraft card blanks
Pack 6 x 6 white front step card blanks
Pack 6 x 6 kraft front step card blanks
Pack 6 x 6 7 Gypsies Global paper
Couture Creations World Map embossing folder
Kaisercraft Madame Boutique clear stamp set
Kaisercraft Botanical clear stamp
Graphic 45 Curtain Call 2 cling stamp set

Please leave a comment below if you'd like a chance to win and please feel free to put the pic on your blog to spread the word if you like. You have until 31 January to join in and I'll make the draw on 1 February.
Thank you all for following my artwork and for leaving me such lovely comments.
Big hugs and good luck, Fliss xx

Easy Inking Technique

2012-01-27T12:23:00.002Z

Hello folks, it's time for another tutorial from me which is somewhat overdue I think as it's an age since I last did one.
You won't believe how easy this one is and how versatile it can be and there are quite a lot of pics so you might want a coffee before you start reading.
This one came about because last year I was really inspired by Sir Tim's patchwork inking with ink blending tools and wanted to pass this on to my ladies at a class. As I don't have that many ink blending tools and didn't want them all fighting over them, I improvised with fun foam blocks on Kling-On and it worked really well.
This got me thinking as I love making my own backgrounds (as I'm sure you know!) and wanted a way to create a larger inked area. I managed to drop a rather inky acrylic block on scrap paper and inspiration struck!

Easy Inking Technique
You will need:
A selection of acrylic blocks
Very smooth white cardstock
A selection of Distress inks
Some soft cosmetic sponges

STEP 1 - Add ink to the block by tapping all over and press, inked side down on your card. Remove the block and immediately rub gently over the inked area. As the ink is still wet, the ink will spread over the card.

STEP 2 - Repeat the above step until you have the colour required. I usually do 2 coats and the result will be a shabby chic inky panel. The reason that I specified smooth card is because if the card is very matte it will tend to be more absorbent and the ink will not spread around as much. It still gives a great effect though.

STEP 3 - Stamp a design on your inked panel. I have chosen a large corner design here and stamped on one side only. If you want a completely decorated paper you could turn it and stamp the other corner.

STEP 4 - A bit of Blue Peter here with a panel I made earlier lol. This one has a pretty sprig design stamped around the edges with the same colour ink as the panel and gives a pretty delicate look.

STEP 5 - Another idea here using a small square block to make a pretty patchwork panel with Crushed Olive and Wild Honey Distress inks. In this case you will need to sponge each square as you go to ensure that the earlier squares don't dry out before you sponge them.

STEP 6 - This panel uses a long rectangular block with Crushed Olive and Stormy Sky inks and will make a lovely addition to a masculine card I think.

STEP 7 - A very different idea here as the same technique can be used to make a quick inky panel to stamp on. In this case, I inked all over first with Scattered Straw and then added Crushed Olive at the bottom with Peeled Paint on the very edges of the block. I then added Mustard Seed to the rest, following up with Spiced Marmalade then Worn Lipstick at the top. I inked more heavily round the edges with the pink. I used 3 different sponges so as not to contaminate the inks.

STEP 8 - Here's the panel stamped with some Penny Black grasses. A lovely watercolour effect background.

Here are some cards made with the technique so you can see the finished results.

Both the cards feature papers made with different sized acrylic blocks so you can adapt what you make very easily to suit the card layout. Some of the square blocks make lovely patchwork pieces by simply cutting each square out. The floral panel on my bird card started off as a Shabby Shutters inky panel was stamped all over with a floral sprig using first Crushed Olive then Victorian Velvet.

I hope you've enjoyed this and I'm sure you will see that there are loads of possibilities so do let me know if you make something.
Hugs, Fliss xx

A Love Affair With Chocolate

2012-01-26T15:55:00.000Z

Hello folks. I hope you're all having a good week so far. We have sunshine here at last after early rain and a big hailstorm. My workload has at last become manageable and I've had time for a bit of crafting.
I have a tag to show you which was actually inspired by the Go Girly theme over at Sugar Creek Hollow this week and to me there is nothing more girly than a love of chocolate combined with my favourite roses.
I've made a tag with the gorgeous vintage Chocolate Lover stamp by The Stampsmith combined with their beautiful rose background stamp.

I made my own large tag and inked this up with Victorian Velvet Distress ink and then stamped on the rose background with VersaFine crimson ink.
I stamped the image panel with Archival coffee ink and cut this out leaving a narrow white border.
I stamped a rose border with a Judikins bolio stamp using the coffee ink and deep rose card. I added this across the centre of the tag and embellished with inked rose lace and pink pearls.
I added rows of braid, lace and pearls at the base of the tag and tied lace through the hole at the top. I then added the image panel with foam tape and finished off with a German gold scrap butterfly.

Challenges for my tag:
The Stampsmith January challenge - TSC26 Tag Art
Sugar Creek Hollow - Go Girly

Before I go, I'd like to say hello and welcome to all my new followers, it's lovely to have you all on board and if anyone hasn't yet seen I have candy, you still have a few days left to enter.
Thanks for looking,
Fliss xx

Flowers and Leaves

2012-01-23T09:00:00.000Z

Good morning everyone, Monday is here again and I don't know where the year is going as it's disappearing so fast at the moment.
We have a new challenge for you over at Make My Monday. Continuing with my Nature theme for the month, this week we would like to see your creations with Flowers and Leaves. As you will see when you look at my card below, the leaves could be as simple as blades of grass.

I decided to go for a walk on the wild side this time with a meadow in mind as I love seeing the wild flowers on countryside walks.
I've also used a new technique to make the background papers and add colour to the image panel by stamping colour on the card using inked up acrylic blocks. I'll be doing a little tutorial on this in a couple of days as you won't believe how quick and easy it is to make an inky background.
Supplies used:
Stamps:
Paper Artsy Hot Pick HP1005
Crafty Individuals Elements CI 206
Hobby Art Butterfly BU16A
Inkadinkado Sentiment 97635 Round Frames
Distress Inks : Shabby Shutters, Crushed Olive, Bundled Sage, Forest Moss, Mustard Seed, Scattered Straw
Cuttlebug Daisies embossing folder
Prisma pencils

Challenges for my card:
Let's Ink It Up - Anything Goes
2 Sisters - Embossing
Challenge Up Your Life -Thanks

Do pop over to see the Design Team makes as they're incredibly varied this week and you're sure to be inspired.
Thanks for looking,
Fliss xx

Polka Doodles Sketch Challenge

2012-01-20T09:00:00.003Z

Good morning folks, it's Friday again and time for a new challenge over at Polka Doodles which this week is another sketch by our head doodler Nikky and it's also our stashbox stamp week which means we use non Polka Doodles stamps with Polka Doodles elements. The theme is to make a birthday card.
Here's the sketch

My card is another owl one as I really love these and took the opportunity to use a gorgeous and very cute Tattered Angels stamp.

All of the papers I've used are from the Pretty Sweet CD as the shabby look combined with some lovely vintage colours are a perfect match (I think) for the little owl.
I stamped the owl with Memento Rich Cocoa ink on white card and decided not to colour him as I wanted more impact. I cut the panel out with a Nestabilities label die and added a paper mat cut from the next size die. I inked the edges with Crushed Olive and Vintage Photo Distress inks.
I made up the card following the sketch and finished off with a sentiment from the Back To Nature CD cut out with the Papermania square parenthesis die set.

The Design Team have again risen to the challenge and created a great variation of cards so do hop over for a look. You have until 12 noon on Sunday 29 January to enter and good luck.

Now for some challenges for my card:
Crafty Purple Frog - Anything Goes
Moving Along With The Times - Things With Wings
Whimsical Wednesdays - Anything Goes
Lollipop Crafts - No Embellishments
Crafty Sentiments - Anything Goes

I'm very sorry to have been neglecting you the last couple of weeks and hope to catch up soon - my days with 8 hours of figure work should be finished by the middle of next week or at least I hope so!
Hugs, Fliss xx

Creating A Scene

2012-01-16T09:00:00.003Z

Monday is here yet again folks and January seems to be flying by! I hope you all had a lovely weekend and managed to fit in a bit of crafting.
We have a new challenge for you today over at Make My Monday and continuing with our monthly theme of Nature, this week would like to see you Create A Scene.
I have to admit I struggled with this one a little as I couldn't find my Artistic Outpost Serenity set which would have been perfect for this one (note to self - craft room tidy up necessary!) and had to improvise.

I decided to use this gorgeous sleepy owl stamp by Blue Moon which I love as those little cuties look so sweet and fluffy. I stamped them with VersaFine Vintage sepia ink and coloured them with various brown Promarkers. I then cut out the panel with a nestabilities die and inked the edges with Crushed Olive Distress ink.
I made a background with a piece of pale green textured look paper which I first stamped with a brick wall stamp using Stazon Dove Grey ink then sponged with Frayed Burlap and Wild Honey Distress inks. I sponged the top half with Tumbled Glass and Stormy Sky.
I stamped fern sprays from the Penny Black Enjoy Life clear stamp set with VersaFine Olympia Green and Spanish Moss inks and assembled the card as you see.

The Design Team have come up with the most fabulous scenes so do hop over for a look and be inspired.

Challenges for my card:
Craft A Scene - Anything Goes but Create A Scene
The Cheerful Stamp Pad - Birds Of A Feather

Have a great week,
Fliss xx

Butterflies Or Bugs

2012-01-15T11:31:00.000Z

Good morning everyone, hoping you're having a lovely weekend so far. We have sunshine here but it's freezing at the moment and very windy too.
I'm here today with the brand new challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges and this fortnight we'd like to see you strut your stuff with creations showing Butterflies And/Or Bugs.
I was so pleased to see this as it gave me a chance to ink up my gorgeous new Stampsmith stamp called Butterfly Kiss and I absolutely love it as it's my favourite vintage style.

I stamped the image with VersaFine Imperial purple ink on Judikins matte krome coat card and added some colour by painting with various Distress inks when dry.
I made a patchwork style background by embossing 2 squares of olive green card with a butterfly embossing folder. The other 2 squares are some scraps of paper from the Polka Doodles All Around & Everywhere CD that I had in my scraps to use up.
I assembled the card as you see, adding some floral lace, a stamped butterfly (Crafty Individuals) and text which is part of an Inca stamp I've had for ages.

The Design Team have made some fabulously inspirational and varied creations so do hop on over for a feast for the eyes. You have a fortnight to enter your creations and hope to see you there.

I'd like to enter my card in this week's Sugar Creek Hollow challenge which is Embossing.
Thanks for looking.
Fliss xx

Vintage Or Retro Style

2012-01-13T09:00:00.006Z

Good morning folks, before I give you the details for this week's challenge over at Polka Doodles, a quick apology from me for my lack of commenting lately. This is because it's that nasty time of year again with the tax deadline looming so I have a mega pile of book-keeping and accounting work at the moment which has left very little time for crafting, let alone commenting. It will hopefully be back to normal the week after next.
I've chosen the challenge theme this week at Polka Doodles because my younger daughter will be 21 years old in a few days. She's studying for a fashion degree and really loves vintage and retro fashion and has just had a fringe cut inspired by a photo she found of Francoise Hardy.
This is why the theme is Vintage or Retro Style.

I chose the gorgeous sewing themed elements from the Sundae of Seasons CD and printed them out on beige parchment card (Southfield Stationers) for a vintage feel. I cut out the dress form and pin cushion and die cut the text with the Papermania doorplate die set. I inked the edges of the text panel and added a pink button.
I covered the 8 x 8 kraft card blank with rosebud paper from the Pretty Sweet CD with Paperchase kraft paper photo corners then added a layered central border of papers from the same CD. The striped one is die cut with a Papermania scalloped edge border die. I added floral lace to embellish.
I then made an embossed panel with kraft paper recycled from the inside of a roll of Christmas paper (to my complete delight all the papers had a piece of this instead of a cardboard tube) embossed with the Cuttle bug roses folder and the corners rounded with a punch.
I finished off as you see, adding pearls to the pin heads to make them look more realistic and then added numbers from the kraft alphabet on the Double Sprinkle of Kraft CD, resized to fit the card.

Challenges for my card:
Moving Along With The Times - Spots And/Or Stripes
Simon Says Stamp - Spots And/Or Stripes
Incy Wincy Designs - Vintage

I hope you like the challenge and can't wait to see what you make.
Fliss xx

Animals With Make My Monday

2012-01-09T09:00:00.009Z

Morning folks and hope you all had a lovely weekend. I'm here to bring you details of the new challenge over at Make My Monday which continuing with the January theme of NATURE, this week we would like to see ANIMALS on your creation.
I decided to make a card with a favourite animal as we have 2 adorable (mostly!) grey Netherland Dwarf bunnies.

My card features another of Craftwork Cards cute Warren stamps of which I have several as I couldn't resist them when they produced a limited edition last year. I stamped him with VersaFine vintage sepia ink and coloured him with Prisma pencils. I cut the panel out with my new Papermania square parenthesis die set.
I made a background paper sponging with Distress inks to colour and as you can see had sunset in mind. I then stamped on some grasses from the Penny Black Enjoy Life clear stamp set with VersaFine Spanish moss.
I added the panels to a card blank covered with Polka Doodles kraft textured paper and finished off with some butterflies from the Penny Black set coloured with Prisma pencils and a Hobby Art stamped sentiment.

The Design Team have come up with some very varied designs to inspire you so don't forget to pop over for a look.

Challenges for my card:
Dream Valley Challenges - Anything Goes
Gingerloft - Anything Goes
Paper Sundaes - Saturated Colours

Have a good week and thank for looking. Don't forget I have candy and do leave me a comment on the post if you'd like a chance to win.
Fliss xx

Sketch And Colour Challenge At Polka Doodles

2012-01-06T09:00:00.003Z

Morning folks and hope you're all OK after all this nasty weather we've been having and anyone affected by the gales has my sympathy.
I'm here today with news of our first challenge over at Polka Doodles which has been chosen by our head doodle dolly Nikky. She really loves her sketches so the challenge is both a sketch and a colour one. The sketch follows and the additional twist is to use shades of GREY for your creation.

As Nikky chose a grey colour theme, I decided on a masculine card and if you pop over to the challenge blog, you'll see a great variety of creations by the Design Team which are sure to give you some inspiration.

I chose one of the great images from the Pretty Tuff CD and printed out the black and white digital stamp together with some grey background paper.
I coloured my image with Promarkers in all the shades of grey I have in my collection (2 ice greys, 3 warm greys and 4 cool greys) using Satin, Blush and Dusky pink for his hands and face. I coloured his hair with Warm Grey 2 and Pastel Beige. I then added some detail with Prisma pencils. I was very pleased with the textured effect on his hair which was achieved with a white pencil.
I assembled the card as the sketch using text paper in shades of grey from the Not For Girls CD, a sentiment from Pretty Tuff and an oval panel embossed with the Papermania brick wall folder and inked with Pumice Stone Distress ink.

You have until 12 noon on Sunday 15 January to enter and hope to see you there.

A few challenges for my card:
Pixie Dust Studio - Monchromatic
Inky Impressions - Anything Goes
The Craft Garden - Monchrome
Through The Craftroom Door - Monchromatic

Hugs, Fliss xx

The Stamp Man 3rd Annual Awards

2012-01-04T20:42:00.000Z

Hello folks, hope you're having a good week so far despite the somewhat iffy weather.
After much thought I'm taking part in The Stamp Man's 3rd Annual Award event with a project I did in February 2011.

It's the most unique thing I've made so far as it included a hand drawn figure which as a stamper, I was really nervous about, but I really like the end result so decided to show it again here.

This is the canvas I made for the Gingersnap Creations Spicy Supply Challenge using Coffee Filters. In my case, I used natural coffee filter papers which I dyed with Neocolor 11 watercolour crayons and then stamped on to make the skirt for my figure. As the paper is almost fabric like, it was very easy to gather up with thread. I made the top with more plain dyed filter paper and added a cross hatch design under the saying which is my absolute favourite by Tim Holtz.
The canvas was painted and sponged with Golden fluid acrylics and then stamped on in places. I assembled the piece as you see with a profusion of plain and printed flowers and some decorative brads.

Thanks to The Stamp Man for once again hosting this great event and allowing us to reflect on and revisit our creations from 2011.
Hugs, Fliss xx

Birds and Nature

2012-01-02T09:34:00.000Z

Good morning folks, I'm slightly late here with my post for the first challenge of 2012 over at Make My Monday as I had a struggle to get up again (it seems that the older I get, the longer it takes to recover from a late night - groan!)
It's my turn to choose the theme for this month and I decided on a favourite of mine, NATURE, with the challenge for this week being to include BIRDS on your creation. A nice easy one to start off the year and hopefully welcome after all those Christmas themes.

I've chosen to use my brand new Hero Arts bird collage stamp which I stamped on Judikins matte chrome coat card with Memento Rich Cocoa ink. I then coloured the panel by sponging with various shades of Distress ink. I find that if you sponge a light colour all over first (I used Scattered Straw), the rest of the colours blend in really well. I then trimmed the panel using a corner rounding punch and cut out round the left edge. I added the panel to a mat of deep green card also trimmed with the corner punch and embossed in one corner.
I then made an embossed panel using my new Papermania tri boss leaf folder and didn't realise until I used it what the tri boss bit means. If you look at the panel which I inked with Shabby Shutters, Crushed Olive and Forest Moss Distress inks, the embossed leaves are actually double embossed so that the leaf veins stand out really well. A very clever touch Docrafts! I added the panel to a deep green mat.
I made a panel using my favourite Distress Ink Grunge Background Technique (this was inspired by watching Tim demo a few years back - he's in fact so inspirational that just watching him sparked off a load of new ideas). I used Shabby Shutters, Bundled Sage and Crushed Olive and stamped on a leaf sprig from the Hero Arts real flowers set ( a real favourite from my collection) with Bundled Sage. I then assembled the card as you see.

I've also donated the prize for this month and the winner will also be a future Guest Designer so hop on over for all the details plus lots of fabulous inspiration from the Design Team. Hope to see you there!

Challenges for my card:
Paper Sundaes - Something Old (leaf stamp & technique), Something New (bird stamp & embossing folder)
Secret Crafter - Anything Goes
Card Crafters Circle - Anything Goes
Paper Creations Ink - Die Cuts And/Or Punches
Simon Says Stamp & Show - Something Old, Something New (see above)

Thanks for looking and have a lovely day with hopefully the sunshine we have here today.
Hugs, Fliss xx

Monochromatic With Stampalot

2012-01-01T11:26:00.001Z

Hello there, I'm back again a little later than intended as I managed to sleep rather late this morning and had a bit of a struggle getting out of bed (don't suppose I'm the only one though!). Hoping you all had a lovely time last night whatever you chose to do.
My post is about the January challenge for Stampalot, so generously sponsored by the lovely Janice and Andy of Sir Stampalot. You may remember that I was lucky enough to win the October challenge and received an awesome amount of food themed goodies as the prize so I have to say that you really should enter if you haven't as I never expected to win but as they say, you have to be in it to win it!
The challenge theme is Monochromatic and I've been lucky enough to be invited to be the Guest Designer for the challenge. I chose shades of purple and in fact used to use the colour so much that I was known as the Queen of Purple at stamp club.

I made my own background paper as usual using a flower stamp from Hero Arts Real Flowers clear stamp set, stamped in layers first with Milled Lavender Distress ink, then VersaColor Lilac and finally Sweet Plum Memento ink. I trimmed the right long edge with a Papermania border die.
I stamped the dress form from the Inkylicious Corsetiere clear stamp set with VersaFine Imperial Purple ink on lilac parchment card and cut this out. I die cut a shaped panel from the same card using the Tim Holtz Baroque die, inked the edges with lilac and purple inks then embossed with The Tim Holtz Textures Fades damask folder.
I stamped the corset, price, tape measure and advertising from the stamp set with the Imperial Purple ink, stamped small flowers from a Rubber Stamp Tapestry set on the corset and cut this out. The remaining items were cut out with the Papermania Doorplate die set and the new Papermania tags and labels die set.
I assembled the card as you see, adding stitching down one side of the backing paper with purple floss and finishing with velvet ribbon, floral lace altered in colour with lilac ink, a silk flower and button.

Challenges for my card:
I Brake For Challenges - Vintage
Everybody Art - Anything Goes
Stampin' For The Weekend - Anything Goes
The Artistic Stamper January Challenge - Vintage

Thanks for looking and thanks so much to the Stampalot Design Team for the great honour of being this month's Guest Designer.
Hugs, Fliss xx

New Year, New Stash

2012-01-01T01:00:00.002Z

Happy New Year folks and hoping that 2012 is a fabulous year for you all with good health and time to do all the things you want to.
We have a new challenge for you today over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges and the theme for the fortnight is New Year, New Stash. A perfect opportunity to have a play with some of those new crafting goodies you hopefully received for Christmas.

My card is made using a favourite technique of mine to make the background paper, my Distress Ink Grunge Background Technique which you can find a tutorial for by clicking HERE. I used Distress inks in Crushed Olive, Mustard Seed, Tumbled Glass and Peeled Paint then stamped with Forest Moss. The stamps used are from the Papermania Urban botanical print set.
I cut a panel out of the paper with my new Nestabilities die set then made a frame with 2 sizes in the set and some green card which I embossed with a Sissix Tim Holtz Texture Fades folder.
I stamped my new Magenta cling butterfly panel with Olympic Green VersaFine on a white square card blank and coloured first with DIs then added detail with Prisma pencils. I stuck the aperture paper on the card to leave the butterfly panel showing in the frame.
I added a cut out butterfly (Kaisercraft C5794 Bonjour) with VersaFine Smokey Gray and coloured with Prisma pencils and finished with a sentiment from the same set inked to tone in.

The Design Team have made some fabulous creations to inspire you and we hope to see you there.

Challenges for my card:
4 Crafty Chicks - Something New
Charisma Cardz - Anything Goes
Dutch Dare - Your Favourite Things (Butterflies and making my own papers)
Fabulous Friday - Something New
Glitter Geeks - Brand Spanking New
The Squirrel & The Fox - Something New (All the stamps & the Nestabilities die set)

Thanks for looking.
Hugs, Fliss xx

Polka Doodles Stamp Club Kit

2011-12-28T22:16:00.001Z

Hello peops, hope you've had a lovely Christmas and sorry for my lack of blogging lately. It's been very busy here with Christmas and family stuff so I've hardly had any spare time.
I have just a quick post here to tell you Nikky's exciting news about the brand new Polka Doodles stamp club kit with stamps, papers and a lovely project magazine which is being launched soon. For the full details please click HERE.

Wishing you all a Happy New Year and great 2012. I'll be back soon and will have details of some candy for you in the New Year as I hit 500 posts on Christmas Eve and want to celebrate.
Hugs, Fliss xx

Merry Christmas Everyone

2011-12-24T16:02:00.000Z

Hello everyone, just a quick post from me in the middle of a baking marathon to wish you all a wonderful Christmas and all the very best for 2012. Hoping that you have a great time tomorrow and manage to get some time to yourself over the holiday.

Hoping also that you all get some lovely pressies and hopefully some new crafting stash for the new year.

Hugs, Fliss xx

Seasonal Tags

2011-12-19T09:00:00.002Z

Good morning everyone on a cold and frosty day. Hope your Christmas preparations are now in full swing. Mine are finally getting there as we put the decorations up over the weekend and my girls did the tree so the house is looking a bit more festive. I now have to make a start on the dreaded h.......k to make the house ready for visitors - not looking forward to doing this!
I'm here today with the final challenge for 2011 over at Make My Monday and continuing with the Seasonal theme, this week we would like to see a Tag. This could be just a tag as I have done or something with a tag on it - the choice is yours.

Apologies for the slightly chopped looking pic, I had to use the scanner because the light was really bad.
My tag was inked up with Old Paper, Bundled Sage and Shabby Shutters Distress inks and I then stamped on an Artemio text with Forest Moss DI. I embossed the background with clear embossing powder.
I then used a small Penny Black music score stamp (Clearly in love stamp set) in black ink on buff card, stamping repeatedly to form a background. I tore this out and adhered to the tag. I added a small scrap of antique gold card left over from die cutting a scalloped rectangle.
I finished off with a die cut bird (Marianne Designs) cut out of kraft card and then inked with Distress inks to turn him into a robin. I felt he needed an eye too so added one with a fine black Sharpie pen.

Full details of the challenge and some gorgeous inspiration from the Design Team can be found over at the Challenge Blog.

Challenges for my tag:
Gingerloft - Winter or Christmas
Craft Your Passion - Things With Wings

Have a great week and just a quick note that this post is number 499 so there might be some Candy in the pipeline soon!
Hugs, Fliss xx

Paris In Springtime

2011-12-18T10:33:00.001Z

Morning everyone on a very cold but bright day. We had minus temperatures for the first time this Winter last night - brrrr!
I'm here today with news of the next challenge we have for you over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges the theme of this being Travelling Around The World and the Design Team have covered a fair bit of it with their gorgeous creations.
For my inspiration I decided to look forward to a favourite time of year when the new greens start to appear and set this in a city I still have to visit and which is at the top of my wish list - Paris.

I chose to make a tag this time and made my own from chip board as I needed quite a large one for the main stamp I wanted to use. The gorgeous collage stamp (Hampton Art Diffusion Passport) has been in my collection for quite a while and this seemed the perfect opportunity to ink it up again. I stamped it with VersaFine Imperial purple on parchment card and added colour by sponging with various Distress inks. I then tore the panel out.
I painted my tag with acrylic paint and then added colour with my recently acquired Pan Pastels. I'm really pleased with the lovely chalky matte effect you can achieve with these. I then stamped on a favourite flourish with Memento Pear Tart ink.
I stamped the Hero Arts tulips on tissue paper with Stazon Olive Green ink and then sponged with Pear Tart and Lilac Posies Memento ink. I cut them out quite roughly. I stamped the B Line Designs Eiffel Tower with the purple ink and cut this out.
I assembled the tag as you see, adding the tulips with a glue stick. I really like the slightly misty look you get by stamping on tissue paper. I finished off with some antique copper letter tiles.

The Fashionettes have made some stunning creations to get your creative juices flowing - much needed after all the Christmas preparations I think! You have until 31 December to enter and if you pop over to the challenge blog, you'll find details of the gorgeous prize from our sponsor Marina of Cottage Crafts and of the first challenge for 2012.
Hoping to see you there.
Fliss xx

Through The Window

2011-12-16T09:00:00.002Z

Morning peops, it's Friday again and I can't quite believe it's only just over a week until Christmas and I haven't yet sent out my cards or finished my Christmas shopping - eek! This is mostly because I'm up to my eyes in figure work and VAT returns - yuck!
I'm here today with all the details of the final Polka Doodles challenge for 2011 as we're having a much needed Christmas break. The challenge has been chosen by Daniele and she would like to see a Window or Aperture on your creation. In my case this turned out to be a frame attached with foam tape although it's actually quite hard to see this in the photos.

All of the elements on my easel card are from the Magical Winter CD set and I made a frame to fit the front of the easel with some of the pretty dotty paper and my circle cutter. I attached this to the front of the card with foam tape and set the toadstool house in the frame. I added Woodware Fluffy Stuff on the house and the frame edge to give a snowy effect and glittered it a little.
I added the cute elf to the outside of the frame then covered the base with the dotty paper and finished off with a lovely sentiment panel and some snowflakes punched from various glitter card shades. And that's it - done!

Do pop over to the challenge blog as there's some gorgeous inspiration from the Design Team and also details of the CANDY on offer to some lucky entrant of this challenge.

Challenges for my card:
Crafty Purple Frog - It's Cold Outside
Delightful Challenges - Anything Goes
Meljen's Designs - No Rectangles
Paper Play - Christmas
ABC Christmas Challenge - Anything Christmas Goes
Crafting For All Seasons - Christmas
Divas By Design - Christmas

Have a lovely weekend.
Hugs, Fliss xx

Fantastic News

2011-12-12T15:12:00.000Z

Hello folks, I'm back again with another post because as well as my hubby's birthday card which I have to show you, I had a phone call from my younger daughter Sarah (in the second year of a Fashion degree at Kingston) to say that she and her friend Lucinda are the winners of a competition run by the South African clothing company Woolworths. This means that in the Spring next year they will both be jetting off to South Africa for a few weeks. To say that she's excited is an understatement as she's been running around shrieking and jumping up and down! Isn't this just fabulous, I can't tell you how proud and pleased for her I am.
It's her Dad's birthday too and here is the card I've made for him:

Andrew loves anything nautical and has loads of books on the subject so I decided on another card made with my trusty Aspects of Design nautical stamp set from The Stamp Man which gets a lot of use as most of the men in my husband's family love the sea.
I made a background paper by stamping blocks of colour with various Distress inks in blues and greens and then stamped on a B Line Designs time stamp in opposite corners with black ink.
I stamped the ship collage on grey card coloured the circular element and round the very edge then cut it out. I stamped the map on ecru card and cut this out.
I assembled the card as you see, adding a greeting made with a Dymo machine.

Challenges for my card:
Corrosive Challenges - Anything but Christmas
Stampin' Sisters in Christ - Birthday Card
Crafty Catz - Anything Goes
Totally Papercrafts - Anything but Christmas

Have a great week,
Fliss xx

Tie A Red Ribbon

2011-12-12T09:00:00.001Z

Morning folks, sorry about the title but that song popped into my head (you know the one I mean about the yellow one lol). It's Monday again and I can't believe how close it's getting to Christmas, really must get my cards in the post!
This week's challenge at Make My Monday, continuing with the December theme of Seasonal, is to use Red Ribbon on your creation so my inspiration is another Christmas card.

I've used a favourite Magenta stamp for my card which although not meant for Christmas is very good for seasonal cards with the music and berries. I stamped with VersaFine black and inked the panel then added detail with pencils and Promarkers.
I covered the card with Polka Doodles papers then added some scrunched red ribbon and a stamped, die cut and inked sentiment (Polka Doodles Christmas kit) finishing with the bird panel.

The Design Team have made some gorgeous and very varied cards to inspire you so do pop over for a look and hope to see you there.

Challenges for my card:
Card Makin' Mamas - Christmas
Raise The Bar - Christmas
Stampin' For The Weekend - Christmas
2 Sisters - Christmas
One Stop Craft - Traditional Christmas Colours
Dream Valley - Christmas
Paper Sundaes - Anything Christmas
The Squirrel & The Fox - Christmas

Have a great day and hopefully I'll be back later with more Of Tim's tags and also my hubby's birthday card as it's his birthday today.
Fliss xx

Tim's Tags Day Six

2011-12-09T20:55:00.000Z

I'm back again folks with my second post for today and have the day 6 tag to show you. This one took an absolute age as the painting bit was really difficult owing to the embossing folders I chose to use not having Tim's. I also have to say it came out very grungy and certainly a bit more than I expected so you'll have to let me know what you think - I'm still not sure about the end result.

I used the Alterations Texture Fades Bingo /Patchwork folder and the Cuttlebug holly folder. I didn't have the metal so adhered aluminium foil to glossy card and embossed then painted as Tim did.
I also didn't have a suitably sized metal adornment so made my own by gluing metal flowers to a silver glitter card wreath cut out with Nestie circle dies. I also trimmed the outer edge with deckle scissors.
I finished off with a piece of vintage torn lace.

As before I'm linking this up to Tim's blog 12 Days of Christmas Tag 6 and again to Inspiration Emporium for all things Tim.

Have a great weekend,
Fliss xx

Tim's Tags Day Five

2011-12-09T14:29:00.000Z

Happy Friday everyone and hope you have better weather as we have today. The wind finally went and I woke up to glorious sunshine this morning although it's very cold. I'm hoping it stays like this over the weekend as the last few days haven't been that great.
I've got another improvised tag to show you but before I do that I just want to say how sad I am to have heard that we've lost the lovely Sarah Lawrence, the very talented lady behind Crafty Notions, her company that produces Karantha stamps, gilding flakes and the gorgeous inky sprays. I was lucky enough to meet her on several occasions and admire her beautiful stitching creations so will miss her a lot.
I'm still somewhat behind with my tags but here's number 5:

Improvisation list:
Art Impressions snowflake instead of seasonal reflections stamp. I'd also like to say if you haven't done Tim's technique for this yet that a stamp with bold lines is required as I tried one with fine lines and you couldn't see the resulting image very well.
I didn't have the die either so used a Martha Stewart hydrangea punch and Woodware leaf sprig punch to make my wreath which is set on a backing of hessian (burlap) cut out with Nestie circle dies.
I finished off with some copper letter tiles and a simple ribbon at the top.

I'm linking this up to Tim's 12 Days of Christmas Tag 5 and also Inspiration Emporium where you can buy the supplies and link up your tag for a chance at some lovely prizes.
I'll be back a little later with tag 6 and wish you happy crafting in the mean time.
Fliss xx

Tim's Tags Day Four

2011-12-07T14:38:00.000Z

Afternoon folks from a very chilly, wild and windy South coast. We've got sunshine again but the wind is so strong it's really cold. Hoping you're all having a good week so far and I'm here with the next of my versions of Tim's 12 Days of Christmas Tags Day 4 which I really enjoyed making as the techniques on this one are messy but great fun (I have very blue fingers at the moment lol).

Improvisation list:
I only had the Picket Fence Distress Stain so used Broken China and Tumbled Glass DI re-inkers and ended up with quite a similar effect although brighter
The snowman has Weathered Wood and Stormy Sky Distress inks instead of the stains used by Tim
The numbers were made with a strip die, inked, stamped and Glossy Accents added
Punched snowflakes from kraft and glitter card as no border die and my punch wouldn't go through the plastic packaging I have
Thread and silver weave ribbon as no tulle

I think I enjoyed this one the most due to the techniques as it's a while since I used crackle paint and I loved the background even without all the Distress Stains. I'm linking this up over at Tim's 12 Days of Christmas Tag 4 and if you haven't seen the original it's a must!

I'm also linking to Inspiration Emporium which is worth a visit for Tim's supplies.

Thanks for looking and happy crafting,
Fliss xx

Tim's Tags Day Three

2011-12-06T10:04:00.000Z

I'm late, late, late here with my third tag as boy, did I have a struggle with this one! I don't have anything Tim used and must have gone back to the drawing board at least 3 times before I got something I felt reasonably happy with.
It's been really chilly here and I think I must have brain freeze lol but here's my finished tag.

Improvisation list:
Text stamps - large (Inkylicious) smaller (Penny Black)
No Embossing Folder as nothing suitable
Woodware holly and leaf sprig punches and Sissix flourish die for foliage
White tag inked with Old Paper and Tea Dye Distress inks after stamping
Extra additions - paper roses, metal flower charm

Quite a simple tag in the end but I think I like it like that. I left off the twine as I couldn't make it look right.
If you haven't seen the original gorgeous textured tag and some great inspiration for making Christmas crafted items in bulk, click on Tim's 12 Days of Christmas Tag 3 and prepare to be amazed.

I'm also once again linking this to Inspiration Emporium where there are great prizes on offer and Tim's supplies available.

Have a great day and happy crafting.
Fliss xx

Glitter Glitter Everywhere

2011-12-05T09:00:00.002Z

Good morning folks on a very cold and frosty day but the sun is shining so it's lovely. Being Monday and also the first Monday of the month, we have a new theme for you over at Make My Monday which as it's December is Seasonal Anything Goes with a plus. This week's plus is GLITTER so those of you still making those Christmas cards like me will love this one.
My offering this time is rather clean and simple and something we all need when we're short of time - simple to make too.

I chose this lovely Penny Black silhouette stamp and stamped with VersaMark ink on kraft card and heat embossed with Wow Puff White embossing powder. I then glittered some areas with various Stickles.
I set the panel which I die cut with a Papermania set on a mat of white glitter card. I covered my 5 x 7 card blank with a piece of torn edged kraft patterned paper from the Polka Doodles Magical Winter CD set and added a greeting stamped with the Practical Publishing Polka Doodles Christmas kit clear stamp set with brown ink on buff card, coloured with pencils and cut out with a Papermania label die.
A very clean and simple card.

The Design Team have made some fabulous glittery creations for for inspiration so do pop over for a look.

Challenges for my card:
Addicted To Stamps - Christmas Card
Come and Get It Challenges - Anything Christmas
Hybrid Chick Card Caravan -Make It Sparkle
Bling It On - Christmas
Emerald Faerie Garden - Christmas Non Traditional Colours

Have a great week.
Fliss xx

Dressmaking, Corsets, Accessories

2011-12-04T10:03:00.001Z

Good morning folks, I'm a little late with my post for the new challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges today as we went to the pictures yesterday evening and I clean forgot to schedule my post. The film we saw was the new Hugo film which is a family film and we were attracted to it because of the steampunk look of the trailer. If you're a fan, it's well worth going as the clockworks are just astounding.
Anyway, enough waffling and on to the challenge which this fortnight is all about Dressmaking with Corsets and Accessories as an additional option in your stamping. As many of you will know, this is dear to my heart because my younger daughter is doing a fashion degree and my family background had included sewing - I was taught to sew and knit by my dear great aunt and have sewn all my life.
I chose to make another wall hanging so without further ado, here it is.

My creation began life as a piece of recycled grey board which I painted with antique beige acrylic paint. I then stamped a rose border from a Judikins bolio which was given to me by a dear friend using VersaFine sepia ink.
The remaining stamps all come from the Creative Expressions Vintage Sewing stamp set and I stamped a piece of background paper using the fabulous textile square with Victorian Velvet, Frayed Burlap and Crushed Olive Distress inks. I tore the edges and added this to the panel.
I added an embossed and inked sewing pattern panel (Tim Holtz Texture Fades), the mannequin panel from the stamp set inked and coloured with Promarkers and a panel stamped in the same way as the background paper cut out with the Tim Holtz Baroque die. The tape measure is stamped and coloured with Mustard Seed Distress ink. The thread reels are also stamped and have threads wound round them.
I finished off with a mannequin cut out with the Tim Holtz Sewing Room die with lace and a taper measure ribbon bow added and various buttons and sewing charms. Lace was added to the base.

I hope you can join in with our challenge and please remember that we must be able to see some stamping on your creation to be eligible for the prize and top 3. Do hop over to see the Design Team creations too as they've really excelled themselves on this one.

Challenges for my creation:
2 Sisters - Punches and/or Dies
Craft Your Days Away - Buttons or Bows

Have a lovely day.
Fliss xx

Tim's Tags Day Two

2011-12-03T14:45:00.000Z

Hope you're all having a good weekend so far folks and I have my second tag for Sir Tim's 12 Days of Christmas Tags to show you. This time because I had to wait for our lovely sunshine to disappear to get a good pic as I didn't finish the tag until late last night.
I again had to do loads of improvising which I think has largely been caused by the fact that my Christmas supplies only get seasonal use so I try to do different things year on year to make my purchases last as long as possible to get the value out of them. As a lot of the supplies on the tags are new this year, that's why I don't have them as my craft purse is unfortunately not bottomless lol

Improvised supplies for this tag:
No Kraft Resist so used vintage music score dry brushed with white paint then stamped with holly (Papermania) and Christmas (Inkylicious). I also sponged on Shabby Shutters and Crushed Olive as I felt more colour was needed.
Snow make using a splatter stamp and white paint.
Deer is thick card rather than canvas and was inked with VersaColour Sand Beige, Umber and Cocoa
I added a bell and a holly garland made from punched holly sprigs.
I tried to use hessian at the top but it disintegrated on me! Ribbon used instead.
I added a little plaque made with a Craft Stamper free stamp (December issue)
The bottom border is a Martha Stewart punch with blingy ribbon added for some glitz.

To see the gorgeous original tag and all the instructions please click on Tim's Tags 12 Days of Christmas Day Two to be transported over.
I'm also linking once again to Inspiration Emporium which is worth a look if you haven't yet done so as there are prizes on offer.

I'm off to work on Day 3 now which will be even more of a challenge as I have none of the supplies!
Happy crafting,
Fliss xx

Tim's Tags Day One

2011-12-02T15:45:00.001Z

Afternoon everyone, I'm here at last with my first tag for the wonderful Tim Holtz's 2011 12 Tags of Christmas which I managed to finish just before the light went so I could get a reasonable photo.
I'm a little late with mine as I didn't have any of the things used on this one so had to do mega improvising which made me scratch my head a little lol.
Here's the finished result which is not quite as embellished as Tim's gorgeous tag but I'm quite pleased with it anyway.

My improvising list is as follows:
Stormy Sky Distress Ink on the tag as no kraft core cardstock
Cuttlebug Snowflake folder
Pine cones made with a Marianne Designs flower die set (which was inspired by Tim's beautiful roses)
Foliage made with Sissix flourish die and a Woodware holly punch.
No Noel die so Basic Grey chipboard letters and a Papermania label die

If you haven't yet seen the gorgeous original if you click on my link Tim's 12 Days Of Christmas Tags 2011 Day One, you'll be transported over to be wowed.

I'm also linking this to Inspiration Emporium and many thanks to Terry for this. Do visit if you do the tags as there are fabulous prizes up for grabs.

Thanks for looking and hope you decide to have a go too as I think the best fun is to be had when you haven't got the supplies.
Fliss xx

Secret Element Christmas Card

2011-12-02T09:00:00.003Z

Good morning everyone, I'm typing this post on a very wet and windy Thursday evening as I'll be sitting in the hairdressers when this post goes live. I'm really hoping the weather is a bit better too.
It's time for a new challenge over at Polka Doodles and this week Team A (which includes me) will be giving you some inspiration. We've split into 2 teams to save challenge entrants having to trawl through a gazillion creations to reach the link tool.
This week's challenge has been chosen by Enfys and she would like to see a creation with a Secret Element suitable for a child (or in my case a teenager). I chose to make something suitable for my nephews who are in their later teens.

All the elements on my card are from the Magical Winter CD set and I chose the cute penguin together with papers in colours suitable for boys (or girls who don't like pink!).

I assembled the front of the card in layers as you see, adding a little glitz with navy glitter card. I covered part of the inside with the same backing paper and made a pocket to tuck a gift card in (for game and music mad teenagers) and added a cut out penguin with foam tape.

I finished off with a central border of dotty paper and a sentiment from the CD, leaving room either side to write a message to the recipient. As you see, very simple!

Challenges for my creation:

Fab 'n' Funky - Anything Goes

Divas By Design - Anything Goes

Dream Valley Challenges - Sparkle

Thanks for looking and have a great day,

Fliss xx

Frosty The Snowman

2011-11-30T13:39:00.000Z

Hello folks, hope you're all having a good week so far. I'm finally catching up after my enforced crafting break (very hard to do when you can't see!) and have some Christmas cards to show you. It's the same design but I made a dozen and coloured half with Promarkers and half with Aquamarkers for a bit of variety.

As you can see, the top one with the Aquamarkers gives a much softer effect which I have to say I rather like.

The snowman is from the Polka Doodles Christmas Fun clear stamp set and was stamped with Memento black ink. I then coloured with either Promarkers or with Aquamarkers (which I did by scribbling colour on a ceramic plate and picking up colour with a water brush). I then cut them out.

I printed out the gorgeous snowflake paper from the Polka Doodles Magical Winter CD set and added panels of this to some 5 x 7 kraft cards (Papermania) which were embossed on one side with the Cuttlebug snowflake folder.

I added a circular white panel embossed with the same folder and topped with the snowman. I stamped a greeting from the clear stamp set included in the Polka Doodles Christmas crafting kit from Practical Publishing and stamped on snowflakes from the same set with the Brilliance Peacock ink pad. I set this on a turquoise circular mat.

Challenges for my cards:

I Love Promarkers - Snowmen/Snowflakes

Cards und More - Snowflakes

Karen's Doodles - Non Traditional Christmas Colours

Simon Says Stamp - Anything Goes

Thanks for looking,

Fliss xx

Christmas Box

2011-11-28T09:00:00.003Z

Good morning everyone, that day is here again so we have a new challenge for you over at Make My Monday. We're still with the Christmas theme and this week would like you to

Make Or Alter A Box

Thanks to all who entered last week's challenge which proved really popular and made it so hard to do the top picks as there were so many gorgeous creations.
I'd also like to give a very warm welcome and congratulations to our 2 new Design Team members, Mynnette and Val who will be showing us their gorgeous creations from next week.

For this week's inspiration I decided to alter a box as I wanted something a little more permanent. I found a lovely heart shaped wooden box in The Range and this is what the finished box looks like:

I painted my box by sponging on layers of antique white and antique gold acrylic paints, sanding down a little after each coat.
I then stamped on the largest flourish from the Viva Decor My Paper World clear stamp set with Palette Cognac ink.
I made the Christmas rose decoration with tissue paper die cut with the Nestabilities blossom set and embossed with the Cuttlebug textile folder. I then stacked these up and added a paper rose in the centre. I scrunched up the petals to make the rose shape and glittered the edges with Frosted Lace Stickles.
I then punched out some small leaf sprigs and die cut some larger leaves with the Tim Holtz Tattered Leaves die set using dark green card and embossed them with the textile folder. I glued the embellishments to the top of the box.

Challenges for my altered box:
Creative Inspirations Paint - Anything But A Card
Fussy and Fancy - Make A Gift/Anything But A Card
Paper Crafting Journey - Anything Goes

Thanks for looking and have a great week.
Fliss xx

Snow Is Falling

2011-11-27T17:09:00.000Z

Hello folks, hope you've all had a lovely weekend.
Before I share some cards with you, apologies are necessary for my lack of blogging and commenting this week which is because I've been a bit under the weather. First I had a headache and puffy eyed thing which meant not being able to wear my contact lenses all day. Then when that got better I went down with a mild stomach bug which nevertheless made me feel rather rotten.
I'm recovered now so will try and catch up with you all over the next few days. The cards here are the samples from a class I taught last week using a rather lovely clear stamp set by Papermania called Christmas Time.

This is the stamp set that I used for my oval easel card for the FSC challenge last Sunday and you can see how versatile it is.
The first 2 cards use the gorgeous snowy village and were coloured with Promarkers using pink skin tones and accents for the first on and ivory to golden shades for the second. These are really easy to colour if you assemble 5 or 6 similar shades and arrange in colour order, starting with the lightest first. You then use the lightest colour all over first using the broad chisel end. You then add detail to the houses and so on using the rest of the colours in order from lightest to darkest. As a finishing touch, you go all over the top again with the lightest colour - this was Satin on the pink version and Ivory on the golden version. When dry, add glitter highlights or snow effects with Fluffy Stuff (Woodware).
The pink card uses a snowflake from the set stamped in Brilliance Galaxy Gold, Pearlescent Beige and Coral together with a Hero Arts sentiment stamped with the beige. A die cut gold mat was added to the village panel.
The golden version has a snowflake embossed panel, a deckle trimmed kraft card mat, punched leaf sprays, pearls and ribbon and a die cut sentiment panel.
The remaining cards show how different the seasonal door image can look. The first one took a while to colour with Promarkers and has an embossed side, a Hero Arts sentiment panel and a cut out wreath also coloured with Promarkers.
The second one was coloured in a similar way to the village cards, using Ivory first then adding pink shades and pastel blue for the door for a completely different look. The card has a kraft background panel embossed at the base and stamped with an Art Impressions snowflake which was white embossed and a snowflake from the set stamped with Brilliance Ice Blue. The greeting panel is Penny Black.

Challenges for my cards:
Paper Sundaes - Winter Wonderland
Gingerloft - Winter or Christmas
Stamptacular Sunday - Anything Christmas
Totally Papercrafts - Christmas
4 Crafty Chicks - Snowflakes
Fun With Shapes & More - Cold As Ice (the first 2 cards only)

Thanks for looking and have a good next week.
Fliss xx

Christmas Foliage, Flowers and Snowflakes

2011-11-21T09:00:00.001Z

Morning everyone, a bit of a long title I know but this is the theme of the new challenge over at Make My Monday which you give you plenty of scope for your entries and help with those Christmas cards still needing to be made. Rather a lot in my case but I'm slowly getting there.
I chose snowflakes for mine as I couldn't find my lovely poinsettia stamp (until I finished this card of course!) and I've gone for a blue and brown colour scheme as I really like that combination of colours.

I started off with a kraft card blank and stamped an Art Impressions snowflake all over with Stormy Sky and Frayed Burlap Distress inks. I added a blue border embossed with the Cuttlebug snowflakes folder and some silver ric rac braid.
I stamped the snowman (Art Impressions) on white card, coloured his hat with a brown Promarker and ink and cut out a panel with a Nestabilities label die then inked the edges. I then inked it up with Versamark ink and heat embossed it with crystal embossing powder. I set this on a larger silver mat cut with the same die set.
I stamped the sentiment (Crafty Individuals) with brown and blue inks, cut this out and set it on a kraft tag embossed with the snowflakes folder. I added this to a blue tag shaped mat and finished off with more silver braid.

The Design Team have made some gorgeous creations to inspire you so don't forget to pop over for a look. Hoping to see you enter too.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Moving Along With The Times - Let It Snow
I Did It Creations - Snowmen
Scrappy Frogs - Kraft Cardstock

Have a great week,
Fliss xx

Quirky Crafts Guest Designer

2011-11-20T18:00:00.002Z

Hello again folks, 2 posts in one day from me here as a couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to be asked by the lovely Design Team at Quirky Crafts challenges to be the guest designer for today's new challenge.
This fortnight the challenge is to make a Clean and Simple Card and as you all know I do tend to struggle with that a little but having done this last week for Make My Monday, I've at least had a bit more practice!
The challenge is being sponsored by the lovely Wendy of Digital Delights by Louby Loo and there's a great prize on offer so do pop over for all the details.

My card features the cute Booboo Bear image and the Sending You Smiles sentiment.

I printed out the image and sentiment and added initial colouring with inks. I then added detail with a mix of Promarkers and Prisma pencils, adding highlights with glitter gel pens. I then cut them out.
I made a simple background for the little bear by masking off the base card leaving a circular aperture. I then stamped a tiny Rubber Stamp Tapestry flower in the circle with pink. yellow and green inks. I added the image in the centre with foam tape.
I made a flowery border with a punched strip (a Martha Stewart double edge punch which I stamped with the same flowers. I added the sentiment to finish.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Clearly Inspired - Flowers
One Stitch At A Time - Anything Goes

Thanks so much to Cazzy and the team for the honour of being guest designer which I really enjoyed.
Fliss xx

Dreaming Of A White Christmas

2011-11-20T00:30:00.004Z

Are you all singing now as I have to say that the theme of our new challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges certainly made me start singing (in my head though or I think my family would be throwing things at me!).
So there you have it, you can interpret Dreaming Of A White Christmas in any way you like and in my case it had to be a snowy scene as even at my age it still makes me excited to open the curtains in the morning to find a world turned white and pretty. It would be really lovely to have the view below from my window.
Also, a big welcome to our new fashionette Paula who does amazing and beautiful artwork and now on to my card.

There are 2 photos so that you can see some of the detail close up as I always find easel shaped cards quite hard to take a decent photo of. You may need to click on the pics to get the full glittery effect on the snow and the big snowflake on the base.
The snowy village and the lovely sentiment come from a Papermania clear stamp set called Christmas Time and were both stamped with Memento black ink. I coloured the village scene with Promarkers and Prisma pencils and then inked the sky in very carefully with a sponge and Stormy Sky Distress ink. I added snow using Woodware Fluffy Stuff and glittered it after heating it to puff it up.
I made the paper for the base by stamping the smaller snowflake from the Artemio Art Impressions clear stamp set (it's the one used by Trish Latimer in the latest Craft Stamper and doesn't have a name on) on white card with Brilliance Pearlescent Ice Blue and Beige and Platinum Planet.
I made a border strip for the base with kraft card and silver card embossed with the Cuttlebug snowflakes folder. I cut out the sentiment with a Papermania die and inked the edges with the Stormy Sky.
I assembled the card as an oval easel shape as you see (cut with a Creative memories oval cutting set) and finished off with snowflakes (die cut with the Cuttlebug cut and emboss snowflake set and punched with a Woodware punch).

Do hop over to the challenge blog as the Design Team have made some fabulous and varied projects to inspire you and hopefully get you entering the challenge. You'll also find details of the lovely prize that our wonderful sponsor Marina of Cottage Crafts has generously provided.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Paper Pretties - Christmas with non traditional colours
Stampavie and More - Anything But Square
Paper Crafting Journey - Embossing
Crafty Catz - Snowflakes
Crafty Emma's Challenge - Snowflakes

Have a lovely Sunday,
Fliss xx

The Craft Barn's Amazing Blog Candy

2011-11-19T17:51:00.001Z

This is for anyone who hasn't yet seen the amazing blog candy being offered by The Craft Barn to celebrate reaching 600 followers (I just peeked and they've now got over 850) and you can see all the details of what you need to do to be in with a chance of winning by clicking HERE. It's well worth a look anyway for all the fabulous tutorials on there.

Good luck to everyone who enters,
Fliss xx

Shaped Christmas Card

2011-11-18T09:00:00.001Z

Morning everyone, I was off to an early start today as I had to take my daughter to the station for the 8 o'clock train to work so there was a bit of a queue for the bathroom today!
I can't believe that it's Friday again - don't know where the week went although I have been busy with making samples for Nikky who's appearing on Create and Craft on 23 November with the new Pretty Tuff CD.
This week's challenge at Polka Doodles has been chosen by Ruth so you can maybe guess that the theme is Christmas but this has a twist as she would like to see a Shaped Christmas Card.
I've chosen a favourite shape of mine at the moment which gives some dimension to the card but still fits easily in an envelope.

All elements on my card come from the Magical Winter CD Collection, apart from the green glitter card which you may need to click on the pic to see properly.
I covered my main card base with the pretty dotty paper then made the central stand up panel with the gorgeous stitched look kraft paper and a cute eskimo topper.
I simply added a glittery border strip, some of the cut out embellishments and a lovely sentiment from the CD - simples!
If you haven't yet checked out this fabulous 2 CD collection, it's worth your while to hop over and take a look at the gallery to see all the wonderful creations that can be made, some in a matter of minutes which we all need when trying to get all the Christmas cards done!

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Paper Play - Shaped Cards
Creatalicious - Christmas with Sparkle (you may need to click on the pic to see mine)
Digital Tuesday - Christmas Time

Have a great day and a lovely weekend.
Fliss xx

CAS At Make My Monday

2011-11-14T09:00:00.002Z

Good morning everyone, Monday is here again! Being the start of the week, we have a new challenge for you over at Make My Monday, continuing with our theme for November which is Christmas.
This week the challenge is to make a Clean and Simple Christmas Card Focusing On The Sentiment.
I have to admit that I really struggled with this one as I find less is more cards a real challenge as I keep wanting to add more!
I managed to restrain myself though and here's the result.

I started off with a really lovely sentiment from the Polka Doodles Christmas Fun clear stamp set, stamping with black and heat embossing with clear powder. I coloured in the holly leaves and berries with glaze pens.
I then stamped on the holly sprigs (Papermania) with VersaFine Spanish Moss ink, adding colour to the berries with Crimson Red before stamping. I painted a little Crushed Olive Distress ink on the leaves to add colour. And that's it - done!
This has to be the quickest card I've ever made (although it took a while to think it up!) and also the one with the shortest instructions - which I'm sure you'll appreciate!

The Design Team have made some fabulous inspiration for you to feast your eyes on so do pop over for a peek.
I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Christmas Card Challenges - Deck The Halls - Holly or Wreaths
Less Is More - One Layer Leaves
Wags 'n' Whiskers - Christmas

Have a good week.
Fliss xx

Vintage Gift Bag

2011-11-11T15:45:00.001Z

I'm back with a second post to show you a quick make with supplies that are almost all recycled and the thinking about what to do took more than the actual making up so I think I'll be doing a few more of these for Christmas and all the December birthdays I have coming up.
There's a pic of the recycled items first and then you'll see the finished article.

As you can see I made use of one of those lovely paper bags that various clothing stores use for packing purchases and also of quite a few paper bags from craft shop purchases in the past that were much too pretty to throw away.
The main bag has a nature theme with Autumn shades and leaves so the design followed on from that. I tore off the bag front and added this to the paper carrier bag. I then stamped Hero Arts Old French Writing and a butterfly and postmark from the On Gossamer Wings stamp set by Non-Sequitur that I won from The Stamp Man back in January. I used VersaFine Vintage Sepia and stamped on the plain cream bag twice.
I tore out the little collages and added one to the bag and the other to a recycled clothing label. I also added corrugated card from a coffee cup holder to the tag.
I made a flower using various paper bag and the Nestabilities blossom die, fixing the layers together with an ornate metal brad and scrunching the layers. I finished off with some crochet lace.

I'm entering this in this week's Sugar Creek Hollow Trash to Vintage Treasure challenge and if you haven't yet entered you might want to pop over and check out the fabulous prize that some lucky entrant will be winning next month - it will be a fantastic Christmas present that's for sure! There's a pic on my side bar too.

Bye for now,
Fliss xx

Swirls and Pearls

2011-11-11T09:00:00.003Z

Good morning everyone, Friday is here again so there's a new challenge over at Polka Doodles. This week your hostess is Daniele and she's chosen the theme of Swirls and Pearls with Pretty Pastels.
I really enjoyed this challenge as I love flourishes (bet you didn't know that!!!) and loved combining this with some textures on my card so without further ado, here it is.

All of the papers on my card as well as the cute image are from the Pretty Sweet CD which all the Design Team really love so I'm guessing you will see quite a lot of cards using this one.
I used the pretty papers for matting and layering, having printed out the pretty lilac one on to linen card for a lovely textured look.
I printed out the cute digital stamp and coloured her with Promarkers. I then cut her out and added her to the oval layered mat with foam tape. I used my favourite trick of doubling the tape behind her head to give added dimension.
I embossed 2 panels of white linen card with the Craft Concepts Gem Flourishes folder and swiped them with Brilliance Pearlescent Purple ink. I also sponged the ink round the edges of these and the larger base panel.
I finished off with some flourishes die cut with a Sissix design from mauve card then embossed with the Cuttlebug Swiss Dots folder and some flowers punched with a Papermania emboss punch with pearl centres.
The Design Team have made some gorgeous samples to inspire you so do hop over for a peek.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
I Love Promarkers - Follow That Sketch
C.R.A.F.T. Challenge - Cute
Paper Crafting Journey - Embossing
Charisma Cardz - Cutesy
Dutch Dare Card Challenge - Punch Time
Frosted Designs Fabulous Friday Challenge - Embossing

Thanks for looking and have a great weekend.
Fliss xx

The Key To Her Heart

2011-11-08T11:06:00.000Z

Good morning everyone on a very dark, dull and cold day in the South of England. It's so dark that it feels like evening is on the way at 10.30 in the morning!
I'm here to share a project I've been working on for the last week in bits and pieces whenever I could find a spare few minutes. It's another collage as I really enjoy making those at the moment, largely because I can have a good rummage in my recycling box to find interesting bits to use.
Here's the finished artwork and underneath you'll find how it came about.

Here's what I used for the base

This is my favourite thing to use for a base as you can see from the second photo that it cut down into several interesting pieces. I just used a rectangle for my collage but the other pieces will be in use very soon.
I covered the base with a piece of torn edged vintage music score lightly inked with Spun Sugar Distress ink. I then added pieces of wide scalloped edge lace at the top and bottom to soften the effect. I punched holes at the top with my Cropodile and knotted ribbon through (the ribbon was from packaging on my pressies last week).
I stamped the large background (B Line Designs) on beige parchment paper and embossed with Ranger Tarnished Gold. I then sponged on Victorian Velvet and Crushed Olive Distress inks. I tore the edges and attached across the centre.
I made a further panel by stamping a Chocolate Baroque background stamp (recently won as part of lovely Claire C's blog candy - lucky me!), embossed with pale gold and sponged with Shabby Shutters and Tattered Rose Distress inks. This was then torn around the edges.
I stamped the lovely Maude by The Stampsmith with VersaFine Onyx Black ink on Judikins KromeKote card and tinted lightly with various Distress inks when it was dry. I then set this on the embossed panel, adding a silver key at the top attached with wire, a piece of chestnut velvet ribbon and a vintage jewellery piece.
I finished off with more lace at the bottom together with a jewelled butterfly and computer generated text. The final touch was the heart, hand cut from leftover music score, partially embossed and wiped with Brilliance Galaxy Gold ink.
The wide lace, silver key, vintage jewellery piece and the butterfly all came from one of June of Dezinaworld's fabulous treasure bags and I have tons of things still to use.

I'd like to enter my collage in the following challenges:
The Stamp Man - Collage
The Stampsmith - Ribbons and Lace
Sugar Creek Hollow - Trash to Vintage Treasure
Simon Says Stamp & Show - Upcycling/Recycling

Thanks for looking.
Fliss xx

Vintage/Traditional Christmas

2011-11-07T09:00:00.002Z

Good morning everyone, it's the start of another week and before I give you details of the new challenge over a Make My Monday, I have some good news to share about my Autumn Leaves card from last week's challenge.
I would like to say a really big thanks firstly to Creative Inspirations Paint challenge blog as my card gained a Top 3 award and secondly to Quirky Crafts challenge blog as the card was the public vote winner.
I'd also like to say a HUGE thanks to lovely Cindy Adkins as she made the most wonderful collage for me as a birthday surprise and I was so touched to see it. If you'd like to see what she made, you can see it HERE - warning though, it has my ugly mug on lol.

Now for this week's challenge and being November it's the start of a new theme which this month has been chosen by Suzi B who would like to help everyone with those seasonal cards with the theme of CHRISTMAS. This week's challenge is to make a Vintage/Traditional card and mine can be taken as both so there's loads of options with this one.

The lovely robin came from a useful and much used Artistic Outpost stamp set and was stamped with VersaFine Vintage Sepia and coloured with pencils. The edges of the panel were inked with blue.
I then embossed a piece of green card with the Cuttlebug holly spray folder and swiped VersaColor Green Tea ink over the raised area. I coloured the berries with an American Crafts ultimate glitter pen and inked the edges of the panel with Split Pea and Umber VersaColor inks.
I stamped a Papermania holly spray on buff card with VersaFine Spanish Moss ink and stamped again on one side of a 7x5 kraft card blank.
I assembled the card as you see, adding a stamped greeting (again from the Polka Doodles Christmas kit for Practical Publishing) which will be appearing a lot on my cards this year as I love it. I coloured it with Promarkers and inked the edges.
This is the second of my card designs for this year as it's easy to make the panels in repeat and simple to assemble them all.

The Design Team have made some fabulous cards to inspire you so don't forget to take a look. Please also don't forget that we have a DT Call running at the moment so if you'd like to join a friendly and supportive team all the details are on the challenge blog. No previous experience is necessary and all levels of crafting are welcome.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Paper Sundaes - Rectangle
Creative Inspirations Paint - Anything Goes
I Did It Creations - Christmas/Winter

Have a good week.
Fliss xx

Times Gone By

2011-11-06T00:30:00.002Z

Hello folks, hope you're all having a good weekend although here in the UK it certainly won't be a peaceful one. As I write this post there are bangs and flashes of fireworks as it's bonfire night here.

It's time for a new challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges and the theme for this fortnight is Times Gone By. This theme really got me thinking about what that means to me in particular and I decided in the end that it means the past but in terms of me. I don't know about you but in my case time seems to have flown by since my children were born and sometimes it only seems like yesterday that they were knee high so my project has the theme of time.

The project originated from a trawl through my stamp collection and the text stamp I used caught my eye - the rest of the project followed on from there. Some of the DT have said that it got them singing too and it had that effect on me as I still remember the song and the words as if it were yesterday.

Ingredients Used:
Stamps:
Girl and Clocks Collage - Paper Artsy Kids Plate 1
Text Stamp - Paper Artsy Gentlemen Plate 4
Pocket Watch - A free stamp from the short lived and still missed Simply Stamping mag
Roman Numerals - Stamp-It 1716E
Embossing Folders - Cuttlebug Clockworks, Numbers Collage
Distress Inks - Tattered Rose, Scattered Straw, Victorian Velvet, Pumice Stone, Mustard Seed
VersaFine Ink - Smokey Gray
Manila Tag
Grey Textured Card Blank
Clear Embossing Powder and Embossing Ink
Silver Clip

The background paper was embossed with the Cuttlebug folder, sponged with the pumice Stone and then swiped with Victorian Velvet and Mustard Seed. The edges were torn and it was added at an angle to the card blank stamped with the numerals in the Pumice Stone ink and embossed on one side with the numbers folder.
The image panel was stamped with the Smokey Gray ink and sponged with pink and yellow Distress inks when dry. This was also torn around the edges. It was added to the tag which was stamped with the numerals in Pumice Stone and Tattered Rose DIs. The text was stamped with the grey ink on a scrap of card, torn out, inked and clipped to the top of the tag.
The card was finished with a scrap of grey card embossed with the numbers folder and swiped with Pumice DI and the pocket watch stamped in grey, embossed with clear powder and then swiped with embossing ink and embossed a second time with clear so the watch face had a "glass" front.

The Fashionettes have made some gorgeous creations with which to inspire you so do head on over to take a look.
Please also remember that as a stamping challenge, no digital images are allowed and we must be able to see some stamping on your entries so it will really help our job if you say which stamps you used.
Thanks for looking and hoping to see you there.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Crafty Catz - Anything Goes
The Play Date Cafe PDCC106

Fliss xx

I'm So Excited!!!

2011-11-04T09:46:00.001Z

Back again already as I just found out that I won the Sir Stampalot October Challenge, Food Glorious Food with my Autumn Fruits Collage which you can see HERE. Yippee!!!!
Thank you so much to the Design Team for this fabulous honour and to Andy and Janice for providing such a fabulous prize.
It was my birthday yesterday and this has to be the icing on the cake! I had a lovely day as I went shopping in Brighton with my younger daughter Sarah in the morning and we all went out for a meal in the evening at a local Italian restaurant. I had some lovely presents and cards too as both my daughters always make cards (crafting runs in the family).

Hugs, Fliss, doing a happy dance xxx

Shaped Card Challenge

2011-11-04T09:12:00.000Z

Good morning folks, it's another blustery day down here on the UK South coast and hopefully the wind is strong enough to blow the clouds away - I can see from my window that they're moving very fast.
Today being Friday (yippee!), we have a new challenge for you over at Polka Doodles and I've chosen the theme this week. My challenge to you all is to make a Shaped Card, so no plain squares or rectangles, something a bit more unusual is what I'd like to see. The Polka Doodles dollies and guy have risen to the challenge really well with some fabulous creations to inspire you so do hop over for a look.
Also if you're going to the big craft show at the NEC, Nikky will be there demonstrating and will have lots of goodies on sale including the brand new Pretty Tuff CD perfect for those ever difficult masculine cards.
I've made a circular easel card to share with you:

I really like this shape and cut my card blank out with my Creative Memories circle cutter - something I've had for many years and would never be without.
All of the elements on my card come from the Pretty Sweet CD. I covered the card with circles of the pretty leaf paper. I then printed out the black and white digital image of the very cute Piper sitting down (there are several poses) and coloured her with various Promarkers. I then cut her out leaving a narrow white border all round.
I used the largest Nestabilities Blossom die to cut a mat from beige dotty paper and set this on a circular mat of red rose paper. I made a flower using the same rose paper and blossom die, shaping the petals and adding pink Doodle Dewdrops to the centre.
I added lace to the card front as as it was the self stick type, I used glitter on the portions where the glue showed through. This stops the lace being sticky. I added Piper on the mat and glued on the flower.
I finished off by adding a floral border cut from the red rose paper with a Martha Stewart double edge punch, a sentiment from the CD and a pearl row for the stopper.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
4 Crafty Chicks - Die Cuts
Little Darlings Challenges - Not Square
Craft Your Passion - Bingo (Use A Punch/Sentiment/Bling)
Paper Pretties - Use A Sentiment

Have a great day and a lovely weekend,
Fliss xx

Vintage Christmas

2011-11-02T17:10:00.001Z

Hello everyone on a very wet and dark Wednesday afternoon. It feels like Winter is nearly here as it's really cold too.
I have a Christmas card to share with you today as I went to a crafting group for our occasional meet up on Saturday and now happily have most of the elements needed to make a good start on my seasonal cards. I don't know about you but I normally work out around 10 designs and then make 10-12 of each so that I'll hopefully have enough to cover my ever growing list.
I'll be sharing more when I can but here's the first.

The photo here is not great as I was about to take it when the heavens opened and the light went so my camera used the flash and made the muted gold border much blingier (is that a word???) on one side.
I made the red and green background paper by repeatedly stamping Crafty Individuals CI-237 on cream card with Crimson Red and Spanish Moss VersaFine inks. I then sprayed the stamped card with Glimmer Mists in Emperor Gold, Olive Vine and Vintage Pink. This gives a lovely shimmery paper perfect for Christmas. I covered an A4 sheet to make enough for several cards.
The music panel is a piece of striped vellum which I embossed with the Cuttlebug music folder then swiped with Palette Landscape ink. I placed a piece of cream card cut to size behind this and attached it at the corners with Paperchase kraft paper photo corners.
The lovely bird panel is part of Magenta Cling Set CSET15 which is not actually a Christmas stamp but works well as one. I inked the panel and then added detail with Prisma pencils and Promarkers.
The central border is antique gold textured card and was cut with an X Cut embossing and cutting border die plate. I added a button tied with recycled yarn.
I finished off with a greeting which is from the Practical Publishing Polka Doodles Christmas Kit clear stamp set and was stamped with Archival Olive ink and coloured with pencils.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Sugar Creek Hollow - Vellum (mine is embossed and inked)
Stamp-n-Doodle - Embossing (mine is dry embossing on the vellum)
Top Tip Tuesday - Make Your Own Background (my favourite sort of challenge!)
Simon Says Stamp - Buttons
ABC Christmas Challenge - V For Vintage

Hope you're having a good week.
Fliss xx

Blog Candy Winner Announcement!

2011-11-01T22:12:00.001Z

My third post for today which must be a first but I didn't want to make you all wait after promising to post the winner today.
So without further ado the lucky person to have her name pulled out of the hat by my daughter Sarah is, drumroll please..........

Marie of Dollys Daydreams

Many congratulations to you Marie and if you'd like to email me your address, I'll pop your candy in the post.

Commiserations to everyone else and thank you so much for your interest but unfortunately there could only be one winner.

Bye for now,

Fliss xx

Design Team Call At Make My Monday

2011-11-01T15:27:00.000Z

Another quick post from me to tell you about our Design Team Call now running over at Make My Monday.

Jacqueline would like to add another 2 crafters to our creative team and is running a little challenge to help the selection process.
I cannot tell you just how much I enjoy being part of the MMM team. It's a fabulous way to increase your creativity as we each choose a monthly theme in turn and then choose the weekly challenges to fit the theme. As a result of this, I've used techniques, colours and themes that I wouldn't have otherwise even thought of let alone tried and I've really loved the challenge.

All details can be found by clicking HERE and we look forward to seeing your entries. Good luck and hoping to see you there.

Fliss xx

Pretty Tuff

2011-11-01T10:28:00.000Z

Good morning folks, I'm here with a very quick post to show you the card I made for my nephew's birthday yesterday for which the brand new Polka Doodles CD, Pretty Tuff, came to the rescue. I don't know about you but I really struggle with cards for teenage boys.
If you're going to the huge craft show at the NEC, Nikky will be there with the CD but don't delay as I'm sure it will sell out really fast.

The image and the football come from the new CD and I've coloured the image with Promarkers. I was quite pleased with the T shirt as I discovered that Pear Green layered over Sandstone gives a great light khaki colour perfect for boys' clothing.
I've used a kraft card blank and added simple panels. The paper is from the Not For Girls CD and I'm really pleased with my new brick wall embossing folder. It's new from Papermania and I sponged on Pumice Stone Distress ink and then swiped Frayed Burlap over the top for a really distressed and grungy wall.
I finished off with a sentiment from the Polka Doodles Sensational Sentiments stamp set, coloured with Promarkers on a mat of kraft paper from the Magical Winter CD.
Although you can't see it that well in the photo, the boy is slouching against the wall. This effect was achieved by stacking foam tape double on the body and legs so that his head is lower down as it only has one layer. Give it a try and you'll be surprised how effective it is.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Stamps R Us - Masculine
Birthday Sundaes - Birthday Card
Come And Get It Challenges - Anything Goes
Dream Valley Challenges - Anything Goes

I'll be back this evening with my blog candy winner when I have someone to pull a name out of the hat for me.
Have a lovely day.
Fliss xx

Candy Giveaway Time!

2011-11-01T07:00:00.001Z

THE BLOG CANDY IS NOW CLOSED SO NO MORE COMMENTS PLEASE. RESULTS WILL BE POSTED LATER TODAY. THANKS SO MUCH TO EVERYONE WHO ENTERED.

Yes folks, you're not seeing things here. I'm lucky enough thanks to all you lovely people out there to have reached a double century of followers in the last week or so and this is my promised candy.

Sorry! Couldn't resist a little tease but I did want to say thank you so much for choosing to follow my blog and leave such lovely comments on my creative outpourings so here's the giveaway:

Some of you may remember that a while back I was lucky enough to have some stamp designs made up by Hobby Art and I have the full set to give away to one lucky someone that leaves me a comment between now and midnight GMT on 31 October. I will also add the Klingon foam mount needed to use the stamps as they are unmounted rubber.

Here's another card made using them to make the background paper with lots of Distress inks and the flower has been embossed and sponged with more DIs. Just to show you can do bling too!

Thank you once again for all your support which means so much to me and I'd also like to welcome my newest follower, Liz, to my blog - lovely to see you here and I think you might have joined at the right time lol.
If you'd like to add a giveaway button to your blog it's now on my side bar - not a brilliant one as I'm not very good at technical graphic things so you'll need to save the image and then click on the post title and save the link to add with the picture.

Hugs and thanks,
Fliss xxx

Autumn Leaves

2011-10-31T09:00:00.007Z

Good morning everyone on a very grey and blustery Monday. Hoping that you all had a lovely weekend.
Also I'd like to wish a Happy Halloween to those of you that celebrate it.

Before I go on to details of this weeks Make My Monday challenge, can I just remind you all that my candy ends at midnight tonight so if you would like to win and haven't yet left a comment on the blog candy post, please remember you have to do this to be in with a chance. The result will be posted tomorrow evening once one of my daughters has pulled a winning name from the hat.

Now for the challenge, this week sees the last of our month of Autumn challenges and I'd like to say a big thanks to Caz for this as I really enjoyed this theme. The challenge this week is to make a project featuring Autumn Leaves and I think this is my favourite of all. I've gone quite grungy and shabby for my card with loads of texture.

As you can see, I've used a kraft card blank which I have to say are my favourites at the moment. I made a panel embossed with the Cuttlebug leafy branch folder and inked this with Mustard Seed, Wild Honey, Spiced Marmalade and Aged Mahogany Distress inks.
I then added a torn edged panel of cream card stamped with a B Line Designs skeleton leaf in Rusty Hinge and a Rubber Stampede leaf stamped with Aged Mahogany.
I made a tag from a piece of hessian, fraying the edges and adding a top tab stapled on. I covered up the staple with a button tied with recycled yarn.
I made some leaves with a maple leaf stamp. embossed with clear powder and inked with various Distress inks. I cut these out and added them to the tag with a sentiment by Hobby Art.

Challenges for my card:
Creative Inspirations Paint - Inspired By Fall
Craft Your Days Away - Autumn
Crafty Creations - Leaves Fall Palette
Addicted To Stamps - Shabby, Shabby Chic or Vintage
Quirky Crafts - Autumn Leaves
The Shabby Tearoom - Homespun Fall

Have a great week.
Fliss xx

A Magical Day

2011-10-28T09:00:00.002+01:00

Morning folks, here's hoping this finds you all well and that you've had a good week. Mine has been mixed with being busy but the best thing was a phone call from my younger daughter Sarah. She's recently started her second year of a degree in fashion and this year is spent designing collections for clients.
She's just completed her first one and worked so hard on this that I am really delighted to be able to say that hers was chosen as one of ten to send to the company and it's now winging its way to Cape Town where the company is based (yippee!)
Now for the new Polka Doodles challenge which has been chosen by Claire this time and she would like to see your Mystical and Magical creations - so let's see those fairies, witches, dragons and so on.
It's also what we call our stashbox stamp week so I've used a set of Papermania fairy stamps with some really pretty Polka Doodles papers.

I covered my card blank with the pretty leaf paper from the Pretty Sweet CD and added a border of dotty paper punched with a Martha Stewart border punch.
I stamped a little scene on a circle of white card and coloured everything with Promarkers. I made the little butterflies 3D by stamping these again, cutting them out and adding with foam tape. I inked the edge of the circle.
I stamped the fairy, coloured her with Promarkers, cut her out and glittered her wings by rubbing on embossing ink and heat embossing with crystal powder. I added a pink dotty scalloped mat cut with a Nestabilities die to the circle scene and added the fairy with foam tape. She's been positioned as if she's looking at the tiny sweet fairy on the toadstool.
I added some very pretty lace, a ribbon bow and stamped and matted sentiment to finish.

Challenges for my card:
Charisma Cardz - Anything Goes
Paper Pretties - Embellish
The Paper Shelter - Anything Goes
Simon Says Stamp - Anything Goes
Passion For Promarkers - For A Child
Totally Papercrafts - Glitter It!

Hope you all have a lovely weekend,
Fliss xx

Send In The Clowns

2011-10-25T16:23:00.000+01:00

Good afternoon folks, I hope you're having a good week so far. I'm here today with another just because piece of artwork which is a little different. It came about because I saw the gorgeous lady Pierette image on The Graphics Fairy's fabulous site and immediately wanted to make something with her. Judy Collins started singing in my head and this collage was the result.

As you can see, the image is really beautiful. I printed her out and cut her out then decided to add wings. The gorgeous butterfly that I used for these is from June of Dezinaworld's fabulous Butterfly PNG set which I love because it's so versatile. I printed the image out on beige parchment paper and cut the wings out.
I then made a balloon using this rather jolly clown face also from The Graphics Fairy. I simply printed it out and drew the balloon shape by hand and cut it out and added a red string.
I assembled the pieces on the pretty dotty paper from the Polka Doodles Paper Boutique Volume 3 CD printed on to beige parchment paper and glued to strong card.
I then altered a plain wooden frame by painting it with antique white acrylic paint and stamping on a checkered design by Polka Doodles from the Wonderland set with various Palette and Stazon inks. I then dry brushed with more of the white for a soft look. I added computer generated text coloured with inks and stamped then dry brushed.

Bye for now,
Fliss xx

Orange And Black

2011-10-24T09:00:00.001+01:00

Good morning folks on a rather cold and very windy Monday. I hope you all had a lovely weekend and managed to get some crafting done too. I did quite a lot, some of which is under wraps still.
We have a new challenge for you today over at Make My Monday and continuing with the October Autumn theme, we have a colour challenge for you, Orange and Black, which can be Halloween or not, the choice is yours.
I wanted to do a Halloween project but don't own any stamps which fit this so I resorted to digital images and papers.

I decided on a fun and spooky creation because I love the spiders on the backing paper - they look so cute, unlike the real thing which I'm not at all keen on! The paper is from the Polka Doodles Polly Witchydoodles Halloween download bundle and I printed this out, tore the edges to distress them and inked them with Black Soot Distress ink.
The other elements are all from the Polka Doodles Sundae Of Seasons CD and I used the black and white digital stamps, colouring with Promarkers. I cut out the pumpkins and rounded them out with a large embossing ball tool before adding to the card with layers of foam tape for a 3D effect.
I added a larger bat and text printed with a Dymo label maker to finish.

The DT have some very varied projects to inspire you so do pop over for a look as there are some really gorgeous creations there. Talking of which, your entries for the last challenge were fabulous and it was so hard to pick only 3!

Challenges for my card:
CD Sunday - Halloween
Creative Inspirations Paint - Halloween
Dream Valley Challenges - Halloween
Gingerloft - Halloween or Fall
2 Sisters - Pumpkin Patch
Card Makin' Mamas - Halloween
Fashionista Friday - Spooky Fall
Raise The Bar - Orange and Black

Hope you all have a great week.
Hugs, Fliss xx

Coffee And Cream

2011-10-23T00:30:00.004+01:00

Hi everyone, hope you're all having a great weekend and managing to fit some crafting in too. It's rather cold still here on the south coast but at least my washing dried today!
It's now time for another new challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges and have to say that the amazing creations for the last one are going to cause the DT great problems in choosing the Top 3 so well done to everyone who took a strut down the catwalk this time.
The challenge for this fortnight is

Coffee and Cream with a Hint of Dark Chocolate

and as I said to the other DT members, it's all about how you like your coffee so if like me you like cappuccino and are partial to the occasional caramel latte or mocha, there are quite a few coffee shades to choose from which are reflected in my creation.

Ingredients for my card:

Stamps:

Lady and Paris Text - B Line Designs Le Brun

Eiffel Tower - Prickley Pear

Diamonds - Hero Arts

Dreams Text - Debbie Moore

French Script - Hero Arts

Cuttlebug Fleur De Lis Embossing Folder

Inks - VersaFine Vintage Sepia, Memento Rich Cocoa, Vintage Photo Distress Ink, Umber VersaColor

Coffee Marbled Card

Cream Crochet Lace, Coffee Lace

Manila Tag

Kraft Photo Corners - Paperchase
Clear Embossing Powder

The background paper is the coffee card stamped with the diamonds and the sepia ink, stamped twice before re-inking.

The Eiffel tower was stamped and embossed with clear powder and then inked round the edges and partially embossed then inked on the raised area.

The lovely lady was stamped with the sepia ink and coloured with Promarkers in coffee shades. I then cut her out and embossed her with clear powder.

I stamped the Paris text and then stamped the script over the top and cut this out. I embossed some card panels with the fleur de lis folder and inked these.

I assembled the card as you see and made the lady really stand out by adding 2 layers of stacked foam tape at the top as this gives a very 3D effect.

The Design Team have made some absolutely stunning creations to inspire you and it's well worth a look just to see how many interpretations of the theme there are. Also please remember that we're a stamping challenge so rubber and clear it is but no digis please!

Some challenges for my card:
Top Tip Tuesday - Layer It (quite a lot on mine!)
Moving Along With The Times - Vintage
Charisma Cardz - Embossing (Heat or Dry) (I have both)
Totally Papercrafts - Layer Upon Layer
Creative Inspirations - Monochromatic

Have a great Sunday.

Hugs, Fliss xx

Halloween

2011-10-21T09:00:00.004+01:00

Good morning folks it's Friday again so it's time for a new challenge over at Polka Doodles and I'm hoping this pops up as scheduled as I have an early hairdressers appointment (can't get parked otherwise).
Before I go on to the challenge, I'd like to say a big welcome here to all the new Design Team members especially Joanna who I already know as we're fellow DT members for Fashionable Stamping Challenges. I'm looking forward to getting to know everyone else.
This week's challenge in common with quite a few others at the moment has a Halloween theme and our Nikky has cooked up a gorgeous download especially for the challenge so don't forget to pop over to the challenge blog to see the fabulous spooky creations the teamies have made to inspire you.
Here's my spooky and rather cute creation:

I decided on a side step card as I wanted to include quite a few spooky elements. I covered the card with colour block sections of the same paper as I had some bits to use up and being a side step card, it worked out quite well. The papers together with the sentiment came from the Polly Witchydoodles Halloween Download Bundle.
I added the haunted house image and some rather cute and naughty looking pumpkins from the Sundae Of Seasons CD to the side elements.
I printed out Nikky's fabulous Halloween sheet and chose the very cute witch and her little black cat. I coloured the witch with a variety of Promarkers and gave her green hair for a fun look - I did think of giving her a green face (Wicked style) but I thought she looked a bit too cute for that! I cut her out and her little cat whose eyes I coloured with a Promarker and added them to a mat of white card cut out with a Papermania die.

I have a feeling this challenge will be very popular and can't wait to see all your entries.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Digital Tuesday - Happy Halloween
Flourishes Timeless Tuesday Challenge - Halloween Card/Project
Tuesday Throwdown - Shaped Card
Crafty Boots - Autumn Or Halloween
Creative Stamp Friends - Halloween
Hooked On Crafts - Something Spooky
Magical Monday - Halloween
Paper Creations Ink - Halloween
Paper Pretties - Halloween
Stamp Fairy - Spooky, Scary or Just Fun Halloween
The Crazy Challenge - Halloween
There's Magic In The Air - Halloween Colour
Delightful Challenges - Halloween
Crafting For All Seasons - Halloween
Divas By Design - Something Spooky
Inky Impressions - Trick Or Treat - Spooky Halloween

I did check all the rules for the above and think it's all OK but if I missed something, many apologies!
Have a great day everyone.
Fliss xx

Song Bird Collage

2011-10-19T16:42:00.000+01:00

Hello folks, hope you're all having a good week so far and don't know about where you are but on the UK South Coast I woke up this morning to 5 degrees and it's still October!!! Brrr! Woollies and thick socks on today.
Before I show you what I made today, I want to say a very big THANK YOU to the Design Teams of both Paper Play and Moving Along With The Times as they kindly picked my Autumn Floral Wreath which you can see HERE for their Top 3. I can't tell you how pleased I am!

I now have a little "just because" collage to show you, as in just because I felt like it!

My collage started out as many of mine do with a piece of recycled grey board which came from the back of a pad of accountancy paper. It was A4 size and I cut it in half. I then inked just the edges with Vintage Photo Distress ink.
I then took a piece of vintage music score (my incredible value Mikado score again) and added the large Tim Holtz flourish mask after tearing the edges. I sponged on Tumbled Glass, Stormy Sky, Dusty Concord, Victorian Velvet and Worn Lipstick inks before removing the mask.
I stamped on some flourishes from the Viva Decor My Paper World Floral Embellishments clear stamp set with Chipped Sapphire DI.
I printed a beautiful bird with lilacs image from The Graphics Fairy (thanks Karen!) on beige parchment card then stamped on the same flourish with Versamark ink, clear embossed it and sponged on some pink ink. I added the image to a mat, partly embossed with the Cuttlebug Textile folder and partly stamped with pink ink and a tiny flourish stamp.
I added pearls and a flower altered with Copics together with the sentiment from Paper Artsy Hot Pick 1005 to finish.

Happily, I found some challenges for my creation:
Try It On Tuesday - Taking To The Skies
Heart Song Inspirations - Flowers And/Or Felt
Incy Wincy Designs - Recycle (the backing for my collage is recycled grey board)

Bye for now.
Fliss xx

Autumn Flora And Fauna Inchies

2011-10-17T09:00:00.003+01:00

Brrrr! Good morning everyone on a rather chilly Monday. Hoping that you all had a lovely weekend. Mine was rather busy as I had my younger daughter home from uni for the weekend and I had DT work to do plus preparations for a card making class I'm teaching this morning. My designing didn't get done until the evening whilst I watched the Strictly results followed by the X Factor results and then Downton Abbey (wasn't it sad yesterday).
Now I must stop waffling on as there's a new challenge today over at Make My Monday. We're continuing Caz's Autumn theme and this week the challenge is to make Flora and Fauna Inchies for Autumn.
Here's my inspiration for you which is a little collage:

The base of my collage is a piece of recycled cardboard from a cereal box and I covered it with some rather lovely handmade paper with leaves and flower petals embedded in it.
I made the inchies using a Magenta cling set - CSET28 and chose the floral tiles. I stamped them with VersaFine Vintage Sepia and Spanish Moss and then coloured them with layers of Distress inks, Promarkers and Prisma pencils.
I assembled it as you see, adding the cute little owl from the Inkadinkado 97729 Bird Assortment clear set, coloured with Promarkers and some flourishes cut with a Sissix die from vintage music paper and coloured with Crushed Olive Distress ink. So there you have it - finished!

The Design Team have made some gorgeous projects to inspire you so do pop on over for a look and hope to see you there.

I'd like to enter my collage in the following challenges:
Corrosive Challenges - Flying Things
Delightful Challenges - Colours Of Fall
Scrappy Frogs - Something That Flies
Stamptacular Sunday - You Choose
Kaboodle Doodles - Squares Or Inchies

That's it for now so have a great day.
Fliss xx

Ribbons And Bows

2011-10-14T09:00:00.002+01:00

Good morning all on a rather chilly but beautiful Autumn day. The sun is shining and I can see the trees in their Autumn coats from my window - heaven!
It's Friday again and we have a new challenge over at Polka Doodles which has been chosen by Emma. She would like to see your creation with Ribbons/ Bows and I rather think the DT has been making a lot of cards with Nikky's new mini CD, Pretty Sweet, which we all love so much.

Here's my card:

I really love the patchwork look at the moment and of course, it's an ideal way to use up those scraps of paper left over from other projects. I had quite a few bits after making some samples up for Nikky and I've used them here.
I cut out squares of the 3 papers, then trimmed them with pinking scissors and added faux stitching by piercing holes and then going round with a brown fine liner pen. I added these to a kraft card blank. I added the cute Amelia image cut out to an oval shape on a matching mat of scrap pink dotty paper. To finish I simply added a big ribbon bow and a sentiment from the CD cut out with a scallop circle Nestabilities die.

Can't wait to see all the entries as it's bound to be a popular theme. Do pop over to the challenge blog to look at the DT inspiration too as they've really outdone themselves with this one!

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Charisma Cardz - In Stitches
Do You Stack Up? - Use Your Scraps
Meljens Designs - Use A Ribbon
Whimsy Inspires - Punches And/Or Die Cuts

Have a lovely weekend.
Hugs, Fliss xx

Autumn Trees

2011-10-10T09:00:00.002+01:00

Good morning folks, Monday is here again so it's time for a new challenge over at Make My Monday. We're continuing with our theme for October, AUTUMN, and this week would like to see a creation with a Tree or Trees.
My inspiration again includes a lot of leaves - almost my entire collection I think!

Supplies Used:
Solid Leaf Stamps - Mine are Rubber Stampede, Hero Arts and Crafty Individuals
Tree Stamp - Hobby Art
Script Stamp - Artistic Outpost
Distress Inks - Scattered Straw, Crushed Olive, Rusty Hinge
Brilliance Inks - Crimson Copper, Pearlescent Rust
VersaFine - Vintage Sepia
StazOn - Timber Brown
Nestabilities - Circle, Scallop Circle
Border Punch - Martha Stewart
Promarkers
Textured Natural Ribbon
Hole Punch, Needle & Thread
Beige Parchment Paper - Southfield Stationers
Shrink Plastic - White and Frosted

The background paper was made using the leaves which were layer stamped from lightest to darkest using the inks. I then sponged Scattered Straw over the top to blend everything together.
The tree was stamped on cream card with the sepia ink and clear embossed. It was trimmed to a circle with the die then set on a scalloped mat of brown and a further circle sponged with Rusty hinge round just the edges.
I made a shrink plastic embellishment with the tree stamp and StazOn ink. This was stamped on the frosted plastic, cut out with a scallop die and shrunk. I then added colour with the Promarkers and set on a further mat of white shrink plastic in a scalloped shape.
I made up the card with the brown border punched and trimmed with a strip of the textured ribbon on which I stitched the tree charm. I added the sentiment by Artistic Outpost to finish.

The Design Team have some gorgeous samples to inspire you so do pop over for a look and hope to see some gorgeous entries again.

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Card Cupids - Use A Decorative Punch
One Stitch At A Time - Anything Goes
Paper Sundaes - Favourite Colour Combination (Autumn shades)
Sentimental Sundays - Anything Goes + Sentiment
Our Daily Bread Designs - Make Your Own Embellishment
Sew Many Cards - Burnt Orange, Yellow and Brown

Have a great week.
Fliss xx

Autumn Floral Wreath

2011-10-09T00:30:00.003+01:00

Hello everyone, hope you're all having a good weekend in spite of the cold weather that has suddenly appeared after the mini heatwave.
It's time for the next challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges and this fortnight we want to see a lovely parade of Anything But A Card.
I have to confess I slightly struggled with this as I couldn't quite decide what to do until a good trawl through my treasured collection of Somerset Studio gallery magazines which always help the creative juices return.
I decided on a little wall hanging decoration in more of those glowing Autumn shades I can't get enough of at the moment. There's a photo of the finished decoration and underneath you'll find a few pics to hopefully show how the wreath came about, so here we go:

Both of the above papers were brayered with stripes of Distress inks going from light to dark. They were then stamped with the same inks and the Viva Decor My Paper World Letters and Embellishments clear stamp set.

I then used various punches (Woodware and Papermania) to punch out the flower parts and layered them up with foam tape - a little inking with darker Distress inks brought out the petal edges.

I made the leaves with a Woodware punch and scraps of inked and stamped decorated papers from my bits box. The flowers and leaves were then attached with foam tape to a ring card shape cut out with my trusty Creative Memories circle cutting set.
As you can see, it really isn't that difficult so I'm hoping you're all ready to strut your stuff!

I'm entering my wreath in the following challenges:
Fussy and Fancy - Fall or Halloween
Glitter Geeks - Flower Power
Stampin For The Weekend - Colours of Autumn
Stamping With The Dragon - Fall Colours
Moving Along With The Times - Autumn Leaves
Scrapalicious - Hang It Up!
Paper Play - Autumnal Colours
One Stop Craft Challenge - Anything Goes

Have a great day,
Fliss xx

Handmade Flowers

2011-10-07T09:00:00.000+01:00

Good morning everyone on a very chilly Friday. It looks like Autumn has finally arrived and I was rather surprised to find my hubby had put the heating on this morning as he is normally the last one to do this!

We have a new challenge for you over at Polka Doodles and this time it's my turn to choose the theme. As I'm sure you know, I really like making my own card elements in lots of ways so my challenge to you is to show some Handmade Flowers on your creation. You can use punches, die cuts, stamps, decoupage - in fact anything but pre-made paper or silk flowers.

I've used elements for my card that you can find on the A Double Sprinkle Of Kraft CD which I love for the pretty shabby chic papers.
I've made a favourite shaped card that I really love at the moment as it's quite easy to do but looks very different. This is quite a big card but will still fit in an A5 size envelope as I made sure that the raised central panel doesn't exceed the measurements.
I covered the card base with striped paper and then added a strip of floral paper trimmed with scallop scissors and inked to emphasize the edges. I then added a scalloped border from the CD.
I made the central panel with a cute girl image, coloured with Prisma pencils and then ran a warm grey Promarker round the edges of the image to make her pop out more. I layered the image panel on contrasting papers and then on a scalloped panel which I hand trimmed with scallop scissors and inked with brown.
I finished off with a flower made from scraps of paper and a Woodware punch and emboss punch. I inked the edges and added silk flower stamens to the centre. I also made the embossing show up more by using a large embossing ball tool in the embossed lines.

I hope you can enter and look forward to seeing the flowers you create.

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Crafts and Me - Use A Digi
Fab 'n' Funky - Die Cuts/Punches
Penny's Paper-Crafty - Anything Goes
Color Throwdown

Anything Goes Challenge - Die Cuts/ Punches or both

Have a lovely day,
Fliss xx

Polka Doodles DT Call

2011-10-04T13:06:00.001+01:00

Hello all, just to let you know that our Nikky, head doodler over at Polka Doodles is looking for some new talent to join the Design Team and here's a little of what she says:
Yep, we need some new blood to join our lovely talented team on this challenge blog and also to make samples for shows and TV! So, if you LOVE colouring and you're great with your Promarkers, Copics, Prisma's and Watercolours (or any other colouring medium) and it's your speciality then please email us with a link to your blog and NO MORE than 50 words about yourself and why you want to be on the Polkadoodles team. If you don't like colouring then don't worry - we cater for everyone, but you do need to be able to use digital products and rubber stamp. It doesn't matter if you're a cardmaker, scrapbooker, a stamper or a CD crafter, we need someone who can be versatile and fit within the other talents on our fabulous, happy team. We look for all kinds of abilities and styles so you've gotta be in it, to win it, as the saying goes! You MUST have a blog where you post regularly. You MUST be able to commit to participating in the challenge blog 3 times per month, making TV samples when required AND commenting on challenge entries each week, so please ensure you can do all this before you apply - this is a permanent position and you must be able to offer the commitment we need.

The rest of the details and requirements are on the challenge blog so just hop over for a look if you'd like to be part of a friendly creative team and work with Nikky's fabulous products.

Good luck!
Fliss xx

Autumn Resist

2011-10-03T09:00:00.003+01:00

Good morning everyone on another fine and sunny day. Being the start of a new month, can't believe it's October already, we have a new theme over at Make My Monday and no surprise here - it's AUTUMN. The challenge for this week is to use the monthly theme with a RESIST technique and if you're not sure about this, I know that there's a link to one on the challenge blog and if you read my blurb here, you'll find that I have used a resist technique I designed just over 2 years ago which is perfect for this. The link to my tutorial is below in the card details.

Supplies Used:
Solid Leaf Stamps - Hero Arts, Rubber Stampede
Open Leaf Stamp - Personal Impressions
Script Stamp - Butterfly Kisses
Distress Inks - Wild Honey, Rusty Hinge, Barn Door, Fired Brick, Crushed Olive, Mustard Seed, Old Paper
StazOn Inks - Timber Brown, Pumpkin, Olive Green
Embossing Ink
Clear Embossing Powder
White Embossing Powder
Copper Embossing Powder
Tag - Mine is a recycled clothing tag with fab distressed edges
Vintage Music Score
Twine
Kraft Card Blank

The decorated paper was made using some of the Distress inks and StazOn inks with my TWIST ON RESIST TECHNIQUE which you will find HERE.
I covered the part of the tag with writing on with a piece of torn, inked music score. I stamped and embossed the leaves with clear powder, coloured them with Distress inks and cut them out.
I added a stamped, embossed text panel inked to colour and the edges copper embossed and a twine bow to finish.

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Paper Sundaes - Lots Of Layers
Stamptacular Sunday - Photo Inspiration

Craft Your Days Away - Tag It!
Our Craft Lounge - Fall Foliage

Have a lovely week everyone,
Fliss xx

A Wish From The Heart

2011-10-02T18:28:00.001+01:00

Hope everyone's been having a good weekend in all the lovely sunshine we have at the moment. I've just returned from visiting my parents in law and have a quick post to share a card I made at the last minute for the UK Stampers Stash Buster challenge to use glitter on your creation which ends at 12 midnight today.

The main part here is the blingy button heart which I made a while back for a project and it didn't fit so it's been sitting in my bits box since then and I decided to use it for the challenge. I had applied Diamond Glaze all over the painted heart to stick the buttons, pearls and jewels on and sprinkled pink glitter on to cover the remaining glue.
As it's quite busy, I made a simple card covered with paper embossed with a Tim Holtz Texture Fade folder and inked this with Spun Sugar and Milled Lavender Distress inks. I swiped Cotton Candy glitter glue over the top. The plain side was trimmed with the Martha Stewart arch lattice border punch and then swiped with VersaMark ink and embossed with clear powder with glitter added.
I finished off with text and a heart from a Tim Holtz sentiment. I cut these out as the whole thing was a little too large for the card.

I'd like to welcome Gail to my blog as my 200th follower and will soon be having a giveaway to celebrate as I was so excited to see I'd reached my second century today.
Thanks so much to everyone who follows and those that leave me such lovely comments.
Fliss xx

Autumn Fruits Collage

2011-10-01T17:38:00.000+01:00

Hello everyone, I hope you're all enjoying the somewhat unseasonal heatwave we seem to be having at the moment. I'm on the South coast so we do at least have a sea breeze to keep it a little cooler.
I have a collage to show you that is in my favourite warm, glowing Autumn colours and will be hanging in my kitchen as it has a fruit theme.

Supplies used:
Pear stamp (unknown as I've had this one for over 10 years)
Script stamp - Anna Griffin
Jar stamp - Inspiration Jars from The Artistic Stamper
Distress Inks - Scattered Straw, Wild Honey, Mustard Seed, Crushed Olive, Peeled Paint, Worn Lipstick, Aged Mahogany, Old Paper, Frayed Burlap, Rusty Hinge
VersaFine Inks - Spanish Moss, Toffee, Vintage Sepia
Brown Fineliner
Corrugated packaging and cardboard packaging
Beige Parchment Paper
Checked Wired Ribbon
Acrylic Paints - Olive Green and Golden Green

I've used the parchment paper for the inked and stamped background as well as the jar and pears which were stamped and sponged with ink to colour. This paper is very good for inking as the inks move around well.
The edges of the packaging were inked and the torn edged paper added. The corrugated card was painted with the acrylics and the collage assembled as you see. The text is computer generated and was inked. The jar label is cut out with a small Nestabilties label die and was hand doodled and written on.

I'm entering my collage in the following challenges:
The Stamp Man - Pears or Pairs
Sir Stampalot Challenge - Food Glorious Food
The Artistic Stamper Challenge - Autumn Colours

Hope you all enjoy the rest of the weekend.
Fliss xx

Birthday Ages

2011-09-30T09:00:00.005+01:00

Good morning all on a rather hot and sunny Friday morning, the summer has certainly returned this last few days and I put my woollies away again.
We have a new challenge for you over at Polka Doodles chosen this time by Colette and she would like to see cards with an Age on. My younger daughter and all her friends will soon be turning 21 so I decided to get a head start on the cards.

I've gone for pretty pastels using a yellow stitched style paper from the Double Sprinkle Of Kraft CD with a border of pretty pink paper which was a leftover scrap from the Sundae Of Seasons CD.
I printed out the numbers (Double Sprinkle CD) on very smooth card, cut out into a circle and clear embossed it before the ink dried. I put this on a contrast scalloped mat.
I finished off with a lovely sentiment from the Double Sprinkles CD and a little stamped butterfly (Hobby Art) coloured with Promarkers.
Make sure you pop over to the challenge blog for some fabulous inspiration from the Design Team and hope to see you there.

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Simon Says Stamp - Anything Goes
Flutterby Wednesdays - Anything Goes (with butterfly, fairy or angel)
Anything Goes Challenge - Anything Goes

Have a lovely day and a great weekend,
Fliss xx

A Contemplative Mood

2011-09-27T11:32:00.000+01:00

Hello all and hope you've had a good start to the week. I wasn't actually going to do a post today but I came cross something (whilst looking for something else of course!) that I haven't yet put on here so I decided that today's the day to share it with you.
This is largely because I've been making samples with Nikky's gorgeous new mini CD, Pretty Sweet, which will be on Create and Craft on Friday and I'm now in a mood for making really pretty things so this is the perfect time to show you this little piece of artwork.

This started life as one of the chipboard pages from a Papermania bare elements chipboard album and I find these really useful for making little wall hanging pieces of artwork. They come in several different shapes with the holes already in them. I painted my scallop shaped piece with aqua acrylic paint and then stamped on flourishes from the Viva Decor My Paper World Floral Embellishments clear set (available from The Craft Barn) with Distress embossing ink and embossed with clear powder. I then painted over the top with the same colour for a subtle textured effect.
The paper I used is Papermania Rose Garden and I inked the edges of a square with pink ink and then added a double border of paper scraps. I double mounted the gorgeous lady from the Dezinaworld Spring Ladies collage sheet on contrasting card and added her together with some pink pearls.
To finish, I added a layered paper and fabric flower and knotted pink ribbon through the top.

I'd like to enter my wall art in the following challenges:
Stamp With Fun - Sketch

Cupcake Inspirations - Photo Inspiration

Creative Stamp Friends - Anything But A Card
My Craft Spot - Ribbon

Before I go, I'd like to welcome Rebekah to my blog. Lovely to see you and hope to get to know you soon.
Fliss xx

Steampunk Garden

2011-09-26T09:15:00.004+01:00

As promised, I'm back and this is where you might need your sunglasses as my artwork will surely brighten up a dull day!
Today we have the final Steampunk Challenge for you over at Make My Monday and this week we would like to see Anything But A Card with a Steampunk Theme.
My creation started life as a piece of cardboard packaging which I decided to recycle and when I painted it with several shades of olive green the underlying corrugated cardboard bobbled up and came through to give a rather interesting (or at least I thought so!) textured effect.
I then went a little mad and OTT with my collection of Artistic Stamper steampunk stamps - this is the bit where you need the sunglasses as here it is! Also if you click on the pic to enlarge it, it's not quite such a shock - honest lol

I stamped the flowers with black, crimson red and habanero VersaFine inks and embossed them with clear powder. I then sponged them with Distress Inks in Spiced Marmalade, Barn Door, Fired Brick, Victorian Velvet and Worn Lipstick.
I stamped the leaves with black, spanish moss and olympia green VersaFine inks and again embossed with clear powder. I then sponged these with Crushed Olive and Peeled Paint.
I cut them all out (a bit of a labour of love here as it took ages lol) and glued the flowers to some glitzy copper wire. I then added these to my painted background as you see.
I then stamped the glamorous lady (Time To Stamp), coloured her with Promarkers and stamped the plain butterfly, also coloured with a Promarker to turn her into a fairy.
I added the cute little steampunk snail (so sweet with his top hat) coloured with Vintage Photo DI as a finishing touch.

I'm entering my little piece of artwork in the following challenges:
Crafty Emma's Challenge - Recycle
Mark's Finest Papers - Things With Wings
Hanna & Friends - Anything Goes
Little Miss Muffet - Things With Wings
The Sunday Stamper - Simply Irresistable

Thanks for looking and once again, have a great week.
Fliss xx

Fetch A Sketch Challenge 7 - Guest Designer

2011-09-26T09:00:00.003+01:00

Good morning everyone on a rather dull and dark Monday, it looks like rain will be here soon but I do have a post a bit later that might cause you to bring out the sunglasses! Not this one though.
I'm here now with my last card for Fetch A Sketch as I've come to the last post as September's Guest Designer. I would like to thank Ruth and Jenny for having me as I've so enjoyed doing the challenges - I find sketches really help if you're a bit stuck for ideas and sometimes do this myself to start off the creative process.
The sponsor for this challenge is our lovely Nikky of Polka Doodles and there's a fabulous prize for the winner so do pop over for a peek.
Here's my card and there's a reminder of the sketch underneath.

My card features papers and a cute image from the brand new Polka Doodles mini CD, Pretty Sweet. The papers and elements on there are just that with yummy colours and designs with a vintage, shabby chic edge.
To add a little extra texture I printed out the pink and white paper on linen card and it really does give it a fabric like feel. I added this to a scalloped card blank as I decided to go for all over pretty!
I added the image to a plain mat of Bazzill card cut with a Papermania large rectangular scalloped die. I then added a border of pretty patchwork paper trimmed with pinking shears and made the bunting from the same paper by marking out the measurements on the white reverse and cutting it out with scissors.
I finished off with a pretty greeting from the CD and a lilac gingham bow.

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Aly's Sunday Challenge - Bows
Corrosive Challenges - Punches And/Or Dies
Paper Sundaes - Anything Goes
Our Craft Lounge - Patterned Papers

Have a good week.
Fliss xx

Vintage

2011-09-25T00:30:00.003+01:00

Hello everyone, it's time for a new challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges and you certainly rocked the last one with all the gorgeous tags on display.
The theme for this fortnight is Vintage which I absolutely adore and I'm sure a lot of you do too so there are sure to be a lot of entries this time. You can make whatever you like but please remember that it must include some stamping.
I've made an 8 x 8 card as the image as chose to use and which I've had for a while is quite large and I wanted to do some stamped papers to go behind it.

I really love this collage style image which is Paper Artsy Wings Plate 5 and I've had this in my collection for a number of years. I stamped it with VersaFine Imperial Purple and then inked it with VersaColor cubes in Old Rose, Cinnamon, Topaz and Lilac. I added colour to the adorable little angels wings with an aqua pencil and then painted on a touch of Stickles.
I set the panel on a mount stamped around the edges with a tiny Anna Griffin stamp that I've also had for years (the code is 580C02). I embossed with gold detail powder and sponged on burgundy ink.
I made a background paper with parchment paper sponged with Tattered Rose and Victorian Velvet Distress inks, stamping on the large flourish corner from the Viva Decor My Paper World Big Corner Elements clear stamp set with the Victorian Velvet.
I tore a piece of dusty pink handmade paper with deep pink flecks and attached this to an 8 x 8 kraft card blank. I added the pink flourish panel and then some cream crochet lace. I added the image panel and then some pink pearls.
I finished off with a layered flower - the larger one was altered with the Old Rose and Topaz inks and the centre is a German Gold Scrap flower from Paper Artsy.

I also urge you to visit the challenge blog as the creations by the Design Team are totally stunning and you couldn't wish for better inspiration to spark your creativity.

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:
Fairy Fun Fridays - Pink and Distressed
Raise The Bar - Things With Wings
Sugar Creek Hollow - Vintage Children
Emerald Faerie Garden - Pearls
Wags 'n' Whiskers - Lace
Deep Ocean Challenge - Lace

Thanks for looking and Happy Sunday,
Fliss xx

Less Is More Take Five

2011-09-23T10:29:00.001+01:00

Well, I'm back again with what will be my last entry for the Less Is More Anything Goes 1000 entry challenge as my younger daughter is off back to uni tomorrow and I have loads to do on the washing, helping with packing etc front.
Thanks to Chrissie and Mandi for this challenge too and for commenting on all the entries which must take an age. Good luck with your goal ladies and hope you get there.

The image here is also by La Blanche as I really lovely their pretty stamps. I stamped in black and coloured with my Prisma pencils again. I then stamped the circular greeting by Inkadinkado in black and coloured this with Tumbled Glass and Worn Lipstick Distress inks. I have to say that I really like these pretty scalloped card blanks by Papermania as they add a lovely detail to clean and simple cards.

The cards I made for this challenge will all be going off to a local charity shop in memory of a lovely crafting friend that I lost just over a year ago. She spent a lot of time making cards for the local hospice and is very much missed.

Fliss xx

Distress It

2011-09-23T09:06:00.001+01:00

Good morning everyone on a rather cold but very sunny Friday. I don't know where the last week went but it's time once again for a new challenge over at Polka Doodles and this week Emma has chosen the theme of Distress It so you can do some ripping, sanding, scrunching and so on to add a bit of shabbiness to your creation.
I really loved this challenge and have made something a little different:

I used the gorgeous bird cage from the Paper Boutique Vol 3 CD and distressed it up somewhat! I printed out the black and white digital stamp twice then distressed one with Tarnished Gold embossing powder (Ranger Antiquities). I then coloured elements of the second one with Promarkers, cut out the horizontal bar sections and added them to the cage with the inner spaces cut out.
I then die cut some branches with a Sissix set and coloured these with Distress inks in Crushed Olive, Spiced Marmalade and Rusty Hinge for an Autumn feel. I die cut the bird from the Tim Holtz Sissix set and coloured this with DIs using Rusty Hinge, Vintage photo and Barn Door for the wing.
I punched some flowers, coloured these with Promarkers and layered them up. I added all the elements to a kraft card covered with torn edged paper from the CD as it has a lovely shabby look which was perfect for my card.
I finished off with some butterflies punched from the inky scrap paper resulting from colouring the branches as it looked too good to waste!

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
CCEE Stampers - Add A Bird
Paper Play - Autumn Leaves
Crafting For All Seasons - Fall Colours

Do pop over to the challenge blog to see the DT inspiration as there are some fabulous ideas there.
Have a great weekend.
Fliss xx

Less Is More Take Four

2011-09-22T22:03:00.000+01:00

And another one! There will be more tomorrow too as I'm on a roll at the moment and can't seem to stop!
I'll wish good luck here to the lovely ladies of Less Is More too and hope they reach the target.

A really simple one here with the lovely dahlia stamp by Circa Design which was stamped in black, coloured with Prisma pencils and then inked with VersaColor Bisque. The sentiment by Hobby Art was stamped with VersaFine Spanish Moss.

Fliss xx

Less Is More Take Three

2011-09-22T21:58:00.000+01:00

Here's the next one folks for the Less Is More 1000 entry challenge and I'm really enjoying my colouring at the moment so this one has more of that:

The cute stamp here is called Big Hat and is again by La Blanche who have some really gorgeous vintage images at the moment. She was stamped with Vintage Sepia VersaFine ink and coloured with Prisma pencils. The sentiment is an old one by Anita's that I've had for ages and is also stamped with the sepia ink.

Fliss xx

Less Is More Take Two

2011-09-22T21:17:00.000+01:00

I'm back again with the second one for Less Is More and things were getting easier so here it is:

The stamp here is Among The Daisies by La Blanche and was stamped in VersaFine Olympia Green and coloured with Prisma pencils and VersaColor Split Pea ink. The little butterflies are Hobby Art and the Hero Arts sentiment was stamped with the same dark green ink.

More to follow shortly as my hubby is calling me down to watch TV!
Fliss xx

Less Is More Take One

2011-09-22T21:11:00.000+01:00

Hello everyone, after seeing all the blog entries of the last few days about the Less Is More 1000 entry challenge I decided to join in with the fun. This is a real challenge for me as I find doing less very difficult!
Here's the first of several I managed to come up with:

This uses the Technique Tuesday Pocket Full O' Posies clear stamp set. I stamped the big bloom and some leaves in black and then coloured the flower with Mustard Seed, Dried Marigold and Worn Lipstick Distress inks and the leaves with Crushed Olive.
I streaked the card with Scattered Straw, Crushed olive and Spun Sugar DIs and stamped on the sentiment by Hobby Art with VersaFine Spanish Moss.

More to follow!
Fliss xx

A Decorative Mood

2011-09-21T09:00:00.002+01:00

Morning everyone, I won't say it's a good one today as it's dark, miserable and grey - not to mention rather cold! I have something quite bright to show you that might cheer up a dull day though.
It's my turn to do the Mid Week Motivation for the Steampunk with Metal Challenge over at Make My Monday this week and I've done a tutorial on how to get a fabulous metal look on your creations without breaking the bank! So of you pop on over, you'll see how I made the dress form on my tag below:

The details of the dress form are on the tutorial and the rest of the supplies used to make the tag and the wings are as follows:
Wings - The Artistic Stamper Steampunk Butterflies
Background Stamps - Grungy Numbers from Paper Artsy Gentlemen Plate 4
Text from Paper Artsy Wrought Iron 3 USW13
Embossing Folder - Mini Steampunk from Tim Holtz Texture Trades Artful Muse set
Additional Inks - Stormy Sky and Dusty Concord Distress Inks, Black VersaFine Ink
Clear Embossing Powder
Drill Ribbon (altered with the StazOn inks)

I'm entering my tag in the Simon Says Stamp challenge - Dies To Die For (Tim Holtz Sewing Room)

No crafting for me today as when this pops up I shall be in the middle of preparing a VAT return!
I would like to say hello and welcome to Jane before I go - thanks so much for joining my followers.
Fliss xx

Up Up And Away

2011-09-19T09:10:00.002+01:00

Hello and welcome to this week's challenge at Make My Monday. We're continuing with the September theme of Steampunk chosen by Cath and this week the added extra is to use some Metal on your creation.
Although I do have a few metal embellishments, I don't have any metal sheet in my stash so I decided to improvise and here's the result:

My collage started off as a frame mount which I stamped all over in black with the Artistic Stamper cogs stamp. I then inked over the top with Wild Honey, Vintage Photo and Spiced Marmalade Distress inks and I have to admit I added a little too much of the orange - my only excuse for this is that I was shouting at the TV in annoyance at the time as I was watching the X Factor auditions!!!
I then embossed a piece of aluminium foil backed with card with the Cuttlebug clockworks folder and coloured this with Olive Green, Midnight Blue, Timber Brown and Jet Black StazOn inks.
The glamorous lady is by The Graphics Fairy and her fabulous top hat is from the Steampunk 3 Collage Set by the lovely June of Dezinaworld. I cut these out, rounded them out with a large embossing ball tool and added them with foam tape.
The gorgeous hot air balloon that you see here started off as a fabulous pencil drawing by my daughter Sarah (studying a Fashion degree) which she drew to make a bookmark and matching card for her Dad for Fathers Day. I altered the size a little to fit my collage then added colour with Distress inks, cut it out and embossed it with clear powder to add some definition.
The finishing touch is a Dymo text label.

I can't wait to see what everyone comes up with for this challenge as the entries for the monochrome challenge were just fabulous. For inspiration, look no further than the challenge blog as the other DT ladies have come up with some stunning creations!

I'm entering my collage in the following challenges:
Creatalicious - Anything Goes
Papercraft Star - Anything Goes
Simon Says Stamp - Song or Film Title Inspired (Up Up and Away)
Gingerloft - Vintage or Distressed
Quirky Crafts - Anything But A Card
Scrappy Frogs - Vintage
Linking to The Graphics Fairy Brag Monday too.

I'll be back on Wednesday with a tutorial for Make My Monday for the current theme of metal.
See you then!
Fliss xx

Fetch A Sketch Challenge 7 - Guest Designer

2011-09-19T09:00:00.002+01:00

Good morning everyone on a very chilly Monday. Hope you all had a lovely weekend too and are rested and ready for the week ahead. I'm teaching a class this morning and hopefully by the time this pops up I should be a great deal more ready for it than I was when I drafted this post!
This is my second and last challenge as guest designer for Ruth and Jenny of Fetch A Sketch and the sponsor for this one is our lovely Nikky of Polka Doodles. There's a really great sketch this time perfect for celebration or Christmas so without further ado, here it is:

As you can see. I chose to make a Christmas card and used digital stamps, embellishments and papers from the Magical Winter CD set which has loads of elements for Winter themed cards and of course, Christmas!
I covered a kraft card blank with the blue dotty paper and then added a torn strip with a dotty ribbon and bow.
I printed out the jolly snowman and the Merry Christmas bunting and coloured these with Promarkers. I made the scarf look woolly by colouring all over with a pale blue marker then adding dotted stripes with 2 darker shades of blue and 2 greens. I hope you like the effect.
I cut these out and assembled the card as you see. Simples!

Do pop over to the challenge blog to see all the gorgeous samples and details of the challenge prize which is sure to be fabulous!

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
The Squirrel And The Fox - Anything Goes
Jingle Belles - Christmas including a digi
Crafty Ribbons - Anything Goes
Cute Card Thursday - Anything Goes
Paper Creations Ink - Buttons Or Bows

Thanks for looking and have a good week,
Fliss xx

Whiteout!

2011-09-16T09:00:00.005+01:00

Morning everyone and no, it's not snowing! It's just the theme for this week's challenge at Polka Doodles chosen by Enfys. It actually looks more like rain here this morning as it's sunny at the moment but there was a very red sky earlier and the old saying about the shepherd's warning springs to mind.

Before I go on to the challenge, I'd like to welcome Joan, Debbie-Anne and Jane to my blog - lovely to see you here ladies.

This week's theme is Whiteout and Enfys would like to see your all white creations although black outlines for stamped images are allowed. I have to say I was a bit stumped by this one as I do love my colour and although Christmas did pop into my head for a moment, I decided against that and made a romantic vintage style card with loads of texture instead.

I actually photographed the card against a pink background as my usual white one made it disappear! You may also need to click on the pic to see the card properly as a white blog background dosen't help either!
As you can see, I've used embossing folders to add texture and made 2 panels, trimming the dotty one with scallop scissors to add detail. I die cut a white glitter scalloped circle with a Nestabilities die and some letters to spell love from the same card from an old Quickutz set.
My frilly flower is made from some of the black and white flowers from the All Around & Everywhere CD and I cut them out inside the black lines. I scrunched them up and then layered them up to make the flower, adding a vintage pearly button centre. The finishing touch is some lovely crunchy white crochet lace.

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Deep Ocean Challenge - Lace
Everybody Art - Flowers
4 Crafty Chicks - Embossing

This is also now linked up to the lovely Cindy Adkins Shabby Chic Girls Club - click HERE for details. Well worth a look if you love shabby chic and vintage.

Thanks for looking and have a great weekend,
Fliss xx
PS: Do check out the Polka Doodles website as there's a brand new mini CD on the block and it's adorable! I got my hands on it yesterday and the papers on there are to die for, plus there are loads of really cute images too.

Fetch A Sketch Challenge 6 - Decoupage Fairy

2011-09-12T09:30:00.001+01:00

I'm back with another post as today is the mid way in the Sketch 6 challenge over at Fetch A Sketch and you have nearly a week still to get your entries in.
Here's a reminder of the sketch:

Here's my card with uses Claire of Jellypark's cute decoupage fairy:

I printed out the fairy and cut out all the elements then layered them up with foam tape. I rubbed the back of the wings with a large embossing ball tool to give them a bit of shape then added the fairy to a circle of white card embossed with the Cuttlebug Paisley folder.

I chose a favourite paper, Basic Grey Lemonade and covered my card blank with a piece of floral paper having first rounded the corners. I added a layered central bar also with rounded corners. I finished off with a sentiment from Inkadinkado stamped on some of the patterned paper and cut out and some Prima flowers - I altered the colours to match with Promarkers - with button centres.

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:

Alphabet Challenge - P Is For Pretty Pastels

Totally Papercrafts - Cute With Buttons

Flutterby Wednesday - Anything Goes

My Mum's Craft Shop - Layer It Up

Thanks for looking,

Fliss xx

Monochrome Steampunk Collage

2011-09-12T09:00:00.003+01:00

Hello everyone on a very wild, windy and wet Monday, I think the hurricane leftovers have now reached Sussex so I don't think I'll be going far today!
Being Monday, we have a new challenge for you over at Make My Monday. Continuing with the September theme of Steampunk, this week we would like you to create a Monochrome project which I think suits steampunk very well.
I'm definitely addicted to this type of artwork now so expect lots more over the next few weeks! The piece I made for this challenge is a favourite with my hubby who loves the airship in particular. I shall be raiding his books soon as he has quite a lot with vintage engineering diagrams.
Here's my effort:

You may need to click on the pic to see the full detail as I couldn't fit a very large photo on without cropping part of the collage.
Ingredients Used:
Airship - Creative Expressions
Buildings - Crafty Individuals
Cogs and Gears - The Artistic Stamper
Elaborate Clock - B Line Designs
Victorian Gentleman - The Graphics Fairy
Pocket Watch - Vintage Feedsacks
Inks - VersaFine Vintage Sepia, Distress Inks in Vintage Photo, Frayed Burlap, VersaColor Umber, Sand Beige
Promarkers in brown shades

Using the Vintage Sepia ink, I stamped a row of the buildings on white card and then stamped the airship at the top left. I coloured the images with a mix of Distress inks and VersaColor inks then added detail with Promarkers. I stamped the cogs and gears at the top right corner, stamping with the Vintage Sepia ink, stamping a second time without re-inking the stamp.
I stamped the B Line Designs Time stamp with the sepia ink, coloured with inks, cut this out and fixed in the top right corner before trimming the excess.
I printed out the gentleman and pocket watch images having first altered the colours a little in Photoshop to give them a sepia tone. I coloured them with Distress inks and cut them out.
I added some detail to the sky by cutting a cloud style paper template with 2 sizes of scallop scissors and sponged on some clouds with the Sand Beige ink.
I finished off as you see, adding a little propeller to the gentleman's hat made by stamping part of the airship and cutting it out.

I can't tell you how much I enjoyed making this and I'll also enjoy looking at your creations. Do pop over to the challenge blog to see the other DT samples as they're fabulous.

I'm entering my collage in the following challenges:
Simon Says Stamp And Show Some Steampunk (How about that for timing!)
The Stamp Man - Monchrome
Just For Fun - Timeless Vintage
Paper Play - Use 2 Or More Stamped Images

I'd also like to say hello and welcome to Julia and all the new ladies from the Fashionable Stamping Challenges who have all joined my blog.
Have a great week.
Fliss xx

Make A Tag With Fashionable Stamping Challenges

2011-09-11T00:30:00.007+01:00

Hello everyone, it's time for the 4th challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges but before I give you the details for this, I just want to say that everyone who was affected by the catastrophic act of terrorism on 9/11 is in my thoughts today. I know that I will remember the complete horror I felt on the day for the rest of my life and it's obviously unimaginable for those people who lost loved ones on the day.
Our new challenge runs for the next fortnight and this one has the theme of Make A Tag which gives plenty of scope for creativity, just please remember that your entry must include some stamping as that's what the challenge blog is all about - we're called Fashionable Stamping Challenges after all!
The Design Team have created some fabulous and incredibly varied inspiration for you and I hope you like mine:

The background for my tag was made using a technique I was taught several years ago by textile artist Kim Thittichai who makes the most amazing artwork. This involves painted bondaweb which is ironed on to a painted or inked background.
I inked my tag with Distress inks in Dried Marigold, Spiced Marmalade and Victorian Velvet Distress inks then ironed on a piece of bondaweb painted with Lumiere paints. I then ironed on some mica chips and Beadazzles and melted on some Cosmic Shimmer and Blonde Moments embossing powders.
I stamped the Magenta flower several times with Memento black ink and coloured with various purple Promarkers. I then decoupaged the flower, cutting out various sections for a 3D effect.
I stamped the B Line Designs butterfly with the black ink, coloured with turquoise Promarkers and cut it out.
I assembled the tag as you see adding altered leaves from an old floral arrangement and twisted ribbon through the top.

The winners from the last challenge will be announced in a few days and it's going to be difficult as we have loads of gorgeous entries - the theme was obviously popular! I'm hoping this one will be too.

I'm entering my tag in the following challenges:
Craft Your Days Away - Make Your Own Flowers
The Rubber Cafe - No Designer Paper
Crafty Creations - Anything But A Square
Creative Card Crew - Anything Goes
Incy Wincy - Make Your Own Flowers

Thanks for looking,
Fliss xx

Setting The Scene With Polka Doodles

2011-09-09T09:00:00.002+01:00

Good morning everyone, I'm writing this post at 7am in the hope that it pops up at 9.00 when I shall be at the hairdressers which this time I'm not looking forward too as my hairdresser left last week and I have someone new. My hair isn't the easiest to cut so I'm hoping the new one can cope with it!
We have a new challenge for you over at Polka Doodles which has been chosen this week by Lou and she would like to see your creations with the theme of Setting The Scene. This is something I've been doing more of so watch this space for something really different on Monday!
Her's my card for this challenge which is a tent shaped card:

All the elements on the card are from the Magical Winter CD set and I printed out the backing paper on sturdy card and used this to make the tent shape. I used the Santa's workshop cabin at the back of the aperture in the card to set my scene.
I then simply added Santa, Rudolph, some presents and a greeting on the sides of the card and my scene was set - how easy is that! The only tricky bit was making sure that the pleated base section didn't show to spoil the scene.

The DT have made some fabulous examples to inspire you and really varied too so do pop over to the challenge blog for a peek - you will love what they've made.

I'm entering my card in the following challenge:
Scrapbook Sisters - Ho Ho Ho

Have a great weekend.
Fliss xx

Fetch A Sketch Challenge 6 - Guest Designer

2011-09-05T09:30:00.001+01:00

Surprise! I'm back again with another post as I'm really excited to be able to tell you that Ruth and Jenny over at the Fetch A Sketch challenge blog asked me to be Guest Designer for September. Thanks for the honour ladies and I can't tell you how much this means to me.
Here's the great sketch:

This fortnight's challenge is being sponsored by Jellypark so do hop over to the challenge blog for all the details. Here's my card using one of the gorgeous digital images available at Jellypark.

I printed out the cute girl and coloured her with Promarkers. I then cut the image out with a circle cutter and left one elbow and a foot peeping out over the edge. I inked the edges with VersaColor Split Pea ink. I then added a red paper mat die cut with a Nestie scalloped circle.
The background paper is Picnic in the Park by Serif and came free with a magazine a while back. I stamped the flower trio by Rhonna Farrer for Autumn Leaves several times across the base of the gingham paper and coloured them with Prisma pencils.
I added a pretty strawberry border and some tiny punched butterflies coloured with Promarkers to finish off.
The challenge lasts for the next 2 weeks so there's plenty of time to enter. Hope to see you there!

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Our Creative Corner - Stamping Onto Patterned Paper (I couldn't believe it when I saw this one!)
Clearly Inspired - CIC35 Patterned Paper
Charisma Cardz - Anything Goes

Thanks for looking.
Fliss xx

Steampunk ATCs

2011-09-05T09:00:00.003+01:00

Good morning everyone, another week is here already and I hope you all had a good weekend whatever the weather threw at you - very hit and miss in Sussex with both rain and sunshine.
We have a new theme for you over at Make My Monday and this month it's Cath's turn to choose and the theme is Steampunk. Each week there is a new theme under this heading and this week we would like to see some ATCs - being small this will hopefully start you off gently.
I was both excited and apprehensive when I saw this theme as it's a style I very much admire but I had yet to take the plunge and create something. My craft space is currently covered with cogs, gears and all things machine like, much to my hubby's delight - he's been very enthusiastic about my creations which is a first!
As I couldn't quite decide what to do, I ended up with 3 little pieces of art which I hope you like:

Ingredients Used:
Glamorous Lady - Time To Stamp, Buildings - Crafty Individuals, Globe - The Graphics Fairy, Gears - Cuttlebug Clockworks, Ink - Wild Honey, Vintage Photo and Frayed Burlap Distress inks, Promarkers

Ingredients Used:
Weather Forecast stamp - Paper Artsy, Flying Boat - The Graphics Fairy, Ink - Tumbled Glass, Stormy Sky and Vintage Photo Distress inks, Martha Stewart border punch

Ingredients Used:
Balloon - Dezinaworld, Airman and Globe - The Graphics Fairy, Cuttlebug Clockworks folder, Ink - Wild Honey and Vintage Photo Distress inks, Promarkers

I can't wait to see what everyone comes up with and do pop over to the challenge blog as the Design Team have a lot of gorgeous inspiration for you.

I'm entering my creations in the Paper Creations Ink Challenge - Vintage or Distressed Look.

Have a good week,
Fliss xx

Autumn Colours

2011-09-02T09:00:00.003+01:00

Good morning everyone, Friday is here again so there's a new challenge over at Polka Doodles and this week's theme chosen by Miria is Autumn Leaves and she would like to see your creations inspired by Autumn colours.
I just loved this one as I'm sure you know how much I love the colours of the trees in their Autumn coats so here's what I came up with.

I've used a cute image from the A Double Sprinkle Of Kraft CD, printed her out on off white card and coloured her with Promarkers. I then used Zig Art & Graphic Twin Markers to add some grass blades around the wall.
I cut the image out with an oval cutter and added an olive green mat. The background paper I used is from the Sundae Of Seasons CD as are the acorns which I coloured with Promarkers and cut out. I finished off with a sentiment from the Sensational Sentiments stamp set which was stamped in black. I coloured the stamped card with a Promarker to make it blend in with the rest of the card.

The Design Team have come up with some fabulous creations so don't forget to pop over for some inspiration. Hope to see you there!

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
I Love Promarkers - Anything Goes
Passion For Promarkers - Anything Goes

Have a lovely weekend,
Fliss xx

Published!!!

2011-09-01T16:11:00.000+01:00

Hello everyone and hope you're all having a good week so far. I'm somewhat excited here as I can finally share some very good news with you all.
A little while back I received a mega exciting email from the lovely Nikky Hall of Polka Doodles asking me to take part in making up projects with a gorgeous Christmas kit that she designed for Practical Publishing. The kit consists of papers, stickers, die cuts, a clear stamp set, a gorgeous gingerbread house template and some lovely embellishments. It comes with a magazine jam packed with projects to make with the kit with complete instructions and photos all designed by Nikky, myself and 7 fellow Design Team members.
You will not believe the number of different things you can make and there are 83 projects in the magazine!!! You can buy it in W H Smith (I saw it in ours today - yippee!!!), Hobby Craft and various other craft outlets.
Here's what to look for:

I'm really pleased to say that my shaped easel card made the front cover and you can see it at the top on the left hand side (many thanks go to Diane Grimshaw for this lovely surprise).
Here are some sneak peeks - more to follow next week!

My article has a homespun theme and all the cards and the gift bag have hessian, raffia and twine etc incorporated on them.

Thanks for looking,
Fliss xx

Photo Inspiration Challenge

2011-08-29T09:23:00.001+01:00

Good morning everyone on a currently bright and sunny though cold Bank Holiday Monday. Hope it stays this way as we're off to my brother and sister in law's Silver Wedding celebration later today.
Being Monday, there's a new challenge for you over at Make My Monday and it's our last Things With Wings theme - this time Suzanne has a gorgeous Photo Inspiration for you but please don't forget the Wings!

I took my inspiration from the pink, green and white shades and the lovely roses surrounding the cage for my project.
I stamped my favourite rose (a huge one by B Line Designs) on the side of a piece of A5 card with VersaFine Spanish Moss ink and coloured it with Spun Sugar, Victorian Velvet, Shabby Shutters and Crushed Olive Distress inks. I added a little Worn Lipstick round the outer petal edges.
I then sponged Shabby Shutters all over the remainder of the card and stamped the text (Hobby Art's Shakespeare Sonnet) on the left side. I then stamped a flourish from Paper Artsy Hot Pick HP1005 all round the edges to add texture.
My bird cage is cut from recycled grey board with the Tim Holtz die and I then embossed it with the Cuttlebug Textile folder. I painted it with antique white acylic paint, heat embossed it and then inked the outer edgees with Palette Cognac ink.
I finished off my card with a little bird from the Papermania PMA 9074003 clear stamp set stamped with brown ink and coloured with Promarkers.

Don't forget to pop over to the challenge blog for some great inspiration and hope to see lots more entries this week as last week's acetate theme seemed to have stumped everyone!

My card is for the following challenges:
Opus Gluei - Coming Up Roses or Rosettes
Jellypark Challenges - Punches and/or Die Cuts
CASE Study Challenge - Signature Style (mine is making my own decorative papers usually vintage in style)
Moving Along With The Times - Birdys

Thanks for looking and have a great day.
Fliss xx

Ribbon And Lace

2011-08-28T00:30:00.001+01:00

Hello everyone, I'm excited to say it's time for a new challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges and I'd like to say a huge thanks to everyone who took part in the last one as there are some stunning creations there which will make the Design Team's task really difficult.
We also have some new Design Team members so pop on over to the challenge blog to be introduced to the lovely ladies who will be wowing you with their creations now.
The new challenge theme is Ribbon And/Or Lace so you can include just one or go for both. I've actually used ribbon and braid on my card as I love texture so much.

As you can see, I decided on glorious Autumn colours for my card as I'm an Autumn girl at heart and always love seeing the trees wearing their gorgeous Autumn coats.
I made 3 layers of background papers for the card but the only one that is fully stamped is the first because I just inked and stamped the edges of the 2 lower layers - there's no point spending time on something that will be covered up!
The first paper uses embossing resist technique. I stamped the flourish (B Line Designs) with crimson ink and embossed the images with pearl plum powder. I then sponged on Dried Marigold, Spiced Marmalade, Victorian Velvet and Barn Door Distress inks. I added this to a mat of deep red hammered card, trimmed along one edge with the Martha Stewart scallop dot edge punch.
The next paper was made by sponging Mustard Seed Distress ink round the edges of the card and stamping on a flower spray design (Great Impressions) with Dried Marigold DI.
The base paper uses a B Line Designs detailed flourish stamped with Aged Mahogany DI just around the edges and then Tattered Rose, Victorian Velvet and Aged Mahogany was sponged on top. Both this and the golden paper were trimmed with deckle edged scissors.
I stamped the gorgeous Audrey image (B Line Designs and a real favourite of mine) with black ink on white card and a little subtle colour added with Promarkers. I cut this out with a circular Nestie die and added it to a deep red mat cut with a Nestie scalloped die.
I assembled the card as you see with velvet ribbon and braid, adding a layered flower coloured with Promarkers, some punched leaves and pins and a sentiment by Penny Black.

We're all looking forward to seeing this fortnight's entries and don't forget to hop over to the challenge blog for some fabulous inspiration and a peek at this challenge's lovely prizes.

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Lily Pad Cards - Any Resist Technique (heat embossing in my case)
Sew Many Cards - Use An Edge Punch
Paper Pretties - Make Your Own Background (I have 3)

Thanks for looking,
Fliss xx

Spots And Dots

2011-08-26T09:00:00.002+01:00

Good morning everyone, it's Friday again and the week disappeared really quickly - I can't believe it's almost the weekend!
As it's Friday, we have a new challenge over at Polka Doodles which has been chosen by team mate Miria. She would like to see your creations with Spots & Dots. It's also our stashbox stamps week so my card has quite a few stamps from my stash as I decided on a collage style effect. As you'll see, if you stamp directly on the background paper, you'll get lots of interest without adding too much weight to the card.

I've chosen a very chic paper to go with the lovely image of 2 ladies relaxing with a drink and the scene always seems to have a French flavour so where better to put them than Paris.
The lovely dotty paper is from the Paper Boutique Vol 3 CD and I stamped this with the Eiffel Tower and Paris text by B Line Designs and a dotty stamp by Great Impressions. I used VersaFine Smokey Gray ink which is softer then black and inked the edges with a brown ink pad.
I stamped the ladies (Art Impressions) with the same grey ink and added them to a mat of kraft card. I finished off with pretty border with stripes and dots from the A Double Sprinkle Of Kraft CD.

Don't forget to pop over and look at the Design Team inspiration as our new team members have joined in this week and there are loads of lovely creations on show.

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Delightful Challenges - Use Digital Paper
More Than Favors - Travel
My Time To Craft - Here Come The Girls
The Stamping Boutique - Stripes & Dots
The Paper Variety - Travel

Have a lovely weekend,
Fliss xx

Fairy Bunting

2011-08-22T17:46:00.001+01:00

Hello again everyone, I'm back with another post today as I've finally finished what has definitely been a labour of love as my creation has been in the making for nearly 2 weeks and I can't tell you how much I enjoyed making it.
It's another piece of wall art and this time it's in the form of bunting. I had to take the photos on the table as I haven't yet decided where it will hang.

All of the stamps I've used are Crafty individuals as I have quite a collection of them and those used are as follows:
Fairies - CI-137 and CI-132
Birds - CI-248
Flowers - CI-206
Butterflies - CI-231
Backgrounds - CI-173, CI-253 and CI-258

The bunting is made with recycled grey board which I painted with bright shades of acrylic paint. I then stamped on the flourish background with toning shades of Palette ink.
I stamped all of the images, flowers and butterflies together with a lovely leaf which was free with an order (thanks to Jean and Malcolm for their generosity) in black on white card and coloured them with Prisma pencils with the exception of the leaves which were sponged with Peeled Paint Distress ink. I then cut everything out.
I stamped the floral and the text backgrounds on more white card and inked with various shades of Distress inks. I then cut them into heart shapes with a template I made.
I assembled everything as you see with foam tape for added dimension having first rounded out various pieces with a large embossing ball tool.
Some very pretty braid finished off the top edges.

I'm entering my creation in the following challenges:
Crafty Individuals August Challenge - Bright and Beautiful
Sir Stampalot August Challenge - Whatever You Fancy
Scrappin' Chics Challenge - Pennants/Banners
The Stamp Man Challenge - Anything Goes with Summer Colours

Thanks for looking,
Fliss xx

Acetate And Things With Wings

2011-08-22T09:05:00.003+01:00

It's Monday again folks so we have a new challenge for you over at Make My Monday. We're continuing with the August theme of Things With Wings and this week the challenge is to include Acetate on your creation.
This is something that doesn't get used nearly enough and for my inspiration, I decided to revisit a technique I learnt years ago involving tissue paper, clear glue and re-inkers with the acetate. I made an easel style card because it was the only way to fit all the elements on!

I cut a square of acetate and stamped the leaf spray and dragonfly from the Inkadinkado Garden Delight stamp set on with black Stazon ink. I turned the acetate over when the ink was dry and squeezed on some small pools of Diamond Glaze and then added drops of Crushed Olive, Broken China, Dried Marigold and Spiced Marmalade Distress re-inkers to the glue. I spread the coloured glue about roughly with a brush and found the Distress inks really great for this as they blend a lot better than any other re-inkers I've used for this technique.

I then crumpled up some white tissue paper with added blingy bits (Paperchase), settled this on top of the glue and gently brayered the tissue on to the acetate. I did this on a piece of kitchen foil as the glue tends to spread out a bit and if you use paper underneath it can be tricky to remove. I left it to dry completely and then trimmed off the excess tissue paper round the edges. I then glued the panel to a piece of silver mirri card - you can use white card but the mirri card gives the piece a lovely glow.

I attached the panel to the easel front and added a copper peel off line frame. I finished off the card with a scrap of leftover card made using my Distress Ink Grunge Background Technique (tutorial link on side bar) which happily used the same Distress inks and stamp set. I added a butterfly (B Line Designs) stamped on acetate then glittered on the reverse and layered up, some blingy ribbon, skeleton leaves and blingy flowers.

Do pop over to the challenge blog and look at the other DT creations are there are some absolute stunners this time - I think everyone has really excelled themselves for this one!

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Crafty Calendar Challenge - August Hot Colours
Dream Valley Challenges - Colour (Lemon, Lime, Orange)
One Stop Craft - Bold & Bright
Scrappy Frogs - Bling

Have a good week,
Fliss xx

Single Layer Card

2011-08-19T09:00:00.007+01:00

Morning everyone, hope you've all go the sunny Friday morning we have here. I can't believe it's Friday already - where did the week go!
We have a new challenge for you over at Polka Doodles and this week's theme of a Single Layer has been chosen by Ruth.
I have to own up to having struggled like mad with this as I really love layers on my creations as I'm sure you know so this was a real challenge for me. Here's what I finally came up with:

I decided to make a little scene with my favourite Fairy Flutterby, Gracie and the elements in the set which cleverly, I think, has the wings separate so that Gracie doesn't have to be a fairy,
I stamped Gracie on a scalloped card blank and then masked her and stamped the wings on so that they appear to be behind her. I then stamped on a few flowers at random and the greeting near the top.
I coloured Gracie and the flowers with a mix of Flexmarkers (I just love these) and Prisma pencils. I painted the wings with glitter glue and here serendipity struck as the wings were originally blue and the brush I used still had some Dried Marigold Distress ink on it (that'll teach me to wash my brushes more thoroughly!) and the wings ended up a rather interesting mottled colour which I actually like.
I finished off by adding some grass with Zig Art & Graphic twin markers in 2 shades of green.
I had to take the photo against a coloured background with all the white space on the card - a first for me I think!
Do pop over and look at all the other DT creations as there are some fabulous creations there and it might just inspire you to have a go.

My card is for the following challenges:
Craft Us Crazy - Anything Goes
Lawnscaping Challenge - One Layer

Have a great weekend,
Fliss xx

Fairies and Angels

2011-08-15T09:00:00.002+01:00

Good morning everyone from a currently sunny South Coast. It's the start of another week and time for a new challenge over at Make My Monday. We're continuing with Suzanne's August theme of Things With Wings and this week the challenge is to include Fairies or Angels on your creation - this will be popular I think.
Before I show you my creation, I'd like to say hello and thanks to Gayle and Babs for joining my blog. Big thanks also go to Top Tip Tuesday who picked my embossed butterfly card from the Friday before last for their Top 3 - ladies, I'm thrilled to bits! Also, huge thanks go to Jean Hardy of Crafty Individuals as she's included my little triple bird wall hanging on the Crafty Individuals blog as inspiration for the current challenge, Bright and Beautiful - yippee!
My inspiration for you for this week's challenge is a collage style card for which I made my own background paper with a difference which I'm hoping you'll like as much as I liked making it.

The image I've used is a really sweet little fairy stamp by Faerie Poppets which was generously given to me by a crafty friend after I admired it on a card she made - how lovely is that! I stamped her with VersaFine Smokey Gray ink which I like as it's softer than black. I then coloured her using my Aqua Markers (I wanted a soft effect so scribbled on a plate and picked up colour with a wet brush). I then inked around the edges a little.
The background paper started off with Sir Tim's wrinkle free distress technique (if you haven't yet got his Compendium of Curiosities it's a must have!) with Crushed Olive, Shabby Shutters and Tumbled Glass Distress inks. I then stamped on the flowers (Stampendous) and coloured these with Promarkers.
I finished the paper off by stamping on a very old Hero Arts manuscript stamp and a large corner flourish design by Viva Decor My Paper World. I added this to my card blank and glued on the image panel. The final finishing touch is a favourite Hero Arts sentiment stamped directly on the background paper.
As you can see, this technique gives the effect of lots of layers and plenty of texture all on one background paper.

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Delightful Challenges - Things With Wings
Moving Along With The Times - Fantasy
Paper Play - Make Your Own Designer Paper
Clearly Inspired - Things With Wings
The Crafty Pad - Cute 'n' Girly

Thanks for looking and have a good week,
Fliss xx

Handmade Flowers

2011-08-14T00:30:00.003+01:00

Hello everyone, hope you're all having a great weekend. It's time for the second fortnight's challenge over at Fashionable Stamping Challenges and this time we'd like to see your creations with Handmade Flowers and of course, some stamping with rubber or clear stamps but no digis please as the challenges are all about getting inky fingers.
We had some incredible entries for the first challenge and it's going to be really hard to choose the top entries with such a high standard. Thanks so much to everyone who entered and made that first challenge such a success.
Now for my inspiration which this time is not a card but a little box that I altered which will make a lovely gift for someone soon.

The little box I used is wooden and perfect for the shabby chic look I wanted. I brushed on a coat of antique white acrylic paint on both the outside and inside first.
Next I stamped on a spray of roses from the Clearly Inspired Stencil Flowers set with Palette Cognac ink. I stamped this everywhere it was possible to stamp and the only place left out was the inside edge of the lid as the block simply would not fit!
For my shabby, distressed look, I then dry brushed everywhere with lilac and blue acrylic paints and wiped some paint off with a baby wipe until I was happy with the result.
I made panels for the inside top and base with squares of parchment paper embossed with the Papermania Vine folder and then sponged on Milled Lavender, Stormy Sky and Vintage Photo Distress inks for a shabby effect.
I made the flowers for the top with a Woodware cut and emboss punch and punched them out from lilac, light blue and light brown scraps of decorated papers. I enhanced the embossing with a ball tool and then sponged the corresponding flowers with the same inks used for the inside panels. I then pierced holes in the centres and added the silk flower stamens. I rounded out the petals with a large ball tool and then brushed them with glitter glues. I glued these on with some Prima leaves.
I finished off with some ribbon and braid around the base.

After all the gorgeous entries last time, I can't wait to see what everyone comes up with for this one. Don't forget to check out the creations made by the rest of the DT as there are some stunning creations on view.

I'm entering my box in the following challenges:
Fussy and Fancy - Use 3 or More of Your Favourite Embellishments (Handmade flowers, Prima leaves, ribbon, braid)
Phindy's Place - Vintage Look
Simply Create - Distress
Crafty Catz - Emboss It
CRAFT - Gifts
Do You Stack Up - Emboss It
Allsorts - Anything But A Card

Thanks for looking,
Fliss xx

Good Luck Wishes

2011-08-12T09:00:00.001+01:00

Good morning everyone and hope you're all keeping safe with the terrible stuff that has been going on in the UK.
Before I go on to this week's challenge over at Polka Doodles, I just want to mention one of our teamies who because of her job, has been right in the thick of all the troubles. She's been really brave trying to keep people safe in the area she works in and I want to say a huge thanks to her and her colleagues who have been working very long shifts with little sleep to help calm the situation. All of this too when her department doesn't usually work in this area of policing.
Our challenge this week has been chosen by Claire as the children in Scotland where she lives are about to return to school so she would like to see a Good Luck themed project.

I've made a very simple card this week that uses elements from the ever versatile Sundae Of Seasons CD. I chose a pale green polka dot paper which I added to a cream scalloped card blank.
I printed out some pretty flowers, cut them out and then added some chunky glitter around the edges. I assembled the card with the flowers, some Prima leaves and one of the clever sentiment panels where you can add your own sentiment. How easy is that!

I'm entering my card in the following challenges:
Sweet Stamps - Bling It Up
Cheerful Stamp Pad - Petals
Gingerloft - Make It Sparkle
Sentimental Sundays - Flowers + A Sentiment

Thanks for looking and wishing you all a safe and quiet weekend.
Fliss xx

Birds Or Bugs With Make My Monday

2011-08-08T09:00:00.002+01:00

Good morning everyone and hope you've all had a lovely weekend. As it's Monday again, we have a new challenge for you over at Make My Monday. We're continuing Suzanne's theme for the month of Things With Wings and this week this challenge is to include Birds Or Bugs on your creation.
I went for birds which I really love as I'm not a fan of bugs so don't have much in the way of those. I've used a little triple hanging frame that I bought at The Craft Barn to alter and here's the result:

I painted all the frames with some antique white acrylic paint and then stamped on a flourish design from Crafty Individuals which was one of the generous bag of freebies that you get when you order stamps online. The flourish was stamped on the front of the frames with Palette Cognac ink and round the sides with Palette Boudoir Blush (fab name!).
I then dry brushed the frame fronts with pale blue and lilac acrylic paints to soften the effect for a shabby chic look. I rubbed a little Brilliance Galaxy Gold ink round the edges.
Next, I stamped 3 of the birds from Crafty Individuals CI-190 with black ink and painted them with Aqua Markers by scribbling on a plate and picking up the colour with a wet brush. I cut the images out and added them to black velvet paper mats and set them in the frames.
I punched out some flowers from beige parchment card with a Woodware multi flower punch together with a few from plain green Bazzill card. I stamped the flourish design on the beige flowers with Milled Lavender, Crushed Olive and Victorian Velvet Distress inks. I rounded them out with a large embossing ball tool and glued some together in a variety of colour combinations.
I finished off with some leaf sprays punched with a Woodware punch, some metal text plates (Darico) and some butterfly buttons (Dress It Up).

I'm entering my altered frames in the following challenges:
Clearly Inspired - Things With Wings
Fabulous Friday - Colour In An Image (my bird panels)
Raise The Bar - Anything Goes
Crafty Purple Frog - Anything But A Card

Hoping you have a good week and thanks for looking,
Fliss xx