Come Fly With Me

Also know as the unpredictability of Brushos!
Hello everyone from a rather sorry for herself Fliss who currently could give Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer a run for his money appearance wise only I'm not half as cute! I have my second lot of sinus troubles in less than 2 months since I started working in the new office - in case you missed it, my ex boss sold his client list to another firm where I now work. Before this, all I've had in nearly 5 years is a 1 day sick bug which is why I'm feeling so sorry for myself.
Anyhow, enough of my woes and on to the card I have to share which I began before I got sick and just got up the energy to assemble today. It's for the current Rubber Dance challenge which is a colour one and there's a bit of artistic license here as you'd never believe I used Dark Brown Brusho Crystals on the paper I coloured.

I took a piece of mixed media paper torn from the pad - I really love the torn edge for a bit of shabby chic texture. I misted it with water and sprinkled on Dark Brown and Turquoise Brush Crystals and misted with water again. This is where the unpredictable nature of Brushos came out because as you can see, there are some orangy red bits that came out. I did like the result though so decided to go with the flow!
I then added some stencilling, using That's Crafty! Dinky Stencils - Clock Background and Star Shower - with Gathered Twigs DI for the clock and Stormy Sky DI for the stars. I glued the paper to a kraft card blank.
I stamped the butterfly girl from Rubber Dance Fly With Me stamp set (couldn't find the set in the shop but single images are available so linking to that, or you can buy the set at That's Crafty!)) with Archival Potting Soil ink and added a touch of colour before cutting her out.
I stamped the Fly text from the set on a couple of times with the same ink then stamped the Come Fly With Me text on mixed media paper and cut the words out. It was then that serendipity struck as I realised I could position the word tiles to tie up with those stamped directly on the background paper - yay!
I bent the wings of the butterfly girl and added her with dimensional tape to finish.

I'm linking my card up to the Rubber Dance colour challenge and hope the slightly unpredictable Brusho episode is OK.

Have a great day everyone.
Fliss xx

Back to School at Make My Monday

Hello there, I hope you've all had a lovely weekend and that those here in the UK are enjoying the Bank Holiday so far. I've been very busy with crafting stuff over the weekend as I'm off on my hols next weekend so have to get ahead and will be sharing my makes over the next couple of weeks.

There's a new challenge today over at Make My Monday which has the theme of Back to School, something I struggled with as my 2 are way beyond the school stage now and I couldn't think what to do! Luckily my Tim Holtz Sideshow stamp set came to the rescue and I hope you like my simple inspiration which is a Tim style good luck card.

I stamped the main image and numbers border on mixed media paper with Ranger Cobalt Archival ink and then sprinkled on Brusho Crystals in shades of orange, red and yellow then misted gently with water and allowed the colours to run.
Once I was happy with the colour, I then used the number block image with the cobalt ink, stamping partially several times before re-inking to add texture to the panel.
I added a deep turquoise mat and glued to my white card blank, finishing off with a Tim Holtz Small Talk sticker.

Have a great day and a lovely week.
Fliss xx

Sentimental at Make My Monday

Hello everyone, hope you all had a great weekend with some glorious sunny weather as we did down here in the South of England - actually wore a short sleeved top all day for the first time this year!

Sorry for my lack of visiting lately too which is because I'm working on something behind the scenes which is taking up most of my spare time at the moment and I also started a new job 2 weeks ago with a change in my working week which will take a while to get used to.

There's a new challenge today over at Make My Monday which has a theme chosen by your truly for the next fortnight and it's Sentimental, by which I would like the sentiment or text to be the focal point of your creation whatever it might be - a tag, card, art journal page?

Here's my inspiration which is a simple card and unusually for me, took only 15 minutes to make!

My Brushos came out to play along with my treasured Tim Holtz Good Thoughts stamp set which I haven't inked up in an age!

The background was made by sprinkling lemon, purple and turquoise Brusho crystals on mixed media card and misting gently with water, blotting with a paper towel as the original colours were a bit in your face.
One the background was dry, I stamped on the text with Archival Cactus Flower ink which I think tones very well with the Brusho colours. I added a deep lilac mat and attached the panel to a white card blank.
As a finishing touch, I added a scattering of purple and fuchsia gems for some added sparkle.

Hope you can join in and would love to see you there. We have a DT call out at the moment too as we've lost a couple of DT members lately, the latest being Martina for the best possible reason as she's just had a beautiful baby girl - good luck Martina!

Have a great day and a lovelt week and see you soon I hope.
Fliss x

One For The Boys At That's Crafty!

Hello everyone, I hope you're keeping warm in this somewhat unseasonable weather. I'm definitely wishing for the Spring to come back!

I'm over at That's Crafty! today with a card for the boys in your life which I hope you'll like. It features my treasured Brusho Crystals and my new set of Tim Holtz stamps.

You'll find all the details over at the blog and i'd love it if you hopped over to take a look.

I'll be back in a bit as we have a great new challenge today over at That's Crafty! Challenge Blog and I have some inspiration to share.

Fliss xx

Going Round In Circles At Make My Monday

Hello everyone, I hope you're all having a lovely Easter break with hopefully not too much in the way of bad weather. It's been very windy, wet and cold here since yesterday which was such a change after Friday which was sunny and much warmer!
Today's the day for a new challenge at Make My Monday and this week I chose the theme which is Going Round In Circles as I'm sure you all know how much I love those!

For my inspiration my Inkadinkado stamping gear has come out to play again and I used the round cog with one of the lovely flower petal stamps to make 2 circles of petals with Memento Cottage Ivy ink.
I then coloured the petals with Brusho Crystals used as paint by sprinkling them in a paint dish and misting them with water. I used lemon, gamboge and lime green. When the paint was dry I cut the floral circles out.
I assembled my little plaque using a round chipboard shape by Papermania and added an embossed circle and some ribbon to finish.

Have a great day and a good week.
Fliss xx

I'd like to enter my little plaque in the following challenges:

Stamping Sensations March Challenge - Flower Power (as you see I have a rather big flower here :D)
Creative Corner - Anything But A Card

Birds of a Feather For That's Crafty!

Happy Easter everyone and hoping everyone who celebrates has a lovely long weekend too.

My post is also to let you know I have a tag to share at That's Crafty this week which is one of the fabulous substrate surfaces great for mixed media which is what my creation turned out to be.

You'll find all the details over at the blog as usual if you'd like to visit and I'd be so pleased if you did too.

See you again soon.
Fliss xx

Something Fluffy For Make My Monday

Hello all, I hope you had a lovely weekend and managed to fit in some crafting time as I did, although only a little in my case as I had quite a lot of other things to do!
Our new challenge today at Make My Monday is rather a fun one as we would like to see your creations with Something Fluffy on and yes - you did read that right!
When it comes to something fluffy, what else could I pick for my card but this cute Just Inklined bunny - isn't he just adorable?

OK, so my card actually became mixed media as I had the background floating around just waiting for the right image and as it has a meadow look to it I thought it perfect for this cute Meadow Rabbit.
The paper was made by sprinkling lemon, yellow and gamboge Brusho Crystals on a piece of mixed media paper and misting it with water. I then allowed the paint to run and it formed streaks down the paper. When it was dry, I turned it upside down (can you see the streaks at the bottom).
I then put some lime green and olive crystals on a plate, misted them with water and picked up colour with an old store card, using it to form the blades of grass on my paper.
I printed the bunny out on to mixed media paper and coloured the image with a mix of Prismacolor pencils and Distress markers, trimmed it to a panel and added a blue mat.
I assembled the card as you see, adding a Tim Holtz Chit Chat sticker also on a blue mat to finish.

Have a great week and see you again soon. Sorry if I haven't been round lately, I've been really busy with little time for blogging.
Fliss xx

Some Challenges I'd like to enter:
Try It On Tuesday - Nature
Dragonfly Journeys - Hippity Hoppity
Challenge Up Your Life - Bunnies

The Tale of the Party Hat That Became a Kite

Hello everyone and welcome to my first post of the week which is a bit late as I had a bit of a struggle with our challenge this time at Make My Monday where Marina would like to see something with a KITE on.
I don't have anything kite related at all so spent some time pondering on it and then late yesterday after have made a birthday card for my eldest nephew, I was putting the stamps away and inspiration struck!
Here's my card which took a bit of time actually coming together and is the tale of how a party hat became a kite - and yes, you did read that right! If you look below, you might see what I mean.

This is a one layer card as in it doesn't have anything stuck on, I just did a lot of layering until I was happy with the effect.
I first stamped on the bird, following that with the party hat from the Crazy Things stamp set which I stamped upside down near the top corner of my 5x7 card as the crazy bird is looking up.
I stamped the text from a Dylusions set in 2 parts for balance.

I then got out a fine black pigment pen (one of my zentangle ones) and started doodling. As you can see, I added a top section on the party hat to make it more kite shaped and then repeated the pattern on the hat, drawing crossed lines to form the string. I drew a wiggly line coming down from the kite and added bows as well. I then doodled some grass and flowers to ground the bird.

I then coloured the bird, kite and text with coloured pencils, adding shadows round the text boxes to make them pop more. I added Distress inks to the bakground (Spun Sugar, Squeezed Lemonade) and deciding this was a bit flat, sprinkled on Lemon And Lime Green Brusho Crystals to add some texture. This still wasn't quite there so I stamped on my favourite Carabelle Studio Journal du Jour background stamp with Worn Lipstick Distress ink using first and second generation stamping.

Have a great week and see you soon.
Fliss xx

Don't Forget To Fly For That's Crafty!

Hello everyone, sorry I've been awol the last week which is because I managed to scratch my right eye last Friday night whilst trying to extract a contact lens which seemed to have gotten glued to my eye! I'm currently wearing glasses that don't quite work so my computer time in the evening is limited as I have to work on one all day.
My post today is to let you know I have my usual Friday tutorial over at That's Crafty and this week I'm sharing a little rainbow coloured art panel which I hope you like.

You'll find all the details over at the blog as usual if you'd like to see how it was created.

Hopefully I'll be able to put my contact lenses back in over the weekend and once I can do that, I'll be round to visit.

In the meantime, have a great day and a lovely weekend.
Fliss x

Tongue In Cheek At That's Crafty

Hello everyone, I hope you've all had a good week and not as busy as mine as I have so much work on at the moment I practically fall asleep in the middle of dinner!
I have a post at That's Crafty today to share a rather cheeky card I made with some bits from my experimental box.

You'll find all the details over at the blog if you'd like to see how it came about and there are quite a few progress pics to show how the background paper came about.

Have a great day and a lovely weekend.
Fliss xx

Brusho Play

Hello and welcome to today's post which has happened because I wanted to share a card I made with one of the bits from a demonstration I did last week for my sister in law who is a teaching assistant and runs an art club for the children.

We got talking on Boxing Day and I mentioned Brusho Crystals in connection with something I'm working on at the moment (can't tell you what as it's a secret at the moment :D) and she said they had those at school but what could she do with them!

I'm sure you know how much I love them so I did a demo with various ways using things I thought the children would like to use such as bubble wrap, jar lids, straws etc and I'll show you all the things I did another time.

I saw a couple of challenges that would fit the little meadow scene I made with my new Hunkydory Poppy Meadow clear stamp set which I couldn't resist as I love poppies. Hope you like it!

I started off with a piece of mixed media paper torn from an A5 size pad and decided to incorporate the torn section as it gives a rather rustic look which I thought fit what I wanted to do very well.

I sprinkled on some Lemon Brusho Crystals at the base of the paper then misted with water. I then used a straw to blow the paint about the paper and gained some streaks on the top half.

I then turned the paper up the other way and stamped the poppies on with Archival Watering Can ink. I stamped a butterfly from the set with the same ink. I painted the images with Brusho Crystals, sprinkling a little in a paint palette and adding water. I used Brilliant Red, Lime Green and Turquoise.

I made the grass by sprinkling lime green crystals on a ceramic plate and misting with water. I then used an old store card to pick up paint which I applied in streaks to resemble grass, pulling some paint sideways whilst the paint was wet.

I then sprinkled on a little Gamboge Brusho Crystals, concentrating on the torn edge and the bottom of the panel. I misted this with water and let the colour run a little. You can see where the water made the colours on the poppies and butterflies run a little and I think this gives a lovely free flowing effect.

I glued the panel to a white card blank and stamped on the Hobby Art text with the grey ink to finish.

Have a great day and see you again soon although not sure quite when as I have to go back to work tomorrow - eek!

Fliss xx

I'd like to enter the following challenges:
Allsorts Challenge - What's New (my stamp set and blowing the Brusho Crystals around with a straw!)
Inkspirational Challenges - Thank You With Something New (shown above)
Just Us Girls Challenge - Thank You

Wings At Christmas

Hello everyone, hoping you had a lovely weekend. Mine was rather busy as it was my hubby's birthday so we had our two down from London for the weekend and although we didn't go out for a meal having had my hubby's office Christmas dinner on Thursday, we had a great time with family. I can't believe it's Christmas next week - eek! Where did the time go and why haven't I finished my Christmas shopping!!!

We have a new challenge for you today over at Make My Monday and this time it's Wings At Christmas so for my inspiration my favourite Dina Wakley scribbly bird is a robin again and I've used up a piece of my Christmas masterboard too for a very simple design that I hope you like.

The masterboard was made with Brusho crystals and stamped with trees and text from the Tim Holtz Scribbly Christmas stamp set with Mowed Lawn Distess ink and Olive Archival ink.
The bird was stamped on smooth cartridge paper with Watercan Can Archival ink and then painted with Brusho Crystals and cut out when dry.
I stamped the Christmas text across the base of the card blank with Fern Green Archival ink and then glued the paper panel and the painted bird on the card.

Have a great week and see you soon.
Fliss xx

A Frosty Wreath For That's Crafty

Hello everyone, I hope you've all had a good week in the rather strange weather we've had. It's been unseasonably warm down here in the South but extremely windy which I don't like!
I have a little bit of home decor to share over at That's Crafty as I've finally managed to finish what I actually intended for last week. The colours are a little Autumnal but I've made it frosty to add a little Wintery effect. Hope you like it!

As you can see, this is just a peek and if you'd like to hop on over to the blog, you'll find all the details over there.

I'll be back in a while with all the info on our new challenge over at That's Crafty Challenge Blog.

See you soon.

Fliss xx

Angel Wishes For That's Crafty

Hello everyone and welcome to today's post which is to let you know that I have a project to share over at That's Crafty Blog.

Here's a sneak peek and you'll find all the details over at the blog if you'd like to hop on over. It's not exactly the project I planned for this week either and ended up being kind of thrown together at the last minute as I ran out of time to finish my other creation. That will be for next week!

I'm sorry if I haven't been round lately too which is because my spare time has been severely cut down for various reasons. I'm hoping for some more time very soon!

Thanks to everyone who has stuck with me and see you soon.
Fliss xx

Growing Wings At That's Crafty

Hello everyone and first up is an apology for my lack of visiting lately which is mostly due to lack of me time as i'm very busy with work and family stuff at the moment.
I should hopefully have time to catch up over the weekend so sorry it's been like this for a while. Only just managing to fit in some of my DT duties too!
Here's a sneak peek of my project over at That's Crafty today which is a pge in my art journal which came about very quickly once I got going. Hope you like it.

You'll find all the details over at the blog as always.

See you soon!
Fliss xx

A Haunting We Will Go!

Hello again, I'm back with news of our new challenge today over at That's Crafty Challenge Blog which this time has the theme of a Haunted Halloween so it's time to get spooky!
My inspiration which I hope you like is a little arch shaped panel.

Ingredients:

Stampendous Skeleton Lady Cling Stamp
That's Crafty Dinky Stencil - Flight of the Bats
Tando Creative - Arch With Spider Web
Archival Jet Black Ink
Distress Ink - Hickory Smoke, Black Soot
Brusho Crystals - Emerald Green, Orange, Violet
Silver Detail Embossing Powder
Water Mister
Stamping Paper

I coloured the paper with the Brusho Crystals spritzing lightly with water to spread the colour. When it was dry I stamped on the skeleton lady image and then used the stencil to add some bats with te black Distress ink. I cut this to the size of the back panel and glued it on.
I inked the spider web frame with the Hickory Smoke Distress ink and whilst it was still wet sprinkled a little embossing powder on the web and heat embossed it.
I glued this to the back panel to finish.

Hope you can enter as the randomly drawn winner will receive a voucher for the online shop where you'll truly be spoilt for choice.

Have a great weekend.
Fliss xx

Boys Will Be Boys At That's Crafty Challenge Blog

Hello again and welcome to my inspiration for our new challenge at That's Crafty Challenge Blog where we're following the last girly theme with Boys Will Be Boys.
I was really glad of this theme as one of my nephews has a birthday at the end of the month so I've made his card a bit earlier than I normally do!
His birthday is actually on Halloween but I managed to restrain myself this time and not make a spooky one - largely because he's a bit too old for those now!

I've turned one of those quirky and cute crazy birds into a rather cool dude don't you think?

The background was made with Sandstone and Grey Brusho Crystals and I then used the Chevrons Background Dinky Stencil with Chipped Sapphire Distress ink followed by the Star Shower Dinky Stencil with Peeled Paint DI.

I stamped the crazy bird on some orange Gelli print paper from my stash (I keep a few plain ones for stamping images such as flowers, leaves and birds). I stamped the portion of the bird with the beak on a scrap of yellow print paper, then the sunglasses and bowler hat from the Crazy Things stamp set on smooth cartridge paper (I coloured these with Grey and Cobalt Blue Brushos used as paint) and then die cut everything out with the Crazy Birds and Crazy Things die sets - these are fab if your cutting out of intricate images is not great like mine!

I stamped the birthday text from the Crazy Thoughts stamp set directly on the background paper and glued this to a card blank before adding the bird with his funky hat and shades.

Hope you can enter as the lucky randomly drawn winner receives a £20 voucher for the online shop and the amount of fabulous goodies has to be seen to be believed (my favourite being the latest Carabelle Studio release!).

Have a great day and a lovely weekend.
Fliss xx

Scribbly Christmas For That's Crafty

Hello everyone, I hope you've all had a great week and I'm here with a very quick post to let you know that I've got my Friday post over at That's Crafty and this week it's Christmas- eek!
I thought I should make a start or I'll never get them all made so I created a masterboard which is great for making a background for several cards at once.
Pop on over to the blog to see how I made it.

Have a great day and a fab weekend and see you next week!

Fliss xx

Crazy Together For That's Crafty

Hello everyone, hope you've all had a good week. Sorry for my lack of visiting lately too, things have been very busy here and I haven't had much time for creating, let alone blogging!
My post today is to let you know that I have my Friday project over at That's Crafty and this week I've been breaking out the Brushos again for a bit of serendipity involving rather too much water but the result was a riot of colour which I rather like!

Here's a sneak peek and you'll find the whole thing over at the blog is you'd like to see how it came about.

Aren't these birds just too cute!

Have a great day and a fab weekend and see you again soon.

Fliss x

Coming Up Daisies For That's Crafty

Hello there and welcome to my first post of the day which is to let you know I have my usual Friday tutorial over at That's Crafty Blog and this week I'm sharing a simple card made for one of my nieces who has her birthday on Monday.
Hope you like it and you'll find all the details over at the blog as usual. Here's a sneak peek to tease you!

I'll be back in a bit as we have a new challenge starting today over at That's Crafty Challenge Blog at 8am.

See you later.
Fliss xx