Butterfly Wings Canvas

Hello everyone, wishing you all a very Happy New Year and hoping that 2018 brings you all that you wish for. I hope you all had a lovely Christmas too as I did, very busy but packed with lots of family stuff which was really lovely.
I managed a bit of crafting too which is because I wanted to enter the Rubber Dance December Challenge which is a colour one and as usual, have only just made it!

As you'll see, I managed all of the requirements although the glitter element is quite subtle as I don't do too much bling.
I painted and sponged my box canvas with watered down That's Crafty! Multi Surface paint in Teal which is a lovely light and bright blue when diluted a little.
I stamped Melina's gorgeous butterflies from the Butterfly Trio set on painted papers from my bits box which happily contained some in shades of pink and peach. I cut the butterflies out and added deeper colour to the bodies. I glued them on to the canvas as shown as I wanted a soaring explosion of colour on my canvas. I added glitter glue to the butterfly bodies to make them pop.
I finished off with a quote from Lynne's Affirmations Set 1 as I didn't have quite what I wanted to say as this one fit the best.

I'd like to enter this in the Rubber Dance December Challenge and thanks to everyone who hops over to see what I've created.
Happy New Year!
Fliss xx

Serendipity Strikes - I Think!

Hello all, I have another art journal page to share today which has the background that was actually intended for my Autumn journal page yesterday but things did not go quite as planned due to the unpredictability of oxide inks.
I decided to have a go today to make the background work for another page and again things didn't quite go to plan as the grey in the mix took on a slightly greenish cast but with the addition of more dark blue and some Rusty Hinge Distress ink I think it just about fits the colour challenge at Rubber Dance. I really love these colours which is why I wanted to make the page fit!

The oxide inks I used were Faded Jeans and Fired Brick with Hickory Smoke Distress ink. I added them to my craft mat, misted them with water and dipped the page in. This is when the grey Distress ink went a little green in places but I knocked it back with Faded Jeans and Rusty Hinge Distress inks.
I then stamped on some of the circular images from the Rubber Dance Round in Circles stamp set using the same inks. This was a bit bolder than I wanted so I misted the page with water and blotted it with a paper towel.
I next stamped on the Phone Home girl with Archival Watering Can ink and added some of the text phrases from the Something Wonderful set which I love for the positive thoughts on it. The final touch was a little stencilling with the Brick Background Dinky Stencil using the Rusty Hinge ink.

I hope you like my happy accident (I think serendipity might be my middle name lol)

Thanks for looking,
Fliss xx

Autumn Art Journaling

Hello all, hope you've had a good start to the week. Mine started off with a walk first thing as the new chapter in my life has now begun and one of my resolutions is to get fitter so I went out, first walking along the seafront and then making my way back a bit inland. Along the route, I managed to collect some fallen leaves which inspired and indeed helped with my journal page for today.
I'm entering this in the Rubber Dance October colour challenge as I love these particular colours and challenged myself to create my journal page with them.

I decided on Autumn as it's my favourite time of year and created the background with a wash of grey and cobalt paints which I applied in rough stripes.
I then used a very unusual stamp - one of the leaves I collected - to add a pattern to my page. I used Chipped Sapphire and Rusty Hinge Distress inks which I pressed on the leaf, using both sides and then placed the inked leaf on the page, running the brayer over the top to transfer the ink. I repeated this until I was happy with the effect.

As you can see, the leaf has left a very good impression and I love the way nature can be brought into art like this.
I finished off my page very simply (I felt the leaves didn't need much else) by stamping on the Art text which is part of the Rubber Dance Kiwi Postoid stamp using the Chipped Sapphire ink.

Have a great week.
Fliss xx

Anything Goes! at That's Crafty! Challenge Blog

Hello and welcome to my inspiration for our new challenge today over at That's Crafty! Challenge Blog where our new theme is a really easy one as Anything Goes!
You should try and enter as the prize is a voucher for the online shop and there are so many amazing goodies you'll be spoilt for choice.
My inspiration is a mixed media tag using one of the fabulous MDF surfaces which will take any medium you throw at them without fear of buckling.

 

I decided on my much loved tree bark effect background as I get withdrawal symptoms if I don't do this every so often!

The first thing you do is spread a thick layer of texture paste on the tag surface then draw on a pattern to resemble tree bark with a wooden skewer. It's one of those things you don't see the full effect of until you add the paint so don't worry if you think it doesn't look like much at this stage.

Then when you add a couple of layers of paint - I use a couple of shades of brown, a grey and finally add a few green streaks to look like moss or lichen and this is what it looks like then.

Now do you see what I mean!

I then stamped some of the gorgeous camellias from the Rubber Dance Antique Botanicals set on manila cardstock with Archival Potting Soil ink - I stamped 6 for some layering up. I cut out 3 whole flowers and then just the flower from the remainder, shaping the images with a large embossing tool and layering the separate flowers on top with 3D tape for added dimension.

I painted some of the leaf sprigs from the brand new Bits and Pieces greyboard embellishments by That's Crafty! (from the Small Funky  Flowers Set 1) using cream paint and die cut some leafy sprigs (Tim Holtz Garden Greens) from manila cardstock.

I then assembled the panel as you see, finishing off with some toning sari ribbon and a stamped butterfly (Carabelle Studio) from my bits box.

Have a great day and will see you later with details of my Friday post at That's Crafty! Blog which is the complete opposite to this being very bright!

Fliss xx

Some Bunny Love for That's Crafty!

Hello everyone, hope you're all OK. I'm rather tired after a difficult week at work wrestling with foreign currencies and bad bookkeeping by a client so I have to admit my brain hurts!

I'm over at That's Crafty! Blog today with the card I made for my dear hubby Andrew as this week we're celebrating 35 years of marriage - it's a bit yikes as it doesn't seem that long!

As he doesn't like fussy cards, I've made quite a simple one with my dear friend Donna's gorgeous bunny for Rubber Dance who's just like our Dill (a Netherland Dwarf). She very kindly sent me the set a little while back when I was struggling with my eyesight issues.

There's only a sneak peek of the card here and you'll find the whole thing over at the blog as always. There is a pic of the lovely Dill below though so do scroll down for that as he's soooo cute!

And here's our cute little man:

Isn't he just adorable?

Have a great day and a lovely weekend.
Fliss x

Just Because

Hello everyone, hope you're have a good start to the Bank Holiday weekend. I've managed to fit in a bit of crafting after the supermarket trip and a trip to town with my Sarah who's home for the weekend.
It's something that was a bit of an experiment and I'm not quite sure about it! I wanted to do something for the Rubber Dance second April challenge which is to use Black and White with One Colour and I picked green with my beloved Crushed Olive Distress ink which is one of my favourite shades.

I made the paper, which is actually foreground rather than background due to my experiment, by pressing the Distress inkpad repeatedly on a square of white card to make a sort of grungy criss cross design.
I glued this onto a mat of black card leaving a narrow border all round. Then came my experiment as I tried stamping the asters from the Antique Botanicals stamp set on white card and die cutting into a shape before adding to the card. It didn't quite work as I wanted so instead I die cut a shape out of the inked paper attached to the mat.
I placed this on my white card blank and marked the top and sides of the cut out with a pencil dot, then stamped the asters directly on the card blank.
I added a little more green using a Crushed Olive Distress marker on the leaves and flowers then finished off the card with a Tim Holtz sticker (as an aside, my hubby came in when I was adding the sticker, looked and the book and said it must have been very time consuming cutting out all the stickers - he thought I did it!!!).

You'll have to let me know what you think as I'm still rather iffy about it.

 

I want to say thank you so much here to Bibi for my prize from the recent blog hop which arrived a couple of days ago and I've only just had time to say this. I'm thrilled with the stamps and Bibi has generously included some more stamps as well - thank you sooo much and I hope to play with them very soon xx

I'm linking this up to the current Rubber Dance Challenge in the nick of time I think as the challenge ends tomorrow.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend,
Fliss xx

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

Craft Stamper and Other News

Hello again and welcome to my second post of the day which is to tell you that I'm absolutely thrilled to be featured in the May issue of Craft Stamper which hits the shops today.

Here's a sneak peek of my project and if you want to see the whole thing I'm afraid you'll have to get the mag!

I also had some other amazing news yesterday as well as my 2 entries in the last 2 Rubber Dance challenges were chosen as an Honorable Mention - how fab is that! In addition to that I also won second prize in the blog hop! Even more amazing!!!

In case you missed my challenge entries, here they are again:

Have a great day and a really lovely weekend.
Fliss xx

Quirky Spring Flower Tag

Hello again, I'm back with a rather quick post to share a tag I finally managed to finish off this evening as it's been in the making all week!
I wanted to enter the Rubber Dance challenge with the theme of Everything Spring and as I haven't yet got my inky mitts on any more of the lovely stamps I ended up having to improvise and make my own flowers with paper I stamped on with the stamps I actually have.

As you can see it's very bright and rather quirky in style!

I coloured some card with pink, orange, yellow and green paints and then stamped on circles from the Round in Circles stamp set in toning shades of Distress inks. I then die cut a variety of circle shapes from the paper to use for making my flowers. I hand cut some leaves and stalks from the green variation.
I then coloured a manila tag with green paint, which I then stencilled and stamped (again using the Round in Circles stamp set).
I created the flowers from the various circle shapes and glued these on my tag with the leaves and stalks. I added some orange chiffon ribbon to finish.

I'm linking this up to the Rubber Dance challenge in the nick of time as I didn't think I was going to make it!

See you again soon.
Fliss xx

Psychedelic Journal Page

Hello everyone, I'm back sooner than expected as I managed to find a little spare time to rustle up a new journal page which you might need sunglasses for as it's very bright.
It was inspired by the current colour challenge over at Rubber Dance Challenge Blog and I decided to ink up my Rubber Dance Round in Circles stamp set for this as I'm sure those of you that regularly follow my artwork will know how much I love circles.
This rather psychedelic page was the result and I hope you like it.

I used my trusty Paper Artsy splodger to apply the paint (all DecoArt) to the page having happily just acquired almost the exact turquoise shade shown on the colour inspiration (see below) and just scraped the colours on to cover my page.
I then stamped on various circle images from the set using Ranger dye ink in Caribbean Coast and Wild Orchid plus a little stamping with Archival Watering Can.
I finished off with the the text from the Rubber Dance Something Wonderful stamp set using Archival Jet Black ink.

Hope you have a good week and see you again soon.
Fliss xx