Craft Barn Twelve Month Challenge : January

A new year and a new challenge from the Craft Barn, this year the challenge is based on Sara Coleridge's poem, The Months.

January brings the snow

makes our feet and fingers glow

Click here for the link to the challenge page to join in.

This year I had a plan which is a massive improvement on 2016 when I had no plan for the alpha/dictionary challenge other than the dictionary itself. My original plan was to make postcards and send them to people each month but my plan is now modified. I am going to make a mini book with twelve pages in it, one for each month. Now, the postcard idea was still in my head so that is how I dealt with Mickie's twist challenge for January which is to include a bird in wellington boots. I had to draw the boots and the bird but I have made it into a postage stamp and stuck it on the page.

About three years ago I went to a workshop at the Craft Barn by Kay Carley, the first craft class I had ever attended! We did two lovely winter scenes using Lavinia stamps so I thought I would revisit that style for my January entry. Here it is:

Stamps used:

Lavinia Stamps : Spring Trees

Kanban : Stag and Doe

Woodware : Deck the halls

Paperartsy : ELB30 by Lin Brown

Clarity Stamps : postage stamp

The background is made using distress ink : Milled Lavender, Tumbled Glass, Stormy Sky and Chipped Sapphire. The trees are stamped with stormy sky and the fir branches are stamped with silver ink, I think you can see those silver branches if you look closely, they are subtle. 

The rhyme is from the poem on the Lin Brown set which I fortunately have so hope to be able to use it for all the pages in the challenge over the year but I think it might be a challenge to do that as the text is small.

I finished it off with some Stampendous Frantage shabby white embossing enamel to make the snow, I love that stuff, gorgeous little bits of gold in with the white.

OK, thats me done for this post, enjoy your weekends wherever you are and thank you for dropping by.

Alpha/Dictionary Challenge 2016 : H

H is for Holly. That is the word I have chose for the Craft Barn Alpha/Dictionary challenge this time.

H was one of the easier letters, so many possibilities.
The stamp is from Woodware and it has been coloured with inktense watercolour pencils as usual but with some Wink of Stella on top. The sparkle is subtle so does not photograph well.

Hope those of you in the UK are enjoying the August Bank Holiday if you have the day off. I am off out now for a wander in the sunshine.

Winter Trees

I didn't manage to post anything for last week's Craft Barn challenge due to the usual Christmas panic but this week's theme is "Tree" so it seems appropriate to enter a card I made using my Winter Trees Woodware stamp purchased at The Craft Barn. The design is not entirely original as it was inspired by a Brusho's demo by Kay Carley earlier in the year. Thanks Kay.

The trees are stamped and embossed in black on ordinary stamping card then Brushos (grey) added with lots of water. Shabby white embossing enamel is sprinkled on for the snow.

I love tree images so maybe I will manage a second entry for this challenge before Christmas, who knows.

Stay warm,

Julia x

Paper Folding : Trees

My offering for the Craft Barn challenge this week is a set of Christmas tags. They are easy to make. Just cut a 4 inch circle from double sided card or peper, cut them in half, fold the right side in to the middle and then back on itself. Flip it over and fold so the edges meet and form a triangular tree shape and trim the bottom of the tree.

The sentiment is from a Woodware Celtic Christmas set, I love that font, especially on Kraft card.

Some gems and garden twine and the tags are done.

Looking forward to seeing what everyone else comes up with this week.

Fireworks

When I saw the theme for the Craft Barn challenge this week the first thing that popped into my head was the Katy Perry song, Firework.

Ignite the light
And let it shine
Just own the night
Like the Fourth of July

Rather than over thinking this one I have made a firework display panel, mixed media style.

The background is a mixture of DecoArt mixed media paint applied with an old credit card and some translucent PaperArtsy Fresco finish paint applied with a brush over the top.
The landscape silhouette is die cut using a Memory Box die.
The stars were punched (Woodware star punch) from some scraps I had left over from a gelli plate stamping project and I added some doodling with a white pen to make them look like fireworks.

It was fun to do this one, a nice break from the Christmas cards.
Have a good week everyone.

Doodles

The theme for this week's Craft Barn challenge is stamping so I have combined stamping and doodling for my entry.

Stamps used : Leane Creatief Doodle Pine Cone and Woodware sentiment from Trio of Trees set.
Doodling by me.
Coloured with Promarkers : Shale, Cinnamon and Honeycomb
Clear Wink of Stella on the pine cone to add some shimmer (does not show up well in the photo as it is subtle).

I reckon this one is more autumnal than Christmas. Maybe I should add some snow?

Dotty Demos

My first visit to the Craft Barn for a demo day was last Saturday and the theme was dots. The demonstrators were using the new Woodware stamps and alcohol markers. Copics were used for the demonstrations but Promarkers work equally well.

Follow this link for Jane Gill's example from the demo.

Here are my attempts at using dots.

Woodware : Love Tulips

Promarkers : Forest Green, Lime Green, Pastel Blue and blender pen.

Woodware Clear Stamp : Bubble Blooms

Promarkers : Burgundy, Walnut, Coral, Marine, Oasis

Black dots added with a Sakura Micron pen

Many Thanks to Jane Collman and Jane Gill at the Craft Barn for the inspiration.

Santa ... I've been so good

It's been a while. I have an excuse - the hard disk on my laptop died which did not leave me happy I can tell you. I was good, I backed up my hard disk quite regularly but, when the disk died, the external drive I was using for the backup got trashed too. Not happy, I have lost 2 years worth of my photographs and files. I highly recommend at least two methods of backup including cloud storage. At least my blog pictures are safe, that will teach me to blog more often!

So here is a quick blog update, my Santa Christmas card :

Woodware Large Word Stamp
Stamped onto Christmas paper from stash (Papermania I think from several years back).
Fussy cut the letters and glitter added to the hat.

More to come .......