Art on tour.

I thought I'd share a few of my favourite art journal pages from my Italian holiday.  Yes I did take my art supplies on holiday with me and who wouldn't be influenced by that view.

The pages from my summer journal have been watercoloured, inked and drawn on and stamps from My Stamp Box have been used for On the beach.



Al Fresco dining - STILL!

This weekend was quite busy and I'm happy to say the weather is just superb still. We're trying to profit from warm sunny days and eating out as much as possible because we know it can all change in an instant.

Saturday was the day for picking the apples in the village, so alot of the villagers got together to pick bags and bags of apples which will eventually be made into juice.  At lunch time we sat outside for a picnic lunch of homemade lentil soup and brownies (made by me - the brownies that is).  It was all very friendly.

Saturday evening was dinner with friends which involved more eating!!  Then sunday as a family we sat outside to eat lunch. 

Sunday afternoon I had to watch Create and Craft tv as it was the Kuretake show where I had several cards on display.  The card above is one of the cards which I'd sent for the show.  It's acatate coloured with alcohol inks and then stamped over with a script stamp. The prima flowers have also been coloured with the alcohol inks so they all matched. You can buy the inks from the Create and Craft web site.

I hope it's sunny where you are, have a good week.

A touch of vintage.

It's happy friday here in Luxembourg where the sun is shining and the weekend promises to be great.  It's just as well because we're picking apples in the village tomorrow which will be made into juice so good weather will make things easier.  Especially as it's a picnik lunch too.

On the Sarah Hurley challenge blog the new theme for the next two weeks is 'Vintage'.  I don't usually do vintage terribly well. I like to look at it and admire how other people do it but it's not something that sits well with me.  We were given some images from Altered Expression, who are sponsering the challenge, to work with and boy did that make things easier.  These gorgeous downloadable images are all ready to go, it's just cut and stick! I put mine on a tag which I'd painted and inked and backed the image with the bingo card from Sara's Wonderland cd.

Altered Expression are giving away gift certificates to the top 3 winners of this challenge so you could get your hands on some of their images for yourselves.

Also Sarah is launching two new sets of Halloween digi kits on her blog.  I got to play with the kits a little while ago and made a trick or treat bag and a gothic arch card with the digi papers and elements. The two kits are vintage and whimsical and they include backing papers, toppers, alphabets and stamps.  Everything you could need to make cards, invitations or treat bags.  You'll find them in her shop here and on the blog for more inspiration from the dt.

My first digital download for sale.

I'm offering my first digital download over on Etsy. I designed this digital tree stamp for myself initially but decided I'd test the waters so to speak and offer it to anyone else who might like to use it. 

For anyone buying the stamp, it comes as a digital stamp to colour yourself or in a pre-coloured version to print out and use as a topper.

If you're interested in purchasing it, you can find it here.

Getting back to normal.

Happy Sunday everyone. Slowly things are returning to normal after the summer break.  School starts tomorrow for my girls and I've started to fill up my autumn calendar.  Christmas cards is one thing I'll try to do early this year (I say that every year!) - I imagine most crafty folk started theirs in the summer but I wasn't quite so organized.

Anyway, yesterday I managed to have another play with my Kuretake alcohol inks - I love these things. Here are two cards made with the backgrounds.

For the first one I've also used the Art and Graphic Twin pens to create the cool watercolour stamping technique. Simply colour onto the stamp with the pens and spritz with a fine mist of water before stamping.

This second card has been made by wiping the alcohol ink across the surface and using some blending solution to dilute the colour in spots. I stamped the trees from My Stamp Box onto it in black Versafine then flicked white drawing ink onto the card to look like snow. I love it's simplicity.

Kuretake alcohol ink cards.

These are the two cards which were used on the Kuretake show, featuring the Kuretake alcohol inks. The colours are really very vibrant which was one thing that struck me when I used them. 

On the top card I've used them on glossy card, acetate for the butterfly's and the little metal heart.

On the second card I've again used the blending technique for the background and the black ink on the embossed metal foil. I even coloured the prima flower to match the background.

Kuretake on Create and Craft TV

Tomorrow Kuretake Uk will be demonstrating their new alcohol inks on Create and Craft tv.  To see them you have to tune in either to the tv or via computer at 3:pm 5:pm and 7:pm uk time and maybe you'll get to see a couple of my cards on the show.

Before I went away on holiday I got to play with the inks and sent off some work to use as samples and the top of this box lid was one of the things I didn't get to finish before I went. Now finished I can show you here the finished box.

How small can you go?

In October I'll be giving a workshop to the Mosaik Scrappers, the first one after the summer break and we'll be making a Maze book.  This little one has been made using a 30x30 (12x12) piece of cardstock so the pages are only 3x3 inches - tiny.  I've used it to showcase some of my stamps from My Stamp Box but incorporating stamps onto a page so small proved to be more than a challenge. It was fun to come up with ways to include them without obscuring the photo's.

The obvious choice had to be shrink plastic and acetate and here's the end result.

For more information on how I made it go to the My Stamp Box blog for details.

challenge 49, Recycling.

Its time for challenge number 49 on Sarah Hurleys challenge blog and this time it's Natalie who's chosen the theme of Recycling.
I had it in my head to turn bottle tops into fridge magnets (I have to come up with an idea for the Christmas Fair) and this one is quite large with a diameter of 5 1/2 cm wide.  I cut a circle from book page then cut a smaller scalloped circle with my Spellbinders and another circle to go inside that from the rainbow backing paper from Sarah's Oz collection. I stamped and cut out the owl from Sarah's Woodland Whimsies stamp set ( I love him) and layered him on with some wire and beads. I used some magnetic tape on the back which I have to say didn't stick too well until the entire surface was covered with tape, and there you have it!