Chocolate Baroque one day special

Hello there! How are you? i hope you are well and happy. Tonight I have some samples to share with you of projects I made using the new Kingfisher stamp sets that were aired on Hochanda at 8pm  in a one day special... These stamps are available from Hochanda only for 10 days and after this time they will be available on the chocolate baroque website.

I was again lucky enough to be asked to make some samples and I had lots of fun!

This is a tag I made using a distress paint background and the new kingfisher main stamp....

The same stamp appears on this door hanger I made using a CB vegetation stamp too.

This is probably my favourtite sample I made - its an 8x8 box picture  featuring so many stamps from the show.... I hope I have given you some inspiration if you did buy the sets and a further incentive if you're still hovering!

Hugs

Rachel xx

Quick makes at chocolate baroque

Hello lovelies! How are you today? I hope you are well. I was lucky enough to be asked to make some samples for the first Chocolate baroque show on Hochanda and these two cards I have to share today were quick ones that I made for that.

This one used on of the big bold background stamps simply stamped and coloured in distress. The topper was stamped in distress in yellows and greens....

This one used the same background stamp and masking plus another topper stamped and coloured in distress. 

The final sample I have showing today is another one from the early January show - I made it using the archival resist technique with alcohol inks.

There are more quick makes on the chocolatebaroque blog today. I'm sure you can find some wonderful inspiration there!

Big hugs rachel xx

Clarity Cumbria day

Hello lovelies - how are you? Sorry its been a while - I have been trying to get my craft room organised having bought yet more units for storage ...and trying to keep on top of my exercise regime too! Its all taking time but the craft room is getting there - I am hoping I might find my desk tomorrow! Lol!!!!

Today I did my crafting at Lindale - at Jo Rice's Clarity Cumbria. We all had a wonderful time using Barbara's paper pad - Northern lights - the samples Jo had prepared were all fashion oriented but I went a little off piste as it was the only chance I was going to get to enter the Clarity challenge this month - so I used the cards of Jo's as inspiration and did my own thing!

Here's all four makes - they are so colourful - for someone who doesn't really use papers I really enjoyed myself - the papers are stunning - but you can see that for yourself!

I paperpieced the toucans on this one ....

and the rooster on this one .... and used the windy day stencil.

This one the dolphin is also paperpieced...

In this one the tree and houses and bushed are paperpieced. As soon as I saw this paper it screamed snowy landscape to me....

I am entering these into the clarity challenge which is now on facebook!

Thanks to Jo Rice for a lovely day!

Big hugs

Rachel xx

Anything goes at Countryview Challenges

Good Morning all! I do hope you are well and happy....if not sending crafty hugs your way! Today I have an inspirational piece for you over at Countryview Challenges. The theme this month is anything goes so an easy one!!!! I decided to do a jounal page using gelatos again - plus paperartsy stamps - from Claire Lloyd.

Its a pretty large spread in my big journal - I enjoyed creating the background using gelatos. I then added the stamp by-clare-lloyd and painted it in using a combination of gelatos and fresco paints. I also used paperartsy-stencil- from jofy.

Here's a closer look - I added the raindrop stamps and glossy accents to them and the eyes.

Here's a close up of the right hand side...

and finally the lovely quote....

I do hope you can join us at countryviewchallenges in our challenge which is anything goes! You could win a £20 voucher! 

Big hugs

Rachel xx

christmas card club - stars

Hello all! Well a fortnight has already passed since out last christmas card club so today I am back with the second post of the year .... our theme this time is 'stars'....I love this theme and chose it myself for CVC in November - but I still had plenty of dies and stamps I could use - so I made 4 cards this time....

This one is distress inks and lavinia stamps - I love hares and enjoyed receiving a few hare christmas cards last year so I think hares may feature quite a lot this time around! This star die is from TH.

This one involves a clarity stamp and stencil and I coloured it using distress inks. The backing layer is from the clarity stencil packaging.

The stamp here is from indigoblu and I stamped it in lilac archival ink. The die is from Crafters companion. I like this a lot and hope to use it again soon.

This final one uses some old papers from LOTV and another die from crafters companion.

I really enjoyed this one - the four cards only took about 90 minutes in total too! 

Big hugs!

Rachel x

ATC swap - film quote

Hello there! Well I have been a bit of a bad blogger haven't I? Sorry - been a bit busy! I have managed to get an ATC swap made though so I thought I would put it on here today! The theme for the swap is film quote - I decided to use the quote 'There's no place like home' from 'The wizard of Oz'....I used paperartsy stamps having first made a masterboard in paints.

I hope they are well received and I really look forward to seeing what comes back.

Big hugs for a happy day!

Rachel x

Penny's birthday party invitations

Good Morning Lovelies! How are you? I do hope you've had a good weekend. We've had a busy and fun one - we had a lovely party around at a friends house on Friday night - on Saturday I went to see I Daniel Blake with a friend and then Sunday the girls did readings and sang in church. So a busy family orientated weekend! Yesterday afternoon I managed to make the invitations to Penny's party. She's having another friend of mine around to do a pottery party. Danielle has her own kiln and a degree in ceramics and she is such a lovely lady - she usually makes cakes for my girls parties when I can't be bothered/am too busy! Anyway - this is a newish venture for her and I am looking forward to seeing what they get up to. Its not until February - but I will let you all know how it goes!

The invitations - well the party stuff is all on a finding Dory theme which Penny adores - so I printed some pictures out and made a masterboard ....did a bit of stencilling, stamping and diecutting and these are the results ...

She's very pleased thankfully! 

So I am off to go for a run today - and then its strength training at 12.30.. All good stuff!

Have a great day! 

Hugs

Rachel x

Chocolate Baroque quick makes

Hello lovelies! How are you today? I hope you are well! Just a quick post from me today to show you a card I made for the 4th January CB show on Hochanda. I made the background using alcohol inks and yupo and then stamped in archival ink before rubbing the ink off quickly!

The result is subtle and quite hard to photograph but I think it showed up well on TV. In retrospect I wonder is I should have decouplaged up the image - but then the technique would have been lost a bit so I think perhaps I was better leaving it as it was!

There's more super quick inspiration on the chocolatebaroque.blog today!

Big hugs

Rachel xx

More Chocolate Baroque samples

Hello lovelies! How are you? I hope you are well and surviving the weather - isn't it terrible?

I'm back today with some more of the samples from the recent chocolate baroque show. I loved using these stamps and felt very honoured to have been asked to make samples.

This one involves the script rose stamp which I stamped in versamark onto black card and embossed in gold. The inner was then painted with inka gold.

In this one I used the big bold floral background and coloured using distress pens.

This one was my favourite card sample of mine - the background is done in distress inks and the topper is stamped in flitterglu and then flake rubbed over. So pretty and I think with this particular stamp it looks beautiful!

I hope you have a great day - I'm meeting my lovely friend Danielle for lunch and really looking forward to it!

Big hugs

Rachel xx

New year ....new coffeepot!

Hello all! Well yesterday was the first of our new coffeepot year. And it saw a change in venue! The vicarage was no longer available for us to use so we have moved to my dining room! But only once a month!!!!There were 6 of us yesyerday and we did some simple cards using clarity stamps from jayne nesterenko!

They really are the most stunning stamps!

And I love the fuchsia too!

The ladies all loved the stamps and thoroughly enjoyed having a good colouring session! 

I have planned next month already - its going to be gelatos and crazy dogs - so quite different indeed!!!

I hope you have a great Tuesday! Enjoy whatever it is that you're doing!

Hugs

Rachel x

CCC: Anything goes - first challenge of the month.

Good morning all! I hope you are all okay! We are good. It was a busy day yesterday. Penny had a birthday party and a sleepover and Lucy came to the gym and swimming with me then had a friend over for a sleepover. It should be a bit quieter today. I hope!!!!

Its our very first Christmas card Club this week and the theme this time is anything goes. Woohoo. I got to play with my new holiday sparkle pens that I got in the crafters companion sale. Here's what I did.

I stamped two images - first this one from stampendous and secondly one from kanban. Then I coloured them using the sparkle pens.

Here's a close up ....

I have a few of these mini pine cones left from my craft box december issue so expect to see a few of these on cards!

Its only two cards but not a bad start to my stash for christmas 2017!

Hope you have a great day! Hugs

Rachel x

Isla's Card

Evening all! Just a quick post before I turn in for the night! I had to make a card for my youngest daughter's friends birthday! Its tomorrow! Last minute lil here decided to make a Lavinia card!

I love these badgers - I bought them in November and to my shame only just inked them up tonight!

They are lovely characters aren't they?

I hope she likes them!

Big hugs

Rachel x

swirls, whirls and fluorishes

Hello there!!! How are you today? I do hope you are well. Its time for a new challenge over at stamps and stencils - the theme was set by Ruth and here's what she had to say about it....

Theme : Swirls, Whirls and Flourishes. It may be January but this months challenge is nothing to do with winter, this month I'd like you to usher in the New Year by creating any mixed media piece you like as long as somewhere you include a swirl or a whirl or a flourish and some stamping or stenciling, of course!

Gorgeous theme Ruth - I decided to create a canvas - that has the required swirls, whirls and fluorishes, and just a small amount of stamping and stencilling!!!

I started by gessoing the canvas - then added the fluorishes and whirls and swirls of string. Next I overpainted in grandmas teacup blue paint from indigoblu, I stencilled the word snow from an indigoblu stencil and also added some snowflakes diecut and embossed plus some metallic ones.

I did a bit of stamping in flitterglu and added some flake and also some glitter. Finally I added the sentiment. A real wintry piece....hope you like it!!

You can find our challenge here and see the amazing makes my teamies made!!!

Big hugs and hope you will join us!

Rachel x

Snow snow snow at Indigo Blu ... reminder

Just a quick reminder today - the current challenge at IndigoBlu is snow snow snow. We should love to see your makes using Indigoblu stamps following the theme. The original post where you can link up is here. As  an inspirational piece I have been playing with alcohol inks and using the archival resist technique. I made this card....

The archival ink rubs off when stamped onto the alcohol ink - this works even better on yupo paper! The main snowflake image is large-snowflake-a6-red-rubber-stamp-by-indigoblu and the deer image is from winterland-wood-a5-red-rubber-stamp-by-kay-halliwell-sutton.

I stamped the second image also in archival but left it to dry!

I hope you can join us!

Hugs

Rachel xx

Fun with family and some samples!

Hello lovelies! How are you? Sorry I've been a bad blogger - I've been away visiting Shaun's family in Nottingham and only just returned. We had a lovely time. We all went up to Sherwood Forest on Monday and had a lovely walk.

 This is Lucy and Penny with Shaun's mum and our niece Josie who we sometimes visit in Germany.

 I managed to sneak on this one with the others plus nephew Henry and Shaun's brother Lee. They live in germany too.

Today I managed to catch up with an old school friend Lisa. She now lives in Australia but was over visiting her parents.

 This is us with her husband Paul who also came from where Lisa and I grew up in Nottingham but he went to a different school. It was so lovely to see them after so many years! Who knows - maybe we'll visit them in Australia!!!

The main reason for this post is to let you know about Chocolate Baroque's first appearance on Hochanda TV on 4th January at 11am and 5pm - I have made a few samples that I'm hoping will be shown - here are a few!

These stamps are all featured on the shows tomorrow. This is one of my favourites - I used brushos to create the background and coloured the rose in using distress pens.

I used two stamps here and made the heart super sparkly using glitter pens.

This one has an inky distress background and a rose script stamp.

I hope you can tune in!

Hugs

Rachel xx

Anything goes at Countryview Challenges

Hello there! How are you??? A very Happy New Year to you! I do hope that 2017 is your year! Lots of health and happiness for all!

Today is the start of a new challenge over at countryviewchallenges - and its out favourite theme - anything goes! I took the opportunity to play with some christmas goodies in the form of gelatos and some stamps I had already bought but not yet used from paperartsy. I used stamps from the following sets.

tracy-scott-03-a5-stamp-set
jofy-collection-jofy37
eclectica-rubber-stamp-sheet-by-kay-carley---ekc01

I decided to make a journal page - reflecting more summer than the dreadful rain we've been having!!! Here it is!

I used gelatos to create the background .... they are lovely and soft and blended well to make the background. I also used them to colour the stamped images - partly direct to the image and partly using a water brush.

I also used a posca pen to add dotted details to the page.

I love this sentiment - perfect for me!

Here's my final close up - that wiggly caterpillar is fabulous!!!

Please join us in our challenge - you may win a £20 voucher to spend in store!

Hugs

Rachel xx