Mothers day

Hello there! I do hope you are well and happy and thanks for joining me - I have a card to share with you today that I made for my mum for mothers day ...its made using paperartsy stamps - I used my mums favourite colours.

Glad to report that she really liked it! 

Have a great day!

Big hugs

Rachel x

a vegetation sensation!

Hello there! I do hope you are well and happy. Its my second post for Countryview Challenges today with my theme this month which is 'plantastic'. I've hit the paperartsy paints, stamps and stencils and had a lovely messy play....

Here's the start - I used green patina and key lime from paperartsy seth-apter-set-2 paints and slimed and sargasso from -tracy-scott-set and also  one called seaglass. I spread it all over a hardboard using my fingers ...

when dry I got some stencils out and stencilled these images...

then I added some stamping using jofy59 and jofy63. and also my trustee white posca pen.

More painting, stamping and cutting out...and finally - the finished article ...

I hope I can tempt you into joining us! You can link up here.

Big hugs

Rachel xx

I see you baby ...

Hello there ...its nearly the end of the month and I have finished making samples for next month and so I have had a little bit of a play time!!! I got some new stamps from paperartsy recently and have used them to make a tag ...

Such a fun image - and I just loved that saying...everytime I stamp it I start singing!!! Lol! Funny!

I am having a smart meter fitted today - I am hoping all goes well - I'll be able to see what is most expensive in the house!! My mum likes hers so I thought I would take the plunge!

Have a great day!

Hugs

Rachel x

ATC's at paperartsy

Hello there! How are you? Here's hoping you are well. Thanks so much for the lovely comments on yesterdays post - you are very kind. I've stuck with pperartsy characters today and made a set of ATCoins for the theme over at Paperartsy this fortnight. Love these quirky characters!

I started by painting the coins and adding detail using a JOFY stencil (PA83). I then used Darcy's stamp set EDY22 onto card and did a bit of fussy cutting! Hope you like them!

I'd like to enter these into paperartsy-topic-15-artist-trading-coins

I had a grand day out with my lovely mum yesterday - we went to the show at Event City near the Trafford Centre . I got myself a very large ball of wool and a pattern for a celtic knot shawl. It will take me forever so don't hold your breath! I also got a book on needle felted animals - looking forward to playing!

Big hugs

Rachel xx

Cake

I think I must be feeling the after effects of my afternoon tea on Sunday ....because todays card has a definite theme!

Love all these whimsical characters from Elenazinski art from paperartsy!!!The background is distress oxides and I have used posca pens to colour most of the stamped images although the chefs hat was paper pieced!

I would like to enter this for paperartsy-topic-4-whimsy-challenge

Hope you're having a good day!

Rachel xx

Playing with Seth Apter paints

Hello there! Well I mentioned I had been playing with some Seth Apter paperartsy paints in a post earlier this week ....and now I have managed to finish the card I was making using the other piece of the master board I created..... here's the masterboard in creation....

I used the following paints and applied them with my brayer until I was happy with what I had created.... Butter, Double denim, Magic Moss, Blue Lagoon, Key lime, green patina..

I then added paint circles and lines mostly using butter but also doubling up with the double denim....

At this point I was hoping to use the new sheep stamps....but they are yet to arrive ...so I went back to the new Kay Carley ones and created a card...

Here's the final look... I used a Kay Carley stencil too and bumped the stencil creating a double 3d effect... Stamping was done in paint and lastly in ink and I fussy cut those flowers!!!

Here's a closer look! Some white highlghting too. 

I want to enter this into the challenge at paperartsy topic-2-new-seth-apter-fresco

Have a great Friday!

Hugs

Rachel xx

More paperartsy play

Hello there! Hope you are doing okay! We are all good. Whilst I was at Cumbria crafters I had a bit of extra time so I had taken along my paperartsy stamps to play with and this is what happened....

I made the tag first whilst waiting for things to get going! 

I do love these grasses - so very pretty - I added the white highlights once I got home...

This one I did after the card in Jo's class and used one of the papers from the shenandoah clarity pack. I think it worked well!

Big hugs

Rachel xx

Make it round at Christmas card club

Hello there!!! How are you? After two consecutive weekends of crafting madness I am glad to be at home this weekend. I need a bit of normality I think!!! And since its the 1st tomorrow I am posting my Christmas card club makes a day early. The theme was 'make it round' ...I love this theme - so very different for me - and very open to variation too. I decided to make some cards using some elenazinski designs from paperartsy.

Here they are!

All cards were made in basically the same way - using dies to cut 8x8 cards plus circular toppers. I used distress microglaze to keep the borders clean then created distress oxide backgrounds.

The toppers were stamped and coloured.

I do hope you like them.

Hugs

Rachel

Autumn

Hello there my lovelies! How are you? I do hope you are well and happy! I am very happy - still on cloud 9 after my workshop with Tim.

  

Tim is such a natural presenter and demonstrator of ideas and is so warm and funny. And Mario - what a fabulously warm and humble man - he was just lovely!

We made 10 tags using different techniques - 5 I had done before but I had forgotten them! 5 nexw ones using distress oxides. All good - expect to see some of the tags as I replicate the techniques in pieces I make. 

Today I did use one of the techniques but it didn't replicate well so I haven't shown it here!!! Will try again!

Here's what i made - a distress oxide background plus stamped leaves from scrapcosy stamped onto claritypaper....and words in stamps from Alison Bomber.

Here's a closer look!

I do hope you are okay! Off to pop around your blogs for a peep at what you've been up to! 

Hugs

Rachel x

Bye bye Rose!

Hello there! How are you today. I hope you are well....sending hugs if you are under the weather physically or emotionally. We all need a good hug at times!

Today I have the card I made for Brownowl - she left brownies at the end of June after 23 years service. We have her leaving 'do' tonight - aptly a camp with songs and games. Looking forward to it. Brown owl is called Rose so I decided to use this stamp set from scrapcosy at Paperartsy.

I did the stamping on the card in versamark then set with white embossing powder. I added the stamp from Alison Bomber - the Rose is a rose .... it seemed appropriate! The butterflies were stamped and added later. I used two distress inks - tattered rose and victorian velvet.

Two close ups - I do hope she likes it - its something a bit vintage and different for me but I really like it! 

Things were fun at the demo yesterday - I didn't get to stay too long as predicted but we all made a little folkart card so that was nice! 

Big hugs one and all!

Rachel xx

Jo Firth Young comes to Carnforth!!!

Hello there my lovelies - well it was a rare treat on Saturday for me when the lovely Jo Firth Young headed north and led a workshop at Carnforth Station visitors centre ... hosted by Rowan Tree Crafts. Sharon is the main lady there and is really lovely - if ever you get the chance to visit the shop - its really friendly and stocked with loadsa goodies!!!

Anyway Jo is a really lovely lady - I have so many sets of her stamps but have never met her! It was just lovely and her project was fabulous - here's her make ...

it used two of her new sets of stamps plus some an older set and three different stencils.

Here's a smiley picture of me and Jo...

I was also lucky enough to meet up with Chris from Pear Shaped Crafting...

I really enjoyed meeting Chris and hope to meet again.

Now to my make ...

Here's the whole thing ....

the left hand side ...

the centre - i used one of the new Alison Bomber stamps here. They had arrived into my hot little hands on Friday and I was desperate to ink them up!!!

and this is the right hand side.

To be fair to Jo I won't go into details ...but lots of fun was definitely had!!!

Have a great Monday - we have a busy day. The coffee pot ladies are coming this morning and its the girls sports day in the afternoon. In the evening Lucy is going by Limosine to her school leavers do! I don't know - it seems a bit crackers but she is super happy so has to be worth it!

Big hugs

Rachel x

Infusions and paint mark 2

Hello there! Well I've been playing again - so much to do but I can't keep from getting mucky with paint and infusions! This time I've been playing with a new stamp set by Kay Carley that jumped in my basket at Countryview crafts too!!! Here's the results of my play...

I used watercolour cardstock and stamped the main floral image a few times. Then I used infusions in blackcurrant and spritzed. Next I added some royal blood infusions and spritzed with water again.  Onto the painty part.... I used some tinting base from decoart and mixed some of the royal blood infusions in with it - I used this to paint around the flowers. I mixed more tinting base with blackcurrant and violet and painted some of the flowers in. Lastly I did the dragonflies and the words...

I am very pleased with this - the stamps are so very pretty!

I want to enter this into the paperartsytopic-3-paints-with-infusions

and also

craftstamper take-it-make-it-challenge-march

Have a lovely day!

Big hugs

Rachel x

Tripps card

Hello there! Well its been shocking weather today here - wall to wall rain - I hope it stops soon or the rivers might burst their banks again. That would be awful. I hope things are ok where you are.

This afternoon I thought I would take the opportunity and head into my crafty space to make something for the extended masking challenge over at paperartsy. I have sadly misplaced my masking fluid so had to do traditional masking. I masked of my little figure and surrounded him with beautiful makebelieve vegetation all from elenazinski stamps.

With his mask in place but the vegation left open I added a background using distress oxides. Then I coloured the veg in posca pens.

Here's a close up... I haven't tried painting with the DIO yet - something else to experiment with I think!!!

I would like to enter this into paperartsy-topic-2-masks-challenge

Big hugs

Rachel xx

Pink and orange at paperartsy

Hello lovelies! Well its been a busy week and I have yet another post for you today - this time - nothing to do with DT work - just playtime. The first theme over the at Paperartsy this year is pink and orange ... I just had to join in! I got my journal out and had a painty play!

I had so much fun making the background. I used fresco paints and layered them up with a brayer. Sherbet and candy floss and tangerine twist and tango plus prawn were the paints used. I also used snowflake paint and one of the new stencils. 

The stencilling shows up nicely here - there are some elenazinski stamps in here too...

More stencilling ....

these characters are such fun!

I was inspired particularly by the post pocket-letters-by-wendy-mallas in making this - although of course mine is a journal page rather than ATCs!

I'd like to enter the paperartsy blog -topic-1-pink-and-orange-challenge.

also craftstamper take-it-make-it-challenge-february

Hugs

Rachel x

Stars for paperartsy

Hello there! How are you? I hope you are doing well. We had a good weekend and enjoyed the fireworks...hope you did too! Lucy and I had a lovely walk during the day on Saturday and on Sunday we did lots of visiting!

I have a journal page to share with you today. Its for the current challenge over at paperartsy where the theme is typography, fonts and quotes. I was particularly inspired by Claire Snowdon's post. Here's what I did...

I used eclectica-sara-naumann-13 and lots of lovely fresco paint applied with a brayer!

Love this quote!

I would like to enter paperartsy typographyfonts-and-quotes challenge

Have a great day - I'm off to coffeepot and am in charge - I will show you what we made tomorrow!

Hugs

rachel x

patchwork creatures

Hello there - I write this in a warm house - wow - it makes such a difference to have heating - fingers crossed the rodent (s) that caused the damage have bit the dust!! Otherwise there will be more problems to come I suspect!

Tonight I have a patchwork card to share with you in response to the latest challenge over at Paperartsy. I have used a layout very similar to that used by Jennie ....but the main inspiration for my card is by helen-chilton. My card really looks nothing like either of these though! I used those fabulous creatures from Elenazinski.

These guys are fabulous - love them to pieces!!!! And I love them only partially stamped too - aren't they cool????

My method is very simple - I cut 9 4x4cm pieces, stamped coloured and assembled them! Not rocket science but cute I think! What do you think?

I'd like to enter this into the squares-and-grids-challenge over at paperartsy.

Big hugs and a happy Friday night to you!

Rachel x

Boo!

Hello there! How are you? I hope you are well! I am okay but reeling from a bit of a rubbish day yesterday. I managed to get new pipes fitted under the floor in two bedrooms last week and hoped that this would solve my boiler trouble - but no - yesterday I got up, ran the shower and no hot water - so I checked the boiler and the pressure was down again. The plumber came and said that I've got a choice - rip the floorboards up to find the leak - or rip them up and renew all the piping! So now I'm waiting for a quote! Oh my! What joy!!!!

Anyway - as a bit of therapy I had a play with some of my new stamps from the weekend. Here's what I made:

These are some of the characters from a new set of stamps from elenazinski at paperartsy. There are 4 sets in total and I love them!!!!

I used ZA02 plus a stencil from dutch doobadoo. I also used a diecut for the bats from Tim Holtz and the Boo word is another die cut from Tim.

They are such fab characters - it definitely cheered me up!!!

I would like to enter this into the current paperartsy challenge - paperartsy-die-cuts-challenge - I was inspired to use a negative die part as in the one by sheswickedcrafty.

I also should have a piece on the fiskarettesuk facebook page today... its one I already gave you a sneak peek of ...

Here's to a fun Wednesday!

Big Hugs

Rachel x