Alecs card

Hello there! How are you today? We're good - and its the last day of mad science for the girls - they have had such a good week and enjoyed lots of crazy science experiments and fun! I'm off for a swim today - I hope it goes better than yesterdays run which was a bit of a disaster! Nevermind!

Today I want to share a card with you for one of Lucy's class mates - Alec will be 9 on Monday!

I chose the colours - distress - stormy sky and aged mahogony to reflect his choice of football team - The Clarets! I used TH stencils to build up the background and a small script stamp too - then I used an Imagination Crafts stencil - Skater Boy to create the main focus - with black matt dreamweaver embossing paste.

The letters and number were cut using Tim Holtz  Wordplay sizzix grand die.

I would like to enter this into the following challenges:

fashionablestampingchallenges challenge-101-all-about-the-men

unrulypaperarts august-2015-reader-art-quest

I hope you have a good Friday! Take care and I'll see you all soon!

Rachel x

Emily's card and a cappucino cake.

Good morning lovelies - how are you? I hope you are well. Thankyou for your kind comments on my canvas ....You are very generous! I am feeling much looser today after my sports massage - the lady said all my muscles were very tight and I'm hoping that todays run is going to reap the benefit of her work - I can't see her again until early September - so I hope the results that I currently feel last!

So today I have a very similar card to the other days - this one is for a girl who will be 5 on Saturday - she will also become one of my rainbows in September - her name is Emily.

I used another LOTV artpad  annabel image and cut with a spellbinders die. The paper is also LOTV. 

The lettering and numbers were cut from a TH wordplay die - its proving very useful. 

I have also made a cake! Its a cappucino cake - and was made from a kit that I won from the cake2craft blog. There aren't many followers over there - and i have won 2 things in as many months - why not pop over and join up - any of you who love cakes!!! 

The cake was very easy to make - just add butter and eggs and mix - I did find the cooking instructions a bit short on time but as long as you're used to baking and know when a cake is cooked you should have no worries! It tastes good too!!!!

Have a great Thursday!

Hugs

Rachel x

Flowers at Paperartsy

Hello Lovelies! How are you today? i hope you are well - thanks for your kind words about my card and my dad - he behaved himself yesterday - no sunbathing on the concrete thankfully! He's a bit battered and bruised but in good spirits!

Today I would like to share with you a canvas I have been working on for the paperartsy flower challenge - I adore paperartsy flower stamps and seem to have amassed quite a few recently - so I had to make a second entry into this challenge!

I started with a clarity 12 inch square canvas board and added a napkin covered in strawberries. I made sure there were creases  in the napkin and stuck it with deco art multi matt medium. You can't see much of the pattern because the next step involved painting with with fresco paints - I used two semi opaque ones after first covering in watered down gesso. 

Next I did some stencilling in snowflake fresco paint. I used eclectica-paperartsy-stencil-elb-ps001, 004, paperartsy-stencil-jofy-ps007.

Then I stamped and coloured the main flowers using distress markers then fussy cut them. I used jofy32, elb22, elb24. for the flowers.

I hope you like this - I do!!! I then stamped coloured and added the butterflies, dragonfly and sentiment. 

I would like to enter this into the following challenges:

theartisticstampercreativeteam augusts-creative-challenge-anything-goes

mixedmediamcchallenge-15-get texty

welove2create - ag mixed media

paperartsy-topic14-flowerschallenge

I hope you have a great wednesday - my girls are off to mad science again - and I'm meeting my friend Julie, running then having a sports massage and then once I pick the girls up I'm off to see my friend Julia for tea and cake!!! Looking forward to that! Busy day me thinks!!!

Take care!

Hugs

Rachel xx

Merri's card

Good morning! I hope you have slept well and are having a good day. It was a mixed day for all of us Fishers yesterday - The girlies went to mad science and I went for a 9 mile run - which was hard going but I did it ... then I went home and finished cutting the roadside hedge. Then, whilst crafting I got a call from my mum to say dad had had another fall - he was going off to hospital. I went and fetched the girls and then met my mum at the hospital - thankfully all the tests went okay and they released him around 7.30 last night. A big scare for all of us again but thankfully he's okay!

Today its one of Lucy's friends birthdays - Merri is going to be 9 - and this is the card I made to give to her.

It feels a bit like a blast from the past - I haven't made a card like this for donkies - but I enjoyed it and I think Merri will like it.

The image is from a LOTV pad - I chose this one as Merri likes camping and has a Jack Russel dog - result!  I don't think its too young for her! Hope not!!!

Have a great day - we're all busy again - the girls have more mad science and I'm going swimming - followed by shopping and housework .... and some crafting if I get chance!

Big hugs

Rachel x

Playtime at my mums

Hello Lovelies! How are you? I hope you are fine and well. I wonder if you had the rain that we had yesterday. It was a very wet afternoon - and we were in Morecambe at a funfair! Oh joy! Perfect weather for it!!

I want to share a card with you today - made at my mums house last week using some of the new sheena christmas dies and stamps:

I thinks the pine cones are particularly effective.

The holly would have taken forever to cut out!

Love this pine cones

This was from an earlier release but is from Sheena! 

I enjoyed this little play and am pleased with the outcome! 

I would like to enter this into the following challenges:

craftyhazelnutschristmaschallenge-two-of-something two plants - holly and pine

craftyhazelnutschristmaschallenge2.august-2015

sirstampalotchallenge august-challenge-anything-goes-with stamp and a die

The girls are off to Mad science this week so I'm hoping to get a few miles under my belt - I can't push it too much though as I have plantar fasciitus - joggers heel! Very painful but curiously it goes whilst running! Something to do with endorphins apparently. Anyway - I'm hoping to do a 8 and 1/2 miler today. Not so long now until the Great North. 

Whatever you're doing enjoy yourself!

Big hugs Rachel xx

An experiment and a bench!

Good morning Lovelies! How are you today? Hope you are well and happy. We are all good. Penny has been taking part in a soccer sports reach programme this last week and has really enjoyed it. She has been gracing the field today in her pink football boots and socks!

 She is so very funny - funny that she got photobombed here too - she's usually the one doing it!

Today I would like to share an experiment with you - recently I watched a piece that Kay from Indigo Blu did about stamping with the cottage paints onto fabric - once dry if you iron them they are colourfast up to 40 degrees. Anyway - I wanted to try so this is what I did:

I took a plain cushion cover and stamped onto it using stamps from the giant-poppy stamp set and also acrylic-paint-emerald-city-metallic and acrylic-paint-ruby-slippers and acrylic-paint-hot-cocoa.

I started with the border - I found it best to brayer the paint onto a surface and then stamp into it then onto the fabric. I did the same thing each time - then afterwards painted in using diluted paints.

I think the exercise was quite useful and I will try this again - on other fabric.

I would like to enter this into the theartisticstampercreativeteam augusts-creative-challenge-anything-goes.

Why not give it a try? I think its a brilliant idea!

I just wanted to share the bench with you too - I got this in memory of Shaun. I love it.

Shaun used the company (Classic memorial Benches) to get one of these benches when his dad died - that bench is in his mums garden. This bench from the same company - for Shaun - is in my garden - so I can sit and reflect on the happy days we shared. I think I'll sit on it lots.

Big Hugs to you!

Rachel x

In the Summertime at Country View Crafts

Hello Lovelies - well its the first of the month and time for a new challenge over at Countryview Crafts Challenges. This months challenge theme has been chosen by alison and has got me thinking about things bright and beautiful and floral. With this in mind I decided to use Paperartsy goodies all from countryviewcrafts to make a canvas. I already sent this to a good friend for her birthday - hope she liked it!!!

Here's the full canvas - its around 7 inches by 18 inches - so its quite large. I started by painting the background in fresco-finish-chalk-acrylics smurf blue. Next I started to add background layers using the fresco-finish-chalk-acrylics snowflake and eclectica-paperartsy-stencil- dots, eclectica-paperartsy-stencil-elb-ps002 leaves. I added paperartsy-fresco-finish-chalk-acrylics-hey-pesto to the leaves once the white had dried.

Next I used grunge-paste through eclectica-paperartsy-stencil-elb-ps013 by Lin brown. and allowed this to dry. Then I used rubber-stamp-sheet-by-lin-brown---elb16 and rubber-stamp-sheet-by-lin-brown---elb15 to create the stems and flower heads.

I painted the leaves in the snowflake paint then added some hey pesto. The flower heads were done using paperartsy-fresco-finish-chalk-acrylics---tango. with touches of some red acrylic paint that I had to hand.

Finally I added the butterflies made using sizzix-bigz-die-wtexture-fades---butterfly-duo-by-tim-holtz. I swiped over the surface with  brown potting soil archival ink then added the orange colour using distress pens.

I would like to enter this into the paperartsy topic14-flowerschallenge

I loved making this and I hope you agree its very summery! Please join us at countryviewchallenges where the prize is a fabulous £20 to spend in store! 

Big Hugs to you!

Rachel xx