WOYWW #346

Hi folks, Wednesday again, and if you've been living under a rock somewhere for the last few years, you may not have heard of WOYWW. So hop over to Julias, at The Stamping Ground, link up and join the fun.On my desk this week are some 'will eventually be a card' projects.
 Some inked backgrounds left to dry thoroughly, so I can stamp and heat emboss over them.
 The plastic bag contains some die cuts- reindeer, 25's,Christmas Trees, some NOEL's,and some Christmas stockings. The dreamcatchers at the front I bought off E-bay.12 for £1.35, a bargain. I thought they may make some nice cards. I buy quite a few of these die cuts from E-bay, as sometimes you'd like a certain die cut, but know that you would not get enough use from it to justify the purchase, if you know what I mean?

I had just moved these off the desk, so they could dry out. I'd cut them out using the Sizzix Alterations NOEL die- which seems to be discontinued now-and I thought a few of them might look good glittered.
 So we'll see where that goes. I'm still on a roll with my Christmas cards- though I'm only going to post up one a month now- but while I've got the flow I'm going to run with it. I'll run out of steam eventually, hopefully I'll have most of them done by the time that happens.Have a good day, I'll see you all later.

Alcohol inks on Mirror card

Well, the Black Hole that is Pinterest does actually yield some interesting stuff. Mind you, if I wanted to make everything I've pinned, I'd have to craft 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for the next couple of lifetimes!  But still it sucks me in. However, today I spotted something, pinned it, and for once had a play with the idea there and then.  So to all of you now suffering biblical plagues and floods, sorry, my bad! The thing that caught my eye, was someone using alcohol inks onto what she called shiny card, for that read mirror card. Now I just so happen to have a Really Useful Box full of that stuff- bought back when I first started card making, and did a lot of decoupage. Always made a nice backing panel. Then I discovered stamps and ink, and was lost for ever. So if you have any of this knocking around, and don't know what to do with the stuff anymore, have a look-see at this.
I've got some plain 'pillars of light' style card, and some with patterns, so I thought I'd give both a try out. The tub of felts for the blending tool by the way- I bought a pack of felt sheets off e-bay and cut my own. A pack of 10 9"x9" squares cost me £4- the contents of that tub is from one square!
By the way, I give you fair warning now, this is a picture heavy post!

 For the first one, I tried out three of the new colours- Mermaid, Indigo and Honeycomb.

 Its not easy to show on here, but the effect is really amazing, a little bit like glass paint on a mirror.

 This next one is Purple Twilight, Raspberry and SailBoat Blue.

 Because of the holographic effect of the card, you get different colours depending on the light direction.





This is one of the pieces with stars in the foil- Poppyfield (another new colour), Pesto and Sunshine Orange were used here.

 This one used Raspberry, Wild Plum and Raisin, with a tiny bit of Black Soot added at the end.

 I thought the starry background would look good in night sky colours- Purple Twilight, Raspberry, Stream, Denim and Sailboat Blue.

       This combo is  Botanical, Honeycomb,(both new) and Sunshine Orange.

                                                


This one is Indigo, Poppyfield and Terra Cotta.

  

 The four completed panels.










             






And the three with the pattern.











Now I wondered how the plain ones would look with some embossing folder texture added.




















This is a Cuttle bug folder, Gears.





The second two are Tim Holtz folders.




 As is this one.

The four sheets, all embossed. You get a lovely deep reflective colour using this card, plus the bonus of changing shades depending on the light source.

Artful card- Artists Pastels, Stamping & a Watercolour background!

I'd been musing about this idea for a while, after seeing so many gorgeous projects using Pan Pastels, but having a mass of Artists Pastels & crafters chalks, absolutely cannot justify buying any! Pastels (& chalks) tend to imply, and give, pale colours, so I wondered how I could use the Artist Pastels sticks in my cards, and get some nice strong colours too.
 I've used chalks over Versamark before now, but one problem I always have is that rubbing on the chalks can smudge the image- best cure is to dab them on, rather than rub them in. Artist pastels are in a stick form, and not so easy to get colour off and onto your applicator. One day, whilst roaming around Tesco, I spotted what I thought might be a solution- A Nutmeg Grater!


 So here is what I started this project with:
 A pack of Artists Pastels,  with the Nutmeg Grater in the top left corner  of the pic.

I took one of the Acrylic plate stamped sheets from an earlier post, Versamark ink and a selection of Tim Holtz stamps.

The heart was stamped first, then had some blue pastel grated over it, and dabbed across the image with a cotton wool ball.

I was actually quite shocked at how well it worked, and gave a nice clean image, without a 'halo' of colour, which chalks sometimes give.














 
Another stamp in the lower right corner, covered this time with purple pastel.Dusted it off again, and out pops the clock image.

Next came a brown pastel, over a filmstrip stamp here at the top, and you can see the grated chalk better. I also stamped the filmstrip onto a post it note, and just rubbed the cotton wool ball over it to make a mask for later on.

 Dusted off with the cotton ball again. I like how its applying colour, but with an almost 'distressed' finish, which works brilliantly with the stamps & background.

 I added some stampings of a floral swag,  in brown at the top right and orange in the lower left.

Next I stamped the Umbrella Man at the bottom, using Sepia Versafine. The post it note filmstrip mask came into play now.







The centres were cut out with a scalpel, and the image covered  with it. I used one of the Three Top Hatted men to stamp in Sepia again, into each of the frames.  To make sure I got them in the right place, out came the  Stamp Positioner- I hate it when I do it by eye, I'm always slightly 'off'.

I added some prints of the numbers and small ticket strip, using the second & third print, with Sepia Versafine again.

The final image was a single pen nib in a couple of places, just inking up one nib on the pen nibs stamp, and using the second impression.









 



     For the backing, a piece of Craft Core card, in a Teal colour embossed with Tims texture Fades 'Gears' folder. After I'd embossed it, I rubbed over the embossing with a Chipped Sapphire Distress Inkpad.

  I wanted to add a Clock die-cut to the card- I don't have this die, but had bought some ready cut from e-bay. This is a great way to get a selection of die cuts, without having to buy all the dies, especially if you are not likely to be constantly using them.
 I added colour with Distress Inkpads Faded Denim, Dusty Concord & Chipped Sapphire. Then added a covering of Versamark and clear embossing powder.




The hands coloured in Black soot, and clear heat embossed too.

Now they were layered up, sandwiching the clock face between the two card layers. The clock hands were held in place with a black brad, and I used copper brads to hold the two sheets of card together.

This is my desk, mid composition, lol. It was marginally worse at one point, here I've moved the stamps and my pad for working on, and put the DI pads away.

The whole thing is mounted onto a dark blue card base using copper brads. I  used two to attach the right hand side of the card, then removed the original two, made corresponding holes in the base card, and reattached them. I also added a Tim Holtz token to the top corner.
 Final addition was a pen nib, added with Pinflair Glue gel, over one of the stamped pen images.








Supplies:
Artist Chalks ( The Works)
Nutmeg Grater
Assorted stamps- mine came from the following Clear stamp sets( all bought from e-bay)
Lifes Possibilities
Lost & Found
City Central
Pen nibs & Top Hatted men from Cling Stamps Curious Possibility
Versafine Sepia
Versamark
Clear Embossing powder
Heat Gun
DI Pads in  Black Soot, Chipped Sapphire, Faded Jeans & Dusty Concord.
Clock Die Cut (E-Bay)
Texture Fades Embossing folder, Gears. (Comes in a two pack, with Blueprint)
Craft core cardstock
Embellishments & brads

WOYWW #182

 This is my offering today- everywhere else is still too mucky to show you, lol. I ordered some die-cuts from e-bay, as I don't have the dies for these, and received a fab package, with not only the die cuts, but some lovely other bits & pieces too. I especially liked that she sent me the 'whole piece' of the die cut, so I have masks as well. So a huge thank you, and well deserved credit to Dawnbirdsong , who also put me a lovely personal note in with the goodies. Its so nice to be able to give someone such a big thumbs up for amazing customer service! She later sent me a great e-mail, and is more than willing to make up special packages, to customer orders,so if you need die-cuts, and don't have the dies, I highly recommend her.Its also a good way to try out die-cuts, to see if you would actually get your money's worth out of purchasing the die, I think.  A little more of the 'work in progress' that is to be my new craft room:
               Most of the old plaster & lath down;

All the old plaster & lath now gone, and the plasterer starts today putting up new plasterboard, and then plastering the ceiling & skimming the walls.All being well, should be putting down the laminate early next week, then paint ceiling (a few times) then the walls ( another few times), paper the chimney breast wall- I have a fab black sparkly paper that didn't get used in the bedroom in the end, then we can start putting the Ikea stuff together.Have a great Wednesday everyone, see you around the desks!