Simples .....

Good morning, peeps!  I hope you're all having a great start to the day!

Today I thought I'd show you a couple of cards that I'm currently teaching at workshops for Samuel Taylor. In fact, there's only one workshop left now at the Brighouse store on Saturday 27 April.  It's always hard to come up with something new that will interest people sufficiently to attend a workshop.  These two cards focus on techniques so the design of the cards themselves is kept fairly simple.  Also, I do like stamps with a floral design (as regular visitors may have noticed!!) and I thought it might be nice to celebrate Spring with some seasonal flowers.

Here's the first one:

These tulips are paper pieced then shaded with coloured pencils to give the image some depth and dimension.  I also like making shaped easel cards, which are not as mysterious as some people might think.  The stamps come from a set by Woodware, available here.  The pink 'frame' to the picture is created with one of the wonderful newer Spellbinder dies called Floral Ovals.

and this is the second card:

The basic card for this one is even simpler, just a basic A5, but I always think that matting and layering brings an elegant shift to any card and the technique this time is watercolour using Ranger Distress Inks - specifically Dusty Concorde and Forest Moss.  You could also use watercolour pens for this technique but, for me, nothing reacts with water better than Sir Tim's Distress Inks!  This is another Woodware stamp called 'Grape Hyacinth' (never refrain from stating the obvious, Diane!!)  It's another design from the talented Jane Gill and being in the style of botanical illustration, I thought that this one was perfect for the watercolour technique.  The plant label at the bottom is cut from another of the newer Spellbinders, this time it's Enchanted Labels 28.  This is just the smallest die in the set and is fairly plain but the larger ones are just wonderful.

Thanks for looking today and I'll hopefully see you all again soon.  Some more goodies from Sheena should be arriving today, so watch this space!

Hugs

Last sneaky peek

Good morning, peeps!

I thought I'd just pop in and show you a final sneaky peek before Sheena's shows tomorrow.  There is a correction to the timings from my previous posts, the shows are at 11.00 a.m. and 3.00 p.m. and, as well as the lovely canvasses from my fellow teamies and the lovely lady herself, you might just catch a glimpse of this:

These iris are so easy to paint with the help of the stamp images.  The scrolls at the top right were produced by layering the Pebeo Acrylic Gel medium on to one of the stamps from the Flying Colours Stamp Set.  When it's dry, you can simply peel it away from the stamp and layer it on  to your canvas.  I just rubbed some of the lovely Gilding Wax over the result to show the relief.

The frame is from the usual place but unfortunately the glass didn't make it intact on the journey to wor Sheena so I hope that the canvas itself wasn't damaged in the fray!

I hope you enjoy the shows tomorrow, you can be certain that I'll be watching along to keep you company!

Hugs

A little bit Oriental

Good afternoon, peeps!  I hope you're all having a good day - things are getting better here and the snow is going away slowly so maybe Spring will come soon!

I have some more samples to show you that I've made for Sheena's shows on Saturday at 11.00 a.m. and 3.00 and 7.00p.m. (unless Create and Craft TV change their minds that is!!).  These three pictures are intended to be hung together:

As you can see, they were all produced with Sheena's fabulous Magnolia Blossom Stamp Set, which also has a wonderful corner design as a part of the set as well as smaller flowers and I really find it a very versatile set.  All the canvasses were painted with the wonderful Pebeo Acrylics that Sheena will be introducing to you on the shows.  They are 10 cms square and are mounted on those lovely £1.50 mirrors from that well known Swedish department store - such a brilliant bargain!  The charms are from my stash.

Whilst I'm showing you canvasses that are meant to be hung together, here is another project I created for the same shows where you don't have any choice but to hang them together because I firmly glued them that way!!

These are painted using four of the other stamps from the A little bit Floral series - all equally wonderful and large enough to use in wall art.

Thank you for looking today and I do hope you'll tune in to Sheena's shows or record them if you're going out - there are sure to be many useful tips from wor Sheena to help you!

Hugs

On the canvas

Good morning, peeps!  Have you got snow today?  It's been snowing quite hard here in Yorkshire but at least it hasn't settled on the areas of ground that have already been cleared after the last lot - it's just sitting on top of the snow that's still lying around!

Anyhoo, let's move on to what's been going on inside Whitehouse Towers lately and I've been busy with me brush adding images to canvas to create wall art!  That's going to be the subject that wor Sheena will be covering in her shows this coming Saturday 30 March at 11.00 a.m., 3.00 and 7.00 p.m. - quite a marathon for the lovely lady!

Now, many of you might be saying to yourselves, 'Oooo, I couldn't paint pictures to hang on the wall' but let me tell you, peeps that with the lovely Sheena's help, her stamps and the new acrylics from Pebeo - you definitely can!

Here's one of my attempts:

This one uses the 'Floral Corners' stamp set, with a little help from 'Flying Colours' and 'Silhouette Grasses'.  The butterflies were stamped on to acetate with black Stazon and then painted from the back and the swirl from the Silhouette Grasses set was stamped straight over the blue acrylic paint with Olive Archival Ink.  Add a trellis cut from a Spellbinders die and finish it with the lovely gold wax that you'll see on the programme and you're done - all that remains is to mount it over one of those £1.50 mirrors from that well-known Swedish department store and it's ready to hang on the wall!.....simples!!

My lovely teamies Tracy and Fiona have been much more adventurous than I have with this mixed media game, to say nothing of the Lovely Lady herself so why not go and pay them a visit to see what they've been up to?

I'll see you again tomorrow with another sneaky peek but thanks for looking at this one.

Hugs

Dabble Day

Good morning, peeps!

If you fancy a day of indulging your craftiness, why not come to the Dabble Day at Samuel Taylor, Roseville Street, Leeds on this coming Sunday 24 February?

This will be the project I'm tutoring:

which, as you can see, is an altered notebook.

If you're wondering what a Dabble Day is, it gives you the opportunity to work with three different tutors each using a different technique to produce a card or other project - you simply move around from one workshop to another.  It's really a fabulous day where you can indulge all your crafty tendencies in one place!  The other tutors are Melanie Heaton, who you may well have seen on Create and Craft TV and Sarah McCrossan, another well known tutor who is on various design teams and published regularly in craft magazines.

The day includes all refreshments, including lunch AND you get 10% off all your purchases on the day.  Why not come along if you're free.

Hugs

My first canvas

Good frosty, sunshiney morning, peeps!  What a glorious morning it is - cold at the moment but the sun is so bright it's sure to warm up later.  We'll be taking this handsome dude for a walk:

He's not ours - we've borrowed him whilst his real Mummy and Daddy take a holiday but he's a very welcome visitor.

Anyhoo, on to the crafty stuff and this will be the last post of the current batch of samples before Sheena's shows on Create and Craft TV tomorrow.

This is the first attempt I've ever made at producing a canvas with stamps and I dusted off a box canvas I seem to have had forever:

I created the branch using an Existencil stencil (these will be on tomorrow's show).  I think I made the paint too liquid because, despite my best efforts, it spread under the stencil.  However, all to the good because it gave the effect of an old and gnarled wisteria branch so all was not lost!  I then stamped bunches of leaves from Sheena's Silhouette Garden Stamp Set using the Luminarte Primary Elements pigments mixed fairly thickly with liquid gum arabic ad painted the result directly on to the stamp.  I did the same with the wisteria, which is from the same stamp set.  The butterflies were stamped with black Stazon (they're from the Flying Colours Stamp Set ) and then painted with the same paint mix but, this time, I added accent beads for a bit of texture, as I did to the centres of little flowers in the grass ( from the Always Floral Stamp Set ).  The shading in the grassy area of the design was created with another of the stencils called 'Oceana'.

Here's another card to complete this post:

As you may have guessed, I did some more tile cleaning to create the background but this time added some splashes of gold with a Luminarte Colour Concentrate - you just whack it down fairly hard on to the card to create this effect - a bit like being at playschool really!  I stamped and embossed the dragonfly ( Flying Colours Stamp Set ) with WOW Pearl Gold Sparkle embossing powder and did the same with the scroll ( Flower Power Stamp Set ).  I then added acetate wings to the dragonfly embossed in the same way.

I'm so looking forward to Sheena's shows tomorrow and will be tuning in to C & C TV at 11.00 a.m. for the first show ( 2 hours! ) and then again at 3.00 p.m. and 6.00 p.m. for the Paint Fusion shows - hope to see you there!

Thanks for looking today.

Hugs

More with the Primary Elements

Good morning, peeps and happy Saturday!

Well, my flabber has been absolutely gasted this morning because I went to visit the lovely Sheena's blog this morning and lo and behold there were piccies of some of my DT items.  Thank you Sheena and Goph, I am truly flattered!

So, at the risk of being boring I shall repeat two of them here - I showed you the mirror yesterday:

I confess to having nicked Goph's photo because it's soooo much better than any that I took in a hurry because I had to make the post.  I hope he'll forgive me.  This box is a perfect illustration of the wonderful, intense colours that can be obtained with this medium  in this instance they were blended with Crystal Lacquer, as they were for painting the mirror I showed you yesterday.  The box has first been painted with ordinary emulsion paint.

....and now for a card.....

This is another 'cleaning up the tile' background (see yesterday's post) and this time I mixed the mica powder with liquid gum arabic to paint the flowers from the Always Floral and Flower Power stamp sets.  They were then cut out and secured to the background with brads.

Sheena's shows are on Monday 18 February on Create and Craft TV - the first is the Craft Clinic show at 11.00 a.m. for two hours and then at 3.00 p.m. and 6.00 p.m. she'll be doing some Paint Fusioning.

Well that's it for today, peeps.  Thank you for looking and enjoy your weekend.

Hugs