An Irish Blessing

As I've mentioned in a previous post, I love this saying.  Living in Oxford means that a lot of people come here for a short time and then move away, and a good friend of mine was leaving this weekend for Scotland. I wanted an understated but stylish card suitable for a man so the challenge was on. Having been ill for a few months, which has kept me out of the craft room, I was dying to get my fingers all inky again!

Kraft cards couldn't be better for me as they fit well with my nature themes, and appropriately this card has turned out quite autumnal.  The background is stamped with a stampin' up set. I loved the transparency of the skeleton leaves, as well as the 'splodge' stamp which made it look like water drops had splattered on the surface. I used distress inks in walnut stain, vintage photo, and bundled sage.  Here's a little close up, along with buttons (bargain pack from The Works!) which are the perfect non-blingy embelishment for the guys.

The main image has been built up using Claritystamp  products, and techniques demonstrated by the wonderful Barbara Gray.

I purposely kept the background quite stark so the words would be the part to draw the eye. As a first foray into the inky world for some time, and being in a bit of a rush, I was quite happy with how this turned out. Wouldn't mind having a play with the stamps again to see how I could improve things. So you never know I might have a new post up again soon.

Helen x

My New Favourite Ink Pad

This short post is all in aid of me discovering my new favourite ink colour! I've always loved purples and pinks but what about that lovely grey colour? This is the Tim Holtz distress ink in Pumice Stone, which I have seriously fallen in love with - just ask the girls at craft group! Sorry that I've also make others buy it... Initially it just looks like a muddy grey, or like concrete, but it goes with so many colour combinations. I also used Milled Lavender Distress, and Wild Plum Memento inks on the above image, and I love the colour combination. It'll be appearing many more times on projects methinks.

More Grungepaper - this time a Hair Slide

This was made last Saturday when I was thinking of what coordinated with my favourite skirt (see below) and I was lamenting that I have broken so many hair slides recently. I guess the advantage of crafting is that you can create bespoke pieces of jewellery relatively quickly and cheaply (especially when you have a room full of stash to use up!).

What got me started was that I still had the large Tattered Floral left from the bracelet from the last post, and I had covered it in the Antique Bronze Crackle Paint and it seemed to go. I then selected flowers that picked out the colours in the skirt and layered them up (about 5 layers this time). I covered the silver hair slide with more petals to cover the metal sticking out at either side of the flower, and then scrunched everything up so it is really 3 dimensional. Nothing like getting inky fingers on a lazy Saturday afternoon (when I should really be doing the hoovering!). Oh well, that's crafting for you... and I did need a break.

Here's how it looks with the skirt:



Let me know what you think by leaving a comment if you have time.

Grungepaper Bracelet

This is a bracelet I made using Grungepaper and some paper flowers and embellishments. For the band, the grunge paper has been inked with Milled Lavender and Dusty Concord Distress Inks, and stamped over using a Clarity stamp in the Dusty Concord. The fastening is a Tim Holtz ideology hitch fastener, and the holes were made using the Cropodile (small hole punch for the fitting, and the large hole punch for the end you push over the fastening).

The flower is made using two of the smallest 'Tattered Florals' Tim Holtz dies, cut out in Grungepaper on the Cuttlebug. These have again been inked with the two purple shades to achieve a more 3 dimensional look, and then coated in Crackle Accents and left to dry. I then layered them up with a Prima paper flower and a fancy brad and finally attached the completed flower to the bracelet using Pinflair glue gel (what else - it is brilliant stuff!).

Here's how it looks fastened:


Hope you like it!