HAND STAMPED SENTIMENTS #395 - A WINNING CARD!!!

Here's our sketch for you this week at Hand Stamped Sentiments.  I loved playing with this one.  I turned it round to suit my card.  I started off by using an Aallandcreate Stencil for my background stripes using Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Antique Linen and going over it to make it slightly darker for the stripes.

I've used some of Tracy Evan's stamps here again - the little watering can is from #437 and is called Watering Can lol!  I stamped it with Versafine Clair in Shady Lane and coloured it with Tim Holtz Victorian Velvet - one of my favourite pink colours.  The flower is from another of her sets called Worded Petals #567.  I cut this one out - fussy cutting is not my forte lol - and coloured it with the same ink.

I stamped the little Fig.1 onto an old lolly stick and added it with dimensionals and added a touch of black twine behind the flower.

I am excited to tell you that I actually entered this card into our local summer show where they had a Greetings Card section and it won first prize.  That's the first time I've ever entered a competition and I was really proud! As I live in Wales you can see that the certificate is bi-lingual in English and Welsh. 

COLOR MY HEART COLOR DARE #508 - DESIGN TEAM MEMBER

I am delighted to have been accepted on to the Color My Heart Color Dare team for their Watercolour team.  These are the colours we are working with.

I used a stamp from Tracy Evans set called Wildflower - I just love this clock.  I used Versafine Clair ink in Shady Lane to stamp the image.  The colours I chose were Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Kitsch Flamingo and Aged Mahogany for the pinks.  I used Twisted Citron as my other green.

You have two weeks to play along with us and we'd love to see your creativity using our colours.

THE MALE ROOM CHALLENGE #165 - ATC's

We have a great challenge for you this month at The Male Room Challenge.  ATC's or Artist Trading Cards.  If you are not familiar with ATC's they are small works of art sized 2.5" x 3.5" .  There is no theme for our ATC's this month so anything goes. 

I've done mine on a theme of time as it was a swap we did in my Facebook Group The Joy of Sets.  My backgrounds were made with Tim Holtz Distress Inks and I used a very old clock stencil of Tim's.  I added some embossing paste with another Tim Holtz stencil.  

The clocks are from a set from Woodware Craft collection called Vintage Circles. The sentiment is from a Creative Expressions set called Circles of Time.  I added some background stamps from Tracy Evans for the various numbers and added a piece of iron wear as a hand on one of the clocks.  Some splatters of white gesso finished off these little ATC's.

I'm adding these into the following challenges:

Little Red Wagon - make it with Circles 

Retro Rubber - AG - I've had these stamps for about 2 years 

Through The Craft Room Door - AG 

Path of Positivity - AG 

Butterflies

Having a play today with the gel press, some Arteza inks and the Visible Image butterfly stencil.  I've made lots of background papers that I can use in future projects. 

This one also used Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Victorian Velvet and Mustard Seed and I stamped some  of the butterflies from Creative Expressions Butterfly Splash with some Versafine inks. The sentiment is from Aallandcreate set #47. There is a touch of Spectrum Noir Sparkle on the inner butterflies.

I'm adding this into the following :

Allsorts - Butterflies/Bug

Daring Cardmakers - Stencil

ONCE UPON A TIME - NEW CHALLENGE BLOG DT MEMBER

I am delighted to say I'm on the Design Team for a brand new challenge blog starting this month - Once Upon a Time.  Each month we will bring you the cover of a well known and much loved Children's book.  Your creations can be ANY kind of craft from something baked to a scrapbook page to a beaded necklace.  Anything goes as long as it can be seen that you have used the book cover, the theme of the book or the layout/colours of the cover on your creation.

Our first book is Dear Zoo - this was a favourite of my own children 30 years ago and is now a firm favourite of my granddaughters!  Where did those years go?

My card was inspired by the book cover's colours and the zoo theme.  I used a stamp from Stamperia called Amazonia which has this gorgeous leopard.  I used Tim Holtz Distress Inks to colour in the image.  The cut outs representing the crate are from Spellbinders.  The sentiment is from Visible Image.

 

I hope you enjoy playing along with us at our new challenge. 

I'm also adding this into the following challenges:

Critter Crazy - AG with a critter 

Crafty Animals - AG must include animal 

A place to start - AG option book - monthly challenge 

Inspiration Station - Animal Kingdom 

SUYP - Cat 

Guinea Pigs

I'm having another play with Anita Jeram's stamp set Paint Town and wanted to use these lovely little guinea pigs.

My colours were inspired by Global Design Project which asked for the following colours.

HAND STAMPED SENTIMENTS - #IC394

Welcome to another challenge here at Hand Stamped Sentiments and our mood board for the next two weeks.  I must admit this was a challenge for me as I don't have any caravan type stamps or even any dog stamps!!  So I took my inspiration from the bottom left photo.

I wanted to have another play with those lovely Anita Jeram stamps and that dark sky was just perfect for the Stargazing set. I stamped the images first.  The trees are from an old Tim Holtz Christmas set Holiday Joy stamped in Versafine Clair Shady Lane.  

I then carefully inked my sky with Tim Holtz Distress Oxide Inks in Chipped Sapphire, Black Soot and Fossilised Amber taking care to leave an area of white around the bears.  The bears were water coloured with Tim Holtz Distress Inks in a various palette of browns.  

I spritzed the distress oxide inks with water and where there were some white spots I added some Spectrum Noir sparkles.  I cut out the sentiment from the same set with some deckle scissors and popped it on dimensionals.

I'm adding this into the following challenge:

Happy Little Stampers - Watercolouring 

Simon Says Stamp - Wed - AG 

FIND INSPIRATION

This was certainly a challenge.  I came across this image at Inspiration Station and wanted to play along but was stumped for what to do.  Rummaging in my bits box I found a piece of water colour cardstock I had discarded as it had a streak of red down the side - but eureka -  the idea for my card was born.

I used the Basket Weave embossing folder from Stampin Up to represent the picnic basket and added an extra stripe of yellow Distress Ink in Fossilised Amber and another in Cracked Pistachio to match the picnic blanket. I added the ink direct to the paper and it coloured in the lovely little squares of the embossing.

I pulled out some Tim Holtz wildflower thinlets which I haven't used in such a long time.  In my same box of bits I found some green background I had made with a gel press and used it for my flowers.  The sentiment is from Tracy Evans' set The Great Outdoors.  I added a touch of twine around it and some washi tape in the same colour palette to the bottom. 

 

I'm also adding this into the following challenge:

Allsorts - Summer 

Color My Heart - choose 3 colours

Mice just want to have fun!

I'm playing along with The Paper Players today and following their sketch for my card.  I wanted to use the mice from the Anita Jeram set Paint Town. 

I started off with some watercolour paper from Tim Holtz to stamp my mouse.  I used SU Real Red for the paintbrush and Tim Holtz Distress inks for the rest.  The paper is some very old SU paper and I simply added the great sentiment from the set.  

A quick and simple card you would think but you should see all the ones that went wrong before I finally was pleased with this one lol!

THRINCHIES!

Thrinchies - what are they?  They are little works of art 3" x 3".  Throughout the month of July I've been joining in with Aallandcreate's Facebook celebration of Tracy Evan's stamp sets which has been challenging us to create thrinchies.  The challenge has been to create a thrinchie every day with different theme prompts.  

Tracy's stamps are quickly becoming my go-to sets as I love their collage style and how easy they are to mix and match.  So far I have done 26 out of the 31 thrinchies but I won't show them all here - just my favourites and the theme they were for.  They are quite addictive though and I'm going to be lost when July is over and they are all done.  I'll then have the challenge of making a little book to keep them all in.

All of them have been watercoloured with Tim Holtz Distress Inks.

Thrinchie no 12 - Botanical

Thrinchie no 16 - Bloom 

Thrinchie no 19 - Colours 

Thrinchie no 24 - Daisy 

Thrinchie no 26 - Clocks 

I'm adding these into the following challenges 

TGIF - Favourites 

Colour Crazy - AG

Creative Artiste - AG 

Happy Little Stampers - AG Watercoloured

Anita Jeram - Paint Town

I'm having another play with my new Anita Jeram set and was inspired by the colours in the As You See It Challenge. Although I don't have those SU colours I used Tim Holtz Distress Inks in Chipped Sapphire, Faded Jeans, Kitsch Flamingo and Saltwater Taffy.  

I love this little guinea pig and he seems to be the only one I've inked up so far so I need to play with some of the mice.  I've added him here with a great splat stamp from Creative Expressions set Circles of Time.  It was just what I wanted to showcase the colours.  I added a touch of sparkle with some coloured gems.

I'm also adding this into the following challenges:

Through the Craft Room Door - AG 

Creative Fingers - AG 

Creative Moments - Cute 

Addicted to Stamps - Any Occasion 

Birthday Flowers

Playing with some more Tracy Evan's stamp sets today - it's not often I do blue flowers but that was the colour I went for this time.  

The background was created with a touch of Antique Linen in Distress Oxide and I used a few of Tracy's Stamps here for the background.  The flower was inked in Salty Ocean and cut out.  The little container was stamped in Frayed Burlap and also cut out. I added a touch of thread behind and cut out the bird to add to the pot.

I'm adding this into the following challenge - 

Addicted to stamps - Birthday 

Anita Jeram Stamps - Stargazing and Paint Town

Colorado Craft Company has another release of Anita Jeram stamps and I do love these.  I was lucky enough to get a set of the Stargazing in the UK as apparently it's sold out of some places in the US.  I warn you though - you will keep humming the tune from Coldplay.

I kept this card simple with some water colouring on Tim Holtz Watercolour card stock - using Distress Oxides in Chipped Sapphire, Unchartered Mariner and Black Soot with just a touch of Wilted Violet.  The grass used Bundle Sage and the bunnies were coloured in with Frayed burlap.  I added the stars with silver embossing powder and that finished off this lovely card.

I'm adding this into the following challenges

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday - make your own background 

Polkadoodles - AG 

Addicted to CAS - kids Anita Jeram is a children's author

Creative Moments - Cute 

For this next card I used the other new set Paint Town.  I loved the words that went with this set and thought they were great for us crafters.  I've kept this one simple with the little guinea pig and his paintbrush.

I'm adding this into the Daring Cardmakers CAS challenge.

HAND STAMPED SENTIMENTS - #CC393

Welcome to another colour challenge at Hand Stamped Sentiments.  As usual our colours are guide lines in case you don't have the Stampin Up colours - just use the closes colours you have.

I've just purchased this lovely new set from Tracy Evans stamps and wanted to do a simple watercolour card with this lovely image.  I used Versafine Black for the outline and had to use my Tim Holtz stamping platform as it is quite a large stamp.

I used Highland Heather for my purples and varied the colour by adding less or more water.  I actually only had Coastal Cabana in an SU Soft Pastel but I think it worked really well.  The vase was inked in Tim Holtz Faded Jeans Distress Ink and I added some of his Distress Crayon in the same colour to add definition.  I added a few sparkles and the sentiment from the same set. 

I've kept it simple as the image is so lovely.

I'm adding this into the following challenge:

Tic Tac Toe - using the middle horizontal line - birthday, flowers, sequins 

Addicted to Stamps - Birthday 

Stamping Sensations - flowers 

NUTHATCH

We have a lot of birds visit our bird feeders and one beauty is the little Nuthatch.  I was delighted to find Tracy Evans had done a stamp with this gorgeous little bird.  I used some Distress Oxide Inks for my background and when dry stamped some background images from another set by Tracy called Pinecone.

I cut out a stitched circle framelit and inked the bird on this and added it with some dimensionals.  The various sentiments and numbers were stamped and then fussy cut.  

I'm adding this into the following challenge:

Allsorts Challenge - Allsorts of Animals 

Creative Fingers - AG 

Creative Artiste Mixed Media - AG 

THE MALE ROOM CHALLENGE #164 - MONOCHROME

Our challenge for you this month at The Male Room is Monochrome.  I chose to use sepia for my monochrome colours. 

My card is for a 21st Birthday - with all the keys and the admission through the door to adulthood?  Maybe although they grow up much quicker now - don't I sound old lol!

I started my background with a Tim Holtz stencil and used Antique Linen Distress Ink.  The key stamps are from Kaisercraft and the door is from Stampin Up.  I added a ticket from Tim Holtz and one of his paper dolls which I haven't used much and I thought they'd work well for this 21st Birthday Card.  I added a little metal key which I  had in my stash.  I used Versafine Clair in Acorn for my dark browns, stamped off when I needed it a paler brown.

I'm adding this into the following challenge - 

Inkspirational - Monochrome