LOVE TO CRAFT

Welcome back to Love to Craft - our last one for this year.   I'm sharing two of my journal pages with you today.  I find myself making less and less cards now as I just have no more room for them and I can't seem to sell or gift them.  I do love mixed media and with journaling and making little journal books I find my creative itch is well and truly scratched.

These are some pages from the Dina Wakely Ledger journal I treated myself to.  Normally I make my own journals out of old books but this is a much larger substrate and is challenging me to create bigger projects.  

I do find the pages a little bit too yellow for my liking so I always start off by covering them in a layer of gesso or paint just to tone them down a little but not completely cover them.  I still want to see some of that lovely writing. 

The main images I've used are from free papers from Shawn Petite.  She is very generous on her website offering us free papers and inspiration. I love to watch her and she was the first person to get me trying this new style of crafting. If you have not found Shawn on your travels I would urge you to go and have a look at her website here. 

I used old Cherry Pie Art stamps for some of the background - Tim Holtz gothic word stencil, a leaf stencil in the background, some texture paste and scribbles with my new calligraphy pen I'm trying out.  The Create word came from Visible Image stamps. 

MOVING ALONG WITH THE TIMES - #195 MASCULINE

Our challenge for you this month at Moving Along with the Times is on a theme of Masculine.  I've been playing with my Lavinia stamps recently and found myself looking at Magnus and thinking he is perfect for a more unusual masculine card. 

I created the background with the gel press and lots of dark broody Oxide inks - Black Soot, Chipped Sapphire, Wilted Violet and a touch of Salvaged Patina. I used Forest Moss for the grass and added some Lavinia mushroom stamps.  I stamped one of the trees from Lavinia Stamps and then added Magnus.  I went over him with some watercolour pencils just to offset the black of the Versafine ink a little bit.  The extra birds came from a Waffle Flower stamp set. 

PEARLY SPARKLES - #125 SPARKLE AND SHINE

Welcome back to another challenge from Pearly Sparkles and this month we are all about the Sparkle and Shine.  This should be quite easy as we move into the Festive season. 

With that in mind I chose to use the lovely Pipspell stamps from Lavinia Stamps.  I've created a tag as he will go on one of my granddaughter's presents as she loves things purple and sparkly.

I used the fabulous stencil from Lavinia stamps - I'd actually forgotten I had this and it was still in its packaging.  One of 4 stencils in a set called Autumn Mist.  I used Distress Oxide ink in Dusty Concord with a touch of Wilted Violet around the edges to create the moon. I inked the background in the same colours but kept them softer.  

I stamped Pipspell in the middle and added some mistletoe stamps by Tracy Evans Boutique Designs. 

I then added one of the Lavinia word stamps and white embossed it - I added glitter around the edges of the tag, yellow sparkle pen by Giotto for his lantern and Wink of Stella everywhere else to give more shine.