Home Sweet Home

This months challenge at Graphicus is "Home" and "Brick and Teal". I immediately thought of doing a bird house, but as I don't really have any Elusive Images bird stamps, what to do? Butterflies of course! I started off by making my background paper, using Glimmer Mists for the main colour, the over stamping with Distress Inks using stamps from EI's Butterfly Whimsy and Delightful Damask plates.
This is how that turned out:
Then I made the butterflies (from Just Butterflies and Butterfly Whimsy plates) colouring most of them with chalks. The swirls are cut from a Filigree Fusion paper, and the flowers are punched from leftover Glimmer Misting bits.
The whole thing turned out to be a bit of a Labour of Love, but I like the en masse butterflies and the unusual colour combination. My craft mojo had left me for a while, but it looks like it's back now!

2x4 for Theme Thursday!

Ha! Thought I would be defeated eh? No! I pulled out the stops and had another go for Theme Thursday. This piece is 2" x 4", which was the theme for this week. All Elusive Images stamps except for the seals which are Non Sequitur. And again, all stamped and coloured using Distress Inks.

Couples...

This weeks challenge over at Theme Thursday is "Couples". Well, here's a Non Sequitur couple, and they don't look too happy, do they?! They are painted with distress inks, and guess what? Yes, there is that Elusive Images stamp in the background again!This is an ATC, I hope you like it!

Edit: I just realised that that was last weeks challenge, they changed it as I was making the thing! Oh well, maybe it will fit somewhere else soon :: SIGH ::

ATC Swap

I've decided to take part in the ATC swap over at Crafts by Carolyn, this month's theme is "Women" The stamps here are all Non Sequitur, although you can see my current Elusive Images favourite has just sneaked into the background of the second card!
I think I will make it a New Year's Resolution to take part in more swaps, challenges and competitions, just to keep my creative juices flowing!

Happy (Chinese) New Year!

January 26th sees in the year of the Ox, so Happy New Year to those of you who observe Chinese New Year. Graphicus have set a challenge for this month - Celebrate / Purple & Gold. I chose Chinese New Year as the celebration, used my new Christmas & Birthday pressie Glimmer mists, and an Elusive Images stamp or two. The Chrysanthemum is embossed in gold, then coloured the embossing with alcohol inks, a new idea from me, and one I know I will explore again! I'm posting this for a challenge on Crafts by Carolyn too!

Eaty Days

The second project out of the box...I started but couldn't finish because my copper ink ran out :( so I have put it to one side for now and will finish it as soon as I can. So I picked another. Now, the other half and I like to try different food from different countries, but again it is quite difficult choosing where we "go" next on our foodie journey. So we had been picking names from a bowl, which was fine, but, well, not really ideal. Cue my next project.... a box for the country names to go in! This is now my second altered box, and I think it looks kind of cool!

Playing with Plastic

The first project I pulled out of the box (see the previous post!) was "pendant". The idea was to make a pendant to match a pink top I recently bought in the sales. I just ended up having so much fun with shrink plastic it got a bit silly! The pink pendant actually turned out pretty well, but I like the orange ones too. It is a shame the picture is a bit blurry, I will take proper photos when I have threaded them. And yes, that is the same Elusive Images stamp you see before you. I just love it!

Sooo Many Ideas!

Have you ever found that you have sooo many ideas for crafting projects that you just don't know what to do first? I have, and the thought of trying to choose made me a bit less inclined to actually do anything! So I decided to write them all down and draw them out of a hat, so as to speak. I have had this plain wooden box in my stash for a very long time, so I decided to finally put it to good use. It has been coloured and stamped with my old favourite Distress Inks, with a bit of extra stamping in Stazon and some embossing for good measure. The metal dragonfly was alcohol inked then covered with dimentional glaze. The little scrolls each have an idea written on them, hidden so I don't know what I'm making next! Then I realised that I might not remember properly what some of the ideas were all about, so I decorated the book to match and am writing more detailed descriptions of each project in that. This project sees the first outing of my new X-Cut alphabet dies, which I think is going to be really useful! Now, I wonder what my next project will be....?

I Just Popped Up to Say Hello...

This is something I made a year ago, but have only just got round to photographing it. It's a fold out Pop Up book type thing that was taken from a Craft Stamper article. I especially love how the Koi turned out, which was stamped on acetate and coloured with alcohol inks. You can see the shimmer paint I used on the background paper through the acetate. Nice.

Inside the third page and close-up of the second

Inside the second page and close view of page one

From the top, the front and inside the first page

Ok, I know the scan is a bit wonky! I just realised I didn't blog this one, it's a card I made for my Nan back in December. The Chrysanthemum was stamped by inking in two different colours, then clear embossed. I masked off the circle then added the rest of the colouring and stamping. It didn't go 100% to plan, but I still like the finished product.

And so to Birthdays....

The techniques used for the bookmark folder enjoy a second outing on this card I made for Mum's Birthday this week. Fortunately I'm not yet in danger of getting bored of it!

It's Zutter Time!

Here's another competition entry. I have entered this in the Graphicus monthly website competition, as it is made with only Elusive Images stamps. I have coloured the background and stamped the images entirely in Distress Inks, I love the watercolour effect they give! Check out the Zutter Diaries for full details of how I created these book covers.