Tissue Paper Tutorial

Over on the Artistic Stamper Creative Team Blog today I have a tutorial on using tissue paper in your rubber stamping. It is something I do a lot, so I thought rather than repeat what I have put on the other blog, I wondered if you might like to see a few other things I have made over the past few months, using this method. I hope it will tempt you to look at the tutorial to see how I have made them. All the stamps are available from the Artistic Stamper. I really hope if you haven't used tissue paper before you will give it a go, and let me know, and if you have, that I might have given you an extra little tip or two! Either way, I would love your feedback as always!

My Blog's Birthday

Just about to go to bed but didn't want the day to pass without mentioning that today my blog is one year old. I was kicking and screaming a year ago, and not at all sure I wanted to go down this path. I was very much in need at the time, and now, of a safe place for me and the things that I make, to be. So I just wanted to say a very big Thank You for making it a supportive place for me. I have appreciated so much that you have looked at my blog, and given me such encouraging and kind comments. Thank you so much.

Anyone for Rococo?

When I received my Altered Element DT pack a few months ago there was such a lot in it, I am still using lots of the items! I received two sets of Artchix images, the Playful Gents but also some gorgeous Happy Hour images with a French theme, incorporating some Rococo clocks. I'm conscious I've done rather a lot of steam punk items for the AE so I thought I would go for something pretty and ornate and feminine as a contrast. The baroque style was quite over the top which suits me fine, and means I can use my new Baroque Alterations die as the base for this hanging:-

 

I cut the die in mountboard, made holes with my Crop-o-dile, and then covered it with Golden Crackle paste, and added some torn French book text. Once it was dry I painted it gold, and added Crackle Accents over the book page. I added a rubber stamped shrink plastic clock, some pink roses, and finally a tassel.

Steam Punk Collage

I was delighted to receive the new Eco Green Paris Trunk Ink Pads and Eco Green Steam Punk Accessories stamp set for my Altered Element DT pack this month. These new ink pads have very soft colours and are easy to blend. They are not as wet as Distress Inks but that seems to make them stamp quite crisply so I was very impressed with them. I was delighted with the stamps as they combine very well with the Vintage Aviation set I already had, and the Playful Gents Artchix images I had left over from a previous month's pack. I found the Eco Green stamps very good quality and I liked the fact that they are already mounted and trimmed.

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you may possibly recognize the tray. Do you remember the marzipan and dried fruits in the New Year? Well, I had to eat my way through them all to empty this out. I could be very cool and trendy and say it is a printer's tray, but no, it was from a French supermarket!

First of all I cut pieces of mountboard to fit the sections and inked them up over Tim Holtz Cog and Compass masks, using the two Paris Trunk inks and a DI Dried Marigold, then did some water flicking. I stamped a selection of the images from both stamp sets, and popped the Playful Gents behind some microscope glass and added memory foil tape. I cut some Tim Holtz Alterations Cogs in both black shrink plastic and mountboard, and gold embossed the mountboard ones.

I had problems with painting the tray itself. I have been looking for a while for something akin to Tim Holtz Crackle Paint but I think I will just stick to the real thing. I bought this two stage crackle in France and the whole process took ages. The idea was to start with a pale colour, in this case white, then mix the coral acrylic paint with Step 1, then when it was dry, paint on Step 2, and wait for that to dry. The whole process took an age and all I was left with were some very, very subtle white cracks, which looked nice close up but weren't really that exciting. I went over it with sepia ink on a sponge partly because I wanted to soften the colour, but partly to emphasize the cracks, as you would with the Tim product. Unfortunately as you probably guessed, all that did was camouflage the white cracks completely so now it looks very bland.

I hope you like it. Overall I am ok with it, just disappointed with my crackles! Definitely love those stamps, though!

Gibson's Girls!

Who is this? And what could be behind the door? Hop over to the Artistic Stamper Creative Team Blog and have a look.

Do hope you like!

Bathing Belles

I've made a fun little heart shaped album in a matching tin, using the Artistic Stamper's Seaside Plate and Gibson Girls Plate 2, for the launch of their new Creative Team Blog. These Graphic 45 'On the Boardwalk' papers are great. What is it I love about them? Is it the quality? Or the lovely soft vintage colours? Or is it the fact that the girls are unashamedly flaunting their white limbs, plump midrifs, and cellulite?! Makes me feel I could almost brave the beach! I think they had the right idea in those days, with the maximum coverage bathing suits - the men wore them too and look hideous - worse than Borat. The girls did worry about one thing we worry about today, though - Sunburn! Hence the advert for Frostilla I had to include on one of the pages - 'For irritated skin, golfer's neck, and hiker's foot!'

If you would like to see more of the pages, and how it was made, hop over to the new Creative Team Blog of the Artistic Stamper!