Gingersnaps Crown Challenge - Is she a Queen of the future?

This is my entry for the Gingersnaps challenge which starts today, for you to use Crowns in your artwork. I used this image from Lost Coast Designs and I always think this little girl looks very petulant. I think she might be going through that phase of elbowing her friends out of the way to get to her favourite toys. When they come round to play with the dressing up box she says, 'it's my house, so I get to wear the butterfly wings dress with the crown'! I decided she is a bit of a diva and wants to be Queen when she grows up! The words are from a set by Art Journey (the set with the image of Michelle from the French Resistance as I call her!) and you can use the background stamp in one piece, or cut out individual words as I have done here - I thought the words, 'Girl Today, Queen Tomorrow' went with my story for her!

The crown is from the Tim Holtz charms, made into a mould with Siligum then made up with clay and gold mica powder. The ribbon is coloured with ProMarker and sandwiched between layers of mountboard cut with a Nestie. The inner layer is a piece of home-made background paper cut with the next size down of Nestie.

The dangly bits are a pair of earrings. I got a necklace and earrings for £2 as I wanted the necklace but I don't have pierced earrings so I knew I could use them on a project. The butterfly is an Anita one. I don't use a lot of bought embellishments but I think these can't be beaten, and they are so well priced.

The all-important crown a bit closer up!

Another Charm Piece

When I was making the piece for Gingersnaps Charms challenge, I made this one as well. I wanted to try out using tissue tape to cover one of these little Crafty Individuals containers. I love the designs of tissue tape and the idea behind it, and the range of uses, but I get frustrated with it as it sticks when you don't want it to, but not when you do. It was fairly quick though, to cover the whole thing, and I then blended on a little Fired Brick as you need a strong colour on tissue tape as it comes out quite muted, and then sealed all the edges with watered down PVA.




I decorated the sections as before, adding some little children and love themed charms. The butterfly was made by stamping a butterfly onto book text twice then adhering to a piece of laminate left from laminating a stamp image sheet. When it was dry I cut them both out and layered them together. I filled each of the sections with glossy accents and left to dry overnight.

The back, showing the tissue tape more clearly

Charming - Gingersnaps Charms Challenge

Today's challenge on Gingersnaps is to use charms in your creation. The charm at the top is an Art Mould, made up in gold friendly plastic.

I used the Baroque Sizzix die to cut two pieces of mountboard and two pieces of Vintage Shabby paper to give strength to the hanging and so I could sandwich the dangling charms in place, and neatly finish off the back. I used a selection of charming Art Journey children stamps, some of which I borrowed from Alison when she was here last week (thanks Alison!). I used some of the words on the background, then the images for the inside of the container, which was from Crafty Individuals.

I finished it off with some german scrap, again from Crafty Individuals, and an ABC charm.

The baby themed charms are hanging from a clothing tag, sandwiched between the layers of mountboard

A close up showing the Crown mould

Filter Paper Album - a Tutorial for Gingersnaps

I have been a little quiet on the crafting front as we stayed with my in-laws in the North East for Christmas, and then went to France for New Year. Since I got back last week, I have been making this project for Gingersnaps, which I have enjoyed SO much! As there are lots of sections to it, I was worried about taking over their blog too much, so I thought I would post some of the individual pages and tags here, mainly just with captions, with the step by step tutorial over on Gingersnaps. Hope that will all make sense!

The stamps I have used are Oxford Impressions Bonbon and Afternoon Tea sets, Art Journey Celebrate, and Crafty Individuals CI 277.

Here's the final album, which has individual tags in each of the filter paper 'pockets':-

Two little girls in their best dresses, being taken to the chocolate shop

A selection of tea and coffee advertisements stamped to look like a vintage newspaper

Chocolate related images. I used gold pen for the chocolate cases

The tea pot sits on a white crocheted coaster. The other images are on shrink plastic to be in scale in relation to the tea pot, on my imaginary tea table! The tiny beads create brown sugar.

The little girl from Art Journey 'Celebrate' was a perfect fit to sit on the cup and saucer, again on a crocheted coaster.

Cupid and hearts, with some tiny heart embellishments

Kept this simple to show the chocolate wording in the paper!

More tea and coffee advertisments. I divided the 'poster' image into two sections, separating the images from the words

A tag with a little girl in her party frock, on shrink. The words at the bottom are on shrink, and the awning is German Scrap, from Crafty Individuals

Chocolate related advertisements/logos

A romantic couple taking tea together. The words have been used to frame the image.

More tea advertisements

The poster image, whole this time. Tea definition on shrink, bottom right

Chocolate price list and chocolates. Paper cases coloured with gold pen

Art Journey Inchies Stampbord Mirror

I mentioned yesterday I had made loads of Stampbord Inchies with the new Art Journey set which I had intended to use on the copper frame for Petra, but decided it was over-doing it. So I have now made another of these mirrors, and apologies as I do seem to make these rather a lot! I dabbed the Stampbord pieces with Kaleidacolor Pastels, using more of the Peach and Pink on some, and more of the Mauve and Blue on others as I don't like the colours to merge with the ones next to them too much. Likewise I alternated between people images and abstract ones. I then sanded the edges, then edged them with StazOn in Gold, then glazed them with Glossy Accents and left them overnight, as I always dip my elbows into them otherwise! I then did my usual trick so that I could stick them together in a straight line, by turning them over and sticking them to each other with red line tape before sticking the mirror in place, otherwise it is really tricky. Who shall I give this to, I wonder?

A bit closer up!

 

 

 

Stampbord Little Boy in Copper Frame

I have made this frame with a Stampbord coaster in the middle as a gift for my dear friend, Petra. She has invited me to a cupcake tasting at her home this afternoon. Her baking is amazing and she grows the fruit she uses herself. I am very lucky to have a wonderful friend who bakes, crafts, is on the same design team as me, and lives only half an hour away! I hope she will like the frame which is not at all what I intended to make. It is one of the large papier mache frames from the Artistic Stamper and they are great value and you have the benefit of a wide frame to work with but also a deep recess, almost like having a shadow box. I had intended to decorate the frame with Stampbord inchies to co-ordinate with the design in the middle which is from two Art Journey plates, Writing and Inchies. My lovely friend, Alison, was very kind and ordered from Art Journey for the two of us as I am not brave enough to order in a foreign language in case there is some small print I haven't understood. In this instance, though, it does help if you know what Winkel means! Anyhow, when she came for the day and delivered my stamp set she also lent me her brand new Inchies set, how cool is that! I did make all the Inchies but they will be on a mirror which I will blog soon. I changed my mind because I liked the Viva Croco Copper background so much, I didn't want to cover it, so I just added a few pieces of the leaf stamp on Grungepaper, coloured with Pro Markers to pull it together with the central design.

For the coaster itself I coloured the Stampbord with Kaleidacolor shades from the Pastels set, and then stamped the little boy and the arithmetic from the Writing set, and the sentiment and the scrolls from the Inchies set, and then glazed it with clear embossing powder. I normally use Glossy Accents but it was such a big piece. As there was a slight gap between the coaster and the edge of the frame I wanted to fill this in some way and I tried out various colours of cord and braid which wasn't quite right, so I have used one of my fave products, Deko Ice glass glitter, from the Altered Element. I added a little extra on the frame to again try to pull the design elements together but I stopped after a few sprinkles as it was just buried against the copper background.

Sorry the photos are so dreadful but the glaze on the tile was causing a lot of glare, but I hope you get the general idea! I hope you like it, and I hope Petra will be able to find a little home for it. Off to have a bit of quiche now before I go out, as I need to have something savoury before I start on the cakes!!

Noel Notebook

I decorated this notebook for Pauline using a piece of faux metal made with the fleur de lys embossing folder. I cut one of the emblems out of it for the embellishment and added a piece of torn French book paper. I think the plate is Noel by Art Journey. Alison let me use it when she was at my house before Christmas as we had both loved Jo Capper Sandon's article in Craft Stamper using this plate.