Same Elements Different Look & Handmade Monday

It's time for Handmade Monday over on the Handmade Harbour blog.  My post today looks at how you can use the same elements but make each card different and unique.

I don't know about you but I get bored making multiple card that look the same (unless they are for an order).  I also like to give my customers unique cards to buy.  

I made the following using some text paper which I had printed and cut into triangles and mounted onto co-coordinating background paper.  The circles are lengths of quilling paper from my quilling days many moons ago - I have quite a collection.  I like how the tight coils lend themselves to the design of the trees as baubles and tree trunks.

I added a silver snowflake which was cut from a tree garland and the greeting is a rubber stamp from Stampendous.

I made different size coils with the quilling paper and added them in a line to make them look like a tree. 

I've also linked up with the following blogs.

Creative Monday

Art Every Day

Have a wonderful and creative week.

Anita

Lilac and Silver Christmas Trees.

It seems like ages since I used a rubber stamp in its own right.  So when I saw the challenge on the Artful Times Challenge Blog I knew I had to join in especially as the colour scheme is one of my favourites - lilac and silver.

One of the stamps I've used is from Penny Black called Xmas Constellation the other I'm not sure of as I'd taken it off the wooden block for better storage and the ink on the back where I had written the company name has smudged - if anyone recognises it please give me a shout so I can credit the designer.

This is the Xmas Constellation stamp from Penny Black.  I love all the swirls and fluidity of the design.

I liked this one for it's non traditional style again with the swirls - can you tell I like swirls?  

These cards are linked to the following blogs as well so why not pop over and have a nosey around at what everyone has been making.

Handmade Monday at Handmade Harbour

Creative Mondays 

Art Every Day

Artful Times Challenge 

Happy Crafting

Anita

Working With Fimo Air Dry Clay

I've been playing with Fimo air dry clay today I've not used this before and found it to be quite 'wet'.  I used a Teflon sheet to roll it out but it still stuck it.  I think I need to either add some oil or corn flour onto the surface before rolling.  

I found it too wet for using with the molds as well - they didn't lift out as easily as other clays I've used in the past (elephant and key) - maybe if I left it out to 'dry' for half hour it would work better.

I did however like to mold it in my hands (hearts).  I found it malleable and easy to use.  

These will be painted with acrylic paint once they are dry and if I like the final result I will be making some more of the hearts to take to Arizona in January for ARTzona where a group of talented artists will gather for a weekend of art, art and more art. 

Oh and I used a cookie cutter for the gingermen - they are a trial run for a swap over on ATCsforAll called 'twisted Christmas .  Not sure I'll be using these as I have another idea using felt to make them with.

I'm linking these to Handmade Monday over on the Handmade Harbour blog. 

Have a great week.

Anita

Witches, Spelling, Potions and CAKE

So this weeks theme for the Handmade Harbour Design Team challenge is "smile or laugh".

As I couldn't decide which stamps to use I asked Wendy to choose a couple for me..........so she sent me over "The Young Witch with Spelling Book", "One Cake A Day" and "Save Water Drink Wine".  3 very different stamps I'm leaving the 'wine' stamp for another day.

I've used the Young Witch and the "Witch or Wizard Potions on a Shelf" for the first card. I made the witch's hat just little bit bigger than my original print out so it looks like she's playing at being a witch.  Then I added the potion bottles to the base of the card,  added some words correct and mis-spelt.  Some punched out silver stars to finish off.  There's a slight gold shimmer to the edge of the card I used some watered down gold acrylic paint.

With this card I used "Witch or Wizard Potions on a Shelf".  The celebration glasses is actually just one rubber stamp that I have stamped twice with black Stazon.  I've added a few 'squiggles' in the glasses to look like earth worms (that was my intention anyway).  The edges of the card has been coloured with inkpads in a direct to paper technique (simply just rubbed the ink pads along the edges until I was happy with the colour.  Over that I have used a slightly darker shade to stamp on some 'bubbles'.  To finish off I've added some glitter to the bubbles coming out of the glasses.

Finally to my 3rd card..........well what can I say I really think this is a 'smile' card.  I LOVE cake, making, baking and eating it so it seemed apt to make this one to.  I've kept this one simple because I wanted the main focus to be the ladies trying to look innocent while eating cake.  On the main picture I've used frosted glitter as the icing on the cake - it's been cut out and mounted onto foam pads to give it some dimension and texture.  I also printed and cut out some smaller cakes but cut out 'chunks' to look as if they had been bitten into.  

You can find all the above stamps over in the Handmade Harbour shop.

If you like to create things with paper then why not join in the fun with the weekly Papercraft Party  and if you use one of Handmade harbours digi stamps in your design you could even win yourself a prize.

I hope you've enjoyed my process into the world of digi-stamps.

Until next time keep crafting and creating.

Anita

   

Accordion Card

I've been wanting to make one of these cards for some time now and finally I had the the time today to sit down and play.  The idea and design isn't new to me it's just that I've not made one in a long time.  Don't you think it would make a lovely Valentines gift?  

I made this lovely lady again as she always proves popular when I make her.

Balanced Heart Project

I seemed to have lost the will to write any blog posts since March.  I guess sometimes you just have to leave things alone and not get too stressed.  This doesn't mean that I've not been creative.  I have carried on with a couple of art projects and handmade card orders.   

Jewellery making has been put on hold since April/May after an accident at work which caused an inflamed tendon and using any of my tools is very painful.  The ultra-sound hasn't helped so I am now waiting on having a cortisone injection which I am NOT looking forward to as I don't like needles.

Anyway like I said earlier I have been creating artwork and since May I have been involved in a project that has been started by my friend Ang West over on The Balanced Heart Project .  Every month myself and 4 other artists create 2 pieces of artwork which incorporates "hearts" as the main feature.  The inspiration for this Project, is Ang's little boy, Andrew who passed away on 22nd of October 2001-please pop over to the blog for the full details.  My involvement came about after Ang posted on facebook asking for artist to collaborate in a heart project.  At the time I didn't know what it was about only that "hearts" were involved and as I have a rather lovely collection of "heart Art" I thought this would be a great way of collecting more original artwork.  It was only after hearing Ang's story that I remembered how art and the support from my artist friends had helped me through a very dark time a few years ago and I wanted even more to "help" Ang with her healing.  I am honoured to be part of this project and hope that my "hearts" help her in her journey.


Here are the hearts I sent to Ang for May and June.

 

Hearts for May

Airdry clay hearts for June

These are the hearts I have received from Ang -

 To see all the hearts that have been created for May and June by all the artist involved please pop on over to The Balanced Heart Project blog.  You can also read Ang's full story there.

  

I hope to be back on a regular basis with more updates of the last few months.  


Thank you for visiting and please do leave your comments - they are really appreciated.


Anita

You Lift Me Up

Just a quick post today showing one of my cards with a sassy corset.  The corset is a rubber stamp design by Pink Cat Studio - Lingerie set.  I've painted it with my favourite Derwent Inktense watercolour pencils and added some jewels to the front.  The tiny flower stamp is also part of the set and makes for a great border and as we all know you can never have enough bling I've added the tiniest of gems to the centres.  I like this set of stamps as they are sassy and quirky and make me smile.

Another Piece of Wearable Art

Oh dear I'm late posting this today.  I was going to do it yesterday but woke up with a niggling headache - which didn't turn into a headache but you could feel it might do - yeah weird I know but there you go.  Anyway here we are at the start of another week and getting closer to Christmas.  It's quite frightening when you see someone post on twitter that there are only XXX amount of days left.  

I've been busy with a few craft fairs not many and I'm glad as I've had an absolutely amazing response to the Shrink art bracelet I posted last week.  I've already had people ordering and paying up front for them - which is great.  I've also been making quite a few Christmas cards for customers.


This week I made a necklace with some polyshrink that was left over from another project.  These bits make for unusual shapes which in turn makes the necklace impossible to recreate and totally unique.  I've used the same design on the pieces just because I like it and it was already out.  I've used doubled up lilac satin ribbon instead of using beads because I like the idea that you can adjust the length of the necklace to suit the outfit and neckline of your clothing.  

Lilac Shrink Art Necklace with Czech beads

Here is one of the cards I've been commissioned to make - 

So there you have it. Now that you've seen what I've made why not pop on over to Wendy's blog to see what all my fellow crafter's have been making. 

Anita

All Made Up

Last week I posted this picture showing you the start of my new collection.

If you follow me on twitter or have subscribed to my facebook page then you will already have seen the pieces made into a bracelet.  If you haven't then here it is all made up and ready to be sold.  

I've had some amazing feedback from people about the bracelet.  At a recent Christmas Market held by a ladies networking group I had the bracelet on display and everyone of the ladies who showed interest in it held out their wrists to try it on.  Normally I have to ask if they want to try anything on - but not with this one nope they all wanted to try it on.  Which I think is a good response.


The first sample piece that I made was made in lime green and that colour seems to be the most popular even though I offer to make the bracelets in the customers choice of colour.


I'll leave you with a photograph of the original piece. 

Why not pop over to Wendy's blog to see what my fellow designers/crafters have been up to.  We have an array of talented ladies and gents and if you are a fellow designer/crafter why not share your makes - we always like to see what others have been up to.

Please do leave a comment of what you think - it's always nice to know that I've had visitors.  There's always tea & cake on offer :)

Anita

Cut, Paint, Shrink, File & Seal

Another week over and it's getting colder each day - there was frost on the cars and rooftops this morning.  I don't like the cold in fact if I had my way I would quite happily go and live in India or any hot country until it warmed up here in the UK.  But for now I will have to make do with the warm company of my on-line friends and blog readers :).

So what do I have to offer you today?  Well sometime back I posted a picture of some new jewellery I had been working on and to date I have had some pretty amazing feedback and a couple of requests for purchase.  So with that in mind on today's "To Do" list was pricing up the new design starting with the bracelet.  

Here are some of the pieces I have made today in readiness to be made up into a bracelet. I will be adding some Czech crystals in coordinating colours along with some wire-work.  Excuse the poor quality photograph I took it while they were still drying and had the desk lamp shining down on them.  The true colour is more on the red side than orange.  I'll take another picture when I've made them all up.

I also painted this papier mache heart box.  I bought a few different shaped ones months ago but never got around to doing anything with them.  So today while I had the paints out it gave me the opportunity to get one made up.  I've used acrylic paint used straight from the tube (my favourite way). There are several layers on the lid to give it lots of texture.  The design is the same background stamp I have used for the above bracelet pieces and for the Christmas Card Trees I made in a previous post.  The base of the box is half red and half black again the pictures were taken at my work desk with the light shining over the top but the colours are more or less correct.

I hope you've enjoyed reading today's post.  If you would like to see what other crafter's/designers have been making why not pop on over to Wendy's blog and check out the links in her Handmade Monday post.