'What you do speaks so loudly, I can't hear what you say.'
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Thursday 25 March 2021

Oops! I had a blip - and lost a week 😉 But I'm still determined to clean out my last year's folder, so here are some cards I made towards the end of last year. I've had this post waiting to upload for a week - so sorry. In between, it was my birthday and lots of other things have happened. I'm also working on a special project for a friend's 80th birthday, so it's been a little busy.

This was a Christmas card for someone special. I love Wonky Tonk images, but they're a little limiting. I was practising watercolour with these - lots of room for improvement, but I really enjoyed it and spent a while on them. I used irridescent inks on part of her hair and gel pen for her earrings. It's never easy to stamp words on watercolour paper, especially without a stamping platform. The stars are Jane Davenport and I used a deckle edged die. I cut off her hair... gosh, it's a long time since my own hair was that long! Long hair always looks so good on other people.

This is the same image, but with different words and for a January birthday.
Wonky Tonk 3 - I have another one I haven't yet scanned, and this one isn't quite finished, but I wanted to show it. It's a watercolour again, but I need to add some text to it and decide whether to use it for a card or a journal page...it was masked around the edges, so there's quite a deep border around it. I think this one is my favourite.


A Lavinia birthday card. Lavinia stamps are always fun to let your imagination go and be a little girl again 😊 I enjoy my playtimes with them. This is only a partial main image and it's 6x6 - well, the main card is.

I was repeating a design I made a couple of years ago when I made this - the first one seemed better, but the oxidisation from the inks just looks amazing on Kraft card, and the white embossing is striking amongst the shades of purple. Love these words.
Alcohol inks swiped on glossy, then an ink lift-off technique, using Blending fluid. Not a good example, really but that's mainly because I didn't choose the ideal stencil. I've found some more samples I did at the time and the stencilling shows up much more clearly, so I'm hoping to find a way to use those soon. Such a shame to waste them. I'll post another one below. I love this technique with the inks, though. Just a swipe with three colours on the felt gives you a lovely effect - very quick and easy - once you've found your AIs and got everything out all over the desk 😖 More of the same for the one on the right, but I think you can see the lift off technique through the stencil a little more clearly. I didn't find this technique easy...the blending fluid is really difficult to control. They were for a CAS challenge, hence lots of white space.

And a card I finally put together, after having half most of it made fo rmonths! Having periods of being unable to stamp plays havoc with your organisation 😁 Lots of stencilling and stamping on this one.


Linking to
Dragonfly Dreams, Anything Goes
Crafts Galore Encore, Anything Goes
Crafting Happiness, Outdoors or Anything Goes
Retro Rubber, Anything Goes (Butterfly OLD)
Try it on Tuesday, Use a Stencil or Two
Day of the Month Card Club, Learn About Butterflies Day
Allsorts, Anything Goes/Optional Monochromatic
Sweet Stamping, For a Special Woman

So lovely to have you visit me today - thank  you.
I'll be back soon.
Stay safe!
Cath(erine)
xxx

Wednesday 3 March 2021

 I set a tag challenge for my FB group yesterday, so in order to open the album, I made a couple of quick tags, using what was on my (very, VERY messy) desk and in my stash 😊

I'd already die cut this one and used it to mop up some colour, so I smooshed a little more, stamped the Paperartsy text, added some filler stamps and doodling, then the stamped and die cut flowers from my stash - which is where the Janet Klein words came from. Edged in Delicata Gold Shimmer.  
I stamped, coloured and cut out this lovely lady yesterday, so I found another tall piece of card I'd stamped her on, smooshed some colour, added some stamping, some Inktense pencil shading and some doodling, then stuck my image over the top, colouring the stars with Oxides. I then went a bit mad with    
Linking to 
Shopping our Stash, Oh, the places we'll go
Addicted to Stamps and More, Die cuts and/or stencils
Love to Craft, Anything Goes

Thank you for calling in today
Back soon
Stay safe!
Cath
xxx