INKY FINGERS

Wow! It's such a long time since I blogged, but I haven't stopped creating - not completely.

Sadly, my eldest son was found dead last year and, as you can imagine, I was devastated. It's amazing how grief dries up all your creativity. A lot of my creative friends have also passed away this last few months - some very, very close to me. I've missed them and I'm sure I will do in future. 

But the biggest tribute is to continue creating, don't you think?

I'm just going to post one or two of my bits and see if anyone looks these days - I've so lost touch with all the blogs, the challenges, etc. Emotions don't ask permission to mess with your life.

I really liked the larger flowers in Lou Withers' Studio Light Just Lou range, so I played with watercolouring them in different colourways. I did have a plan to use them as book covers - they're a lovely size for a nice big journal. (Yes, I'm still making lots of books, mainly with Studio Light dies!)

 A fun playtime today 😁

I couldn't resist this elephant stamp from Katzelcraft, and of course a couple of other small items somehow found their way into my shopping basket 😖 I just don't understand how that happens. Does it happen to you, too?

Anyway, I cheated because I made this background either just before or just after Christmas, when I tried out some watercolour paints on watercolour paper, trying to get a deeper result with them. They are plastered on, so far from a watercolour effect, but that was exactly what I was after at the time. I can't tell you how many images have been on this piece, waiting to be glue(d down, until I changed my mind - again! But I decided it would be a perfect place for Ms Picasso Elephant. I did also end up, somehow, with the Les Pabos sheet I used last week. I have no idea what Pabos are...I should ask my friend in France. She has grandchildren, so maybe she'll know. I just know they make me smile.)

So this is coloured with pencils - a variety of types, with some blending experiments, too. Some is finished off with Inktense pencils and acrylic paint pens because I wanted the vivid rainbow look on Ms Picasso's painting. I thought she'd enjoy a pedicure, so I painted her toe nails to match her beret, and added a few red jewel like dots - the dots were part of the image, so I just coloured them. I used some oddments for the background, which was stamped both in grey and in white - and an Aall and Create Circles background stamp.

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.

I’m still playing with the beautiful, rich shades of Autumn and nature stamps… can’t resist. 

The Dragonfly Dreams challenge is Autumnal Colours and

Ellibelle’s Crafty Challenge is Nature/Outdoors, while Country View Challenges have a Plant-tastic theme..

This one’s a simple leafy card, stamped on watercolour paper with Archival inks, then watercoloured with Distress inks and splattered with Delicata gold ink.

Then I played with my other Autumn love -  ‘shrooms - for a little while… my friend and I used to go fungus foraging and often found some amazing specimens!

This one’s fungus and faeries… ‘shrooms courtesy of Lavinia Stamps….bunny from Inkylicious.

Then, playing with green, orange and brown , I made this background, then stamped it with Lavinia flowers? and more ‘shrooms… colouring with Prisma pencils and a Mermaid paint pen (Jane Davenport). Both the flowers and the ‘shrooms are stamped with Versafine Clair Fallen Leaves, which is dark brown, but it looks black.

I was thinking about these colours and suddenly remembered my Chinese Lanterns stamp, so I stamped in Russet Archival, then coloured them, again with Distress Inks, adding a few floating leaves and a bit of Wild Honey stencilling. I love the Impression Obsession words.

There’s a a Make Your Mark challenge on Addicted to Stamps and More 

and a ‘Fall’ Challenge at Sisterhood of Crafters.

The Everybody Art Challenge is asking for Orange and Brown.

Lastly, a very simple leafy card, made with the card left after die cutting and one of my scrapling cards for the CASology Gratitude Challenge.

Thank you so much for looking

Back soon

Cath

xxx

A little bit more from the results of  my ink therapy…same stamp, different colours. This is a really nice stamp to play with.  Love how versatile it is

I’d like to enter one of the Restful cards into the

Penny Black Saturday Challenge – Anything Goes

and one of the others into both

Dragonfly Dreams Challenge – Flowers

and

Stamping Sensations – Anything with Flowers

Thanks for looking

Cath

xxx

I’ve been enjoying some therapeutic colouring and inking, so today I’m sharing some floral cards.

I’d like to enter the

Stamping Sensations Challenge – Anything with Flowers

and the

Penny Black Saturday Challenge – Anything Goes

Thanks for looking.

See you soon

Cath

xxx

It feels like a long week this week…it’s been cold and miserable and wet. Some of the country is covered in snow, we in the North West have our usual wet rain but it’s also pretty cold and the hailstone showers have been coming thick and fast. Maybe that’s why I’m thinking of sunshine and spring?

Our Yahoo group had a request for Sunshine this week, so I made the following cards…

Seems I’m still into frosty colours, lol.

I’ve been making other bits and pieces, amongst which are these…

A Scrapling (left over card after cutting a larger one down)

…a watercoloured card…

…and some journalling snippets.

I think that’s enough for now…

I’d like to enter the following:-

Penny Black challenge – Anything Goes

Country View Challenges – Anything Goes

Stamping Sensations – Cold and Frosty Colours

Try it on Tuesday’s Favourite Things

and

Inspiration Destination’s Anything Goes challenge.

Thanks for looking and thank you for all the lovely, encouraging comments on my last post! 

See you soon!

Cath

xxx

I’m going to TRY to blog more often this year…famous last words, I hear you say??? We’ll see …

So, there are a few ‘New’ or ‘Something New’ Challenges around at the moment and I thought I’d concentrate on that in this post.

I recently bought a few new Penny Black Stamps – I do love their flowers – so I’ve been playing with them the last few days.

The first is this beautiful blossom stamp..stamped with Tombow Markers and watercoloured afterwards. Some of the inks were smudged by my clumsy painting, but I don’t mind the small smudges.

Here’s another using the same stamp … Not too happy with the way that ‘Many Thanks’ stamps – it’s unusual for PB stamps, which are usually amazing quality.

Here’s another one, where I was just messing around, really.  Not sure I’ll keep this one… I stamped over an inked background, so it’s very subtle and the black is a little overpowering.

This is one I’ve had since December, but hadn’t really used until now.

Here’s my latest…I LOVE this stamp! I love magnolias but this is so pretty.

This is another magnolia stamp I’ve had for a long time but hardly used – seen next to the above, it looks very insignificant!

And here’s a little Bible Journalling.

I’ll enter one of the above cards into the following challenges:-

Allsorts – Something New

Simon Says Wednesday Challenge – Something New

Penny Black and more – Something New

Everybody Art Challenge – Latest Purchase

See you soon!

Thanks for looking.

Cath

xxx

Oh my goodness!  Is it really that long since I blogged???

My apologies – that’s what Christmas does when you get stuck into making gifts and cards and gift cards and foodstuffs for peeps!  I always find it saps my creativity and really enjoy the down time afterwards to recharge my creative batteries.

It’s really not what Christmas is all about, is it?  As a Christian, I find it especially difficult when everything is so commercialised and so money driven and I get pulled into the trap…

I’ve decided to cancel next year’s Christmas and am planning on being far away!

Enough of that. I hope you all had a lovely time and spent it with people you love.

I’ve been gradually getting back into my art and it’s been good. I had intended doing snowy things but it just hasn’t happened because I’m already thinking Spring and Spring flowers… I have a beautiful bunch of brightly coloured tulips in front of me and they are so joyful!

I’ve also done more Bible journalling and good old journalling, which has been fun. I started a book of quotations and I’m really enjoying writing and painting that, but maybe I’ll share some of that at a later date. I have stuff from last year I still haven’t shared and I know there are a lot of ‘New’ challenges around at the moment, but I’ll start by showing you a couple of cards from last year…

… some Bible Journalling…

…and some journalling.

Onto 2018!

I’ll enter the above into the Art Journal Journey challenge – New Year, New Adventures!

I’ll enter one of the cards into the Anything Goes challenge on

Country View Challenges

I’ll be back soon to share more…but for now, I wish you all a very happy, healthy and peaceful New Year!

Thanks for looking.

Cath

xxx