playdate 44

The challenge for Playdate 44 was to use hot pink, navy blue and mustard yellow - I was stuck for ideas until I remembered this stamp from Elusive Images.  I sprayed the back ground with glimmer mists - can't tell you which ones, as I did three versions, I just dug out all the relevant colours and got messy! far as I can remember, this one used 2 each yellows and pinks, a red  and a blue - I added the red as none of the pinks was really a 'hot' one. The image was stamped in black versafine, clear embossed, and the lettering coloured with a marker pen as the paper was a bit too pale at that end.  A very bright pink paper that came in a mixed pack made the bakground, stamped with an Artemio stamp in faded jeans DI - the flower is prima, and the base card is navy blue.
Hopefully the next challenge will have nicer colours!

blog candy

There is some lovely candy up for grabs! Jak has some, closing 3rd September; also Val until 8th September - why not pop over there and drool?

butterfly

I've been quite hooked on leafy backgrounds lately, and as they have mostly been greeny, thought one would fit the Playdate 43 challenge, which was to use lime green, dark green and blue. I stamped the butterfly from the Elusive Images patchwork butterfly plate in versafine black, clear embossed it, then painted it with a mix of H2O and cosmic shimmer paints - I used the nearest to lime green I had, which was more of a goldengreen on the paper, plus a turquoise and a dark green to paint the butterfly. The sentiment from the same set was stamped onto a nestie shape, edged with DIs in greens- I think peeled paint and forest green.
This is also for Rainbow Lady challenge 115, which was 'paint'.
Sorry the scan is squiffy, the 8"x8" base card is a dull gold - but it came out better than the photo.

cats

The 'big black one' as Nimbus was known by the neighbours was unfortunately hit by a van at the beginning of the month, and sadly did not survive the meeting. As there was a cat-shaped hole around, OH and I took a trip to back to Venture Farm - we didn't find a cat there that wanted us badly, so went home to think about the possibles. Then we had a call to say that a cat had been returned, please go look - cut a long story short, we now have Bibble, a pretty little tabby aged about 7. She is the original scaredy-cat at the moment, having had somewhat of an upsetting time over the last few months - in fact, the day we brought her home, she hid for 8 hours! She is improving, will now sleep in the dogbed (Nimbus didn't fit a cat one!), comes for strokes, but is still very nervous although she has plucked up enough courage to go outside.

grungy brocade 2

This is a very simple card, so I can show off the leafy background I made following the instructions on Elaine's blog - I had tried to copy this without a whole lot of success before Elaine revealed exactly how she did it, and the 'right' way is a lot simpler than what I was trying to do! DIs used were old paper, shabby shutters, peeled paint and forest green - and I found that smaller leaves worked better than big ones, and fresh was better than ones that had been sitting around for a while.
Image from the grungy brocade plate from Elusive Images, stamped in corduroy DI , clear embossed and coloured with watercolour pencils this time.

grungy brocade

This was not what I started out to do, I blame it all on the weather -it has been miserable here today, grey and drizzly all day, more like October than August!
Anyhow, what was going to be nice, cheerful and green ended up being grungy and brown - all was not lost, as not only did I need more 'man' cards but I decided that it would fit the Playdate challenge  42 colour scheme of dark brown, green and beige - admittedly with very little green, but there is some there!
Base card is dark brown, cuttlebugged strip dark beige (sanded to show the white), background paper from Artylicious, flowers by Prima. The stamp is from the grungy broacade plate by Elusive Images, which I have had some time but not used very much - stamped on beige card in vintage photo DI, clear embossed, then coloured with more vintage photo using a water brush. Edges were rubbed with more of the same ink on a baby wipe, then edged directly with the ink pad.
I used the sketch from Moving Along With the Times - very loosly admittedly, so adding it for that challenge as well.
ps - according to my ruler, everything is straight - it doesn't look it though!

I made the top 3 at MAWTT- wow!!

essence of nature

 The long-awaited new cd  from Glenda Waterworth  Essence of nature  is now here - and I had to try some of the backing papers out!

The first card is for Playdate 40, where the colour scheme is for black/white/hint of green - fortunately, there is a lovely muted colours folder on the cd, with a greeny/grey misty trees image which fitted in beautifully (the photo comes out rather brighter green, it didn't scan well as the silver grey came out very dark grey mud colour). The image was embossed in detail black, butterfly pained with H2Os, and the poppy heads coloured with pencils highlighted with an inkssentials white pen.

Second card used an alternative image I had thought of using for playdate, but coloutred the poppy heads in brighter tones. the butterfly is using 2 layers of fantasy film. The film was was in tones of blue and golden green, but they both came out more purply.....the greeny gold in the top layer does show up in sunlight though.........backing paper again from the cd, but a brighter colour scheme, more autumnal shades - I can see this cd getting a lot uf use, I already have a small stack of printed papers rady and waiting to be used..........
All the stamps used are from Elusive Images - butterfly poppy plate and patchwork butterfly plate