roses

 This beautiful rose stamp is crackling rose, a big stamp that is a delight to colour in.
I used some leftover card from a workshop that had been coloured using shaving foam and brusho powders for my background, and stamped the image in black memento ink.
Image was coloured using my favourite watercolour pencils and a waterbrush. The matt is a dark green card.
The base card 7"x7" was stamped with the studded lattice stamp using a green adirondack ink, which was also sponged round the edges.

My second card using the slightly smaller floribunda net stamp is on a 5"x7" white card blank.
The image was stamped in versamark ink onto gereenc ard and white embossed. I painted the leaves and roses with diluted white reinker, and once that was dry coloured them with marker pens.
Mats of pink and green card finished this off.

live,laugh,love

 Steampunk was never my scene, but having played with the steampunk butterfly stamps, I fell in love with the roses, and treated myself to the punky hearts set of stamps in the recent Chocolate Baroque sale as that had more roses.......I also got a stencil (among other things) and felt that I really had to use them.

Having bought some canvas boards after making my first ever canvas at a Clarity East workshop

I went totally wild and made a canvas using the lovely colour scheme from the CB Colour  challenge 20.
Throwing caution to the wind, I used brusho powders for the background, reasoning that I had a load of white gesso to cover it up with if it didn't work! I just sprinkled red, orange and yellow over the canvas board and sprayed it with water. It looked fine wet, but the colours faded to a pastel when it was dry, so I added more red and spritzed it again and let the colour dribble down.
The cog stamp from the butterfly set was randomly stamped in grey as a background.
The rose was stamped twice onto a sticky label and the heart once, coloured with promarkers and cut out. I stamped the heart in black memento onto the canvas to give me the key, to save some fiddly cutting out. Using the stamped image as a guide, I stuck the cutout roses down, and then the cut out heart over the top.
I lined the words of the stencil up on the left of the canvas, and stencilled them with what I thought was a white embossing paste - it turned out to be pearlised translucent, which didn't show up at all well when dry! A quick recovery job, line up the stencil again and sponge black archival ink through - it didn't do the stencil any favours, but at least I could see the words!
Dark brown acrylic paint ws roughly brushed round the edges to finish - I was quite pleased with how it turned out in the end

floral musica

 Two cards today using the lovely new floral musica stamp - it is a big stamp, perfect for a spot of peaceful colouring in, and really doesn't need much else to make a card.
The first card Istamped the image in brown ink onto a very pale beige card, coloured with watercolour pencils, then cut out using a fancy die, and edged with a green promarker.
The background panel was a dark brown card embossed with a music image embossing folder, with the music highlighted with some very ancient gilding wax.
The base card is a 15x15cm kraft card blank

My second card was also coloured with watercolour pencils, stamped with black ink onto white card, with a wash of old paper distress ink over the music background.
I didn't have an oval die which fitted the image, so had to handcut the oval, which I mounted onto a dull gold diecut mount.
The base card is white 15x15cm, randomly stamped with the same image in old paper distress ink.

steampunk romance

I took advanatage of the recent sale at Chocolate Baroque to buy the punky hearts set of stamps - not normally my type of image, but I loved the roses. Having got them, I did feel that I ought to make a valentine's card, and this is my first effort, using a stencil that was another sale item as well.
I stamped the heart first in black memento ink, and clear embossed it, then masked the heart off while I stamped the rose twice behind it, also clear embossing them. Both images were coloured with promarkers, then gone over with a versamark pen and clear embossed again. I used part of the stencil to add the words in the bbottom corner, using the memento ink again with a sponge.
Background was done with distress inks onto a blending mat, spritzing with water and blotting up the ink from the mat - I used picked raspberry, barn door  and fossilised amber inks.once it was all dry, Isponged black soot round the edges, and added a black mat - it made a 7"x7" card.
Thanks to Rocky, i have a nice long list of challenges on this theme -
Brown sugar - valentine/love
creative corner - valentine's day/love
simply create too - love/valentine's
crafty creations - hearts
craft rocket - valentine/love
4 crafty chicks - love

beautyin the garden

This is my offering for the Chocolate Baroque colour challenge 19, using the new walled garden stamp and the lady from the  Mackintosh beauty set.
I was trying to create a dreamy garden scene behind the lady, so used brusho powders for the background, with watercolour pencils for definition.
Full details on how to make this are on the Chocolate Baroque challenge blog