Bits and pieces

Hello Folks,

I have had a lovely day today, pottering around and getting jobs done, the sun has been shining (after a little shower of rain first thing), the cats have all been outside (must be warming up!) and I have got my cards ready for the Diva Red workshop on Saturday.  I'm very pleased with what I've done, but can't show you until after the workshop, so here is something I made using lots of those bits and pieces we all have lurking in drawers and craft boxes

 I have been trying to use up some of my craft stash!      stop laughing!
I had a bit of a clear out and found all sorts of things, buttons, sequins, MDF shapes, die cut frames from old kits from years ago, ribbons, papers, flowers, brads, the list goes on and on...
I took it all to the workshops last weekend for the ladies to have a go at a collage.
We started by gluing all sorts of bits to a square card, trying to get lots of different textures.
Once everyone was happy with their layout, we painted it all with white gesso (another pot of stuff I've had for ages...) and left it to dry.


Then paint it all with coloured acrylic paint, spritz with shimmer spray and/or add gilding wax.

Some of the ladies produced the most WONDERFUL pieces of art!!  We had good fun and I hope everyone enjoyed themselves.

...so I bet you are wondering how much of my stash got used... they barely made a dent! Still we had a good time, which is the main thing.  I will just have to think of other ways of using my stuff (which is good fun in itself!)
Thanks for popping by
Janet xx

Getting Groovi

Hello folks,
Wishing you all a lovely Easter weekend! 

This card is another from the Claritystampers East workshops last weekend.  Getting Groovi - it is always extremely quiet when everyone is concentrating and relaxing .
We used the Nested Octagon and the Funky Henna flowers to create the design, then a combination of embossing and coloured pencils to bring it to life.  Apart from the ease of creating the white outline, what I love about the Groovi system is being able to use bits and pieces of each plate to make up your own design, such a pleasure to use!
I cut all round, keeping the octagon shape and attached it to the background card with a couple of brads in the centre of the flowers.
Have a great weekend
Janet xxx

Just stencils

Good morning,
It's an absolutely beautiful day today and I am lucky enough to have the day off work, so I intend to be out in the garden (working - not quite sunbathing temperature yet!!)
Just time for a quick blog post though...

This is one of the cards we did at the Claritystampers East workshop over the weekend.
For this one, we just used stencils...there are lots to choose from on the Clarity website

I used cream hammered card to start and blended yellow (Mustard Seed) distress ink all over, then used sequin waste to add small circles in the same colour - just blend small areas.
I changed ink and stencil and blended another design in patches, and changed again for a third pattern - many of the lovely background stencils would work for this.

Allow the ink time to dry, then position the wonderful wild flower stencil where you want it and secure at the top with masking tape.
Add a dollop of glossy black embossing paste at the top, then spread it across the stencil, remove the excess paste with the spreader and return it to the pot.
Remove the stencil and cover the image with glass microbeads, tip off the excess and allow to dry  I highly recommend you put your card in a container of some sort before you add the microbeads - they roll around everywhere!!
Once dry, mat on to black card and add some gems

I hope it is lovely where you are too!
Thank for popping in today,
Janet xx

Double Diva

Good morning folks,
I hope the weather has been as lovely for you as it's been here recently.  I am always much happier when the light increases in Spring...
Today's cards are the ones we did at the Diva Red workshop a couple of weekends ago.  Moira had a prior engagement, so I did all 4 cards.

 This is done with Clarity stencils: Sunflower
and Circles from the basic background set
Do the background first, add plenty of colour, the stencil the same colour through the circles, move the stencil around and add another colour.

Put the Sunflower stencil in place and colour it,leave to dry.
Once all the ink is dry, put the stencil back in place and spread Glass bead gel through it (this is like translucent embossing paste, but with the beads already added to it) and leave to dry.



This card is pretty much a repeat of the one we did at the Claritystampers workshop..

We also got a bit Groovi, making a pretty Mother's Day card

...and a bit messy...


Enjoy your day,
Janet xx

Workshop cards

Good morning and happy weekend,
It is looking like it might be a nice sunny day here, the cats are all spending more time outside, which always means it's warming up a bit!

These are the cards we did at the Claritystampers East workshops a while ago - sorry it has taken so long to get them blogged!  All using the lovely Wee Houses and Wee Shops and the Wee Trees and Wee Foliage sets of stamps....

For the first card, I drew a semi-circle template round a saucer and covered the lower portion of the card, then stamped the house in place, covered the house with a mask, then did the sky using the cloud mask from the landscape mask set
Once the sky is done, stamp the trees in place, then remove all the masks.
Cover the sky with the top half of the saucer template and add colour for the grass, then stamp the grasses in place at the front.

We used a brayer to do the sky for the second card, coming in from different angles to leave a shaft of light in the centre

The last card we did is one very much like Barbara has done on her blog, so I suggest you look here to see how it's done.  I just added a border
I have since coloured the houses, but I had a sore thumb at the time we did this and colouring was quite painful!

This one did prove a bit tricky and does require a bit of practice!

It was a lovely couple of days with the ladies from Bawburgh and Great Blakenham, I am busy getting ready for the next workshops next weekend - looking forward to seeing you there ladies..

Have a great weekend!
Janet x