Up, Up and Away!!

How is everyone today?  I hope you are all enjoying your crafting.  I am home after a couple of days in Birmingham - not the easiest of places to navigate even with Ken (my trusty sat nav man with a sexy Australian accent!)  Glad to be home again!
This is a sample card for the Clarity show on the German TV channel, HSE 24, using a kit with all three balloons and the mountains and hills mask.  I have always liked cards with the same image repeated, so this is my take on that idea.

• Follow the same procedure three times in the different sizes
• Stamp the balloon in place, using Archival ink on watercolour card, repeat the image on a sticky post it and cut out to make a mask
• Put the mask in place over the stamped image
• To create the sky, I used a natural sponge with a very open texture and just sponged lightly with denim, mountain rose and raspberry inks. Sponge to a level just below the base of the balloon image
• To create the hills, I used the Clarity Hills and Mountains mask- put the mask in position and sponge Lettuce and Oregano inks
• Move the mask to create a different hill and sponge slate and oregano inks to make a contrasting colour hill
• Remove balloon mask and colour with Inktense pencils
• Mat onto blue card
• Try out your positioning of the three images on to green card before you stick anything down!!
• Mat onto another layer of blue
• I also sponged around the edge of the base card, in the same way I did the sky
• Embellish with card candy

Hope you like it!  xx

Foxgloves

This is one of the cards I did for the Clarity TV show in May.  I love foxgloves, they are amongst my favourite flowers and I enjoy watching bees going in and out of the flowers.  Everyone seems to be going 'arty' these days, so I thought I had better have a bit of a go!  These are big, remountable stamps, I had an acrylic block big enough, but if you haven't, Barbara recommends using a ruler as you mount.  The stamps used are the remountable foxglove set from Clarity

• For the background, I used watercolour paper and lightly spritzed it with water, then repeat stamped the foxglove stamps using multi-coloured dye based inks
• Completely cover the paper, then spritz with more water, so the colours run and blend with each other, there should still be bits of the images left
• Lightly blot with copy paper, then dry with a hear gun
• Ink around the edges with one of the colours from the inkpad
• Mat onto dark pink card and then onto the base card

Main Images

• For the three images, stamp the foxgloves with a black archival and colour in with inktense pencils
• Tear round the edges and mat onto a dark pink card and tear round that
• Mat onto the card

There you have it!
Enjoy your day
Janet xx