WOYWW #95

My goodness, it's Wednesday again already!! And that means its time for What's on Your Workdesk Wednesday over at the Stamping Ground.


First off, I want to say a big thank you to the lovely ladies that left me comments last week when my mojo had abandoned me; they really made me smile. And I took Julia's advice and put crafting aside for a while and focused on other things (namely getting excited about the fact that filming has started on The Hobbit - cue girlie squeal and clapping.... yes I am a geek at heart!)


Anyway, this week.... look! I've started making things (mostly a mess!!) again.

On my cutting mat you can see a couple of little bookmarks I've been working on; a great experiment with using different colours together for me, and I love playing with my little spray bottle - it belonged to my hubby but once it was empty I liberated it. It gives a really fine mist.


To the right and in the clear CD case at the back are stamps that I've played with on the bookmarks.


And over to the left is a WIP. One of my friends is having an engagement party in a few weeks time and thankfully she told me the decorations and cake are going to be in her chosen wedding colours; of course I had to ask what those colours were in order to make a special card that matches lol. She has chosen white and aqua.... making me realise I have nothing aqua!!! So far I have these panels done (you can see the masks I made to make the bouquet) and coloured the roses with a 'kingfisher blue' watercolour pencil - hopefully it'll be close enough to her chosen colour. Just need to find some backing paper to layer the main panel onto, though I think silver would compliment it too.


Thanks for stopping by. I will definitely stop by a few more desks this afternoon now I'm back in the flow.
Take care and happy crafting,
Charli x


EDIT: Oh my goodness, I do appologise for the state of my cutting mat! I never realised it was so filthy lol!! Think I'd better give it a clean before next week!!

WOYWW #94

Well, as you will see in the picture... not alot!


Over the past week my mojo seems to have fled and my motivation has vanished; I've sat at my desk and stared at things, but just haven't managed to do anything. I'd even lost the urge to blog-hop!! I know, I know, I've just not been feeling myself! 

Resting behind my cutting mat is the one card I managed to do this week for my little cousin's birthday; she's mad on Hello Kitty so I traced the picture out of one of my daughter's colouring books lol. And the doorhanger from last week has that side finished, though at some point I want to do the back too.


And on the far left there, the card with the decoupage daffodils, is a card my daughter made and its waiting for me to sort out a pic and upload it to her blog later.


If you hop on over to Julia's blog the Stamping Ground, I'm sure you'll see some much more interesting desks than mine!


I really hope my urge to craft comes back pretty sharpish, and hope you've all had a much more creative week than me!
Take care and happy crafting,
Charli x

WOYWW #93

Okay, seriously who is stealing my days?? I can't believe its Wednesday again already!!!


And in answer to the lovely Julia's question; what's on my workdesk (this) Wednesday? A big mess that's what!! Which is quite an achievement considering its not a very big space to begin with. I'm afraid once again I have neglected putting things away and have resorted to the "push-back" technique (as in, just pushing everything back a bit to make a small space in which to work)!! Really must tidy it up... later... after I've finished the current WIP.

The work-in-progress this week is a doorhanger that I shall hang from the shelf above my desk that will read: Warning! Creative Mind at Work! lol So scattered around the immediate area are bits and pieces (and odds and ends) that I've been using or will be using - like my adorable lil skull and crossbones stamp. Only a true crafter could go to a pirate experience (you know where people dress up and everything is fairly authentic, including random swordfights going on around you) and pick up a rubber stamp... like I did last year!


Also you can see the finished tag that was sitting naked on my desk last week, and beneath that my lil notebook where I keep track of current challenges I take part in regularly.


Thanks for stopping by, I will try to get around a few desks today, but will have more time tomorrow evening when hubby is on overtime.
Take care and happy crafting,
Charli x

Sweet and Girly

And this card certainly is! 


A friend of ours always asks me to make the 'special' birthday cards that he sends, which is a win-win situation as I always have spares and as he pays for them I can buy new stash lol!


Fab 'n Funky are wanting to see girly this week, and as I needed to make a birthday card for my daughter (from our friend - I've not done one from us yet as her birthday is a month away) and she is one of the girliest little girls I know it seemed fitting.


As you can probably tell, she LOVES pink lol!!

I also made this card to fit in with the clever little challenge over at Raise the Bar - you must use the acronym GREEN, but the letters can stand for anything you like. After having a rough idea of what I wanted to do it came quite easily:
G - girly
R - ribbon
E - embossing
E - embellishment
N - new (to me) image


The image itself is rather lovely and is a free digi from a very talented lady called Beccy; she produces lots of cute images that are FREE, check out her work on her blog Beccy's Place.


I coloured the image with watercolour pencils and cut out, sticking onto a pre-cut cream oval that I had stamped with the flower in Victorian Velvet Distress ink and edged with the same colour.


The background is pale pink pearlescent card, once again run through that lovely embossing folder with the 'Bug. I love how the pearlescent card shows up the deep embossing so beautifully.


I stamped out the flower 3 more times onto white card with VV and blended more ink onto them. I cut them out and shaped them, layering them together with a pink pearl brad that I've had forever!


I cut a little tag from cream card and handwrote the greeting with black marker. This was edged with VV and added to the card under the flower.


Finally a strip of irredescent white organza ribbon to finish it off.


Phew, 3 posts from me today!
Take care and happy crafting,
Charli x

Time Flies

And it certainly does! I've had the base of this tag sitting on my desk since Tuesday (it made an appearance on my desk this last Wednesday!) and I just wasn't sure what to do with it.

It's an ordinary manilla tag, run through my lovely 'Bug with a beautiful embossing folder that came with it. I inked over it with Tea Dye DI to bring out the embossing even more and then edged it with Walnut Stain.

Then on Friday the back issues of Craft Stamper magazine that I had ordered arrived and with the February issue was this rather fetching little pocket watch and 'Tempus Fugit' script. So I tore a piece of card and inked with my fave combo of DI's; Antique Linen, Tea Dye and Walnut Stain. I flicked a bit of water at it and once dry the script was stamped in black StazOn and the watch in WS. And then that was it again for a couple of days.


Anywho, over the weekend I finally finished it! I wrapped the panel with a bit of twine and layered on foampads. The watch was stamped again, this time in black, onto white card and inked (AL and TD). the little inner dial and the hands were glazed with a Sakura glaze pen.


I cut some wings out, using a template, from a grey-ish board for a different colour and inked and stamped with TD and WS.


The letters were torn ransom stylee from the freebie newspaper we get here and aged with those same inks.


As this weeks theme over with the lovely Hels at the Sunday Stamper is brown I thought this was a very apt project.


And also, there is not a flower in sight so I will also enter this into the Creative Card Crew's 'no flowers' challenge.


Charli x

I am Woman

Try It On Tuesday asked for a tag this time around, on a womanly theme to celebrate Woman's Day last Tuesday.

Having seen the other entries, which are all beautiful I'm now not sure whether my humourous take on it is suitable afterall, but hey ho, here it is anyway.

I am woman, watch me shop indeed! Not that I get much chance for shopping sprees, but a few crafty goodies now and then is enough to raise anyone's spirits.


The images of the shopper and the bag were from a little free set of digi's called 'Shop 'til You Drop', I just wish I could remember where they came from!!


Just a bit of fun I think in an unusual combination for me of pink and yellow, but I think it works quite well.


Charli x

Never-ending Nature

Phew, I am just in time to enter the Sunday Stamper's challenge, which this week has been 'nature'.

Also the Take a Word prompt was 'birdlife'. So with those two ideas in mind this project was born:

Last year for Mother's Day I made my Mum and MIL never-ending-cards and my Grandad was thoroughly fascinated by Mum's; kept playing with it and thought it was really complicated (of course I didn't let on how simple they actually were lol!!). So I decided that for his birthday this year I would make him his own to play with.

I chose to use my gorgeous bird stamps (from 7 Gypsies) -I've had them for a good while now and I still reach for them all the time! And chose to go with neutral colours for a masculine look and a natural feel.

The base and panels were made from white card, inked up with DI's (Antique Linen, Tea Dye and Walnut Stain). All stamping was done with black StazOn and the two darker DI's. The panels were layered onto black card and it was all stuck together using a combo of DST and gluestick. It took quite a while to do - 14 rectangular panels and 24 squares, plus the layers argh!!

Well I think all that work was worth it as I love the outcome. Just need to sort out some wording for it now, but as his birthday isn't until June I've got plenty of time to find something appropriate!!


This is also being entered into Simon Says Stamp Challenge, which this time around is Anything Goes!


Thanks for looking, I now have to try to remove the Walnut Stain Distress Ink from my fingers....


Take care and happy crafting,
Charli x

WOYWW....already?!

Where on earth has the past week disappeared to?! It only seems like a day or two ago that I was blogging my desk last week.


It was so nice to get up this morning at half past six and *not* have to put the light on!! A sure sign that spring is coming.... if you ignore the weather presenter that is!!


Anyhoo, here is my desk today, a real mix of this and that that I've been playing around with.

And of course, having received my new toy last Thursday I have been playing alot! Here is my gorgeous Cuttlebug V2, next to my handbag because I just can't get over how compact it is! Its so lovely (and all the better for not being completely green!)

And here is where it lives when its not being played with on the lounge floor! This shelf is just along from my desk, which you can see on the far right. The drawers hold paper (plain and patterned), card and Xmas stuff in the bottom drawer. The black and white basket hold finished projects. Just please ignore the ancient state of my computer lol, its only the casing thats old I assure you - the insides are all fairly new.

Happy desk-hopping everyone. I will be heading over to the lovely Julia's blog to have a nosey myself after work.


Take care and happy crafting,
Charli x

Purrfectly Masculine

I often struggle with cards for men, that's one reason I love Distress Inks so much as I find the right colours offer a good masculine look.

This time I was a little lost when trying to think of a design I could use for a male cat-lover.... then I saw the challenge for the Secret Crafter this week is a patchwork background, and that seemed to ignite a spark of inspiration.

Also I'm entering this card into Sarah Hurley's challenge of four-legged friends!

I took a plain white A6 card blank and drew a diagonal grid of one and a half inch squares using a brown Indian ink pen. I then lined the squares with faux stitching (I just hope the 'imitation patchwork' still counts for the challenge lol).


The rows of blue squares were coloured with Weathered Wood and Faded Jeans, and just Faded Jeans. The green columns are Tea Dye and Forest Moss, and Forest Moss and Walnut Stain. I inked the squares by masking them one at a time with sticky notes.


The panel was made in the same technique; a square of white card split into 9 one-inch squares using the same pen, then little crosses added to the joins to represent stitches.


This time, the 5 paler squares were masked and coloured with Antique Linen and Tea Dye with the stamping of the little cats and sentiment done with Walnut Stain. The other squares were WW and FJ, overstamped with FJ; and TD and FM, overstamped with FM.


The finishing touch was to add the trim twice around (its really thin!) and knot it.


In my opinion a purrfectly masculine card!


Happy crafting,
Charli x

Mother's Day

Yes, I know its still a good few weeks away, but I'm trying to be super-organised this year. Plus its the current challenge at C.R.A.F.T.

This card is also eligible for the Alphabet Challenge - R for ribbons.

And it was supposed to be entered into last week's Tuesday Throwdown, whose challenge was tags, but I forgot to upload it yesterday... ooops!

The card is a trifold a little smaller than DL, and I cut 3 panels and 3 pockets; some were run through my new Cuttlebug V2 (love, love, LOVE my new 'Bug!!) and inked up. The other panels were inked and stamped. 'Happy Mother's Day' was stamped in black StazOn and everything else was done using Distress Inks (Milled Lavender, Victorian Velvet and Dusty Concord).

The tags are chipboard flower fairy ones that I've had lurking for a while; they were a craft mag freebie. They were layered onto silver mirri and threaded with white shiny organza ribbon.

Then I added some little sentiments onto the backs.

And here is the card for my MIL; my first 'double twisted easel' -catchy huh?!
I really like how this one turned out.

Pale pink pearlescent card run through the 'Bug. White card layers inked up. Flowers were stamped and cut out, the pink ones were inked and over-stamped, the lilac ones were put through the 'Bug too (can't you tell its new?!) and then inked. 
Sentiment was stamped in StazOn, roughly masked off and over stamped with a floral journalling panel.
Obviously all inking was done with DI's, this time it was Milled Lavender, Victorian Velvet and Worn Lipstick.


Charli x

Under the Sea

That's the new challenge over at Crafts and Me.
Now if I think of under the sea, I think of mermaids; my fave image of the moment is this gorgeous flippered gal from ching-chou kuik. Speaking of favourite stamps, that just so happens to be the theme for Sweet Pea Stampers!


And what colours say 'underwater'? Blue and green of course. Guess what? Yup another challenge, this time Crafty Creations are asking for a feminine birthday card in just those colours (and the perfect way to move on from all that pink yesterday).

And to finish off, Simon Says Stamp Challenge has a recipe of 1 image (the mermaid -check), 2 papers (the dotty one and the stamped/inked one -check), and 3 types of embellishments (shaped beads, gems and string -check!)


Image stamped in black StazOn and coloured with DI's using the watercolour technique (Faded Jeans, Weathered Wood, Forest Moss, Tea Dye and Walnut Stain); plus fleshtone watercolour pencil; cut out and layered onto foampads.
Strip of torn white paper inked with Weathered Wood and scalloped border stamped in Faded Jeans to look like scales.
Torn strip of green dotty paper, edged in Forest Moss.
Torn piece of white card stamped with sentiment, coloured WW and edged in FJ; wrapped with strand of string and adhered with foampads.
Beads threaded onto knotted string double strand.


Take care and happy crafting,
Charli x

WOYWW

Well, there I was "Little Miss Organised" this morning. As soon as I came home from taking little one to school, I took a picture of what was left on my desk from last night. But....


I couldn't transfer the photo onto my computer d'oh! Had to wait until this evening to get hubby to find the other SD card, the one I usually use and works fine in my PC, then retake the pic so my desk is slightly different from this morning (namely the WIP from last night is now complete)


And finally, here is What's On My Workdesk (this) Wednesday:

As you can see, its all very pink, but for good reason. That has become the banner/header for the blog I set up for my daughter. (There is a link at the top left of my blog - only one project uploaded so far though).

Not too much of a mess, but really need to clear some space to work on something thats not pink!!

Join in the fun over at the Stamping Ground and show off your workdesk!

Take care and happy crafting,

Charli x

Sweet Simplicity

Lately I've been doing alot of projects where I use lots of colours to colour a stamped image, and a fair bit of papers for backgrounds and things, but yesterday I had the urge to just simplify everything.

To make this card I literally used about one and a half sheets of A4 plain white cardstock, 2 Distress Inks (Dusty Concord and Forest Moss), 2 floral stamps, the sentiment stamp with black Staz-On, and a strip of plain white satin ribbon.

I think when you keep all the 'ingredients' simple and white, it allows for more creativity.



Firstly, I scored, folded and trimmed a sheet of card down to standard DL size. Then measured the stamp I wanted to use and found that it would fit a 2x3" panel perfectly. I cut 3 panels to follow the sketch over at Cards and Things.


I stamped the image onto each panel using Forest Moss, then used a wet paintbrush and smidge more ink to colour in the leaves.


The flowers themselves were stamped onto other card in Dusty Concord (I love how those two colours give a vintage feel without being really girly), using the same method to fill in the blooms. Once they were dry I cut them out roughly and layered them onto foam pads.


I cut 3 panels slightly bigger, and three more a little bit bigger still, then inked them with the Distress Inks, alternating the colours of the panels; then layered them up.


I drew a line across the base where I wanted the ribbon to be and masked off the top portion with sticky notes. I chose a small flower stamp that was easy to ink by pressing the flowerhead onto the purple and the stem onto the green, then blotted it on scrap paper each time before stamping onto the card.


I coloured the white ribbon with the Dusty Concord and stuck it down with DST as wet glue would've made the colour run.


Finally I added the sentiment in black to the right hand panel, and added all three on foam pads.


Incidently the theme at Lexi's Creations is 'flowers' so I'm entering it there too.


Wishing you all a great weekend; we're off for a family gathering so should be good fun!


Take care and happy crafting,
Charli x

Alice Artwork

....well, if you can call my attempt art that is!


The Altered Alice is asking for either a dress form, or a change in form for young Alice, and this is a scene that features my second favourite change in form (or size) of our poor heroine; my actual fave is when she grows too large inside the White Rabbit's house and her arms and legs poke out the windows and doors, but I couldn't draw that at all!

Anyway, this is when Alice drinks the 'Drink Me' potion to fit through the door, leaving the key atop the table.

I haven't done any sketching or painting for a very long time, so I'm quite pleased with this, just so long as you don't look at it too closely - its definitely work to be observed from afar lol!!!



Sketched onto watercolour paper then washed and painted with a combination of Distress Inks and watercolour pencils.


I am also entering this into Raise the Bar's cartoon character challenge. I hope this counts as I know Alice is really a character from literature, but this is based off of the Disney animated film (having never readthe actual book!)


Take care and happy crafting,


Charli x

By Royal Appointment

Once again I was in the mood for getting my hands all covered in ink this morning; I suppose I need to make the most of it while its half term and I don't have work to go to!

I managed another three-for-one, well I suppose technically its a three-for-three lol; I haven't made an ATC for so long that I just couldn't stop at one!!

So this little set of three Royal ATCs are entered into:

Simon Says Stamp and Show 'stripes'

Sunday Stampers 'numbers'

and The Crafty Pad 'red, pink and black'

 The ATC bases and the inchies on the first one were cut from an old cereal box. All were created with plenty of stamping, masking and inking (coloured with Victorian Velvet, Worn Lipstick and Barn Door Distress Inks). A couple of bits cut from some old playing cards, crowns stamped and cut from white card and some'coins' punched from silver mirri coloured with black ink.
You can't see it but the crowns on the inchies and the ones from white cardstock are highlighted with a Sakura glaze pen.

Incidently, all 3 ATCs are available if anyone wishes to do a trade, either the whole set or individually. Just leave me a comment here and/or click the link at the top of my blog to email me.

Charli x

PS. The stamped stripes were done with another background stamp I made myself with some strips of craft foam and a lid from a small cigar tin. Here is a little pic of it and the harlequin design I made a while back and used on my tag here.

A Three-For-One

This morning I decided to spend some time getting all inky and messy, with some inspiration from a couple of challenges.

First, Play Date Cafe has red, green and black as their colour scheme.
Second, Simon Says Stamp and Show are asking to see a tag.
And lastly CRAFT Challenge want 'not a card', which a tag isn't; so here we are:

Barn Door DI was blended around a manilla tag and edged with Walnut Stain.

I stamped the keys around the edges using black Staz-On and made a couple of masks from sticky notes. Using the masks I stamped over the keys with the script background and Tim's ticket block.

I added the  harlequin backgroud (that I made myself from craft foam glued onto a block) with Barn Door.

The letters were stamped onto inchies and then inked with Forest Moss, edged in Walnut Stain, then I used a wet paintbrush to lift the colour from inside the letters for a bleached effect. The centre one is glued down flat and the others are on foam pads.

The bird, from a Seven Gypsies set, was stamped using Walnut Stain DI and then the colour was blended out using a wet brush. He was cut out and attached with foampads.

The puzzle piece was inked with Forest Moss DI and a crown (from the same set as the bird) was stamped in Staz-On and coloured with green watercolour pencil.

The tartan ribbon adds a finishing touch and ties the colours together.

Take care and happy crafting,
Charli x

Another Great Sketch

The challenge over at Sweet Pea Stampers is a beautiful sketch by DT member Vanessa.

This paper is absolutely lovely, fab colours, and is a sheet from a book of free paper from an old craft mag (wish I knew where I could get more). I cut a square down into the blocks on the sketch and adhered them to a square of silver mirror card.

The image is yet another gorgeous ching-chou kuik meraid, stamped with black Staz-On and coloured with Distress Inks (Weathered Wood, Victorian Velvet, Antique Linen, Tea Dye, Walnut Stain and Forest Moss) using a waterbrush. I cut around it using a pair of decorative edged scissors, layered onto more silver mirror card and mounted onto foam pads.

The flowers were punched and ribbled until the layers peeled apart and were coloured with Weathered Wood and Victorian Velvet DI (which match the paper superbly).

The finishing touch is the text, a quote from Hans Christian Andersen that was included on the ching-chou kuik stamp plate.

Charli x

New and Neglected Stash

The best thing about the challenges over at Sketch n Stash is not just the fabulous sketches to inspire you, but the nudge in the right direction to use new and/or neglected stash. And this week I've used both.

For this weeks sketch click HERE

The 'new' element from my stash is another beautiful ching-chou kuik image, stamped in black Staz-On and coloured with watercolour pencils.
The paper is from the Dovecraft Fantasy pack, which I've had for nearly a year and have used only twice (and never this actual paper either),and the border punch (from Woodware) has been sat collecting dust for goodness knows how long.

A lovely simple sketch design that results in a beautifully simple elegant card, may have to use this sketch again in the future!

Charli x

A Winged One

I made this card using one of my gorgeous new Ching-Chou Kuik stamps, and as luck would have it it's suitable for entry into a couple of challenges.

Firstly over at Crafts and Me the theme is Time To Spread Your Wings, meaning anything with wings, which this gorge mermaid-fairy definitely has.

Also the requirement over at Fab'n'Funky Challenges is to make your own embellishment/s, which I have done with my distressed paper flowers.

The flowers were punched from ordinary white cardstock, and run through my paper ribbler/crimper/thingamajig in all directions until the layers peeled apart, then coloured with Distress Inks (Dusty Concorde and Milled Lavender). The centres were doodled on with a gel pen.

As for the rest of the card, it was a white square base card and I cut the front off then folded it in half so that the image could stand above it and it would still fit in the same envelope. I used some temporary adhesive to attach some star-shaped sequins to the bottom corner to act as masks, and inked the whole card with Milled Lavender DI and edged it in Dusty Concorde. I stamped the script background in black Staz-On.

The image was stamped in Staz-On and coloured with watercolour pencils. I trimmed her down and rounded the top corners before layering onto purple holigraphic card. It's attached to the base with foam pads and the flowers were added with mini glue-dots to allow the petals to maintain dimention. The finishing touch is the 'Do you believe' stamp that came on the same plate as the image.

Gulp - My First Ever WOYWW!

Yes, I know.... I must be one of the only crafty-bloggers out there who have never joined in with What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday! But now that I am back with prope internet access (hooray for broadband!) I decided it was time to take the plunge and take a picture of my desk.

 And here it is:
(Only just managed to refrain myself from adding a 'tah-dah' lol)

It's not huge but it's all mine; and for once it's actually tidy! Only due to a bit of rearranging over the weeknd; well I had no choice, my old computer monitor stopped working and this shiny new one is a fair bit bigger so I had to clear extra space!

Not alot going on there at the moment, been too busy trying to catch up on all the blogs I've missed while withot internet! But I have recently purchased Joanna Sheen's Lofty stamp 'Lick of Paint' as it's going to be perfect for my F-I-L's Father's Day card (planning ahead -oooh, get me) so I've had a little play; I find his expression adorable.

And in honour of this being my first WOYWW, I thought I would just share a pic of my corner - otherwise christened my 'crafty nook'.
We live in a small cosy 2bed terraced house so I'm not lucky enough to have a whole room, well not 'til my daughter moves out in 10+ years!

But this is my nook, in the corner of our lounge, you know in that awkward gap under the stairs that has no real use! But I love it. The desk itself is very special as it was built by my hubby when he was back in school as a woodwork project and it is so sturdy I love it.

The hutch above it was also made by my hubby specificly for this purpose. (Just pretend you can't see the mess on the top shelf lol, I didn't get that far yet with the tidyup!!)

There are drawers and things below the desk as well as on the other side of my computer base. And the CD rack on top of it holds CD cases storing my unmounted and clear stamps - and it's waiting to be attached to the wall so that it won't stay at that precarious angle!

And beside me on the wall is my big notice board, holding my To Do list for the month, other bits and bobs, and of course artwork by my nearly-8-year-old!

Thanks for stopping by, and I will make an effort to visit as many desks as I can this afternoon/evening.

Take care and happy crafting,
Charli x

Gifts!

Ha, so much for me posting at least once a week, but am having real problems getting online at the moment.

Anyway, here are a couple of pics of some of the gifts I made for Christmas just gone.

 I made 4 of the jewellery boxes, in varying colours, and 2 of these frames - plus another type of frame too but as yet I can get no photo (can you believe I forgot to take photos before I wrapped them all and gifted them to family?! Luckily these were given to my mum so pics were easy to get)

 The jewellery boxes were little plain wooden ones with magnetic catches. First I gave them a white emulsion undercoat (have a big tin in the cupboard from repainting the ceiling lol) which gave a nice worn look with only one thin coat applied.

Then I added some subtle colour; for the box in the picture I used Dusty Concorde Distress Ink, but only to the flat areas, staying away from the edges to maintain the "shabby chic" effect. I then stamped onto it using Dusty Concorde, Forest Moss and Walnut Stain DIs, blotting the stamps for a paler, more distressed look.

The flowers were made by stamping out 6 petalled flowers - 3 large and 6 small - onto plain white cardstock. I overstamped them with a script stamp and cut them out. The flowers were inked alternately (on both sides) with Dusty Concorde and Milled Lavender DIs. There are lots of tutorials online on how to make the flowers, I simply used only 3 layers for mine, adding coordinating seedbeads into the centres, and inking a couple of the removed large petals for leaves coloured with Forest Moss DI.

Once everything was glued on I coated it all in watered down PVA glue, including all the petals.

This frame was again given a coat of white emulsion, then lightly coloured with Antique Linen and Tea Dye DIs. I stamped the script backround in black, the flowers in Forest Moss and Tea Dye, and the birds in Walnut Stain. Crowns were added in Tea Dye above the birds and at the top of the base. I made sure to stamp the birds' tails on the outer edges too.

For the 'roof' I inked a book page in Walnut Stain then tore it into strips and glued them down overlapping, with watered down PVA glue, which I then coated the whole thing with; adding the wooden bird embellisment to the bottom corner.


I have to admit, I really enjoyed making them and was very pleased with how they turned out. And most importantly they were very well received! I'm planning to make a stack of them to sell this year at a craft fair.

Will try to post again ASAP.
Take care and happy crafting,

Charli x