Inspiration....

So as the title of this blog post suggests, it's where does your Inspiration come from...???

Well for this card, mine came from a challenge that I wanted to enter...It wasn't that the card looked like "Tea" it was more the colours that I used that reminded me of tea.... OK and I've arrange the flowers to look a little like a tea pot....(If you close one eye and squint?? maybe..?? and I now have the nursery rhyme I'm a little tea pot playing in my head LOL)

Anyway this is the Adore You stamp set by Altenew, coloured with Copics and Polychromos pencils.

The background is distress oxides in Tea Dye, Tattered Rose and Dried Marigold. Complete with a few splatters of starry night colour gold and a few sequins to finish it off.

The sentiment is also an Altenew set - Penned Rose and this has been embossed in copper.

Hope you like the card, and I am entering this into Inkspirational Challenge #185 - Tea Photo

Thanks for stopping by

Hugs

Alli

XoX

Wallpaper art

I know from the title you would think I was talking about wallpaper that you put on walls haha...but no...this is a Stamp set by Altenew... it is rapidly becoming a favourite of mine!  The flowers are are so gorgeous to colour!

This is my card made with this set, I wanted to water colour the images so I stamped them out using a water colour friendly ink, and coloured them with my Zig clean colour brush markers.

The background is an ombre effect of distress oxides inks, blended with a make up brush, similar to the Picket Fence ones,  I find this brush really does change how you can blend inks!
I used Spun Sugar, Milled Lavender, Shaded Lilac, Tumbled Glass and final colour was Broken China.

Of course no card is complete without a few splatters this time using the Silver/White (906) metallic colour from the Kuretake - Starry Colors.

All that was left to do was to mount the flower and leaves using foam tape and add some sisal and sequins!

I'm sorry I've been quiet this week, my husband has taken a few days off and we've been trying to create a garden from scratch... We had a house built and moved in last September so the garden has been a blank canvas, we've just about completed the pond and designed what were doing with the rest of the space...its hard work LOL...

Anyways, I think I might enter this into the Simon Says Stamp - Anything Goes Challenge

hope you liked my card, and thanks for popping in
Hugs
XoX

Alcohol inks and Yupo paper

Now who doesn't like getting messy.....I find alcohol inks (let's call these AI for short...) on Yupo paper so relaxing to work with...You don't have to be in control of anything not like when you water colour and have to wait for the layers to dry... Working with AI is so refreshing and you can just drop ink anywhere...and get such different results...

I like to make a few backgrounds and then play with what I'm going to put on them...

So here is my finished card..

The trick to AI is to stop when you think it looks good, believe me I've ruined a few backgrounds by over doing the ink and then having to wipe it off with Isolcol - Rubbing Alcohol.

I've paired this card with two Simon Says Stamp sets Spring Flowers and Even More Spring Flowers.

I coloured them with Zig markers on Quill Board 200GSM paper available at Officeworks here in Australia.

Added a die cut in silver foil (that I had in my stash) just to ground the flowers, the sentiment is a hot foil stamp (they actually look like dies but reversed) from Ultimate Crafts, that was hot foiled on my Go Press and Foil machine by Couture Creations with a purple foil also by Couture Creations. A few nuvo drops too look like purple water and that's it...

I'm going to enter this one into the Simon Says Stamp Challenge - Spring Mood Board

Thanks for stopping by!

Hugs

Alli

XoX

Flowers....

So you know by now that I love flowers..... Well I also love making them too.. I wanted to enter into  the Flower Challenge #31 over on the The Flower Challenge Blogspot.

Now the design had to be this below

I decided that as I'd already water coloured flowers last week, I thought I would make them instead..

The sets I decided to use are Altenew and there are three of them...

The sentiment "Congratulations" is from the Persian Motifs set

The heat embossed flower is from the Christmas Rose stamp and die collection which was free from a magazine (Don't you just love that...)

And the other 2 flowers are from the build a Flower, Peony Blossom set

A few die cuts, that were from a Tim Holtz garden greens dies.

I needed to think about the colour scheme, I already had some scrap water coloured panels, so every thing else needed to tie in with these colours...( you always get bits that you never seem to use up...)

So I stamped the images out  and heat embossed on vellum with some copper embossing powder... and jeez did the get hot, but it did work, and I didn't burn or melt anything in the process... and I die cut these out with the coordinating dies .

But the peonies looked a bit lost by themselves, so I stamped the image again using Pink Pearl ink by Altenew on "Foamiran" if you've never worked with Foamiran its a bit like fun foam sheets, but a lot thinner, and I mean like 0.3mm thin... when you heat it with either and iron or a heat gun it decreases in size.. (I can see another tutorial on this at a later date...) and die cut these out and played with the heat gun and made them curl up. added some gems in the middle of the flowers.

Next I die cut a few of garden green dies by Tim Holtz on to some copper paper and played with the arrangement.

I stamped the sentiment using Pink Pearl ink by Altenew  die cut it out added a few sequins and the result is this...

Hope you liked this card!

Hugs

Alli

XoX

Edited, I received an honourable mention from this challenge YAY

Happy Friday!

Helloooo and happy Friday to you all!

So I've been playing with my new favourite set "Wallpaper Art" again... I just love this set so much, the flowers are so lovely and easy to colour...

This is the card I made

So for this one, I started out by stencilling the background in distress oxide inks, (antique linen, tattered rose and abandoned coral) with the Elegant Swirls stencil from Altenew.

Top tip, if you are stencilling and you don't want it to move secure it with some blue painters tape, but put the tape on the back of the card stock so the stencil sticks, I learnt the hard way and my beautiful background ripped off as I removed the tape...

I stamped out the flowers and leaf with hybrid ink on water colour paper using my stamp platform. Today I used my set of Gansai Tambi water colours in shades, 31 - Scarlet Red and 33 - Orange for the flowers and shades 50 - Aqua and 57 -Turquoise Green for the leaf.

After it dried I popped it up on foam tape added sisal and sequins, nuvo drops in ebony black for the middle of the flower. 

The sentiment is from the the versatile vases set, I've stamped it with versamark ink and embossed it with Hero arts -white detail embossing powder using my Wagner heat gun.  If you're having trouble finding this heat gun in Australia, I bought mine from Bev Cross Crafts.

I've also added some nuvo glitter gloss to the leaves to add a tiny bit of sparkle, because you've got to have a bit of sparkle right!

Hope you like my creation!

And I'm going to enter this one into the following challenges:-

Double "D"Challenges - Watercolors

Inkspirational Challenge 184 - Pop it up

Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge - NO DESIGNER PAPER

Hugs

Alli

XoX

Happy mail...

I received some happy mail in the post this week and couldn't wait to play...
I had to wait until the very popular Altenew sets were back in stock... I ordered Wallpaper art and Versatile Vases.

This is the card I made...

I stencilled a background using Distress Oxide inks, Cracked Pistachio and Tumbled Glass.

I stamped one of the leaf images and one of the flower images from the set.

I inked the leaves from the wallpaper art set in Altenews Frayed leaf ink and added some detail with Polychromos pencils numbers 168 &171.

I coloured the flower using Copics, colours RV32, RV34 7 RV55 and the middle of the flower G12, I also added some fine lines with a multi liner and popped some ebony nuvo drops in the middle of the flower.

I stamped the sentiment from the Versatile vases set on to some mint green cardstock I had in my stash with Altenews Permanent Black crisp dye ink.

I felt I needed some white leaves, so I pulled out a couple of dies from a Tim Holtz set and added those in.

Added some sisal and some sequins from my stash. 

A lot of people have asked me about sisal, its what florists use, and should be available in most florist shops, I got mine on-line from Koch.

I've decided to enter this card into the Color Throwdown challenge #538 as it matches the colours for this challenge!

Why not pop on over take a look and enter too!

Thanks for stopping by!

Hugs

Alli

XoX

Water colouring...

Water colouring is a new.... no old hobby revisited... lets put it that way...

If you've read the about me, you'll know that I've had a set since I was 10 years old...
Here's a photo of it... complete with the price tag...if only paints were that cheap now!

I occasionally use it, along with all the other paints I've bought over the years...
to name a few:-

• Zig water colour brush markers
• Prima watercolour confections
• Gansai Tambi
• Kuretake Starry and Pearl
• Daniel Smith Dot card

Although I didn't buy the dot card, it was free with purchase from Jackson's in the UK..if you haven't checked them out yet, I would recommend you do, postage is cheaper than you think and bonus is we don't pay the VAT on products!

Any way so the card I'm sharing with you today is all water coloured, with the Daniel Smith dot card, I wanted to test them out and this was the first project!  I'm also entering this card in to four challenges today:-

Double "D"Challenges - Watercolors

Uniko Challenge #52 - Spring, Optional Twist Easter

Inkspirational Challenge 184 - Pop it up

Simon Says Stamp - Wednesday Challenge - NO DESIGNER PAPER

(Please click on the links and go check these challenges out and why not enter them too...)

So this is my card...

The set is  called Beautiful day by Altenew.   

I've started by water colouring the flowers and yes those fine lines are all water coloured... next was the leaves, the background is just a a whole heap of pure hot mess... I must admit I do love the randomness of water colouring backgrounds like this..

And I just popped it up on foam tape that I got from Bunnings, its similar to the 3M brand but a lot cheaper!

A few splatters of paint and sequins,  and a heat embossed sentiment, and that is all there was too it!

I would love to know if I've inspired you to give water colouring ago, and if so tag me in so I can see what you've created!

Thanks for stopping by!

Hugs

Alli

XoX

EDITED, 

I was awarded a Top 3 placement over on the Double "D"Challenges - Watercolors Challenge YAY

I got a top pick at Inkspirational Challenge 184 also

Another Three Challenges...

So I've decided to enter into another three challenges today

Southern Girls Challenge - Frame it
Colour Crazy Challenge - Anything Goes
Addictive to stamps and more Anything Goes 

This is my entry

Its a digital image, I've had a while and I absolutely love it, It's by Saturated Canary - Butterfly Baby, I think its still available but in rubber.

I coloured this with my Copic markers and added some flowers from Prima and Wild Orchid Crafts.

I'll link the challenges below so you can find them and enter too!

Thanks for stopping by

Hugs
Alli
Xox

Altenew Challenge

Good Morning from Melbourne.... So today I thought I would enter into my first Altenew Challenge...

This is my entry

I started by looking at the colours you had to use and I decided that I would use the Altenew - Leaf burst stencil for a soft background, I didn't want the stencil leaves to line up so I moved it each time I used a new colour.

I decided that I would pull out an older stamp set, that I hadn't used before (yes I know gasp horror had it a while and never used it) it's called "Hope" I inked this up using "Rose Petal and Sea Shore" inks, I thought these inks would tie in with the soft colour palette of the challenge.

The sentiment is from the "Penned Rose"stamp set, because who doesn't like being told their amazing ...right...

Thanks for popping in to see me, Hugs Alli XoX

The Mirror Image Technique....

Hi, thanks for popping in to see me, today I wanted to chat about the "Mirror Image Technique"...

Yes it's been around for a while but not many people use it, it brings a whole new use to those stamps..

This is the card I created using this technique..

I'm also entering this card into the Rainbow Challenge - Perfectly Pink, Click on the link to take a look and enter too!

Now on to the tutorial.

You will need something called a Mirror Image stamp, a few companies sells these, I bought mine from MFT (My Favourite Things). It looks like a solid piece of Photopolymer ..and don't forget to prep it like you would normally for a solid stamp using an eraser. (this helps the ink to stick to the stamp)

Now it all starts out the same, you decide what paper and what medium you are going to use... I decided on watercolours and yes its slightly harder to stamp onto water colour paper but it's not impossible...

I do find a Stamp positioner tool"very handy for this... you stamp your first image on the paper as you normally would,

Then place the mirror image stamp on top of the paper.

Stamp again until you have a a good image on your stamp, you may need to repeat this a couple of times so you get a good clear image.

I like to pick the image stamp up, and place it on top of the paper where you want the image to be mirrored, close the lid and press, this should then stamp the mirror image on the paper.

That's all there is to it!

Hope you try this technique, post it to social media and tag me in so I can see your wonderful creations!
Hugs
Alli
XoX

Its a first

Well its a day of firsts.... my first blog post, my first Instagram upload and my first card workshop in Melbourne CBD with Altenew!!

Why did it take me this long to get around to having a blog ? I have no Idea but I'm here now! haha

I had an amazing fun packed crafting day at the workshop, I met some wonderful people, and it was great to put names to faces.

We got lots of goodies from the workshop too, and I'll try and post a card this week made from the April release from Altenew!

Thanks for stopping by and supporting my blog!

Hugs
Alli
XoX