Crafting for Ickle Pickle

Been crafting for ickle pickle!

It's cheating really, because I used a K & Co kit. But Ickle Pickle doesn't mind!

Bitten By The Bug!

After the card making class I can't stop thinking about crafty stuff! So to break myself back in slowly I bought a couple of kits (wwwarrrrghhhh! kiiiiiits!) to get me going again. This one will be for my OH birthday - he's a fishing freak!

Kanban Card Making Kit - Fishing Shed

This one will be for general friendship cards and a wedding card for a close friend.

Basic Grey Blush Card Kit

With ickle pickle around it's hard to get time to craft so I'm off to Mums on Friday - she'll watch ickle pickle for me whilst I get crafting. I cannot wait!

Crafty Chick Is Back!!!

After a looooooong time off (had a baby, moved house etc. etc.) my FDF suggested we go to a card making class at http://www.sirstampalot.co.uk/ so off we went! Here are the 3 cards we made during the 2 hour class:

Woodware Clear Magic Stamps - Birdsong

Woodware Clear Magic Stamps - Elegant Cameos

We used gilding flakes on the back of stamped images to create the main elements of each card. Then we did simple matting and layering along with punched out flowers, brads and ribbon to finish of these scalloped cards. What a great couple of hours!!!

Bootiful Backgrounds! Eye Candy!

With one background done for the Beautiful Background swap on UKATC (see webbing spray post!) and the option of doing another, well, how could I resist the urge to get arty farty, messy, gluey, painty... again!

Playing with Gouache Paints

My base card was cream (not that you would know that looking at it now!) I brushed stripes of yellow gouache paint in a random fashion, then dry brushed over the stripes in the opposite direction to pull the paint out. Repeated this with green paint too, leaving space for my third colour - purple! This I blobbed on and then used a round noodle brush (thanks FDF!) to take the colour across the entire background. Then I doodled over with pearly stuff, but didn't like the effect. So I took me trusty expired credit card and smooshed the liquidy-pearly stuff over the entire page.

Thought - aha! Still wet, sprinkle in embossing powders and see what happens! So I chose a couple of different colours of B-Muse embossing powders and sprinkled them over random parts of the card. Turned on my heat gun, and not only did the emobssing powders melt into the pearly stuff, but where there were no embossing powders, it bubbled up slightly - ooooh!

Close Up!

Anyway, both this background page and my webbing spray background sheet have been chopped into 9 pieces, 8 of which went to UKATC for the swap, 1 of which was mine to keep. This was an anything goes swap, so just look at what eye candy I got in return!!!

WOW!!!

Flower Power Canvas!

And Now For Something A Little Bit Different...

Webbing Spray!

Been playing with my webbing spray! Black lightweight cardstock, a spritz of webbing spray, and shoot gold embossing powder over, tip off excess and heat. Repeated this with raspberry dazzle embossing powder, then spritzed entire sheet lightly with a mica pigment based spray. Voila!

First Time Webbing Spray

Could be a potential background for a swap running on UKATC...

Prezzies Galore from FDF and Melt Pot Experiments!

I couldn't see my Freaky Deaky Friendie until today (mwah!) but we had a Melt Pot Party! Yeah! First though, wow, I got prezzies galore (I told her off for getting so much but she never listens - talk to the hand lol!)

Lookie at the piccie! A Mimi mini mini mini tote (sooooooooo cute), which was just the bestest surprise ever! I also got some rubber stamps that I have been dying to own! Hero Arts Create collage stamp, 2 Crafty Individuals Stamps (little girl in Paris and an Oriental lady - yes I am bonding with Oriental and my FDF is being very supportive of this lol!).

Also in my pile of prezzies there are packets of jute and co-ordinating paper covered wire, metal embellishments, metal distressed word charms, glitzy heart beads, Queen&Co. mini brads (funky-wunky ones) and my fave kind of eyelets, adonised ones! As if that wasn't enough (naughty FDF spending so much money) I also got a pack of Diddl pens which are the best Diddl pens you can get 'cos they write in different colours.

It took a fair while to open all those gifties!

My FDF bought her melt pot along for our melt pot party, and we played! FDF melted was in hers, I farted round with UTEE etc. This shows my melt pot which has clear UTEE, a sprinkle of the flex, the green and yellow UTEE Brightz and a sprinkling of white UTEE... lusherly colours, all marbling and melting into each other, with a little help from the spatula that came in my toolz set (don't rate the tweezers/spoon tool do we FDF?!)

Melting Moments...

Here's a piccie of all the bits and bobs we created between us. We tried dipping and then stamping into corrugated cardboard, which had some fab effects! We also used some molds that I had - a face, butterflies, and a flower button - we were dead chuffered at how these came out - the finished effect of poured UTEE that has set is soooooooooo smooth... like a boiled sweetie!

All Our Bits and Bobs!

We also tried dipping punched circles from an egg carton and stamping into them and that effect was molto magic. Because the stamp we used was quite intricate, the pieces look like a real sea sponge texture. Top notch! One piece we left plain 'cos it looked too pretty to stamp into!

Dipped Egg Carton Circles

A most successful Melt Pot Party! Watch this space for more from me and my Melt Pot lol! I need to give him a name... suggestions on a postcard lol! Melvin? Michael? Mickey?

Ooh, and I got another New Home ATC (from Kathleen, my crafts blog - check it out, it's on my blog list)

New Home ATC

Melt Pot In Da House (and the big 30)

Could you get a bigger 30 on a birthday card?!

Thank you sis for reminding me just how old I am now! (That said, I am still 29 if anyone asks me. Besides, I have been asked for ID *twice* in 3 weeks to buy cigarettes!!!)

It was one of the strangest birthdays I have ever had, being in new surroundings, not waking up to the aged parents singing "Happy Birthday To You" (they text me it instead lol!)

I felt "reet spoilt" with all my prezzies and cards! Mumsy bought me some flowers too!

The Window Sill of Birthday Cards (and flowers!)

Got some stonkingly stunning gifties! Some crafty people have craftily looked at my wish list here on my blog and fulfilled two of my wishes! I got the Tim Holtz DVD (his first one) *and* some Chapel Road Art Stamps...

Craft wise, I also got my much hankered after Melt Pot, UTEE, To Dye For Inks and other accessories to go with it. But most stonkingly of all, I got a cake stand! (OK, you may be thinking what on earth does she want with a cake stand and how does that fit in with being crafty - let me explain...)

A Baa-Me Chick bought one to use as decorative storage for her crafty bits and bobs, and my Freaky Deaky Friendie followed the trend. I have fancied one myself for ages, but no room for it in my previous craft space. Who bought it for me? Mumsy of course! I am using it to store all my Melt Pot stuff, and I think cake stands rock! (as long as they don't have cake in them lol!) Other crafty bits I got included an additional bead storage box that I had been dying for :)

My Prezzies (and Birthday ATCs in the background!)

Other prezzies I got included money (some of which will go on crafty stuff no doubt!), Diddl writing pad, Diddl letterset, Lush Gift set "Happy", Lush Happy Hippy shower gel, Heavenly Bodies buttercream, Care Bear top, a superbly special mouse mat, grow your own Birthday Gerbara, Mamma Mia soundtrack, lovely smellie candles and a lusherly turquoise/brown/pewter coin purse...

Mumsy pulled out all the stops with her handmade card! Laura Ashley papers/epoxy stickers and pretty prima flowers and a peridot (my birthstone) brad.

Super Duper Card from Mumsy (and Freaky Deaky Dad)

I also got some fab RAKs off crafty peeps, both cards and ATCs, check 'em out! You can't really see them properly in the piccie of my gifties, so here they are in full view! These are all made by members of the various Yahoo groups I belong to...

Hugs and the Beginnings of Delight

My folks just got back from a few days away in Dorset, and bought me back a present! A hugging salt and pepper pot - how cool?! Perfect for my new flat (and so much more attractive than my old ones - don't ask!)

Salt and Pepper Pots - Hugs

Have also finally decided on my theme for Diane's Delight, an ATC booky wooky round robin running on Goody Bag Girls. My theme is...

*drum roll* ...

"Quotes or Characters from Shakespeare"

I have this lovely scrapperdashery paper that I have been hoarding for almost a year... I have finally come to terms with the fact that it must be cut up and used for a project. I have used Twelfth Night, The Merchant of Venice and Othello. As my book travels round each of the Goody Bag Girlies, they will make an ATC to go in one of the pockets. But I am getting ahead of myself because all I have to show right now is the front cover (not finished!) but it will eventually be an accordian style book with pockets on each page.

Front of Shakespeare ATC Book (needs finishing!)

I have covered a frame in one of the papers, and inset an ATC I created which has a quote from Shakespeare around the edge (look closely!)

"To me, fair friend, you never can be old,
For as you were when first your eye I eyed,

Such seems your beauty still. "

What's Black and White and...

Q: What is black and white, white and black, black and white?
A: A zebra caught in a revolving door!!!

OK, apologies for the really poor attempt at humour there, but it was the only black and white joke I could think of right now!

Swiftly moving on, Black and White is a theme for ATC Addicts R Us this month, so I took the bull by the horns and got creating! I already had some stamped acetate images ready with this swap in mind (Crafty Individuals and some other company I cannot remember right now!)

First ATC, Flower Girl, I cut along the shaped side of the image and attached a strip of lace paper (see the texture peeking out the right hand side?) I then used diamond glaze to glue the image onto a piece of DCWV backing paper (black and white stack - sunflowers) hoping that the petals of the sunflowers look like layers of her dress... does that work?

Kind of... anyways, I inked the edges and matted and layered onto white and then black card. To embellish, I used versamark and black and white embossing powders to colorise 2 die cut flowers, and layered them up on the bottom right hand corner, attaching a pearl flower in the centre and a mini micro brad. I added a teeny weeny pearl flower to the image in her hair, and a teeny weeny fabric flower to her dress - onto this one I popped a black gem, and then to finish I attached a few more gems in the centre of the flowers on the stamped image.

Flower Girl

This next ATC, Girls Night Out, was such fun to make! I placed the image over some handmade paper and some lace - I think it looks really cool, like the lace is the top of the girls' dresses! All this needed was matting and layering and a few finishing touches. I added wire and beads down the left hand side, and a tiny star button up the top. Melikes! (I don't say that often!!!)

Girls' Night Out

Actually, melikes this next ATC too (what happened to self doubt?! Maybe it decreases the nearer you get to 30?!) I love this Pierrot image, it seemed to fit perfectly within the black and white theme. I layered it onto handmade paper, then onto black card, adding 3 brads over buttons on the image to help hold the acetate in place. I attached the word "Pierrot" using diamond glaze, and embellished with a pinwheel sequin, pearl flower and mini micro brad. The harlequin style lace down the left hand side adds a bit of texture and interest!

Pierrot