Time - SCD

The theme of "Time" is the challenge over at SCD and we are making an ATC for the last week of the month......then we post 'em in to Carol and wait for the swaps back :)

Time is a constant source of inspiration as it can mean so many things in so many ways don't you think? For the time challenge I decided to go down this road.........I often wish you could take 50% off LOL!!

I inked up the background using the swooshing T!m way using DI's Frayed Jeans, Scattered Straw and the divine new colour Rusty Hinge......stamped the Paperarsty crown and masked it then stamped the skull...used a quickie glue pen to stick the gilding flakes on the crown and added Adirondack wild plum dimensional acrylic dots........stamped the Stamp Attack label onto a previously made background and wrote/stamped the wording.....the ruler idea I've done before but Hel's fab tag the other day reminded me how good it can look......applied glossy accents to the stamped letters and cut out....the bracket and exclamation mark are both stamped in Rusty Hinge although in the photo they look completely different!

Thanks for looking and happy stamping......looking forward to seeing what delights return in the swap :)

xoxo Sioux

Men and a No. 9 Bus!

You know how it is?......you wait hours for a number 9 bus and then 5 turn up at once!!!

I'm talking about challenges not men btw!!HOL.....all of a sudden inspiration to create is bombarding me from all directions LOL my only gripe is that I just don't have enough hours in the day to give 'em all a fair attempt!!...I should make a note of the prompts I suppose but I'm just not that organised!!

So over at Hels Sunday Stamper this week the theme is "Men"........as luck would have it I found I could use my new stamp from Joan Gevaert again...paired up with the Paperartsy man I got with the CS subscription last year.

I masked off two negative oval shapes with paper and stamped each with an image and stippled with Scattered Straw.......then masked the image with the positive oval and inked with DI's Dusty Concord and Frayed Burlap.......added the wording in Spiced Marmalade and the pens (Artifacts) in Impress Chocolate........Oooh!...and what do you know the crackly grungy bit on the background is some of that packaging inked up from this post............Fab & Free!!! Who could ask for more?

BTW.....I passed on the Di's on offer at QVC....the colour combo did not include my preferred choice in either option, so have decided to just go for a couple of re-inkers elsewhere......however.....I did buy the mini mister set with stand as I have yet to find it cheaper elsewhere in effect even with the P&P you get a set of 3 misters for free!!!

Thanks for looking and happy stamping!

xoxo Sioux

ATC - "Cookies"

The Artist Trading Club theme this month is Cookies!

Mmmm......yes....I did not know what it was either.....not sure if I do now HOL!

Anyways it definitely includes doodling and I think an image...anyways that's what I ended up doing!!! :).....you know by now that I'm not one for making 5 different ATC's but there was no way I could see me doing 5 the same that involved doodling so went with the idea of 5 different ones from the word go......using an old favourite song to start me off..."Up on the roof".....there is not much to say about the making I just found 5 images that suited and doodled around them in a Pilot pen and coloured with Copics.

These are the four I'm sending in for swapping.

This is the one I'm keeping.

...I usually keep number one of my ATC's purely because it's the one I trial on for the rest, but because these are all different anyway it's because I don't think it's as nice as the rest....so if I'm not happy with it I'm not about to lumber someone else with it!!! LOL

You've still got time to join in.......closing date end of month.

Thanks for looking and happy doodling!!!

xoxo Sioux

P.S. Call me sad but I'm taking a holiday day off work tomorrow...it's Craft Day on QVC and there looks like a mega bunch of talented people turning up......I will take what I can from the shows although I realise the main aim is to sell products.....perhaps some gems of crafting wisdom will come my way....there is no other chance of seeing the like in my neck of the woods!.....I don't intend to buy anything.....yes I know!......but I mean it....that is unless the new DI colours are a bargain waiting to be had ;) LOL

Searching

Something Completely Different or SCD for short have the theme "Keys" for the week 39 challenge.

Don't forget it is a month of making ATC's and swapping at the end of it! Fun.

I stamped the umbrella man in Versafine onto the base white card then masked him and gold embossed the key (CS freebie)......stippled Spiced Marmalade and Faded Jeans....stamped the tickets in WS and the compass (Tanda) in Tea Dye..........added the rainy dots in FJ too and the T!m wording in Impress Chocolate........."searching" is in Fired Brick which I then outlined in black.......stamped the grass (Tanda) in Pine Needles

.......ooh! BTW don't go looking for a grass stamp like that at Tanda you won't see one....It was actually a bit attached to another stamp I bought and I have to say I think it's the bees knees....I've used it a couple of times already to add a bit of distress edging to ATC's....yes, I know........little things etc. etc. LOL!

...Whilst we are on the subject of free stamps I made a fabby discovery yesterday.....what do you think of the image I got from inking up the piece of foam packaging? The word scrummy comes to mind!!! LOL.

Thanks for looking and happy stamping.

xoxo Sioux

Time will tell!

Yep! Time will definately tell on this! Not sure if I like how much time this takes up or not yet LOL.

I decided to have a go at a bit of art journalling for the challenge this week at Tuesday Taggers "Time"...this is a 4"x4" size....well actually it is 4x4 and 5/16ths...I wanted to allow space down the side for the holes needed to put it in book format later and then forgot and left more space at the other side...........don't ask!!!

I inked the card lightly with DI Antique Linen then stamped the girl (Stamp Attack) in archival...masked the girl and clear embossed the skeleton (Stampers Anonymous) over the top.....stippled Scattered Straw, Tea Dye and Spiced Marmalade on the background...although you can hardly tell there is any Spiced Maramlade there now!!!......stamped the script stamp (SA again) in Walnut Stain and the pens (Artifacts) in Impress Chocolate....doodled with a Pilot drawing pen and coloured with copics....coloured the girl with distress inks.

Thanks for looking and happy stamping!

xoxo Sioux.

Days of Wine and Roses

Well...at long last I manage a Gingersnap Challenge! It just seems that every week I look and think yes I'll do that one.......then it passes me by and before I know it the whole month has passed by!!! How can that happen LOL? Here is my tag for the Chestnut Challenge with the theme of Romance. My inspiration was one of my favourite movies "Days of Wine and Roses" which sounds like a very romantic movie and in some ways it is in a bitter sweet sort of way......it does become quite dark and haunting....haven't seen it for years....does not seem to crop up much on the television repeats....anyways my tag is not meant to be dark and haunting!!! LOL..and if you are going to have days of wine & roses you may as well spend them in Paris.....not that I've ever been but I imagine that's where you ought to be!!!

The Paperartsy Eiffel Tower was stamped in Archival and the post card and Bordeaux (Royal & Langnickel) in red Stazon then DI's Fired Brick, Frayed Burlap and Tea Dye used for the the background.....roses made from stamped paper coloured with DI's as per T!m's instructions on the 12 tags of Christmas posts....a couple of scrolls at the top in shabby shutters and an All My Memories metal heart to finish.

Thanks for looking and happy stamping :)

xoxo Sioux

P.S. I have to confess I started thinking about this tag for Hels Sunday Stamper The Rose last week but was sidetracked and missed it yet again.......sorry Hels!!! Ooh! I also love the song btw.

Stacks of Ink!

Whoops! it seems I've taken over the dining table again! For WOYWW the ATC's on the craft sheet are for the Artist Trading Club this month....still unsure about these...but am carrying on regardless and colouring them in..........and the stacks of ink?

Well whilst waiting for some elements to dry for a different ATC I was making I decided to do something I've been meaning to do for ages.....you know how it is!!

Stamped the wording with the small Studio G letter stamps......they are just peeking out from behind the ink stack in the first picture.....Oh! How I wish I could find some more of those at 99p!!! I've got three more colours of ink (Fired Brick, Anitque Linen and Dusty Concord) but they are in re-inker form.....I decided that I could probably save money that way.

.........I wonder if T!m's new colours will be the TSV on QVC on Craft day next Tuesday?....and more to the point will they really be any cheaper than anywhere else seeing as they have "such a large buying power" they always are banging on about!!........I do sometimes wonder at the P&P charges they come up with C&C are no different I noticed the other day on there that some Cut & Dry Foam was selling for £4.95 and the postage was exactly the same....outrageous!

xoxo Sioux

Special Love

Hels Sunday Stamper this week is Love thanks for the challenge!

I'm never satisfied........here I am waiting ages to own some Crafty Individuals collage style stamps....I'm then lucky to win some and what do I do? Start to dissect them (not literally!!) to create something different!! LOL....I wanted to practise masking off the actual rubber image with sellotape to isolate the bit I wanted...you can see what I mean here.

I then whisked off the sellotape and stamped the birdies onto an ATC that I had inked with Fired Brick, Tea Dye and Frayed Burlap.

I then did the same with the moon in the corner (from CI Whitby Abbey)...only looking at it now.....is it just me?........or do you think it looks like vultures are waiting to strike the cute birdies?........call me weird......yes you can if you like...LOL......but I quite like the effect!!! HOL

Thanks for looking and happy stamping.

xoxo Sioux

Broken Wings - SCD

The theme at SCD this week is "Wings" ...another fab idea....still keeping to the monthly ATC format.

I swooshed DI's Antique Linen, Scattered Straw and a touch of Dusty Concord onto the base card then stamped the lady (Stamp Attack) in Tattered Rose with a touch of Tea Dye on the hat

.......masked her off and stamped the wording "secrets" in Dusty Concord with a little x in Spiced Marmalade......stuck a piece of book paper to some card stamping the butterfly in Archival tattered the edges and inked with Tea Dye then added Distress Crackle Rock Candy....used a bit of wire for the antennae and attached with silicone glue.....stamped the word fragments on a bit of left over background from my Eternity ATC and added Anita's 3D gloss.

Don't forget we can swap our ATC's this month......Carol is kindly organising that.

Thanks for looking and happy stamping.

xoxo Sioux

P.S. Nearly forgot.....there are some digital image sheets for a lucky winner this week........June from Dezinaworld is kindly offering them.

Love is all around - TT

That's the theme over at Tuesday Taggers this week.....the birds are singing beautifully in our back garden at the moment.....spring is starting to spring all around.....here is my Twinchie.

I've left this fairly neutral so that I can use it on a card to say thanks or as a birthday motif to a friend etc.

I stippled DI's Tea Dye and Fired Brick on the background and added a small damask motif (my own) in Tattered Rose the xoxo is stamped in Impress chocolate......tattered the edges and inked with DI Walnut Stain........the Crafty Individuals stamp was stamped in DI Walnut Stain onto a textured card.....I like how the texture gives it a shabby look......tattered the edges and inked with Fired Brick.

..................the Craft Emporium is sponsoring the challenge this week with a surprise paper pack from CHA...oooh! I wonder what that could be :)

Thanks for looking.

xoxo Sioux

TMTA - Eternity

Over on TMTA the theme is "Eternity" so they want to know what you think of when you hear the word.

......I love that word...........ETERNITY.........it makes be drift off and think of all that has happened in the universe before we arrived.....all the associated things we don't understand yet....I think about all that is yet to be discovered after we are gone....I journey through the darkness past our solar system and beyond the galaxies we can see from Earth...........further and further.....

....until I get a bit spooked and have to stop!!! LOL.............Well....they did ask!!!

I used the free stamp from CS this month.........now......it may not look like it represents Eternity but as soon as I saw it the words of a song by Joni Mitchell and famously sung by Crosby, Stills and Nash drifted into my head (showing my age there I think)

......(I won't say my brain because by now you probably think I've lost it!!! HOL)

"We are stardust...we are golden...we are billion year old carbon"....perhaps it was the circles which of course are never ending.......as is eternity........that did it :)

So here is my ATC........sorry about the babble but I felt like sharing!

I used am emboss pen to make circles and embossed with Moonglow Pumpkin.....they are a representation of the stars in the constellation Orion......swooshed DI's Faded Jeans and Pine Needles a la T!m for the background and hand wrote the star names adding the number of light years away......the girl was a mistake that turned out in the end!!!

....I distress embossed with antique linen but it was not showing up so I over stamped with Versafine...the circles now almost look 3D...the compass image was another mistake that turned out!!....I wanted a grey almost ghostly effect but it was that ghostly you could not see it so threw a bit of verdigris embossing powder on and hoped for the best!!! LOL

Thanks for looking and happy stamping

xoxo Sioux

Teddy Bear

This is only just in time I fear for Tuesday Taggers this week...heck it's Tuesday again tomorrow!!!

I have made a start on a card that this tag will eventually be going on but it is not coming together at the moment so here is my tag.

This is a Popcorn bear image from Crafters Companion......the full image is rather large so I decided to stamp him onto a smaller area of card to cut him down to size so to speak! LOL

.....image water coloured with DI's Walnut Stain....Antique Linen.....Shabby Shutters.....Pine Needles.....Scattered Straw.....Fired Brick and Spiced Marmalade.

.....I know strictly speaking he is not a tag yet but I'm not really sure if I want a hole at all

......or if I want rounded corners or what just yet!!!

Thanks for looking and happy stamping.

Oooops! Nearly forgot......there is a prize this week from The Craft Barn for the lucky winner.

xoxo Sioux

Celebrate ATC for Joan Gevaert

I made this ATC as a small thank you to Joan Gevaert who donated the twinchie stamps that I won over at The Artist Trading Club recently....and I had a lovely comment from Hermine who is the stamp designer that I very much appreciated....It makes you feel all warm inside!

You know I mentioned before about having a really bad aversion to ripping up books? Well....I bought a paperback the other day (one that held no desire for me to read!!) that had a naturally aged patina to the pages and am using them now...phew and only 30p...bargain!!! LOL

...now that I have started stamping on pages there will be no stopping me...so I am entering this into the Lots To Do challenge this week which is backgrounds.

Glued a piece of book page to the card and let dry.......then put sellotape where the stamp was going to go and ripped it back off to take away some of the top layer just like T!m did on one of the 12 tags of Christmas posts.....stamped the twinchie stamp in Impress chocolate and a Paperartsy border stamp on three edges in archival......the Paperartsy word "Joy" was distress embossed in tattered rose over worn lipstick ink...cut out and edged with black marker...a mixture of tea dye and walnut stain used to age the edges.

.....do you see the brads in the corner?

...these are not just any old brads!

...these are genuine antique brads!

.....over 50 years old at least to my knowledge (and the rest I suspect)....as you can read on the label these are from the days when they used to be called paper fasteners!!...I only have a small supply in this old tin box that I inherited from my father so they are very precious.....they have a colour and quality you just don't get today and the paperclip (bit on the rusty side LOL) was from the same source......Gorgeous!!
Thanks for looking and happy stamping.
xoxo Sioux

P.S. Anyone know what the copper medallion was for? It reads Accrington Corporation with the number 288 and is plain on the back.

SCD - Mad March Hare

What a fab lot of creations from the DT this week for the start of a new month focusing on ATC's over at SCD with the theme this week being Mad March Hare set by Laura.....and what's that I see? Chriss from the Artist Trading Club is guest designer....go over and take a look.

I could not wait to get my thinking cap on and here is the result.

I googled the knave of hearts and found the old playing card image on Wikipedia printed it out and stuck it to the base card....did the same with the mask....I love Venetian masks don't you?...I also found in my searching that the original mad march hare in Alice in Wonderland was drawn with straw in his hair......it seems it was a Victorian depiction of madness!!

...I've gone mad myself and given the hare points of the compass for eyes!!!...I also embossed the mask although It does not show up well on the photo.....much better irl.

(Tanda Stamps for the compass and the postage stamp)

......the word fragments are part of a phrase from AinW when the hare is at the Mad Hatters tea party......at least I think it is when they are at the tea party!!! LOL

.........crackle painted the larger heart in fired brick and glittered the little heart.

I can't seem to get Alice in Wonderland out of my head at the moment.....have you seen the trailer on my sidebar? I am so looking forward to seeing that film.....looks like a grand grown up version.

Thanks for looking and don't forget.........we are all going to send our ATC's in at the end of the month and get swaps back.....fun...fun...FUN!

xoxo Sioux

P.S. I've at last got round to buying some ATC pockets for protection....got them fromTanda along with the two stamps I used above

...................and they popped two free stamps in with the order isn't that great?!

ATC for Chriss

I've had more than my fair share of luck just lately and Chriss at The Artist Trading Club asked if I would make her a special ATC just for her with one of the twinchie stamps I won

.....I was happy to oblige :)

I clear embossed the sentiment "Dream as if you'll live forever......" onto the base white card then stippled DI's Scattered Straw and Frayed Jeans all over and then blended the colours a bit with a dry baby wipe......stippling seems to give the colours a more muted look in my view.......stamped the twinchie stamp kindly donated by Joan Gevaert in archival and sponged a bit of FJ on the watch and FB on the postage stamp......stamped and embossed the Elusive Images word "ART" in pewter (love that...it looks like liquid metal :)).....the word "make" is Paperartsy coloured with copics...T!m scroll around the edges in WS and the bingo line in Tattered Rose...Artifacts pen stamped onto copper paper and cut out..edges tattered and inked with WS.

I am thrilled that Chriss liked it.....doing a happy dance ;)

Thanks for looking and happy stamping.

xoxo Sioux

ATC Sewing

Here is the ATC I made for the Sewing theme over at the Artist Trading Club.....I thought I had posted this ages ago but it seems not!!!

I photocopied an old sewing pattern and reduced it to an ATC friendly size and cut out the sewing diagrams.....now....I can't remember exactly what I did with the background but I know it involved gluing some scrunched up tissue paper onto the base and scattering some distress embossing powder over it for some texture then I stamped a watch face in archival.....alcohol inked two of the buttons in the corner and the sentiment was computer generated and stitched on top of a small sample I had of patchwork quilting material.....I have enough of those small pieces to last 3 life times I think at the rate I am using them HOL!!!

Here are the ones I received in the swap are they not fab?!

Thanks for looking

xoxo Sioux

A Fond Farewell!

No...not from me!

Rach has decided to take a blogging break.....shock horror!!

She seems to indicate it might be some time before she returns too.

Just to say that Rach inspired me to get in touch with my girly side...no mean feat as I am more of the grungey type LOL!....and her card confections are never anything but perfect.....I will miss popping along.

So have happiness in whatever you are doing instead of blogging Rach and thanks for the brilliant inspiration :).......

As sure as eggs is eggs.........if I were to be on a design team.........I think it would kill my creativity stone dead!!!.........I would end up feeling like I had to create instead of wanting to create....This is my way of relaxing not putting extra pressure on myself LOL!.....I don't know if that is how she feels but I understand if it is the case.

xoxo and hugs to Rach