Fairy card

Oh, how could I forget to include this one in my previous post. I love the way those bleach splatters seem to glow. Fireflies maybe?
 

FAIRY CARD.

I received my order from Lavinia stamps yesterday so what else could I do but play with them...it would be rude not to.  

I started this one by drawing a circle for the moon on pink card stock.  Then I painted inside the circle with neat bleach, It took two coats of bleach to  get the moon really white.  I am a little impatient so I used the heat gun to  dry the first two  coats... that was not a good move, the heat turned the bleach yellow, fortunately  a third coat brought the whiteness back. The next step was to see what would happen when I stamped over the bleach. Would the bleach affect the ink. 

Much to my surprise there was no change at all. Which was great as it meant this card didn't end up in the bin. The sentiment is from a stampin up set that I can't recall the name of, it's the one with the  unicorns.

 I finished this card with a fine 2 way glue pen..... Well sort of....I am having an  "I hate fine glue pens day."  These fine pens are great for adding small amounts of glitter,... when they work that is. Unfortunately they only seem to work once, when you first get it.  And to prove it...I have a large collection of these pens that have been used once and then died.  So I ended up taking one apart this evening and used the glue by dipping the nib of yet another useless glue pen in the pool of glue that dripped from the pen I took apart.

Bookmarks

I am sorry I have been a bit quiet of late. This is due to the fact I have been working much longer hours and haven't had much time for crafting.
Which means I have had nothing to post.
But as the academic year is drawing to an end, I have had to find some crafting time to make my end of year gifts for the children. 

These bookmarks are my first "make" in quite a while. They will make up part of my gift to two lovely boys I escort to and from school each day. 
 I created these by stamping a moon and masked it off before  sponging the background using Stampin 'Up inks .
Then  I stamped the detail over the top using Versafine Tuxedo black ink an Lavinia stamps.
Highlights were added with a white gel pen.

I printed off the boys names and adhered them to the back of each bookmark and then laminated the bookmarks for extra durability.

Fairy Card in lilac and turquoise.

Another Fairy card.  This is one I made at  Easter  but forgot to post it.  I  actually made two of these but the other one was given to a friend for  her birthday.

 At 8x8 inches  this is a large card. I sponged the sky and background scene using stampin' up inks. then stamped the foliage and fairy over the top using Versafine black ink. A white gel pen was used to add the night stars.

The stamps I used are a mix of companies, Pocket silhouettes by Stampin up!

The fairy and wild flower stamp are by Lavinia stamps  and the tiny  pine trees are by Inkilicous.

A brag post... My work in print.

A couple of months ago  I received an email from a lady asking for my permission to use some  photos from my blog for an article she was writing for a  French crafting magazine.

Initially I thought this was a wind up as three pieces she had chosen were my  first experimental pieces with distress oxide inks and Lavinia stamps.

After some consideration and a discussion with my deputy head who speaks and reads French, I gave her permission to use the photos.
The magazine is not available in the UK
so I never really expected to see a copy.

My deputy head said " my daughter lives in France. I will ask her to track down a copy and I'll bring it back when I visit her at Easter. "

Cutting a slightly  longer story short...
Her Easter  holiday plans changed. So I gave up on ever seeing my work in print.

Then  last week Michelle came over to England, on a surprise visit  bringing  with her this copy of the magazine for me.

I flicked through the mag  quickly and didn't see my images so  I thought the lady had changed her mind.

It wasn't until later that I looked through it properly and found Elise had actually used four of my images.

Regular readers will probably recognize the  photo's as it wasn't very long ago I posted them.

I don't read or speak french so I have no idea what Elise had written.   I ve had a chest infection this past week and haven't had the energy  or concentration to type the text into google translate to find out.


So I am hoping  she hasn't written anything too negative.. lol

I guess this post could be considered a brag post to some.  But this is a first for me so I just had to share. As nothing like this has ever happened before and it probably never will happen again... lol
Thank you Elise  for asking to use my work for your article. I got quite a kick out seeing my work in print and thank you to Jan and Michelle for making it possible for me to see and own a copy of the magazine.

I've bought a new fairy .

My new fairy has arrived... Yay!  Playtime.  I really enjoyed creating  the background for this fairy. 

Playing with Distress Oxides again.

 This week I have been experimenting with distress oxide  inks  on various types of card stock.  The  background on these cards were created by squishing the ink pads onto a baking sheet and  spritzing the ink with water and  laying the card onto the wet ink. 

I found technique this can be a bit  hit and miss, too much water on the baking sheet and the inks  seem too mix under the card giving a rather muddy look to the colours rather than the clean bright colours of the pads. 

Too little water and the ink doesn't spread enough to give even coverage so  you're left with lots of dry white patches. Which really isn't a good look.
  

After much experimentation  I found the best way to combat the muddiness  and to avoid  the dry patches is to spritz the ink on the baking sheet and then lightly spritz the card stock before laying it into the ink.
In my opinion this technique works best on glossy card stock.  BUT pigment inks like Versafine are not suitable for glossy card stock.


I love  Versafine ink for stamping  silhouettes as it's a real dense black ink,  but Versafine ink rubs off glossy card even after it has dried.
I had a choice here, .. do I splash out on more black ink pads or try to find a card that will react well with water and Versafine ink.
I decided to find a more suitable card stock.  
 The best results I got were on Multifarious card stock ... sold by Lavinia Stamps. This stuff retails at £5.80  for 10 sheets.  Which is pretty expensive card for practicing on.     
I tried  various  types of card and most didn't react well. 
My second choice of paper for this technique is be  watercolour paper....  Nothing fancy or expensive.  I used a block  of watercolour paper from The Works  which cost £4.00 for 20 sheets. The sheet are not as big as A4 sheet but it does work out a little cheaper.
Most watercolour papers that I have worked with have a course side and a slightly smoother,  flatter side.  It's best to work on the flatter side as it's easier to stamp on. However,  I found I needed  to stamp the larger silhouette images several times  fill in the misses caused by the slight texture on the paper. So it is  really important to have stamp positioning tool to enable over stamping.

Most of  the stamps used in the making of these cards are from Lavinia Stamps.

Messing with distress oxides

I've been watching videos and hearing people rave about the distress oxide pads for a while now. So When I saw them at the make it show I decided to give them a go.

After some time playing with them I'm not really sure what to think of them.

While  I was quite pleased with the background result on this card stock, I have to say most  of my efforts went in the bin. 

 I am not sure if the poor results I've been getting is down to  the inks , the paper or me.

The best results seem to be on glossy card stock, but then my Versafine black ink  doesn't want to stay on the glossy card. 

So I tried  water colour paper... I quite like this one, but I don't want to be working on water colour paper.  The colours are not as vibrant as they appear in the photograph.

The colours are more muted on this glossy paper. (This glossy paper is  the back 0f a piece of packaging that came in a pack of card stock.) 

I've not quite finished playing with this one,  but I decided to share it Because I  love the sentiment here,  it's so fitting for me and most crafters who use glitter.  Although I am not sure that is the way it is meant to be interpreted. LOL.

I will keep trying different card stocks until one that reacts perfectly with the ink and technique I am using.