SAD and HAPPY at the same time - FUN WITH ATCs CHALLENGE #100

I was quite sad to read that this challenge from Fun with ATCs is to be the last. I have only been taking part for the last 10 or so and really looked forward to them. 

Anyway, my mind started to think about their brief for this 100th challenge which oddly enough was the number 100. Instantly I thought of 100 ATCs and then realised that was a big ask. With another special project on the go with a deadline of next week I felt that was pushing my limits a bit. I then thought I would look back at the ATCs I had done and that was when it struck me.

Teeny tiny weeny ATCs! Even better, replicas of the ones I had made for the challenge!

Oh My Goodness was this a fun challenge! And I think it worked! 

I couldn't fit them all on so I started with #95. Check back on my blog to see the full size ATCs for these challenges, but here is a shot of them together with this 100th ATC which shows just how small the replicas are!

It was fun doing this ATC and doing the challenges! I will miss you 'Fun with ATCs'. 

Check out the other entries and the great inspirational ATCs from the DT.

As always it is great to read your comments.

Happy crafting! Kim xx

Fabulous NEW Stamps - Cheering me up a bit!

Been a bit off colour these last few days. Sitting looking at my craft desk and not much happening in the way of inspiration. Kept fiddling with things, trying to tidy up, having a tinker with Twinchies, but nothing 'HUGE' was happening in my head.

Then I remembered I had some new stamps arrive the other week from London. London ONTARIO that is. I had opened the packet, given them a quick trial stamp and them promptly lost my mojo!!!

With a big NEED to do something crafty running around in my head I cleared the decks, placed the stamps, black ink and white paper firmly in front of me and told myself I WAS going to make something!!

First I just stamped the images using black ink on white card. When I saw all these black on white images I felt the urge to do some 'colouring in'. Always good for the soul, who doesn't feel calmer, happier, and comforted when they do some colouring in? I used H₂Os - Wine & Roses and Ginger Peach for the leaves which led on to the creation of the background which was those 2 colours plus Sunflower and Hot Cinnamon. I used the droplets stamp to a little more interest to the background stamping in a red ink.

Having coloured all the leaves in I decided to cut them out and it was during this process that I decided to make a flower out of them. It has a sort of poinsettia look about it don't you think? I am still not sure if I should add something; a sentiment somewhere or a single leaf. I will just wait and see what happens. With my mojo being on some sort of sabbatical I think I might wait till it returns before making any hasty decisions.

If you like the stamp why not pop over to the web site Designs by Ryn and take a look at the other fantastic stamps there are. FYI HERE is the one I used for this card.

Hope to be back soon with more makes - mojo willing! 

Kim xx

TWINCHIES GALORE! Bling, Animals, Animals with bling - all rolled into one blog post!

So, call me lazy if you like but I wanted to get these beauties in a blog as soon as possible because very soon I shall be working my little fingers to the bone on a new project which will need my full attention and time.

By the way, did you know it is only 51 days give or take a few hours, until Christmas? Check here for current status. You can see now why I shall be busy!!

The challenges in the Twinchie world this time are ANIMALS for the Twinchie Challenge and ANYTHING GOES plus BLING for the Show us your Twinchies.

I started the Bling challenge with a particular stamp in mind, the lovely bee from the Sheena Douglass stamp set Floral Fantasy Violets. It looks like a jewellers plan for a gem encrusted brooch. I wanted to use a combination of colours that I like but haven't used for a while, purple and lime green. 

In the end with this Twinchie I didn't think I had really embraced the bling enough, so I have simply made this for my own library of Twinchies. Mind you, the shine on the black embossing and the reflectivity of the mica in the H₂O paint is quite good.

This led me on to the next version of the bee, this time I went all out with the faux gems! It isn't really my thing to use this many gems on a piece but hey that is what the brief wants so here it is!

Show us your Twinchie - Anything Goes + Bling

I don't have many green or purple gems so I had to use a different colour combo. This time I used gold embossing powder to give the look I described earlier of a real piece of jewellery. (I still prefer the purple/green one!)

And then there is the final Twinchie I made which is for the Animal challenge. I used one of the free Craft Stamper magazine stamps of the boxing hares. Somebody needs to tell me if the Twinchies came first or did the size of their free stamps launch the whole Twinchie thing? I did my usual moon and dimensional thing on this one. It is nice to be able to use up those little scraps of card that have interesting designs and colours on them. I used a little circle punch for the moon. I was amazed to find one that was exactly the right size! I stamped the moon part of the image again onto another part of the paper so that is was a different colour from the background. 

Twinchie Challenge - #8 Go Animal

That is all for today my lovelies! I need to get my work space cleared down for some serious work next week. Don't expect to see me for a while as I will be VERY busy!

Pop along to the Twinchie blogs and see the other wonderful entries and be inspired by the DT samples. Have a go yourself, you will be amazed at how much pleasure you get from making little pieces of art.

Thanks for dropping in, please leave a comment, I love reading them.

Have a great November! Kim xx

FUN WITH ATC's - Challenge #99 - NIGHT

I thought I would leave this blog until tonight HALLOWEEN but I made this ATC a few days ago. It is for the Fun with ATC's challenge which this time has the theme NIGHT.

I used one of my favourite stamps in one of my favourite ways, a silhouette against a moon!! Anyway, I used 2 roughly cut circles of tracing paper for the moon. I like the rough edges and the layers.  I stamped onto the black card with clear embossing medium and used a silver pearl, a hematite, and a black embossing powder on each of the images.  This worked well but when I started to use some gilding wax around the edges I thought I would add a little to the embossed seed heads as well. 

I used the NIGHT part of a Christmas stamp, SILENT NIGHT, as a banner across the bottom held on with 2 lovely square metal brads.

Pop over to the challenge blog and see the other entries and the lovely DT examples. Have a go yourself!

Need to keep it short as I have some haunting to do!

See you all on the other side of midnight!

Kim xxx

SHEENA ON TV MONDAY 28TH OCTOBER

As the title of this blog suggests the lovely Sheena Douglass is back on our screens again this coming Monday! With her batteries recharged after a well deserved holiday Sheena is going to be demonstrating and chatting all the way through the 9am and 2pm shows! I wonder who the presenters are going to be?

What products are going to be on the shows I hear you ask? Well, it features the beautiful Oriental range launched a few weeks ago. You know the one with the fantastic paper pack and the lovely embossing folders? 

If you remember back that far I made a little 'silver' box as a sample for the shows which one of the presenters, Nigel May, enthused over so much I felt I had to make him his very own box. There was a risk of him 'borrowing' the sample! He tells me he keeps his studio ear piece in it! 

My TV sample

The Nigel May Box

Anyway, while Sheena was away (probably enjoying herself far too much!!)  I felt the need to create a card to surprise her with on her return. And here it is....................

It uses my Zig-Zaggy Fold card base and some of the Oriental stamps from the Silhouettes and Sakura plates. The card I used has a sort of elephant skin texture to it, I have had it for ages and as I am trying not to buy any more stuff (like that is going to happen!)  I thought I would use it. You could get a similar effect by using the crackle stamp from the Ageing Beautifully stamp plate. If you stamp and clear emboss it onto the base card the distressing ink you apply around the edges will be resisted and leave fine lines in the colour of your card. I also masked a moon behind the birds on one of the panels. I find that more than one moon on any project, even if it is a patchwork piece like this, tends to 'mess with your mind' a little! 

What I like about the Zig-Zaggy Fold card is not only is it a great way of using up your precious scraps of card/paper, (you know the little bits that we crafters keep 'just in case') it is also a great way of using some of the smaller stamps to create a large card without the end result looking over fussy. Those little borders between the images make it look like a well displayed art gallery.

Well, there we are. What was meant to be a quick blog to tell you about the forthcoming Sheena Show on Create and Craft has turned into a rather long piece! Hope you are still with me on this one?

Tune in to Create and Craft TV  for some great demos, a lot of Sheena chat, and maybe even a few Halloween bargains! 

Have a lovely weekend! Kim xx

PS Comments always welcome! x

TWINCHIE ALERT - #7 DOODLING

My other quick make today is a Twinchie for the Twinchies Challenge. The theme this week is 'Do Some Doodling'. The invitation went out and I accepted! This is what I came up with.

A couple of simple die cut flowers which I doodled on. Now I am an old hand at this doodling game, I was doodling full sheets of A4 long before the internet was even heard of! Have a look HERE and see what I mean. 

Why not pop along to the Twinchies blog page and look at the other examples, Better still have a go at one yourself. We all love a Twinchie!

Thanks for coming over. Please leave a comment, I love reading them.

Happy crafting! Kim xxx

CATS - KATZEN - MOO MANIA #47

Yippeeeeee! It is Moo Mania day again already. 

 I just L O V E this challenge. 

As the title suggests it is all about cats this time. I don't have many cat stamps but I recently bought a magazine with a free set of cat/dog stamps on and what do you know? They are just the right size to fit on a Moo. Well, almost!

Those of you that also bought the magazine will probably notice that I have cut the party hats off the heads of the cats! Rest assured it didn't hurt them one little bit! To be honest the hats made the cats toooo big to fit on the Moo so they had to go. To make up to the cats for the loss of their party hats I gave them some lovely 'nearly real' black whiskers. (The paper ones also got chopped off in the process of cutting out the heads!!!)

The usual fussy cutting and 3D glue gel are in evidence but rather unusually for me the Moo is in landscape orientation. The cats are coloured with H₂Os and the background is stamped with grasses and leaves.

Hope you like my cute cats? They all look like they are sat waiting for their dinner! 

Go see the other entries into the challenge and check out the DT samples over at Moo Mania. Why not have a go yourself?

Thanks for dropping by. Please be kind enough to leave a comment for me, I love reading your views.

Happy Moo-ing!  Kim xx