... and breeeeeaathe..

... you know that feeling when you've finished having a big 'tidy-up and finish-up' session and you can breathe and think again.. well that's how I felt last week when I started a day as 'tidy-up Tuesday' and it ended up as a 'tackle-it Tuesday' ... in a good way...
(ok, that might be a diplomatic way of saying I got distracted and started making things instead of tidying things.... but in a good way!)

My workroom needed attention - it always needs attention! lol   You have to be in the right frame of mind to have a BIG clear-out and tidy up don't you!  and I was IN that frame of mind - I was going to be ruthless, determined and focussed!!

and I was....

... until I found myself constantly stepping over a masterboard (on the floor) I'd made as part of a Roben-Marie Smith online workshop (you can find the class HERE ... great class that pushed me out of my comfort zones - and thats a good thing!).... this A2 sheet has been moved several times and I realised the easiest way to tidy it up and stop annoying myself by needing to step over it was to make something with it!...

and that is when it stopped being 'tidy-up Tuesday' and started being 'tackle-it Tuesday'....  The 'tackle-it' being to finish using this piece from the class...

...much more fun!

During the tidy-up I'd found a junk journal style sketchbook I made a while ago along the lines of Dina Wakely's mixed media journal - its has canvas paper, manilla tags, watercolour paper - different types of papers and I'd sewn it together by hand...  this mini book would be ideal for covering in a piece of the masterboard!!

I removed the hand sewn binding and ran along the spine with my sewing machine using bright pink thread and big/long stitches..

I created a cover from bits of the masterboard, sewed them to the minibook, added some fabric strips as binding and voila..!!

I was on a roll.... next came a portfolio style junk journal..

After cutting the pages for the above book I was left with lots of strips of a similar size, so not wanting to see them go to waste I made this dinky little book! (3x2.5 inches)  (what's not to love about a teeny tiny book!!)

.... and then a sketchbook (from a (small) pile of  books on the desk) received a make-over with a panel of the masterboard - I think this still needs a bit of work - a bit of white pen doodling...
(the book is only 4x4 inches - such a cute size!)

I've been sticking off-cuts and left-overs in it for a while - 31 pages - might use it for the 31 days in August... maybe...

Last but not least... a book I made with a recently purchased die (Sizzix 660331) was given patterned front and back covers..

This was a really fun way to use the masterboard created in Roben-Marie's class - lots of items created AND my workroom is a little tidier.... win win!

x

Demo Day at Birds in the Barn....

Finally getting back to the blog! ... here are the cards/samples I created for a demo day at Birds in the Barn (Marks Tey, Essex) earlier in the month.  I really enjoyed using Kim Dellow and Zinski Art's stamps and stencils/masks to create masterboards, cards and panels.

 Lots of cutting out, paper piecing and layering up the flowers...

It was nice to use embossing powders again - the white embossing gives the masterboard a lovely delicate fresh look.

Stamp sets used were PaperArtsy EKD05, EKD06 and ZA08

Masterboards & Masks

Yesterday was my turn on the PaperArtsy blog - you can read the post HERE.  

Well, I finished painting the boards but I couldn't quite leave it there.....!

I mounted the black gesso'd panel onto heavyweight mixed media paperstock, stamped over the flower in black Archival and then embossed in Copper - but only the parts of the image on the black panel (otherwise the stamping would be lost).

I like this so much - with the added construction lines it reminds me of a vintage wallpaper design in the planning stages.

Thanks for popping by... 

ACP2: RED + D

This post on the ACP2 project is brought to you by the colour RED and the letter D... as with C there is lots of craftiness beginning with D.. and I had different plans for a 'D' project until I was hit with a cold/cough/sinus bug that floored me for about a week... sniff sniff cough sneeze lol  but I rallied (thanks to Sudafed, Strepsils, Karvol and Meltus lol)(other medicines are, of course, available lol).. and my project took a different route.

I've chosen to mix all shades of red from 'blood' red through to orange...  and my chosen topics were distress and doodling....

I like doodling... but its 'controlled' doodling - it has to have some sort of plan, structure.. purpose..
So I've been doodling in my small sketchbook/journal - it measures 6x4 inches - great for mopping up paint, gelli prints or just mini journaling or sketches..

Recently I've been starting my doodles by stamping images on the pages and working around them - the ones below started by stamping a Hero Arts flower (which I LOVE - I used it on a masterboard project for Craft Stamper - you can see snapshot HERE) (shocked to see that this was SIX years ago!!) aaaaanyhoo I digress.. here are the two spreads I made with that stamp..

There is something striking about the black and white isn't there.. I like leaving the white space in the centre - gives breathing space...  I wanted to give each flower a different pattern...

So that was all very nice and relaxing.. but its not RED is it!.. but I was in a doodling mind set so I bought a pack (from Amazon) of white (and black) blank zentangle squares (shown by Chris Cresswell in a photo on a Facebook page).  The 'tiles' are 9.5x9.5cm so not too big, not too small - ideal for what I had in mind.

So that's the 'doodling', the 'distress' part of my project comes in the form of Distress Inks.  I haven't played with these for a while and I'd forgotten how easy they are to work with.  I pulled out all the red and got busy ( Barn Door, Ripe Persimmon, Festive Berries and Dried Marigold)

I taped four of the tiles together to make a...... yep, a masterboard lol well I couldn't wait until 'M' to create one of these - M's not due as part of this project until  JULY!

The distress inks used were. I created the spots using the tried&tested old favourite technique of water flicking/splashing. :o)

Next came the doodling - I methodically doodled each type of image - worked each of the leaves, then small circles, etc - I like to be organised and methodical about the (apparently) free doodling. :o)
and eventually it looked like this...

It was ready to broken apart and used - I created two cards (I like to mount these panels on different coloured backgrounds because they can look so different depending on the mount..) I also added more doodling - this time in white pen... These panels remind me of batik printed fabrics...

The sketchbook I used earlier for the black&white doodles is shown above - now with a nice masterboard panel on the front cover.

I hope this has inspired you to doodle around stamped images - give them your own spin - or dig out some inks or paints you haven't used in a while (as I did here with the Distress Inks) - or just to doodle!

I'll see you back here on the 1st of March (if not before) for a new colour and 2 more letters of the alphabet - E & F - if you have any suggestions for crafting themes for those letters add them in the comments section on this post and I'll add it to my lists.

As part of my 'research' for the Alphabet Colour Project I created boards on Pinterest for each colour - you can see my RED inspiration board HERE

Thanks for stopping by.

J

Masterboard.... the final!....

After I'd finished my Masterboard projects for the PaperArtsy blog (you can see them HERE), I had one label remaining...

If you read and remember the projects from this masterboard, you'll realise I like to use every last piece.

I didn't want to make another card, I wanted to make something different, and so I thought why not co-ordinate the envelope with the card..

....and keeping it simple I punched hexagons (love!) out of the stickers sheet:

 I  punched 4, selected my 'favourite' and used it as an envelop seal.

I still had lengths of the painted masking tape left over too...

so I used it as decorative strip to write the recipients name onto..

Thats it.. all gone!

x

Masterboard = Cards

I really enjoy using the 3x5in Gelli® plate - especially to make 'masterboards' such as the one I created here - there are lots of tutorials out on the web so go take a look at how to make one.  (Anneke de Clerck did a lovely vibrant project HERE on the PaperArtsy blog).

One of the best tips I've read/seen is to put the 3x5in Gelli® plate onto an acrylic block - it makes it easy to pick the plate up and take it to the journal/paper rather than bring the journal/paper to the plate (if you see what I mean)... much easier to get 'accurate' print placement.

This is the masterboard I made - I know Gelli printing is a process (building layers etc) but at this point I was not overly happy with it (did I carry on or stop and start afresh) - I knew as soon as I put the yellow on that it was wrong (I'm still not feeling/loving yellow!)... but I persevered.. sort of... 

I reached for the bubble wrap - large bubble version - brayered it with pale yellow/cream and printed all over the page.. here's the result:

(bubble wrap fixes everything!) The bubble wrap print has knocked back/obscures the original pattern and the yellow..but I still wasn't happy so, not to be beaten, I cut it up - thinking it might look better that way - in smaller pieces - it would break up the blocks of yellow even more and highlight the good bits of the masterboard...(accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative!!).. once it was cut into pieces - I loved it!!  All these interesting little panels...

 Here are the cards I made with them:

I love how they look like a group, but are all individual - that's whats interesting about masterboards.

Die cut flower, stamped scallop border (JOFY13), and drawn lines around the masterboard panel to frame. (the flower die cut is the one I used on the masterboard to create a resist - its the white flower on pink rectangle you can see on the left hand side of the sheet - perfect colour match!)

 Panel has been stitched on a Kraft card, yellow bakers twine wrapped around and a swing tag tied on (JOFY34), the sentiment is from JOFY14.

I really like these 10x15cm cards that open on the short edge rather than the usual long edge (hinge here is on the left hand side by the twine), the twigs are a die cut (memory box), and the panel has been sewn on to the card

I like the simplicity of this card, even with the coloured patterned panel it is still quite 'less is more'/ 'clean & simple'. (Flower stem is from JOFY38)

and then 'less is more' went out of the window!  Bring on the glitter!!  This card has been splashed with water and gold embossing powder... distressed & glitzy! love it!

Gelli prints, stamps, stenclils & masterboards - a whole lot of fun!

x



(Gelli® used with permission. Owned by Gelli Arts® LLC)

A mini 'masterboard'...

... was part of a class I taught recently.

It isn't strictly a masterboard - more of a strip that we created and cut up....  This is the demo/sample I created in class (unfinished/unrefined) that I cut up and gave different borders to.

In class we mounted the panels onto white and kraft card blanks because I wanted to show how different the panels can look when you mount them on different colours... (apologies for the dodgy photo quality)

Here are the panels from the top photo mounted onto different backgrounds:

I really like how they all look - the black backgroun makes the panel look 'dramatic', while the white is very 'fresh'.

These are fun to create and make 'batch' card creation much easier - they're the same but different.. I like that.

x

ALBOTAT: A 'Thank you' card

... using a panel of masterboard, a die cut and a stamped sentiment...

(sentiment: JOFY33, die: Memory Box Shrewsbury Stems, background Tinned Peas, Chalk, Buff)

ALBOTAT:.. Happy Birthday.....

... to my youngest nephew... I made him a card (obviously! lol).. love using the Stampotique images on their cards - this time I teamed my latest edition (to my Stampotique weird and wonderful family) with Ellen Vargo sketched shapes and my greeting stamps...

x

What weekends are made for...

... an evening with friends - one of those evenings where you laugh so much your stomach muscles ache, your throat hurts and in the end you have no make-up left on because you've cried with laughter..

We started off at the Blackfriar pub - I've always wanted to go in here to see the interior - & it didn't disappoint - I wish I could've taken photos. I hadn't noticed until I looked at this photo how all the building around it have gone... but its still standing! Fantastic.
I hadn't seen several of the friends in a long time - too long - missed them - great evening.

... a fun day teaching a workshop - at Its Crafting Time - where between us we built a terrace of houses - Balamory has nothing compared to these lovely JOFY houses:

... a day in the garden - tidying up, buying and planting new plants - LOVE lupins - mini towers of colour... this is my current favourite part of the garden:

... time spent with Family - nephews birthday - I made a card for him - boys/mens cards are hard aren't they? (or is that just me!) (must challenge myself) - this one was created thanks in part to the PaperArtsy brayer masterboard video that was on the blog earlier this month.

... all that, and there's still today!  Gotta love a Bank Holiday weekend!

Hope yours is good...

xx