Serendipity Barn

I'm participating in the Serendipity Blog hop today.

Back  in March I won a $20 gift certificate to spend at the Serendipity shop, along with that Mary invited my to take part in one of  their bi-monthly blog hops and of course I had to say yes.

Summer Barn and Windmill

I stamped the image with distress tea dye ink, watercoloured the image. I then re-inked the barn and windmill with Ranger archival mini brown and the rest with tea dye again to crisps up some of the lines.

Thistle and butterfly
I decided to create as second card for the blog hop.
My second is a thistle stamp with the butterfly.  The butterfly can be cut off and used as an individual stamp or as part of the thistle image.  This is a great twofer.
I pencil colourd on kraft and added some Nuvo glitter pen to the thistle tops and the butterfly, you can't see it on the card but it is sparkly in real life.

Just head over and leave a comment on all the blogs for the best chance of winning a $20 gift certificate. 

You have from May 2nd to the 6th to leave your comments and the winner will be announced on 

May 7th.

Christine Alexander (That's me)

Serendipity

Beth Chiu (Beth is away this week)

Julie Warner

Mary Beth Lopez

Miriam Napier

Vicky Zimmer

Card Recipe
Stamps: Serendipity
Paper: 110lb white, Black
Ink: Ranger distress tea dye, Ranger archival minis.
Accessories: Rectangle dies to create the frame, Watercolours
Techniques: Watercolouring
Card Recipe
Stamps: Serendipity
Paper: 110lb white, Kraft
Ink: Ranger Archival minis
Accessories: Pencils, Nuvo glitter pen
Techniques: Pencil colouring

Another Faux enamel ornament

I just couldn't resist making another faux enamel ornament with my embossing powders.

For this card I mixed gold blue and white embossing powders with a little gilding flakes and before it set I embedded some gems.

I used a stencil and some distress inks for the background and Alison Bomber Christmas typed sayings for the background

I'm entering this for the following challenges

CAS Christmas April Ornament

The Holly and the Ivy Christmas Challenge - Anything goes

The Merry Christmas Challenge - Anything goes

I hope you like the card, I'd love to hear from you.

Card Recipe
Stamps:, Paper Artsy sayings (Alison Bomber), Rubbernecker Sentiment.
Paper: 110lb white, thin chipboard, mixed media
Ink: Ranger distress, Ranger archival
Accessories: Embossing powders, Stencil, blending tool and foam
Techniques: Faux enamel, stenciling

New Penny black birds

This is one of my recent purchases which I thought fun to ink up.  I love playing with the Penny black watercolour stamps, althoughI'm certainly no pro at these but I still have fun.

I used a mixture of markers and zigs to paint up the stamps, spritzed with a little water and then blend with a watercolour brush.  Once everything was dry I added some coloured archival ink on the branch and carefully over the flowers and bird using the mini archival ink pads.

I've started to really like touching up my watercolouring with coloured archival inks as they allow you to move some of your watercolours after they are applied.

The background has a blue wet on wet watercolour wash to simulate sky.  Wet on wet watercolour causes pooling of colour which is great for the sky.

I'm entering this for the CAS Watercolour challenge - birds

I'd love to hear what you think 😊

Card Recipe
Stamps: Penny Black
Paper: 110lb cream Linen, 140 Lb watercolour, Black
Ink: Ranger archival
Accessories: zigs, Distress inks, water spritzer watercolour brush.
Techniques: Direct to stamp, watercolouring

More Rubber band exploits

This technique can be quite addictive, for this card I put multiple size bands on a stamp block and versamarked the bands.  I heat embossed clear versamark and sponged distress inks into the mixed media paper.  I love the big splashes of versamark from the larger rubber bands.  I framed the background using a MFT rectangular frame die and inlaid the frame back into the white card.  I die cut the flowers from one of the Tim Holtz wild flower collection and tucked it into the frame.

I'm entering this for the following challenges

CAS Mix up Rubber band, stamping, stamping and my choice is die cut.

Craft Stampers Make it Take it challenge

Card Recipe
Stamps: Purple Onion sentiment, Rubber band
Paper: Water colour, 110lb White
Ink: Ranger Distress inks, Versamark
Accessories: Die cut frame (MFT), Die cut flower Tim Holtz, blending tool, clear embossing powder
Techniques:, distress blending, stamping with Rubber band, die cutting

Faux metal ornament

It's time for our Mid month reminder cards over at CAS Christmas.

Drop by and see all the wonderful ornament cards by the Design Team and all the challenge entries, there's so much inspiration to get you going on your Christmas card stash.

You've probably seen a number of Faux Enamel cards posted recently so this is my version.  You can either use a hot plate or a heat gun  but I found the hot plate was the easiest method to melt the embossing powder for me, this video by Scrap Time gives a great how too tutorial.

My ornament is die cuts from Memory box and after I layered my embossing powders I embedded some pearls across the middle.  My background stamp is JOFY from Paper Artsy which I used coloured pencils in blue and silver tones of the the ornament, and sentiment is from Rubbernecker which I stamped in Ranger archival blue.

I'd love to hear from you😊

Card Recipe
Stamps: JOFY, Rubbernecker sentiment
Paper: 110lb white, Mixed Media
Ink: Ranger archival
Accessories: Memory Box die, Embossing powders, Pearls, Hot Plate, Coloured pencils
Techniques: Pencil colouring, Faux enamel

Lindy's Magicals through a stencil

It's been a while since I played with powdered inks and stencils so it was time to pull them out.
I used the Tim Holtz blossom stencil with Lindys magicals spritzed with water, when the ink was dry I used a blending tool to blend around the edges into the centre.  A little background stamping with the Tim Holtz flowers and ledger script stamp.  The quote is from a Local King set (still life) which I think has now been discontinued.  I threw my paint on the canvas and this is what I got 😉 I hope you like it.

I'm entering this for:-

Craft stampers Take it Make it challenge Anything goes

A bit more time to craft challenge Anything goes

and 

Addicted to Stamps and more - Make your mark

Card Recipe
Stamps: Ranger Tim Holtz background stamp (ledger script) and flower stamp, Saying Local King (still life)
Paper: Watercolour
Ink: Ranger archival Black, Distress Oxide
Accessories: Tim Holtz stencil Blossoms, Lindys Magical powders, water spritzer
Techniques: Stamping, Stenciling with powdered inks.

Rubber band stamping

I forgot all about using rubber bands for stamping until CAS Mix up reminded me.
I used Versamark and Pan Pastels for the background and a Magenta stamp for my focal image.
the sentiment is from Purple onion.
The layer were die cut using the Stamplorations crazy running stitch.

I'm entering this for 

CAS Mix up Rubberband, stamping, and Die cutting
Inkspirational Challenge #158

Card Recipe
Stamps: Magenta flower, Purple Onion sentiment
Paper: 110lb white, Black
Ink: Versamark, Ranger Archival
Accessories: Masking tape, Pan Pastels,  Stamplorations wonky stitch die.
Techniques: Rubberband stamping, Pan Pastels

who doesn't love a Christmas puppy

With two Golden retrievers at home as you can imagine I'm a sucker for puppy stamps.  This set from Hero Arts is so cute with the puppy in a Christmas stocking.
I coloured him with a mix of pencils and Touch alcohol pens and then added a little Nuvo sparkle pen to the white on the stocking, it's impossible to photograph tonight 😊.  The pencil and pen has given the stocking a bit of velvety appearance with the mottled red. His stocking is held up with a small crystal  rhinestone.

I'm entering this card for the following challenges

Merry Monday red and white (with a touch of cream for the dog, I hope this is OK).

Christmas Card throw down (embossing).

Sparkles Christmas feature a creature.

I hope you like this sweet little puppy.

Card Recipe
Stamps: Hero Arts stamp and die set
Paper: 110lb white, Red
Ink: Versamark
Accessories: MISTI, Touch Alcohol markers, pencils, SU embossing folder, Nuvo sparkle pen, crystal rhinestone.
Techniques: Embossing, Alchol inks, pencils

Die cut birds

I had a tiny snippet of cling wrap background with Bister left in my UFO box (it must be time to make more 😏) so I thought I would use as a background for a bird die I have.

I'm entering this for the following Challenges-
CAS Watercolour April challenge is Bird
Snippets Playground #323 for my snippet of background
AAA cards your favorite technique cling wrap background for me
Just us Girls CAS

Card Recipe
Stamps: Carbelle Studio
Paper: Coated card, black, 110lb white
Ink: Ranger Archival
Accessories: Bister (Blue and Black), cling wrap, spray starch, die cut
Techniques: Cling wrap background, die cut

Aprils CAS Christmas Challenge - Ornament

It's time for the Christmas challenge over at CAS Christmas and this month it's "Ornaments". As the name says clean and simple cards, so come on over and join us for our second challenge. Our host for this month is Bonnie of  Stamping with Klass and of course there's the Design team to provide some wonderful ornamental inspiration.

For my ornament I've used a Stamping Up ornament stamp and die set and pine sprig from an old retired set called Peaceful Wishes.
I first stamped the ornament using a MISTI and water, then sprinkled some Infusion powdered inks over the water.  there was a slight image of the ornaments design but not enough for me to use it just as the ornament.
I used the die cut to cut the ornament and then the overlay die to cut out the glitter paper.  You can see some of the swirls

Card Recipe
Stamps: Stampin up ornament stamp and die set, Peaceful Wishes pine branch, Old Island sentiment.
Paper: 110lb white, Mixed Media, glitter paper
Ink: Ranger Archival, Infusions powdered inks
Accessories: Stampin Up Die, foam
Techniques: Stamping with powdered inks, Die cut