Getting VERY inky!!!

I've been sewing ruffles from white muslin, and dying them to match whatever project I'm working on. Experimenting with lots of Distress colours, so consequently my hands are not fit to be seen in public!! Why I can't use gloves, I have no idea.....I get started, get to the seriously messy bit, then think 'oh yeah, gloves.....' Next time I'm going to get the gloves out first and put them somewhere where I can't fail to notice them!
Anyway.... my favourite colour so far HAS to be Picked Raspberry, such a vibrant pink it's silly! I've used my dyed pink ruffle on this...........

I used the rest of the summer colour Distress colours on the piece, so it's all coordinated!
Closeup of the ruffle...

I coloured some bamboo skewers black, then glued on some stamped faces and stars, as a kind of hat!

I twisted some wire to create arms and hands, then hung stars from the hands of my little 'people' !

As I've used the summer distress colours, I'm entering this into the Simon Says Stamp And Show challenge , which asks for projects inspired by those colours!

Have a lovely day,
Trish xxxxx

woyww169

Happy woyww everyone!
Wednesday again...more desk hopping to be done!! Julias Fabulous Blog is the place to start, loads and loads of creative spaces just waiting to be inspected! Go on, you know you want to!
Another angle of my main workspace today..

My sewing machine lives at this end of the bench, and that's what I've been playing with today. I've seen all these fab ruffle type trims on a few peoples projects, and thought 'hmmmm, surely I can make those waaaay cheaper than buying them like that?' Answer? why yes, even my limited sewing skills can create a ruffle! A metre of plain white muslin costs very little, and being white means I can dye it to go with whatever my colour scheme is! One of my last batch got glued on this......

I coloured it with Peacock Feathers Distress ink...... really like the effect...

The aim today is so make a nice pile if them, all ready for when the mood takes me!!
Have a lovely week everyone!
Love Trish xxx

Sneaky Peek Monday...For Calico Crafts

Hello everyone!
It's my turn again on the Calico Crafts DT blog...so here is another weird and closeup pic to look at!

To see the whole project in full, please hop on over to The Calico Crafts Blog!
Have a lovely week!
Trish xxxxxxx

Who inspires you?

I'm a messy crafter, totally admit it! And in a typically rebellious manner, I really admire those who craft 'cleanly'......... People who produce work so crisp and elegant that it blows me away! As I'm sure many of us do, I like to have a little play in the style of someone else, just to see if I can. Which leads me to todays creation, a panel totally inspired by Mona Pendleton of Cupcakes Creations ! Love love love her elegant and feminine style, especially as there is often a little painty 'mess' in amongst the gorgeous layers!
So, here is 'hummingbird'..

Embossed stars on the base card, with a little crumpling going on. I glued on a text strip, mainly so the embossed die cut vine showed up!

I tried not to go overboard with the paint.... not easy!
Three rolled roses using dies by MFT. Two painted up before I rolled them, one glittered afterwards!

I decided the left hand side was a bit bare, so I added a twine bow, a little bit painty with a stamped emblem in the middle...

I glued on leaves, to give added dimension I added them to the already raised lower petals of the flowers, rather than sticking them directly to the base card. The final quirky touch was my teeny hummingbird!
The letters are all cut individually from chit chat stickers...palaver doesn't even begin to describe it! I think I lost more than I used!
I think my effort is still messy, and I'm sure I have big problems with 'elegant', but I think I like it!!!
As this weeks challenge over at Simon Says Stamp And Show is 'no rules', I think this fits the bill!
Have a great weekend everyone (lets hope the long bank holiday weekend here in the UK is a nice one!)
Love Trish xxx

Mega Metal Bottlecap!

I love bottlecaps, I use them flat as embellishments, or as they come, filled with resin or UTEE as little niches. I've even used vintage caps in a bracelet..... So imagine how excited I was to see these simply ginormous ones!!! Now, I'll admit, they're not new, been around for a while apparently, but I've only just found them! By Maya Road, they come in a few sizes. This one is 3 inches across!
I started out with lots of intricate and detailed ideas....planning on filling the space full of lots of tiny ephemera. Once I actually got hands on though, it felt 'right' just to keep it very simple. So thats how it ended up......

The metal is aluminium (probably!) so silver in tone to begin with. I gave it a dry brushing of white paint, then a light sponging of fuchsia. Splats of the pink and black paint, then I added a thin checkered frame I cut and coloured. The little lady gets a second outing this week, just the perfect size for this!
The bottlecap is fairly deep, as you can see if I show you an angled shot...

So plenty of scope there to fill it with resin/utee/glossy accents for a future project! I glued my figure to a tube bead before glueing that to the bottlecap, just to make her stand proud slightly.
I think I *just* have time to enter this into The Stampman Medals/Metals Challenge !! Nothing like squeaking into a deadline with 24 hours to spare eh?! The bottlecap is metal, and as its round it could possibly be a very funky medal of some kind too? maybe? possibly? hmmmm...... its metal anyway!!!
Have a lovely week!
Love Trish xxxxx

WOYWW168

Good Morning everyone!
Missed you all last week! Hope the sun is shining wherever you are.....here in Blackpool it can't make its mind up between being very hot and sunny, or chucking it down lots. Which is VERY annoying as you need to make a choice between sweating or being soaked with rain whenever you leave the house. Think I may just give up and stay inside!
My desk this week...

Sorry its a tad blurry....this is the best of a very large bunch, I seem to have shaky camera hand syndrome today for some reason! What have I been doing? Making some hammered copper rings for a jewellery project. I've bashed them with my chasing hammer on the steel block you can see, then dipped them in liver of sulphur solution to oxidise them. You can see the steel wool on the desk where I've been removing some of the oxidised layer to give that fab antiqued look! And what do I do with them then? Well, can't show you what those specific rings will be used for as its for a mag project, but in true 'Blue Peter' style..here's something I made earlier.....

This was also a mag project, but its been months since it was published so we're all OK! Lots of rings, simply fastened together with loops of seed beads. Closeup of the rings...

I thought it was one of my more simple projects, but according to the lovely lady who cuts my copper rings she had rather a lot of orders after it came out, so it seems it was very popular!
Anyway....... happy WOYWW to all, and for those who have no clue what I'm on about.... pop on over to Julias place and join in the bestest blog hop on the planet!!
Love Trish xxxxx

painty texture......

Whilst I love to create texture with papers, die cuts,metal, fabric etc, my first love is creating texture with paint! (yes yes, I know you all probably guessed that by now huh?!!!)
I've made a panel in my favourite colour palette just now, lime, turquoise and white,with a little fuchsia thrown in!

I started off by glueing down some text paper, just to give that little extra interest, and scraped some texture paste through a harlequin stencil....

Once that was dry, I started to add the painty layers. Lots of layers give the opportunity for lots of texture...

As well as the printing with paint, I used a couple of stamps on the background too.... namely 'Bubbles' and 'Bubble wrap' by Sam Poole for Creative Expressions. LOVE the bubbles stamp....

Once the paint had all bubbled up into lots of lovely lumpy bumpy texture, I added my image and text. The wonderfully carefree dancer is from the At The Ballet plate by Creative Expressions, and the text is from the Art Sayings plate (again, Sam Poole/Creative Expressions)

 One of those pieces that is really touchy feely.... you need to stroke it to really 'get' how textured it is! (or is it just me that does that to my art???!!!!!)
Have a fabulous day everyone!
Love Trish xxx

House of Stars...

I was doing a bit of tidying.. (only a bit mind you, life is tooo short to go the whole hog with tidying....) and I found a little wooden box with compartments.I think it was the box that some little coat hangers came in, but whatever it started off as, it became my ideal excuse to stop tidying and make something!!!  I made a small house...

Very quick (well I was supposed to be doing something else......!) make, this one. I used spray inks in turquoise green and pink to dye the box and three bits of driftwood. I also cut out some stars and they got the spray and splat treatment too...

I doodled on the stars to make them stand out a bit, then added a tiny fairy person....

I put a star on the apex of the roof, then added a word. I know, I know....'star' is a bit of an obvious word to add, but I have a fondness for the literal.......!!!!

Have a great week everyone!
Love Trish xxxxx

Everyday Journey

Hello!
I'm back after a little blogging break.... a bit of family time was overdue!
I've made another canvas, this time with a more muted, vintage feel for a change!

This is a 5 x 4 canvas, nice and chunky so the sides can be painted/inked too...

I used cream  and mushroom paint as the base, smearing and sponging until I got the effect i wanted. Then onto the printing and stamping with lots of different background stamps and bits of junk...

I added a thin strip of text paper for my lady (100 Proof Press) to stroll along.....and then added a couple of word stickers to finish....

It's difficult to see in the pics, but in reality this is very shimmery as I sprayed the lot with gold mica spray, adding chunks of gold Perfect Pearls to the wet surface after I sprayed. Once the Perfect Pearls become wet, they become paint like in consistency, so dry to a nice shiny textured finish!
I'm linking up to the Frilly and Funkie Get Craft With Canvas Challenge with this project!
Love Trish xxxxx

Monday Sneak peek for Calico Crafts..

Hello everyone...bit of a cryptic photo to tease you with today....

This is a little bit of my latest project for Calico Crafts....
Why not pop on over HERE to see what it looks like in full!!
Love Trish xxxx

Ear worms.....

You know, those little snatches of songs that suddenly appear in your head for no apparent reason, then stay for days..........!! I've had one of those for ages, who knows why, so I thought if I made it the subject of a 'creation' it might make it go away!!!
The song in question is Dreamer by Supertramp...... and this is what I made..

 I started of with a regular square of cardstock, then stuck down lots of texture.....
Die cut cardstock and a strip of sinamay for starters..

Then die cut letters underneath a metal foil tape sheet.....

I used the foil tape as I wanted the letters to have a softer edge, so they blend more into the background and become part of it. Sometimes letters simply stuck on can look too much like they're just sitting there...... ( I know what I mean anyway!!!) As you can see, metal foil tape takes paint in exactly the same manner as the cardstock......
I also scraped texture paste through a circle stencil...

You can really build up the layers of texture this way..... Texture paste OVER sinamay and cardstock works fabulously......

Once all the paste was dry, it was a simple matter of smearing and sponging paint to create the background. A Zettiology figure and computer generated phrase to finish......
Now, am I still singing that song in my head?....... um..... yep...... that 'exorcism' didn't work then!!!!
Have a great rest of weekend, I'm looking forward to the big Olympic closing ceremony concert later!!
Love Trish xxxxx

Leftover paint tag...

Morning!
As I generally do after I've created something painty, the leftover paint gets sponged/smeared/scraped onto something else so as not to waste it. This tag evolved from one of those 'extra' painty surfaces, this time a tag. Once it was done, I liked it better than the canvas the leftover paint came from!!!

The background was created by scraping (with a palette knife) lime, turquoise and purple paint over the tag. This needs to be done in layers, making sure each colour is dry before adding the next. I lightly brayered the tag with black paint in between layers too. Lots of stamping using paint to add texture and detail....

The image is a Stampotique, and to add that little extra I've given her stamped acetate wings....

She stands on a stamped filmstrip border, and I've used a teeny phrase to finish.
I have published a DVD going through my painty background techniques, should you be inspired to have a go but don't know where to start....check out the link on the sidebar!!!!
OK, shameless self promotion bit over!!!!
I'm linking up with two challenges today....
Simon Says Stamp And Show - 'paint it up'.....
Fashionable Stamping Challenges - 'anything goes'

Have a great day,
Love Trish xxx

WOYWW166

Happy Wednesday everyone!
WOYWW- the blog hop that takes you where other blog hops wouldn't dare... the craft desks of the world!! Hop on over to Julias place and start the mammoth peek into the mess of others!
My desk this week is a long shot for a change....maybe it'll look less messy this way???!!

Um.... that'll be a no then...still messy! I was creating a painty thing for a challenge (no change there then!) and decided to use up the excess paint on a tag rather than wasting it....then the tag kind of developed into something I liked more than the original project! So, I'll show you the original canvas, and put the tag into the challenge instead!

As you can see by all the black paint left over on the paper in the desk shot, I didn't use white with my brayer for a change, wanted a darker look this time! Hardly any printing either, the background was 99% stamped using paint...

My top tip for stamping onto canvas....use unmounted stamps WITHOUT the acrylic block. As canvases aren't supported in the centre, there isn't a good solid surface to stamp onto. Using stamps that can be bent slightly to take the 'give' of the canvas surface into account gives a much better result. Having said that, I still always use the stamping onto tissue technique for anything that has fine detail!
The image is Zettiology, the words Unity Stamp Co.....

Check back tomorrow and I'll show you the tag I like better than this!!!!
Have a lovely week..
Trish xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Exam Celebration canvas

I have a few friends that are anxiously awaiting for their children to receive their exam results very soon, and a couple of them have asked me to create something for them to give the (hopefully!) successful candidates. They had been looking at cards, but nothing seemed to be just right, so I said I would have a go at a 'celebration canvas'! The girls can keep them on their walls when they go off to Uni, ( if they like them, of course!!)
I was asked for these colours and to keep things a bit simpler than I would do normally.....

The base is spray inks (much more shimmery in real life), with just a touch of printing and stamping in a couple of areas..

I added a strip of painted paper around the edge....

Normally I would have just painted directly onto the canvas edge, but I forgot to mask it off before spraying, and as you may imagine you can't paint with white over blue and purple spray inks.... goes a lovely pale blue colour!
The stars (Stamping Bella) were stamped onto card I'd stamped with a 'dream' definition (Memory Box), cut out and stuck on..

The image is actually a digital stamp from A Day For Daisies, printed off and cut out. Just because I don't have a Copic or Promarker to my name doesn't mean I can't use digis!!!!!

 This may get tweaked slightly by adding in the name of the recipient, but otherwise I'm happy with it....nicer than a generic 'congrats' card anyway!!!!
I'm linking up with the Stampman Challenge Blog , as their current challenge is 'anything goes-Celebration' , which fits in rather well with this, I thought!!!
Love Trish xxx

DVD giveaway!.....and the winner is.....

Good morning all!!!

Wow 70 comments on the post!! Thank You all for being so enthusiastic!!

Ok....the random number generator says (well, the numbers in a pot chosen randomly by smallest child!)......

Comment number 17, which means the winner is......

SueH

 Woooooo! Congrats Sue, please can you let me have your address so I can send you your prize!

Thanks again everyone!!!!

What Do You Say?

The challenge this week over at Simon Says Stamp And Show is What Do You Say?.....
I thought I would create a little something using my favourite ever word stamp.... "Her Brain" by River City Rubber Works. I've had it years and years, and still never get tired of it!
I made a chunky canvas....

I love chunky canvases because you get to decorate the sides too...

Painted canvas, with printing and stamping done with more paint. Gesso smeared through a stencil and then heated to raise the Gesso and give even more texture. Because of all the texture, and because the stamp has a distressed look to it already, I decided to stamp onto tissue and then apply with Mod Podge to the canvas....

As you can see, if you do it properly you can't see the tissue at all once it has dried!
 My new favourite thing is to used stacks of buttons as feet....

Not quite as stable as you'd like when you add them to box canvas, they obviously just get glued to the canvas base which isn't stuck underneath to the wooden frame, so there is a touch of wiggle going on...hence why the sideways shot looks like its listing slightly!! However, they still hold the canvas up, so its all good!!
A feisty lady image (100 Proof Press) , and a bit of doodling around the edges finishes it off!
Love Trish xx