On The Tiles...

...a few weeks ago I taught my Mixed Media Masterboard class and for a change, I actually got a class sample finished!  Oh yesh, normally, class samples get half made and then end up bunged under my desk in a bag with the idea that one day I will finish them... yep, one day!   Anyways, I loved the colours I used on this one so much I carried on when I got home and finished off the decorations.

As this is a class sample, I won't go into great detail on how I made it but I will tell you about the colours... aren't they gorgeous?  I used a mix of Cosmic Misting Ink Jade Sea and Dirty Martini Dylusions sprays and blended them together with water to get this washy effect.

The flowers were coloured with Ancient Green and Egyptian Blue Cosmic Sprays with a smidge of Black Marble Dylusions to get some metallic effect onto them.  The butterflies are coloured with Peacock Feathers DI's and painted with a waterbrush to get the blending on the wings... and the sentiment is one of Tim's original woody stamps I have in my collection.

I have had a marvellous few days!  Grim whisked me off to North Yorkshire for a few days R&R = we stayed at the most delightful hotel just outside York called The Sidings.  The rooms are all in converted Mark 1 railways coaches... and they are about 30 feet away from the East Coast Mainline... a real "trainman's holiday" - laying in bed of a morning watching high speed trains whizz past the end of the bed... cool!   Of course, it would have been very remiss of us not to visit the North Yorkshire Moors Railway... so we did!  And yet again, I didn't see Sir Nigel Gresley!!! One of these days I will get to see "her" in steam!

I am back up north again now... sitting here in me hotel room in Preston - I am here for a workshop tomorrow and a demo day on Friday at Inspirations.  If you are around on Friday it would be great to see you!  I shall away now, time for my bed!   Thanks for looking, have a goodly day!  TTFN

Hels x

Two Cards... Two Ways... One Mask

...yikes!  Where did this week go huh? I am working on a big project at the moment - you know, one of those that starts out pretty small and kind of grows as you are going along?   Well, I had intended to get it finished and blogged today.  HA! Not a chance, I am still a-faffing with the embellishments!   So, instead I have two more sample cards from last Thursdays show.  They are both using the gorgeous That Special Touch mask but used in a different way from each other.  Here's card numero uno *ooh get me going all foreign of a Friday morning!*   When I am inking/spraying through a mask, I tend to use re-po tape and stick the mask in place so there are no disappointing nudges going on.  Once in place, I lightly blended Scattered Straw, Forest Moss and Seedless Preserves DI through the mask, making sure I blended the colours nicely on the flowers.  Once done, I lifted the mask and gave the whole card a zap with a heat tool to set the ink.  Distress Ink stays wetter for longer so it is worth remembering to do the heaty bit.  I used Scattered Straw DI to blend around the edges of the card and then edged with Seedless Preserves to form a frame.  The butterflies were stamped in Jet Black Archival, cut out, then pounced with the same Distress colours but this time in Stains.  Another zap with a heat tool to dry them and a sentiment stamped in Jet Black Archival.  The little buzzy bee is an Embellish Your Art piece, how cute is he!

Card 2 was made by flipping the mask over to have a different orientation.  I taped it into place and misted Cosmic Misting Inks through the mask... I used Meadow Lime, Clover and Blue Cotton colours.  Before I lifted the mask I lightly dabbed over it with tissue paper to remove the excess and then carefully lifting the mask up so I didn't get any splodgey bits where I didn't want them.  The sentiment *Studio 490* is stamped onto an offcut of the cardstock that was over-sprayed.  The butterflies are coloured with Blue Cotton Misting Ink, applied with a paintbrush.  I added some little lines of fine black pen to make some faux stitching and another card was done.  Simples huh?

Anyways... I bet you are all *dying* to know about the Ukelele lesson (ok, I know you ain't but I can pretend rofl)  Well, I can report that I did, indeedily, play a whole tune!  Oh yesh, I am now capable of playing... Twinkle Twinkle Little Star!  I am thinking of changing my surname to Hendrix ... or maybe Slash... or perhaps even Weedon (ahem... quite!)  Ok, so I still have a loooong way to go before I will be leaning on a lamp-post but I am going to practice and master this little instrument that is just too cute!  I shall leave you with the song I am aiming to be, one day, able to play... HERE on YouTube.   Thanks for looking... have a FAB day!  **keep warm... brrrr... someone needs to have a word in old Mother Nature's shell-like, snow, in Spring... gah!**  TTFN

Hels x

C'est Authentic!

...it is a little known fact that I was so atrocious at French when I was at school I was called a dunderhead on many, many occasions and failed my *ahem* O'Level *shows age* with a certain, erm...  je ne c'est quoi.  However, for some ridikkydudalus reason I do slip into a french accent every so often... and whenever I see the word "authentic" I insist on pronouncing it "authentique"  I know, bonkers, pure and simples.     Anyways... here's another page for my loose leaf journal... totes inspired by the wonder woman that is Wendy Vecchi.  Long time readers of my blog will probs recall a time when I ventured into journaling with the greatest of gusto's - buying several moleskine books in all different sizes, even making my own self bound (ok, I used a Bind it All) journal of all different sized pages and card/paper mediums.  And readers of this blog may well recall that I was a total failure at said journaling because I kept getting overwhelmed by ALL those pages... sooooo many to fill... like the amount of pressure I would be putting on myself to get the whole book finished.

Then along came Wendy.  And she showed me that actually, you don't have to do a whole book in one go... oh no, you can do loose leaf pages and then bung them together in an Art Part binder.  Which is when that ickle lightbulb that hovers above my head went "bing".  So, I decided to be a right old copy-cat and do my own individual pages.   This here one was made using Ranger's Specialty Paper.  My word, this is gooooood stuff!  I was asked a few weeks ago to describe it.  Well, imagine how smooth glossy card is?  Well, this stuff is like matte glossy card... if that makes sense!  I used some Cosmic Misting Inks to get a nice smooshy background, spritzing the card with water and then the Inks (can't remember the colour... sorry) and then moving the card about before drying to get the splodgy look.  Then I overlaid the solid part of the Large Heart Stencils for Art and blended Fired Brick Distress Ink around it.  With the solid heart still in place I overlaid the Brick Wall stencil and used Aged Mahogany DI to blend some bricks... taking care not to right up to the edge so no harsh lines.  Next I  spritzed and flicked water to add some paler patches.  I overlaid the Large Heart Stencil (the out-y bit) and popped the Stripes from the Dots & Stripes Stencil over and used Fired Brick DI to add the lines.  This meant that with the open heart in place, it didn't take the lines over the edges of the heart.  I then used Classic Words and more Aged Mahogany DI - using a very fine liner pen to highlight parts of the letters.   Once I removed all the Stencils, I movd the Classic Words down to the bottom and added some numbers in the same way.  I doodled a couple of lines and scribbles around the edge of the heart and the page and then added a twist of rusty wire and a bow to finish.  And there you have it... my Authentique Coeur!  *I do remember some words from my schooling lol*

I had a lovely afternoon yesterday, seeing Aged P after a few months and of course, he brought fish & chips with him (and mushy pea's, can't forget those deeeevine mushy pea's)  We had a veritable feast and I ate every single last scrap on my plate... the fact that my trousers probably won't do up today is another matter... just as well I don't still live up North, I would be eating them everyday (the fish n chips, not the trousers lol)  Anyways, I shall away, I have some beauty sleep to catch up on and then today we are hopefully going to be planting up spring bulbs if the weather stays dry.   Thanks for looking... have a grand day... TTFN

Hels x

For One Day Only... A Giveaway

...as promised yesterday I have done a step by step tutorial... and I am giving away my finished piece.  Tis a bit of a different giveaway than normal because this will last one day only.  So, to join in with the chance to win this piece all you need to do is leave a comment for me.  I will use Random.Org to pick a winner for me and I will announce the winner on tomorrows blog post.  The closing time for comment/entries will be 23:59 today (12th October) any comments received after that won't be added into the draw as tomorrows post is going to publish at 00:00 (13th October)  Right, on with the tut!

Ingredients:
Ranger Specialty Stamping Paper
Cosmic Shimmer Misting Inks - Nature's Gift
Distress Ink: Crushed Olive and Faded Jeans
Blending Foam/Cut & Dry
Studio 490 Stencils for Art: Brick Wall & Heart
Creative Expressions Chain Tassels
Water Mister
Heat Tool
Ribbon & Wire
Thick and thin permanent black pens
Black Cardstock

STEP 1
I always use a newspaper with a piece of kitchen roll under my card when using mists... keeps the mess to a minimum :O])
Mist Ranger Specialty Stamping paper with water, giving it a generous dousing.

STEP 2
Use all three ink sprays, misting over the paper to blend the colours together a bit... try not to overspray otherwise you won't get a definition of colour.

STEP 3
Dry thoroughly using your heat tool... if you have any white patches left over, you can re-mist with a smidge of water to make the inks move about a bit.

STEP 4
Pop the Heart Stencil onto the card and use Faded Jeans DI with a blending tool to apply the ink into the heart shape, try not to over ink the edges of the stencil, work in small circular motions to blend nicely.

STEP 5
Remove Stencil and zap the inked page with a heat tool to set the Distress Ink

STEP 6
 Replace Stencil and lightly mist over with Sea View Misting Ink, add a spritz of water if you like to smoosh it about a bit. 


 

STEP 7

Remove the Stencil and dry the page with a heat tool.

STEP 8

Pop the cutty outy heart from the Stencil over the heart design.

STEP 9
Place the Brick Wall Stencil over the top

STEP 10
Use Cut & Dry foam or blending tool and apply Crushed Olive Distress Ink over the stencils, keep them firmly in place and try not to smudge over the edge of the Brick Stencil so you get a nice blended effect.

STEP 11
Blend Faded Jeans DI around the edges of the page

STEP 12
Use a fine nibbed black pen to squiggly draw around the centre heart, go around twice to make wavy lines for a faux stitched effect.

STEP 13
Place the Classic Words Stencil with the word Fragile over the heart, use a thick black pen to trace through the stencil and dry with a heat tool.

STEP 14
Place the same stencil with the 1 - 0 bit over the bottom of the page and use the fine nib pen to lightly trace the figures.

Finishing Touches
Add some squiggly lines around the edge of the page. 

Pop a Chain Tassell onto some rusty wire, twist and then poke a hole through the heart, pop the twist of wire through, secure onto back of page, stick to black card, tie a bow and use Cosmic Glue to stick this to the wirey bit.  Voila, done!

There you go... phew, a lot of pics, hope you are still with me lol   As I mentioned, all you need to do to be in with a chance to own this page is leave me a comment here before 23:59 today.    I hope you found the tut understandable... I do have to try not to do too much of HelsSpeak lol 


Right... I had better get a move on... my bed is a-calling me and I am so ready to snuggle and have a lovely nice long snoozle!  Thanks for looking... TTFN!

Hels x