Grungy Monday 20 - Distress Stickles

This is the last challenge from StudioL3 for a few weeks as Linda is going away on a cruise with Tim (how jealous are we ...)!!! I bought a set of the Distress Stickles a while back but have to admit I've not used them much (except for the Rock Candy which is an amazing product) so this was another great challenge for me:

For the background I inked the tag with Distress Inks, embossed with the wood grain alterations folder, applied Pumice Stone straight from the pad then Pumice Distress Stickles over the top. I die cut umbrella man, inked him straight from the pad with Stormy Sky then dabbed Tumbled Glass Stickles over the whole surface with my finger (very satisfying!) The quote is by Stampers Anonymous and the little stamp in the corner is from my under-used but much loved Darkroom Door set. That was a quickie wasn't it! I'm off to finish my samples for IndigoBlu. Enjoy the rest of the summer! JulieD x

Indigo Blu Samples

I was asked to make samples for Kay over at IndigoBlu stamps a couple of months ago and I'm currently sorting my second batch!  Here are a few of them:

This is a mini canvas which I painted with haematite Inka Gold, edged with tissue tape and stamped the spider from IndigoBlu's Hocus Pocus plate in purple then went over the top with Glossy Accents. I covered the brass coloured key with silver mixative and black alcohol ink  before adding a touch of the purple Inka Gold and stamped and embossed the quote from the same plate. I also painted the mini easel in the purple Inka Gold and stamped onto it with black stazon for a textured look.

This is a paper mache book box which I've also given the Inka Gold treatment (can you see a theme running through these projects - I am completely smitten with Inka Gold at the moment and currently have six different colours - I'm working on the rest ...). This is the dark grey 'haematite' type colour (none of them have a colour name printed on them so we make them up!) I stamped the Wish You were Here image onto white tissue and used matt medium to adhere it after tearing around the image and added a cute old bike charm with fibres! The inside has stamped images from the Grand Tour II plate - the back image is stamped on silver mirri card and the front image is embossed in silver and raised on really thick foam pads to fill the space more effectively. I made a hole in the top of the box and dangled a second bike charm.

This final project didn't go exactly to plan but I'm reasonably happy with it! It was an alternative version of a canvas which I'll blog later in the week but which used products which weren't from IndigoBlu so I couldn't send it on to Kay! This one is all IndigoBlu so I'll be submitting it - it's a 12in x 12in piece of MDF which I've painted with cream emulsion and a bit of gold acrylic then smudged the edges with the gold and again adhered stamped tissue with matt medium. I've also roughly stamped the butterfly from the Grand Tour II plate onto the background and stamped various other images from the same plate onto black and gold surfaces which I've layered and distressed. Hope she likes them! Look out for them if you're at any of the UK craft shows later this year!! JulieD

Early for Once!!

This week's Grungy Monday challenge went up only 80 minutes ago and I was determined to get it done early - see when I set my mind to it it's not a Sunday afternoon rush ...

The challenge was to emboss plastic packaging and use it as an overlay in a project based on one of Tim's Christmas Tags. Here's my quick piece:

It's a piece of greyboard with inked tissue tape round the edges, distressed black gloss card and a die cut heart and wings image which I've coloured with various Inka Gold colours (I only bought the red this morning on a flying visit to the Stamp Pad!!) and stamped over the outer heart with archival black ink. I've added my embossed packaging a few 'raindrop' gems on the crown, brads to attach the acetate, a bit of red ribbon and a stamped and embossed Stampers Anonymous sentiment. Voila - done in an hour!! Sometimes it's best not to over think these things and it will go perfectly in my newly decorated black and red bedroom!! Hope you have a creative week! JulieD x

Grungy Pink Canvas!

Thought I'd blog a canvas which I created a while back for a workshop at the Stamp Pad - I ran the workshop a few weeks ago which the participants seemed to enjoy! It's an eight inch square box canvas which I painted roughly with dark pink and cream acrylics then went to town embellishing with mini Paperartsy papers (from the swatch strip they created to advertise the range of papers!!) plus embossed and inked grungeboard, charms, stamped fragments, gems, corners, fibres, bead trim, seed beads, stamping and glossy accents ... Quite a frenzy of activity!! I particularly love those black cogs from 7 Gypsies.  It has pride of place on the wall of my craft area. Hope you like it - I'll be running another workshop next month at The Stamp Pad using loads of goodies from 7 Gypsies so if you're in the area check out the website here if you fancy it! JulieD

Grungy Monday - Stamped Vellum

Something new to me this week - I don't really use vellum, it's not that I don't like it, I just never think of it when I'm planning my projects, so this week's Grungy Monday challenge from Linda at StudioL3 was a bit different! Using an example from Tim Holtz' blog from way back (2008 I think) I've created a panel (with no purpose other than to look pretty!!) with a distress inked background and pieces of stamped and inked vellum which I rolled the corners of before attaching:

I threw water at my background which I blotted and heated before adding a stamped IndigoBlu flourish in two corners, my current favourite stamp (the raven from IndigoBlu's Hocus Pocus plate) is stamped and then embossed in gold on a black card background - the words are also from that plate and the Harlequin stamp is also one of theirs. I had a cream coloured flower embellishment which had been sitting on my craft desk looking a bit sad and not really my kind of thing at all so I sprayed it with espresso colourwash and dabbed gold mica powder over it - now that's more like it!! Hope you're all enjoying the weekend! JulieD x