The Play Date Cafe - colour challenge PDCC105

This week over at the

The Play Date Cafe

the challenge is to create something using the colours

Kraft/Taupe...Flesh...Cadet Blue

 

Well, here's my take on the challenge -

meet Medusa!

I cut the bodice from a scrap of leather but used the

reverse (suede-y)side as the colour better fitted the challenge.

I sewed on a strip of lace at the top.

The skirt and wrap are both sari ribbon - I've been lucky

that for the past three weeks of joining in with these challenges,

I've had just the right colours of fabric.

The 'Medusa' locks are part of a recycled scarf.

Her face is moulded from air dried clay and painted with acrylics

and water colour pencils.

She is mounted onto mountboard which I covered with

brown paper, then distressed a bit with masking tape, gesso-ed,

painted and added some Brilliance Dew Drop ink

-colour Pearlescent Sky Blue.

I also had some sari ribbon which complemented the

colours so added that to the edge of the background too.

I stuck everything down with good old glue sticks using a glue gun

- I was amazed that the glue didn't come through to the front of the

 sari ribbon, it must be extremely strong fabric.

I don't know how it will 'age' though (the glue that is)

as it isn't acid free.  As Medusa is staying with me though,

it doesn't really matter - we can age together gracefully,

although I think I've got quite a start on her! 

Thanks for looking :)

An Altered Tin: 'Fall in love with Buttons' Swap

'Fall in Love with Buttons' is a swap I joined in with on a lovely blog called

Button Floozies.

"With Autumn soon upon (most of) us, I thought it would be a lot of fun to have a Fall-themed swap! The Fall in Love with Buttons Swap is one-to-one; that is, each participant will be paired up with a swap partner. We will each alter an Altoids tin, filling it with autumn colored or autumn themed buttons, and send it to our partner!"

I love buttons (well, who doesn't!) and I love sorting

through them, so couldn't wait to alter a tin to fill it up -

 I had to though as I didn't

have the right sized tin but found one on Ebay.

I painted the tin with a coat of white acrylic,

then covered it with some Autumnal patterned Decopatch paper.

I cut some leaves from scraps of leather

using the Tim Holtz' Alterations/Sizzix 'Tattered Leaves' die.

I found a couple of wooden beads to represent berries.

I stitched the leaves and berries onto an old doily flower then stuck it

onto the lid.  I also added a couple of Autumnal themed buttons.

I remembered a poem learnt at school, well the first few

lines of it anyway - Ode to Autumn by John Keats.

I Googled and found it, printed out a few lines

and added them to the outside and inside of the lid.



Then the best bit - finding all the Autumnal coloured buttons

to go inside - I must admit I wanted to keep them all - lol!

Here's all the buttons I managed to cram inside the tin.

Unfortunately my swap partner hasn't confirmed whether or not

she's received the tin yet, although as I sent it out at the end

of last month it should have arrived by now.

This is how I wrapped it - the button card (gift tag) is a rubber stamped

image from the 'Very Vintage Set 3 La Couture' A Katy Fox Collection

from Toodles and Binks.

If you want to see some of the other altered tins and buttons

there is a Linky thingy on the Button Floozies blog here 

and some more on the Button Floozies Swaps

group on Flickr here.

Thanks for looking at mine :)

The Play Date Cafe - colour challenge PDCC104

This week over at

The Play Date Cafe

it's their '2nd Anniversary Challenge' & to celebrate

they have lots of lovely prizes to give out to lucky participants.

It was my first time joining in last week and I was thrilled to

get so many lovely comments and also a little award

for my blog - yay!!

Thanks guys!!

This week's (Anniversary) challenge is to use the colours

Mauve...Egg Yolk...Artichoke

What fabulous colours they are too!

I've decided that whenever I join in with these challenges

I will make a doll of some sort and mount it on a card

as I did last week.

As luck would have it I had some sari ribbon with two

of the colours already combined!

I machine stitched a few strips together to make the skirt.

The bodice is silver self adhesive tape coloured with alcohol inks

and roughly embossed freehand with a pointy stick.

Her shawl is more of the sari ribbon but with some felting yarn

meshed into it I did this with my new needle felting tool.

How easy it was to do too!

The background card is old music and book pages

coloured with distress ink and acrylic paint.

Her face is moulded from air dry clay and coloured

with water colour pencils and acrylic paint.

Her hair is mohair fleece.

(I've just realised I didn't give her any pupils in the eyes - oops!!)

Thanks for looking x

'Tim in Ten' and 'Quixotic Inspirations Sketch Challenge'

I had to make a birthday card and I didn't have much time

(well, that's not strictly true, but I didn't want to spare the time when there's so many other crafty things to do!)

However, it had to be done, and when I saw the sketch challenge on

Quixotic Inspirations

I decided to play along!

I kept it simple, just how I like it (well, that's not strictly true either but I couldn't come up with anything better in the time I allowed!)

I also decided to play along with the challenge over on

Studio L3:Grungy Monday

which was a speed challenge (just 10 minutes to make a card)

and where at least one Tim Holtz product should be used.

Originally I thought I couldn't possibly make a card in ten minutes

but an email from Terry reminded me that the ten minutes

was for the actual creating (not for the idea or getting the supplies together!)

I had no excuse then did I!

I still kept it simple though - oh well!

The items I used to make the card were as follows:

Stampers Anonymous - Tim Holtz Collection 'School Desk CMS057' stamp (the rectangle note pad)

The Artistic Stamper 'Botanical 2 A5#056' (The rulers, ink bottle and nib)

Hero Arts 'CL289' (the 'For You' sentiment in the circle)

If you're still reading this,

thanks for looking :)

Bookmark (and tag) for Christmas!

That's the theme over on the Flickr Art 'n' Soul group for the

swap challenge which runs until 1st December ...

"to make a BOOKMARK with a VINTAGE theme AND include LACE somewhere on the project - you can make the actual bookmark from any medium you wish providing it is sturdy enough to be used and adorn it any way you want to as long as it has a vintage/shabby chic theme!"

For my bookmark then, I cut up an old dressmaking tissue pattern

and stuck on an image photocopied from the packet -

then gave the whole thing a couple of layers of Mod Podge.

The Mod Podge dries clear and leaves the tissue much sturdier

and prevents it from tearing.

I machine stitched it onto some cotton fabric

and added a lace flower aged with some Tea Dye coloured Distress Ink.

I didn't do anything to the button, it was like that - just old and shabby!

I added a few layers of lace to the bottom

and the back is covered with lace too.

The ribbon threaded through the top is seam binding

distressed with more of the Tea Dye coloured Distress Ink.

(In reality it isn't that deep a colour)

 

This is a two part challenge as we also had to make a tag ....

 "You must make a Christmas themed tag to go with your bookmark - so your partners will receive a scrummy Christmas pressie bookmark wrapped with a nice Christmas tag"

 

I actually prefer the tag to the bookmark!

I made it in the same way.

The band of Christmas greetings at the top is part of a ribbon

I saved from a Lush parcel last year.

The hat is a Christmas button which I think looks rather fetching!

I stitched plain paper to the back so there is somewhere

for the message to be written.

They both look like tags, or they both look like bookmarks -

whatever you prefer - lol.

I hope the button emellishments aren't too bulky though

for bookmarks (oops, I should have thought of that earlier!)

Thanks for looking :)

The Play Date Cafe - colour challenge PDCC103

This is my first time playing along with

The Play Date Cafe

challenge blog and I hope

it isn't my last!

The colours we had to use in any project of our choice were

 'Rust', 'Storm' and 'Deep Sea'.

Well that was easier said than done!

Rust was no problem as I had some

 Friendly Plastic and Sari Ribbon

which fitted the bill and became a bodice and sleeves.

The other two colours

Storm and Deep Sea

took me a little longer to come up with, but I eventually settled on

 some more Sari Ribbon and thin cotton

which became the skirt.  I also had some Friendly Plastic which

perfectly complemented these colours and that became the

heart shaped hands!

I didn't set out to make a witch, but that's what she looks like to me!

Her face is moulded from air dried clay painted with acrylic,

water colour pencils and a Sakura Jelly Roll pen.

Her hair is fibres and her hat is more of the Sari Ribbon.

I painted on the neck so the head didn't look as though

it was floating in space!

She is glued onto mountboard covered with

old sheet music coloured with paint and edged with a

copper coloured pen.

Only the head and the bodice are actually glued down

so the rest of her can move (not that I've been playing

with her or anything ... cough, cough!!)

I'd never have thought of putting these colours

together, but I do love the combination.

One last photo -

her best withchy pose ...

Thanks for looking - I'm off to find her a broomstick now!

Altered Cigar Box - for a Jam Maker

When visiting hubby's niece recently she very kindly gave us a

 jar of home made jam - and very yummy it is too!

A couple of days later I happened upon some little packets containing

 'transparent jam pot covers' in a charity shop - what a co-incidence!

  This gave me an idea of putting together a little box full of jam making accessories.

I remembered I had an old cigar box in my craft cupboard

just waiting for the perfect project!

I searched Flickr for some appropriate images I could use and 

found these -

                            

I painted the box with cream acrylic.  Found some similiarly coloured

K & Co scrapbook paper, cut it to size and machine stitched around

the edge and also stitched the 'J' image on before sticking it

onto the box with Liquitex matte medium.

I added a rosette made up of vintage doilies and a gingham scrap,

some ribbon and a strip of Martha Stewart border punch

to resemble a crisp white linen tablecloth.

I also added the scrabble letters to spell out the name of the recipient and this idea I shamelessly copied from Jan of Jan's Arty Journey

who makes the most amazing collages.

Want to see the inside?

I used two of the same images again as well as the Jell-O one

and some rubber stamping from the 'Play Time - Set 1' by Toodles and Binks.

Here's the contents

Five packets from the charity shop, some assorted fabric circles

I cut with pinking shears and some ribbon to tie around the top

of the jam jars.

Here it is all neatly packed into the box and it's topped off with

a really old booklet I purchased from the internet called

 'Why jams and jellies taste fresher when made the Certo way'

by Mrs Handy-Pandy and it contains hints on jam making

(not that Sue needs them of course!) and loads of recipes too.

I don't know how useful any of this will actually be,

but I had a lot of fun putting it all together.

I'll just have to pass it onto Father Christmas now for his safe keeping

until 25th December!

Thanks for looking :)

Stampotique Challenge - A Humorous Birthday

The current challenge on the

Stampotique Designers Challenge

 blog is to create a humourous birthday greeting.

For the background of my card I used old tissue paper

and book text that had previously been coloured with

Brusho powders and spray inks.

The saying of course isn't an original one, but

I thought it was quite fitting for poor old

'Prom Queen' who looks as though she needs a good haircut!

The hair is hand dyed (not by me) mohair fleece

and replaces Prom Queen's usual bunches

which I chopped off!

I printed the words onto copy paper and stuck them onto

the background.  They are edged with gold pen although it isn't

very bright.  The white dots around the words were made

with a white paint marker.

The challenge ends today so I'm just in time!

Thanks for looking,

 and happy belated birthday wishes

to Vicki who chose this challenge.

Some ATCs for a change!

I don't make many ATCs these days but when I saw

 this post

from Penny in Maine, USA I had to join in!

Penny (of A Penny for your thoughts blog) invited participants

to make five ATCs and send them to her so she can make them

into little concertina books and send back out to the participants so

we can own a little bit of artwork from each other.

All my ATCs had Distress Ink backgrounds - you know, the method where

you swipe the pad across the craft sheet, mist with a little water

and glide your card across - great fun and you never know

what the results will be!

All the images used were rubber stamped Stampotique ones onto

card and stuck onto the ATCs.

Various bits of embellishment were added

and some more rubber stamping directly onto the ATCs.

Can't wait to see what ATCs I get back.

Penny told me she's already started work on the concertina books

 and has had big sheets of tea dyed watercolour paper drying

 in her back yard -

  I wonder what the neighbours thought - LOL.