Birthdays & Blog Hop at The Craft-Room Challenge

Hi, I hope you are all enjoying the beautiful sunshine here in the UK - I soooo love the sun.  Now, this might be a long post, but read on - it will be worth it!.

Not only does each fortnight pass by so quickly, the last year has as well, as it's now the Craft-Room Challenge's first birthday!  We have had 26 challenges to date and the most wonderful and inspiring entries - thank you for making it such a success.  To celebrate and as a way of saying "Thank You", we're having a Birthday Blog Hop to run alongside our regular fortnightly challenge.

The Blog Hop

There will be two fantastic main prizes at the end of the Blog Hop, which have very kindly been donated by

Liz Welch 

of

Liz is giving one of one of her DVDs to two lucky random winners

How To Take Part

All you have to do is visit each of the DT members' blogs on the hop, where you will find one really easy question on each.  Make a note of your answers as you go, and once you have visited all the blogs, email all your answers to:

Zoechaos

Do not leave the answer to your question in the comments section, but please leave a comment at each of our stops as there is a further prize to be won at each DT blog on the hop (see below for more details).


My question is:  What is the famous Sir Timmy's surname?

 

You should've arrived here from:  Esther 

and your next stop will be:  Liz Welch

And A Little Extra Something.....

In addition to the main prizes, each DT member has kindly donated a prize to be given away on their blog to one lucky winner, who will be chosen at random from the lovely comments you leave, so don't forget to leave me a comment at the end of this post to be in with a chance of winning.  The prize I have donated is a Paperartsy A6 red rubber stamp plate, a Crafty Individuals stamp CI-155, and some cream and red lace.

The Main Challenge

Our theme for this fortnight is "Anything Birthday", which has been chosen by the extremely talented Julia.  Your creation doesn't have to be a card, so long as it has the word "birthday" somewhere on it, it can be whatever you choose.  Please pop over to Julia's blog to check out her beautiful creations.  As with all of our challenges, there will be a prize for one lucky winner, who will be chosen at random, and Julia will choose her top 3 favourites.  The prize for this challenge is:

A Mystery Lucky Bag

Now, for the first time in I can't remember how long, I've made a card!!!  There is a reason for this!  It is my daughter's 18th birthday in July, so I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to get it made early.

The idea behind this scene was that the woman standing at the beginning of the path would represent the start of my daughter's journey through life as an adult. 

The stamp I've used is one of four I bought on Ebay recently, and were made by a company who is no longer in business, although I don't know the name of the company, I'm afraid.  I will share the others with you at a later date.

I cut some white SU cardstock to size, stamped the image in black Archival Ink, masked the bottom half of it then stamped a Lavinia path around her feet.  I then used Iced Spruce DI around the image and just a touch of Pine Needles to darken around the edge.  I then stamped "eighteen" up the left side of the image, and foliage around the outside, both with Iced Spruce, then overstamped the foliage with Archival black.  I then matted it onto a black card blank and then finished it off with a little Black Soot around the edge, some pink roses, and a metal heart inscribed with the word "Love". 




The sentiment inside reads "Happy Birthday", and it is stamped with the foliage to co-ordinate with the front of the card:







I do hope you can join us in both the challenge and the blog hop, and I look forward to visiting you to see your creations :-)

I would like to enter my card into the following challenges:

Ooh La La Creations - Make It Girly
Allsorts - Birthday for Someone Special
Crafty Boots - Anything Goes
Crafty Cardmakers - Distress It (I used my Distress Ink Pads to colour this)
Totally Gorjuss - Something New
Cute Card Thursday - Pink & Green

Have fun, and enjoy your week.

Maria x

Clean Lines

Hi, another weekend is here, but this time with beautiful weather hopefully.  I would firstly like to apologise for not visiting anyone's blogs as much as usual over the last couple of weeks.  We're getting closer to moving now - hopefully only about a week - so it's all systems go, and stress overload has set in, in a big way.

Anyway, enough waffling from me, I've made two small mdf wall hangings for one of my sisters grown up kids, who has just given their bedroom a complete overhaul and bought new furniture - everything is black, brown and cream with very clean lines and no clutter (for now, lol, but give it time!), so I thought a little something for the walls would make a nice gift.

 


The Stampsmith have a sketch as their theme this month (I've never done a sketch before!), which you can alter, rotate, embellish and personalise, so I've kept this in mind, using their sketch as a starting point.  I've also tried to keep them quite minimalistic, in keeping with the room they're going in.  Their DT have made fabulous creations, as always, for inspiration. 




Black gesso covers the mdf base, then Kraft cardstock coloured with Walnut Stain DI, then crackle stamped with the same DI, which has given it a slight look of well worn leather.  The Stampsmith images are stamped in Stazon onto glossy card then tinted with Vintage Photo DI and the rosettes made with a TH die.  Some dp has been used but I can't remember which one it is I'm afraid.  I'm that scatty at the moment, I completely forgot our anniversary today, you can imagine how bad I felt when some beautiful red roses arrived at work!

I'd also like to enter this pair of wall hangings into the following challenges:

Have a great weekend and enjoy the sun!

Maria x

Add/Use Some Fabric - Craft-Room Challenge

Hi, I hope your week has started well.  Another challenge over at the Craft-Room has just been launched and I'm really excited as it was my turn to choose the theme!  I decided to go with Add/Use Some Fabric, as I'm sure you've noticed by now that I do love my lace, and enjoy stamping onto fabric now and then as well.  The usual rules apply (check out the blog for full details) and a winner will be chosen at random to win something very nice indeed from our sponsor (more details about that below!).

I decided to use fabric throughout my creation, so the sewing machine was recently hunted down, along with the instruction booklet (I do miss my ancient Singer), and the dust blown off.   Now, the only things I have made in the past are several pairs of curtains, and a roman blind which I was extremely proud of - I even put a dangly trim along the bottom and that was before my crafting days!  Sound familiar, lol?

My first question when the machine was found was "where are my pins, cottons, and various other things?", so the idea of a wall hanging quickly changed to a little sewing bag/pouch (I was warned by Dave that, whatever happened with the sewing machine, it wasn't his fault - as if I would blame him!): 

The Front

I used some artist canvas, cut two pieces the same size, and frayed them around the edges.  I didn't colour this as I wanted to keep the colour and texture as it was, but give it a bit of a vintage look.  I stamped directly onto the canvas using a stamp plate from IndigoBlu, "Sewing Mends The Soul".  I then stamped the sentiment on one of the offcuts, layered it onto some Laura Ashley fabric and attached to the front of the bag.  I added some gorgeous cream cotton lace trim across the top and about two thirds down the front.

The Back

Stamps from the same plate was used for the back, apart from the needle book one which is from a Tim Holtz set. The sentiment was done in the same way as the one on the front.  Once all the stamping was done, and the additions sewn on, I stitched twice all the way round (not very straight though, lol).

A pin holder

The needle book was stamped twice onto scraps of fabric, then layered on top of each other and attached just across the top, to use for odd pins & needles.

And here it is in action:

 You will thrilled to know that our challenge this fortnight is sponsored by:

click to visit their store

who are offering a prize to one lucky winner, although we don't have the full details as yet so it will be a nice surprise!

I hope you have a great week, and I'm looking forward to visiting your blogs to see what you create!

I'd like to enter my sewing bag/pouch into the following challenges:-

Bunny Zoe's Crafts - Anything Goes (Ch 24)
Simon Says Stamp & Show - Anything Goes
Out Of A Hat Creations - Vintage Lace

Take care

Maria x

Show Us Your Bling at Let's Ink It Up

Hi, I hope you've all had a great week and are now enjoying your weekend.  A new challenge over at Let's Ink It Up has just been launched:

Show Us Your Bling 

You can use anything you consider to be your bling, such as rhinestones, jewels, pearls, glittery paint, etc, I decided to decorate and embellish an oval mdf plaque:

The plaque itself has been undercoated with 2 coats of Gesso, then I've painted it with chalky emulsion in Parlour Cream (I love this colour) three times, lightly sanding between each coat to give it a nice smooth finish.  I've used a crackle stamp (CI-116) here and there inked up with Antique Linen DI, and rolled for a very subtle effect (technique courtesy of Julia - thank you):

Close Up

The Lost Coast Labels have been stamped in black Archival Ink and coloured with Inktense Blocks, picking the ink up from the blocks with a small paintbrush for the details, and for the larger areas of the labels, I've tried to use the colour as a sort of wash, just to tint the area.

The top and bottom trims are from Dunelm Mill (the top one is metallic) and are attached with a glue gun - now, the last time I used a glue gun I spent £20 quid at the chemist on stuff for burns, so I only use this when absolutely necessary, lol - I'm very accident prone, having cracked my head open 3 times as a child, and nearly chopping my thumb off whilst trying to shell a coconut with a very long, sharp knife (again, as a child), but that's another story completely.  I've added a solid flower on each side, where the trims meet, and added a little stickles to them for a soft sparkle.  Some sheer gold ribbon has been threaded through, from which to hang.

We have a fabulous sponsor for our challenge this month:

The winner of the challenge will be drawn at random, so for one lucky person there will be a great prize of:

For inspiration, please check out the fantastic creations by the rest of the Design Team and remember, no digi images are permitted at LIIU.

I would like to enter my wall hanging into the following challenges:

The Stampman - "Show Us Your Favourite Technique" - one of my favourite techniques is to add
                           colour to my stamped images using water-based products, such as Inktense Blocks or
                           Distress Inks, and a fine paint brush.

The Crafty Bloggers Network Challenge - "Use Paints".

Have fun, enjoy your weekend, and I look forward to seeing your bling creations.
Maria x

Emboss It! Craft-Room Challenge DT

Hi, what fantastic entries we had in the "Ink It" challenge, over at the Craft-Room -  Nikki will have a very tough job choosing a top 3.  The winner of the random draw, and the top 3, will be posted on Tuesday, 8th May.

Moving onto our new challenge, it was Esther's turn to choose the theme and she has chosen "Emboss It" - please pop over to Esther's blog and have a look around, as her creations are fabulous.  The usual rules apply - check out the Craft-Room blog for full details.

My creation started out as something completely different, then I found a plank of wood and it all changed, lol.  Embossing is something I do like, but certainly don't do enough of.  I've used a combination of embossing techniques on this, and it even hangs as well! 

I have mounted three Tando mini book pages onto a piece of wood which has been coloured with Liberon dye and swiped with Inka Gold in Platinum.

The three chipboard book pages were covered in gesso mixed with a little Wedgewood Blue acrylic paint, then I added Distress Inks in Chipped Sapphire, Dusty Concord and Fired Brick.  I spritzed with water to blend and dried with a heat gun.  The two end pieces were then stamped with a SU swirl background stamp in Chipped Sapphire and embossed with clear embossing powder - it's really made the swirls pop.  The middle piece was dry embossed with a lovely elegant embossing folder I won from Marie at Dolly Daydreams in the Get Creative Challenge, towards the end of last year.

The CI images were stamped onto white card coloured with Spun Sugar, Milled Lavender, and Stormy Sky Distress Inks, and edged with Chipped Sapphire.

  

I coloured the images with some of the inks spritzed with a little water.










The two sentiments were stamped on the offcuts of the card from the images, then triple embossed with clear UTEE.  I have a bit of glitter on my Versamark pad and this has transferred onto the sentiments and given them a slight twinkle, which looks quite nice.





I've added some sparkly lace (Dunelm Mill) across the bottom of each piece, a metal heart inscribed with "Love" between the two sentiments and topped with a tiny pink diamante, then mounted them all onto the piece of wood.  I had my other half search high and low for two eye-hooks to screw into the top of the wood so I could use some cord to hang it from :-)

These CI images remind me of when we used to visit my nana in Southern Ireland each year as children, and my sister and I would play on the beach at the end of her front garden, so I'm going to give this to my sister for her birthday next month.

The challenge this fortnight is sponsored by:

(Click on the logo to visit the store!)

who are offering a £10 voucher to one lucky random winner, to spend in their shop!

If you would like a little inspiration, check out the creations by the rest of the DT as they really are fantastic.

I would like to enter my wall hanging into The Fashionable Stamping Challenge, as they also have a theme of embossing at the moment, Craftymess would like to see Distressing or Embossing, and Come and Get It Challenges would like to see Anything But A Card,

I hope you all enjoy your week, and I look forward to visiting your blogs to see your embossed creations.

Maria x