Revisiting Tim Holtz' tissue wrap technique

My long term blog readers will remember that for 3 years I took part in Tim Holtz' 12 tags of the year until 2 years ago when he sadly discontinued the challenge. I really loved learning a technique and turning his tag ideas into cards as that is my main love and have really missed this challenge.

I am part of a Tim Holtz Addicts Facebook page and I was delighted to see that the admin have decided to introduce a monthly challenge using one of Tim amazing 12 tags techniques. For January the brief is to use tissue wrap. I am going to try to take part in this each month as it really does spur my creativity and also gives me lots of new ideas and cards to sell at Dotty's Tearooms.

I had my crafting buddy, Daisy (my granddaughter) staying last week. She loves die cutting at the moment and she got out my Sidekick to make a sweet tag. She really loves the tiny side orders that are make specifically for this die cutter.

(Sorry about the blurry photo but it was just snapped with my phone). She adores glitter so of course we had to die cut using glitter card! She made this for her dolly Annabelle!

This gave me an idea to use another of the sidekick side orders for my tissue wrap card. So when Daisy went home I left my sidekick out. 

I have a few of Tim's tissue wraps and decided to use the Postale one.

 I added some collage medium to the card and then the tissue, scrunching some areas up to give some texture as per Tim's technique. Then I added various distress paints. 

I ended up with 4 pieces from my sheet of A4 card

I decided to use the red/grey background as I thought it would be perfect for a Valentine card. At the moment I am in full Valentine mode for Dotty's and I hope to get my cards into the shop this Friday.

Using my Sidekick I cut the little envelope in red and black card.

  I also used Tim's 3D mini provincial embossing folder to die cut some black edges which I added silver gilding paste to. It brings out the detail beautifully.

I also adore Tim's swirling stars die, I think it is one of my favourite ever dies and I use it lots. 

I die cut a starry background through the tissue wrap and matted it up on top of red card stock. I also used a my new die, the 3D laurel, leaf using aluminium tape (you will see this in the finished card). 

Below is the background after I had die cut the swirling stars...you can also use the stars you cut out, no waste with this one!

It was then time to put my card together...here it is;

with a couple of close ups, showing the laurel and the cute Sidekick envelope from the Love set.

The words are from Tim's thinlits sets; handwritten love and the & is from the Holiday words set. The hearts are Tim's Heartfelt Bigz. 

and one last shot

As well as linking up with the challenge on Facebook I would like to link up my card to the following challenges;

Try it on Tuesday 1/3 something old something new my old is my Postale tissue wrap, my new is my laurel die .
Frilly and Funkie 1/3 Inspired by I have of course been inspired by the master of crafting...Tim Holtz/

Crafty sentiments 1/3 anything goes

Cuttlebug mania 1/3 new mine is my new laurel 3D die

Get creative 1/3 anything goes

Simon says stamp Monday something new mine is my new laurel 3D die

Creative moments 1/3 anything goes

Crafting from the heart 1/3 anything goes

Love to create 2/3 anything mixed media

Not just cards 2/3 anything goes

Thanks so much for stopping by today.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

September stalks in

Good morning I see that September has stalked in today. Autumn is just around the corner now but I should be grateful as this summer has been so delightful. I cannot remember such a good summer since that of 1976.
However I do have so much to look forward to with Mother Nature..the acorns are ripe

and it will soon be conker time!

It is also the start of our next challenge over at Country View Challenges and for this month the theme is "Planes, trains and automobiles". All the details can be seen here. 

So back to the theme.. I will confess initially it had me really stuck as I own very little of any of these. I had a good root around and found some suitable stamps.  So for my first Design team project today I used a real oldie Tim Holtz clear Visual artistry stamp set (I don't know if Stampers anonymous even sell these clear stamps these days). 

The stamps are of a truck and an old vintage American car

I stamped them out using watering can archival ink. I also found some tiny Tim (!) stamps to use. I inked up some card and also die cut one of my fave dies...the world die.

I made any inky background, just playing with different distress ink washes and also some stencilling through Tim's clockwork stencil. My colour palette now has a more autumnal feel to it.

I also added some alphabet stencilling.

I then added some random plane and automobile stamping (and a few clocks)

 I also die cut and altered some cogs.

Then it was time to put my card design together. You can see that I distressed the edges and mounted it on a Kraft card blank. The sentiment is by Lili of the Valley and it is up for sale in Dotty's Teahouse.

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

Simon says stamp Wednesday anything goes
Simon says stamp Monday Fall/autumn
Simon says stamp Work it Wednesday 1/3 stamping/celebrations
Creative Moments 3/3 anything goes
Try it on Tuesdays 1/3 take a ride
The crafty addicts 1/3 all about boys/men

We hope to see lots of you joining in with the planes, trains and automobiles challenge this month. Why not have a dig through your own stash and see what you have there to use and then share it with us? 

The details again can be found here.

Thanks for stopping by and for your kind comments,

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

Continuing to sizzle

Records here in the south of England are being broken as our heatwave continues......we had 33c in the shade on Thursday and Friday...goodness knows what it was in the sun...it really feels like I have moved to Rhodes! My garden is looking a bit frazzled but I still have some colour in my pots and my tomatoes have ripened beautifully.

 Billy has been flaking out in any shade he can find.

 I enjoyed my first crop of tomatoes when Daisy stayed last week, there is nothing quite like the flavour of home growns. 

I am sharing a tag today, as we are meeting up for a family lunch at my son's. The fun egg stamp is Rubber Dance and provided a perfect seat for my Tim Holtz, very dapper paper doll to sit on in shade of the tree. The die cuts are a mix of Tim's and Cheery Lynn and the sentiments a mix of Tim's rub ons and small stickers. The stencils are Tim's and Visible Image. 

I thought my hearts, made from corrugated card and inked and flicked with gold paint looked a little like sun dried tomatoes! My son has become the most avid gardener...much to my amazement but total delight and spends many hours tending his gorgeous sunny garden.

Family Times together, now that our children are grown, are few and far between but they are a true delight when then happen and I like to record them.

 We all have our sunhats and deckchairs packed and will enjoy some precious family time together today. 

I would like to enter my tag into these challenges;

Rubber Dance colour theme or nature Their stamped eggs are perfect to sit my dapper chap on! 

Emerald Creek Dares 1/3 the great outdoors

PaperArtsy mint, sage, claret and gold (there is gold spray on my hearts, hard to see in the photos but they are there!)

Creative Artiste 1/3 anything mixed media

Simon says stamp Wednesday make your own background

Creative fingers 3/3 anything goes

Enjoy your weekend too, keep cool if you are in this part of the country.

I will be back on Monday with my next Visible Image Wonderland sample.

Bye for now,

Jane x

More love in February

We are racing through February. There is so much going on at the ponds with the lovely wildlife. Just look at the love between the swans which I witnessed at dusk last week.

I am here with my 2nd project to hopefully inspire you to join our "anything but cute" February theme over at Country View. Remember that February is a short month so you only have another week to enter and possibly win the £20 crafting voucher to stock up on all the fab new products that have been arriving on the Country View craft website.

For my 2nd card I still kept to the love theme of my first card but this time made a general "love" rather than a Valentine's.
I made myself a metallic background using aluminium tape

and a knitting embossing folder. I used my heart Tim Holtz Bigz die and cut out and removed all the hearts. These will be useful for other projects.

I matted this up on black card

and dded some gilding wax

I then used another of the Tim Holtz hand stamps which I had spare from my first project. I fussy cut it out.

 I infilled a couple of the hearts with red die cuts and one with a little white heart die cut and a sentiment to finish off my card. 

We have seen some lovely anything but cute projects from the entries so far and would love to see even more. All the details for the challenge are here

I would like to join in with the following challenges;

Pixie's snippets playground #320

Crafty catz 2/3 anything goes

Creative fingers 1/3 anything goes

Get creative 1/3 anything goes/use ribbon

Creative Artiste 3/3 anything goes mixed media

Rubber dance stamps 2/3 colour board or hearts I went with the hearts theme

Crafty Calendar 1/3 2 or more layers

That's crafty 2/3 I heart you

Simon says stamp Wednesday add a die cut

Thanks for stopping by today and for the kind comments you take the time to leave me, I really appreciate every single one. A warm welcome too for my newest followers, it's lovely to see you on board my creative journey here. 

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

My Creative Chemistry with Tim Holtz

If you saw my last post you would have read that I had a date with none other than the professor of all things inky, Tim Holtz at his Creative Chemistry Live UK edition workshop in Harrogate on Friday.

Oh my...what a day!

 The sun even shone and as I walked to the class from the hotel I smiled at the colours of the autumn trees.

The workshop was held at Art from the Heart in Harrogate

Everything was set up for us as we arrived...including our very own Tim Holtz aprons which of course we all got signed.

 There were 25 very exited people raring to create...including ME!

I cannot describe how much fun I had and what a brilliant teacher he is. Tim is just such a great guy, his teaching is inspiring and with Mario helping with the smooth running of the class, the workshop was everything and more than I dreamt it could possibly be. He also has some very funny crafting anecdotes which I will always remember.

 The ever smiling and helpful Mario, kept everything running so smoothly.

I will obviously not share Tim's teaching notes but I will share what I made.

It was also such fun to be among a group of such like minded crafters. We really did come out with the biggest smiles possible on our faces, and laden with goodies too. I also caught up with some blogging ladies and Facebook friends who I have never met but felt like old friends. 

These are the tags I made. 10 tags to learn 10 new inky techniques.

We were even given a little folder to hold them in

 and so many wonderful goodies ..in the photo further down you will see the bag he gave us to put everything in. Such generosity.

And when class finished Tim patiently signed everything we wanted signing and posed for photos...

even taking a selfie for me on my phone.

Wow, that really was an experience I can tick off my best wish list...I was in crafting heaven. Thanks Tim and Mario you really are the best....and thanks to Ben of AFTH for organising the whole event.

So today I decided to take my 4 favourite tags (below) I made on Friday and use a combination of these 4 techniques to make a tag to put into Jane's Journal to remember this most awesome creative experience.

I used one of my favourite Tim stamp sets, Lady Rose to watercolour with Distress Oxides and chose colours from those I saw around in me on that warm sunny September day.

 Remember the now was the perfect sentiment to use.

So I used a little Creative Chemistry...

to make my tag.

some close ups

I will certainly remember that glorious autumn creative day.

More words cannot express just how much I enjoyed myself and also what gentlemen Tim and Mario are. I know they won't be reading my blog but I just want to say the biggest thank you to them. Moments like that are ones to treasure forever.  When I look at my tag in my journal it will help me to

Remember the now.

I would like to link my tag up into the following challenges;

The Ribbon Girl 2/3 any image
Frilly and Funkie 2/3 to everything there is a season
Happy Little stampers September watercolour
Creative Inspirations 2/3 Seasonal my season is a glorious start to autumn
Craft Stamper take it make it September
Rubber Dance favourite stamp Lady Rose is my favoruite Tim Holtz stamp set

I am back tomorrow with my weekly Visible Image DT post, the weather this weekend has just been glorious. Enjoy the sunshine if you have it. If not I have plenty to send.

See you in the morning,

Bye for now,

Jane x