A summer fairy bauble for STAMPlorations

Hello I am here today to share my very first project using the awesome brand new CRAFTplorations shapes for sale now over at the STAMPlorations web site here. The lovely Shery posted me over a selection of shapes to play with and boy did I have fun.

The weather this week in South East England has been just perfect...this is my tiny outdoor space where my studio is and I am inspired by Mother Nature every time I walk outside.

You can see my sweet studio calling to me.

and here are some of my recent flowers I planted up in my pots.

For the first time my edelweiss has bloomed. 

My hanging baskets are starting to bloom too. This is one of my begonia flowers.

So I sat down at my desk in my studio with the lovely shapes Shery sent me and had a play at how they might even fit together.

I was drawn first to the sweet fairy as I love fairies and I love moons. There are different thicknesses and materials to choose from, do take a look at the website. Mine is the 3" high, 3mm thickness MDF and you get 9 in a pack in this material. Isn't she gorgeous? Shery cuts everything herself on site using her laser cutter. 

I rested her down on top of

 the #1 Christmas bauble

as I had just finished a  "Zoom" online crafting session with my 6 year old granddaughter  Daisy. We  made a Christmas card online together on the hottest day of the year! (yes she is her Nanna's Christmas loving granddaughter indeed!) 

My version is the 1.5mm wide MDF and you get 12 pieces in a pack. 

This gave me the idea that the 2 would work together perfectly as a non Christmas hanging bauble. I could then send it as a gift to my little  Daisy, who I have not seen now for over 2 months.

 I decided to make a magical starry sky for her.

First I painted the whole of the bauble with my Smurf  PaperArtsy Fresco paint. There is no need for Gesso or an undercoat at all with these paints. They also dry almost instantly. 

 I decided that to be magical my stars needed to be pink so I used Bubble Gum Fresco paint through my Oh my stars ARTplorations stencil

I painted the whole fairy with Vanilla Fresco

and then added some details. Her dress and shoes are Bubble Gum paint again.

I stamped a lovely sentiment from Fond expressions 2 using black Archival ink

and then added details to her wings, hair and moon using gold Kuretake watercolour paint. 

Once she was dry I stuck her to her starry sky using Decou-page glue. 

I finished off with some polka dot ribbon so that Daisy can hang her up.

I held her up in my garden for fun

and then realized that right next to my studio was the perfect prop....my baby Christmas tree from 2019 who will be coming indoors again to hold my vintage tree ornaments and chocolates this December. 

So this just shows that baubles are not just for Christmas are they?

There are lots of lovely shapes that Shery sells which will fit onto the baubles. They will make such sweet inexpensive gifts to post.

Before I close I have some exciting news that Shery has kindly offered to sponsor a giveaway. If you would like to win your very own fairy and bauble blanks plus the fab Oh my stars stencil here's how;

1.  Just leave me a little comment here on this post and
2. Pop over to the main STAMPlorations blog here and leave a 2nd comment.
 The giveaway will close on 8th June and Shery will select one lucky randomly chosen winner who has left a comment on both blog posts. The winner will be announced over on the main STAMPlorations blog on 10th June.  Good luck to everyone!

And finally if you use my unique code  STAMPGIRLJANE at checkout anytime on the STAMPlorations website here you can always get an extra 20% off including any promotions which are running at that time! Shery ships very reasonably internationally too and has so many fab products on line, stamps, stencils, shapes, dies,sequins.....do check it out.

Thanks so much for popping over here and I hope you enjoyed your sunny visit.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

The kindness of others

As everyone knows I have a very "cute/whimsical" side to my creativity. Yes I am a very much inky mixed media girl but I also love fairies, the man in the moon, Father Christmas and the Clangers (remember them?) There is one lovely artist called Tracy Easson who has just captured for me the very essence of my whimsical side. I had the delight to attend one of Tracy's workshops last year (remember those times!) and in the flesh she is just awesome; sweet, kind, generous and an all round good human being. Her range of stamps which drew me in are those featuring her cute mice family, who talk to her. Yes I perfectly understand that. 

I recently entered a giveaway she had on Facebook in connection with her Etsy shop and was thrilled when I found out that I had won one of her delightful mouse prints.

It arrived today and oh my....just look at the packaging inside.

I carefully opened it up and this just made me cry, with joy. My very own mouse print.

How perfect are these words?

Look at her pocket full of love and her feet where magical hearts appear with every step. So very special.

I miss my own little granddaughter Daisy (and Jack her little brother) so much, I will frame this and keep it in Daisy's room here until she returns to stay here after all this mess of a pandemic is over.

I have shared a few of my cards and bookmarks on my blog before, one of my favourite stamp sets Tracy sells is the moon one. This was my Hb's Easter card

and below is a bookmark I made for my son.

So today I will share a new one, a bookmark I made and sent to my best friend. She loved it too.

Here's a close up of the sweet mouse boat

I would like to enter it into the following challenges;

Through the craft room door 1/2 anything goes

Not just cards 2/3 anything goes

Cute card Tuesdays 1/3 critters

Fab n funkie 1/3 anything but a card

In these troubled  times there are so many kind souls out there.

Tracy is one of them. 

Thanks for stopping by today.

I am back tomorrow evening at 8pm as I am delighted to have a little giveaway here...it involves a little something I was inspired to make for my own sweet Daisy.

Bye for now,

Jane x

Sharing creativity the Tim Holtz way

During lockdown I have had plenty of  extra time at home and have spent many hours in my studio getting inky. As you all well know getting inky is my first love and the creative muse for all of this is Tim Holtz. I fell in love with his distress inks many, many moons ago and was even lucky enough to attend one of his workshops in the UK a few years back. 

During lockdown Tim has given 10 yes 10 weeks of  2 hour+ Facebook lives where he has been demoing many of his awesome techniques and products. His enthusiasm even after all these years is so infectious.  He just adds them to his blog if you want to watch them on catch up.  I have loved every single one. 

2 Saturday's ago he started a "Question and answer" format and started off with my first love, original distress ink pads. The one thing Tim keeps saying is to "just play". With his voice ringing in my ears, as I am not able to sell my cards at moment as Dotty's is of course shut for now, that is exactly what I have been doing. Instead of making cards I have gone back to making some tags...just for fun.

And wow what fun it has been. I also belong to another Tim inspired Facebook page and the lovely Zoe who runs it ( she and I met and became great friends at the same Tim UK workshop a few years back) challenged us to use just ONE distress ink colour and make something in advance to the new colours coming out on Wednesday.

I embraced this and have shared a few tags over the last few days and everyone both on Facebook and Instagram have been so kind and left such wonderful feedback. Even Tim kindly commented on one of my IG posts. I also shared them on another stamping group I am a member of which sparked the same challenge. A lot of people have been asking how I made them and I had lots of messages too.

So today I thought that I should pay back some of the amazing inspiration and kindness that Tim has shown over the last 10 weeks and rather than just make I would take some process photos and share a step by step of how I made the backgrounds for my recent one colour tags. I found a very simple format that worked very well for me and I could make a tag from start to finish in about 40 minutes. This is just me, there is no right or wrong way but this is how I made them. 

OK first choose your colour  (I have already shared makes with Dried Marigold and Mermaid lagoon) so today I went with Abandoned coral.

I used these heavystock mixed media tags but I often make my own using his tag die. I use everything from white card, watercolour, black, kraft, glossy etc. I used these heavy stock tags for these particular techniques as there is a lot of water involved and some papers collapse at the thought of getting so wet.

My makes use 2 types of background, the first using the age old wrinkle free technique which Tim resurrected in the FB live. I have not used this this for sooo long it was such fun to get out my old travel iron again. This is my version.

Scrunch the tag then flatten it out again roughly and rub over the surface using the ink pad direct to paper.

Spritz on some water and allow it to wick for a moment. It's fun seeing the ink move.

With a hot iron smooth out the tag again, ironing on both sides.

Make sure you iron on a heat proof surface and DO NOT use your best iron unless you want to distress your clothes too!

For the 2nd background I just pushed some ink onto my craft mat, spritzed with water and then picked up layers of ink, drying with my heat gun between layers. 

Just look at how old my heat gun is..it is an original Ranger one and is at least 20 years old! It is so well loved and used nearly every day.

Then for the rest of the process I did the same for both tags.

I added a layer of stencilling, using my rose stencil.

I added some background text stamping, mine is from my Lady Rose stamp set.

Here are my 2 finished backgrounds.

I then die cut and embossed my dragonfly and butterflies cut using Tim's Bigz dies and added some ink either direct from pad or by watercolouring. 

 And last but most important for me I chose some words from my small talk set....I just love these tiny stickers as for me they finish everything off.

So here they are completed

with a couple of close ups;

 and one final shot.

So there you have it. Please note that no one has asked me to do step by step and I am not in any way at all being sponsored by Tim or his manufacturers. I genuinely love my inks and products and use them nearly every day of my crafting life.

As Tim has been so very generous with his time over 10 weeks I thought this was the very least I could offer back to the many crafters who also love what he does. 

I hope this has been of some help and if there are any questions please fire away. Please remember that this is my very individual take on making these 1 colour distress tags. There are so many ways you can do this......just go on, have a play and have fun.

and in Tim's small talk words; 

Live simply, give generously and practice kindness.

Thanks so much for stopping by today.

Stay safe and stay creative,

Jane x