Winter Days

The new Mixed Media World Challenge #10 showcases some beautiful colors all in grays, blues and browns.  This is what our winter looks like and had me think of wintry days where the sun doesn't shine and the sky is overcast.

I took the colors and smeared them on the craft mat with water and dragged watercolor paper through the ink to pick up a soft watery background.  Then I stamped over with the PaperArtsy set of the music, branches and bird using Pumice Stone dye ink.  I shaded the bird with watercolor pencils.

The sentiment is from Verses Rubber Stamps and I added a layer of Mica flakes form Stampendous.

The lovely color inspiration: 

Happy New Year's Eve!

Suzz

A Merry Merry Christmas to You!

To you and yours a Merry Merry Christmas!

The stamp is Stampendous and I love these sweet birds and how they are huddled up for warmth.

I used a touch of Glimmer Mist and Ranger Distress Stain Sprays mixed and splattered onto  watercolor cardstock.

I stamped the stamp and colored them with the STAEDTLER watercolor pencils.  I added glittery goodness over white gel pen for the snow.

To pop the colors a the end I covered the entire surface with versamark watermark ink and heat embossed with clear embossing powder.

The sentiment is Penny Black.

Have a wonderful Christmas!

Suzz

Funkie Junkie Tag # 11 & 12

Happy Christmas!  It is getting very close to the big day!  I snuck in some time this morning to finish up my tags for Linda's Funkie Junkie Twelve tags of Christmas.  Her on-line store the  Frilly and Funkie Boutique sponsors her challenge. 

Linda's tag #11 is a beautiful shimmery tag with lovely hints of blue and a snowy snowflake inspired tag.  I tried to play with the ideas of the embossing paste, snowflakes and the shades of blue in my take on her tag.

I started with a coat of embossing paste on my tag.  I laid a layer of tissue paper over the embossing paste and inked up the snowflake stamp and stamped into the tissue paper. You get the stamped image and an impression in the embossing paste. I repeated randomly and at the end I sprayed the entire surface with a blue mist.

I let that dry and while it was drying I decided to cut out a series of snowflakes in vellum. I thought I would use the soft vellum to place the snowflakes onto my background. 

When I finished I realized you couldn't see them so I decided to edge them in silver which lead to embossing them with Aged Silver embossing powder and then of course I had to emboss the edge of my tag as well. :)

It ended up darker than I intended with the aged silver embossing powder but I love the heavy metallic feel of the snowflakes.

Next up is Linda's rustic charming tag # 12.  I love that Linda' folded her tag to create a folded tag with a message inside.  I was sketching this idea and trying to figure out what I wanted to do with her lovely plaid on the outside and holly on the inside, when inspiration struck.  What if I cut off both sides of the fold to make it a tag on either side.  After I sketched this and thought about the plaid I realized it would look like a dapper Christmas vest.  So here is my Santa's vest folded tag.

 I used the Tim Holtz stripes stencil with Candy Apple Red and Lucky Clover to create the plaid on the front.  I used Antique Linen in the back with the same plaid pattern.   I added a few buttons and died my suspenders to coordinate.  Linda had the adorable tag and holly on her band which inspired my tag on the suspender.

 When you open it up inside there is a smattering of holly with red stickle berries

I added Christmas music in the background using the Antique Linen Dye Ink and then the berries over that with the Penny Black sentiment stamped in the center. 

A close up of the tag and holly:

Thanks for stopping by!

Suzz

Winter

 Hi all and welcome to another week of the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge. This week the challenge is winter wonderland! 

We had a big blast of snow in November which was followed by incredibly mild days and melted away.  Now we are a few days before Christmas and there is just a light dusting of snow on the ground.  It won't be a winter wonderland this week.    I decided to create a card based on the snow that we like to see at Christmas.

I started with a background of some yummy silver and blue mists on watercolor paper.  I followed it up with some stamped snowflakes in a lovely navy ink.  I finished it off with a layered snowflake with silver, blue and white layers.  A few jingle bells and a simple Christmas card ready to give to a friend.

Products:  Simon Says Stamp Eliza Snowflake Die ,  Simon Says Stamp Lindeman Snowflake Die,  Simon Says Stamp Funky Snowflake Die , Stampers Anonymous Tim Holtz Snowflake stamps,  Ranger Distress Stain Spray - Brushed Pewter, Jingle Bells, Memento Paris Dusk, Sizzix Thinlits - Handwritten Holidays, Simon Says Stamp Sequins

As always Simon Says Stamp will be giving away $50 voucher to shop at the fabulous Simon Says Stamp Store

So now it's YOUR turn, come play along and show us your winter inspired art! You have 2 weeks to play along with this challenge.

Suzz

Follow Simon Says Stamp on Instagram

If you use instagram add  #sssmchallenge to your challenge entry uploads so we can see them on there too!

Silvery Tag

Happy Saturday!  I hope all your holiday activities are going well and you are getting some time for yourself. :)  I was able to sit down and play a little yesterday.  (Yeah!)  I love color and the Words & Paintery color palettes have had me inspired to try so many different things.  This month's color palette is Gray, Blue and Silver. 

 I actually created a masterboard of these colors blended together and have been playing with different ideas using the pieces.  My first completed project was this tag:

 I started with Ranger Distress Stain Spray Tarnished Pewter, Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist - blue and a white mist.  I blended these together multiple times and this was one of my backgrounds.

I laid down some die cut snowflakes and sponged silver ink over the snowflakes. I then sponged on snowflakes using blue die ink over the stencil.

I then took a holly stencil and sponged over that the darker blue ink.  I outlined with black watercolor pencils and softened it with a water brush.  I stamped the deer using black ink and heat embossed him with black embossing powder to make him pop.

I finished with an old Hero Arts Definition stamp over the background.

Here are the inspiration colors form Words & Paintery:

Have a wonderful weekend!

Suzz

Christmas Gifts

I am winding down at work and getting ready for a nice long holiday rest!   I was busy creating little Christmas houses which are hollow to allow you to either use as a place setting or a gift.  You can put candy treats or a gift card inside the houses.

If you can imagine what I started with you will see that I used the Basically Bare House Die Cuts for the front and back of my house and the Basically Bare Mixed Media card set to cut sides to my houses.

 There is some fun tape from the Basically Bare - Paperie Bindery that you moisten and it attaches and it has a paper finish so it can take the paint or gesso.  I have been wanting to try it out and I used baby wipes to moisten it and form my corners on the house.

After that it was a matter of finding papers, embellishments and fun accessories for my houses.

 I cut the papers to size and taped them onto the houses. I used a touch of washi tape on the cornes to make them look fun.

 I used hot glue on the base and covered it in glitter while hot to get my mounds of snow on the base.  I then finished off the house with embossing paste on the roof, door and around the bottom again and coated that in crystal glitter.

 I had some misted tissue paper from previous years that I tore up and stuffed into my houses with a few candy canes and holiday candy.

 Hope you enjoyed my winter wonderland!

Products:  Basically Bare Retail Shop, October Afternoon, Authentique, Jolee's Stickers, Idea-Ology -Seasonal Chit Chat, Embossing Paste, Washi Tape, Stampendous Crystal Glitter, Hot Glue, Hot Glue Gun

I am going to enter these into A Vintage Journey's - A Vintage Christmas Challenge. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Suzz

Just a Pinch

 Hi all and welcome to another week of the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge. This week the challenge is to just a pinch! Whether it is glitter or embossing powder, or perhaps a flick of ink spray this week we challenge you to add just a pinch to your next project. Maybe you simply want to sprinkle your art journal night sky scene with a bit of star shaped sequins. Or do you want to add a pinch of pixie dust to a magical fairy creation? A pinch of the right craft product can make a project extra special!

I started with layering in two different stencils with two different inks over the background of my tag.  The first layer was the holiday words in an antique linen distress ink.  I then came back over with the holly stencil and a tea dye ink to add a more deeper color but not quite brown.  The entire surface of the tag is shimmery gold spray.  

I die cut the deer and holly sprigs and sponged them with vintage brown and added a touch of text stamped over the deer. 

A lovely mix of gold, ivory and browns to give a very subtle shimmer effect.  My pinch is a pinch of sequins that I provided a touch of alcohol inks to coordinate with my color scheme. 

Products:  Tim Holtz Layering Stencils - Christmas, Holly Bough,  Penny Black - Prestige (Deer), Memory Box - Holly Branches, Ranger Distress Inks - Antique Linen, Vintage Photo, Tea Dye, Heidi Swapp - Color Shine - Gold Lame, Memory Box - Heaven and Nature, Simon Says Stamp - Sequins, Alcohol Inks - Caramel

As always Simon Says Stamp will be giving away $50 voucher to shop at the fabulous Simon Says Stamp Store

So now it's YOUR turn, come play along and show us your stamp and punch combination. You have 2 weeks for this challenge until Monday 8am Ohio time. 1pm UK time, 2 pm CET to join in

Suzz

Follow Simon Says Stamp on Instagram

If you use instagram add  #sssmchallenge to your challenge entry uploads so we can see them on there too!