Butterfly Butterfly... - Saturday 9th August 2014

Good Morning Friends,

Thank you all for popping over and leaving a comment on Sam's blog on Tuesday, well I think you know how much I appreciate your comments on my posts both here and there! I was feeling guilty that most of you were leaving a comment on Tuesdays both here and on my actual post, which is why I just put the link this week...so thank you! I think that particular card was a real labour of love, I absolutely had so much fun creating it. It had been a while since I had used acetate in that way and I actually wondered why had it been so long... I was quite chuffed when Sam said it had her rushing for the acetate!

All my samples have been packed up and sent to Sam now for her shows on Create & Craft on 16th August.

Have you all had a good week? We have had a 'busy' one...I am very wary that September is looming and for some incredibly mad reason (so mad I don't even know why), I have landed myself with organising three events in the first two weeks of the month at work - what I would do without my wonderful volunteers at the moment I have no idea! It's all very well having this ideas but all the work in publicising  them and then hoping people will come is quite stressful.

We are also on holiday later in the month of September(I think we'll need it as Tom has been working harder than ever!)...not going far this year (to think this time last year I was getting so excited about seeing my family in California again!!): the kitchen is being fitted and I'm sorry, but everyone keeps saying 'ooh lovely, bet your excited about that' - well I'm not, I'm really not!:)

Tom had to go to London for two days this week, so I did some late night crafting, working on designs for our next workshop...more of that today. I also spent a little bit of time out in the craft barn (should call it 'hut' really!) doing a bit more painting. I am so pleased with the way my Halloween Lantern is shaping up, but I am going to hold off until at least mid-September to post it! 

I did actually intend to do a lovely visit to everyone's blog Tuesday night, but I couldn't comment on quite a few, same on Wednesday. I thought it was an internet problem, but other sites were fine, so it must have been blogger...I ended up catching up with Pinterest instead, I hope I am up to date with you all now!

Today's card is a butterfly card I made for Paola, who is a family member and very dear friend (we got on from the first time we met so many years ago), she is just the most lovely person.

 I brayered the card to create the background using Spiced Marmalade, Wild Honey and Ripe Persimmon distress inks. The leaves are a stamp by Clarity, which I coloured with a water brush using mica powders. It is actually so much more shimmery than the photo shows.

The butterfly is by Lavinia and was again coloured with distress inks and micas.

The inside of the card:-

Inside I stamped the butterfly off the card and added a sentiment from a set by Dreamees


Here is a photo of Tom and I with Paola (next to me) and her daughter Ilaria, at Tom's uncle's restaurant in Vicenza, Italy a few years ago

That's it from me today...I have already spent over an hour giving the coop it's weekly 'deep clean' honestly, they are cleaned out every day and get a thorough clean every week...more than the house gets, lol...speaking of which I now need to do that dreaded housework before I can craft!

Love and Hugs
Carole  X

Sunday Stampers WK 229,Autumn - Nov 1st

Good Morning Friends,

We had quite a few Trick or Treaters as usual last night, with very wet parents...what a shame about the rain! And so we are in November....oh my, Christmas is getting way too close! Today's post is my project for Sunday Stampers challenge and the theme this week is colours of autumn.

With last week's marathon of workshop, events and craft fair I missed last week's challenge for the first time since I started and I really did miss it! I don't have time to enter many challenges, but this one is a must for me!

Two weeks ago I made an autumnal card for the metallics challenge, so the challenge for me was coming up with something different!

For the main image I used the Dreamweaver Bare Trees stencil on white card. I wanted to create a bright background of autumnal colours - sometimes in a dense woodland on a bright day, it can look like the the whole landscape is on fire. I used a mixture of distress inks - Broken China and Faded Jeans for the hint of sky,Brushed Corduroy, Wild Honey, Rusty Hinge and Mustard Seed for the bright colours and Brushed Sage and Crushed Olive for the grass. There may have been a few more in there somewhere - too many to remember! It took quite a while to get it so I was happy with it!

For the base I used Autumn Maple Leaves stamp set from Clarity Stamps. I love the sentiment. The stamps are all individual so I arranged the images around the sentiment. I stamped them with Versamark and then heat embossed. The powders are my own mixture and what fun I had trying to get it right!

I used gold, chocolate brown, holographic and red and I even threw in a tiny amount of stamp magic from the metals range. My aim was to create a brown-gold with a hint of red, just like you get when the leaves are changing.

The trees were matted and layered on brown, white, brown; then I tied some orange ribbon around the bottom (I promise you it's not such a bright orange as the photos would have you believe!) and added a pumpkin button and Spellbinders Leaf cut from craft foil. I added some hessian  to kraft card and mounted  the image on top. To finish I added a few maple leaf brads.

Hope you like this and thanks for dropping by and leaving a comment!

Carole X