Friday, November 29, 2013

Dragons Dream Tag It On #155

Whew – just made the last challenge in time – now for the next one.

The recipe this time at Dragons Dream Tag It On  is “a book of your choice as inspiration plus - Stencil/Mask, Paint and the colour green along with the obligatory stamp and tag.”

I am an avid reader – I certainly read a lot more as a child and one of my favourites was Anne of Green Gables.

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I used a Stencil called Karen’s Houses on a Prima tag and a Prima Black Chalk Ink through it.  I ten got out my watercolour paints and completed the background.  This is where I discovered that the black was not “set”, even when dry!

I used a Magnolia “Tilda” stamp, coloured her with the watercolour paints and popped her up on foam squares.  Here is another view:

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Not a huge amount of technique involved but I like it.

Cheers, Esther xoxo

Monday, November 25, 2013

Good Mood

7 Dots Studio have a challenge running to use their products in a layout about “Good Mood”.

I fell in love with 7 Dots Studio's papers at the workshop with Finnibair earlier this year.  We have no retailers who sell this line in New Zealand at this stage so Brenda and I got together and did an order from Australia.  I was particularly keen to get my hands on the 9th Wave collection and it was so worth it!!

For this layout, however I used a piece from the Love Is In The Air collection as the colours were just right for the photos.  I know I still have a couple of sheets from the Sunrise, Sunset collection that would have been awesome too, but do you think I could find them?

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I won a free photo shoot with a local company and thankfully Liam was in a Good Mood so he was able to relax into it after an initial awkward stage.  By the end of the shoot he was totally rocking it!

I added some distress inks through stencils and inked up a wooden camera embellishment, popped on a kraft envelope with journaling on a ticket tucked inside.  The stamp is from Ali Edwards and the washi tape was some I got through Papervine.

It was good to do a layout again – my first since August for goodness sake! 

Cheers, Esther  xoxo

Saturday, November 23, 2013

Starry, Starry Night

The current challenge over at Dragons Dream Tag It On is to make a tag (using at least one real stamp) that incorporates a bird, a crown, the colour blue and a song.

Initially, I had the song Lavender Blue, Dilly, Dilly …  and then the song  Blue Moon in my head but as the tag evolved, that changed again.

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The owl (isn’t he cute?) was embossed onto my tag using a folder and the cuttlebug.  I used Tim Holtz’s trick of cutting a slit in the join of the folder to thread my tag through so I could get the pattern in the right place.

I masked off all but the moon and shaded it in 3 colours of Distress inks.  I popped the cut-out back over the top and used 3 of the yellow/orange colours of Distress inks for the main part and the remains of what brown/s were on my blending tool for the owl.

The crown and the stars are stamped with the crown being fussy cut.  I popped some washi along the top where there was a nice solid embossed line.

And there you have it.

Cheers, Esther  xoxo

Monday, November 4, 2013

Singing In The Rain

The current challenge at Dragons Dream Tag It On is for a Film of your Choice , some Texture, Embellishment and a Hint of Red. The one real rule is to use at least one real stamp.

I don’t get to the movies much.  I think the last one I went to was Despicable Me II, with Liam.  I figured this would be way too hard with a Minion stamp, lol (I do love those minions though)

So for inspiration I did a good old Google search for the top 20 movies of all times.  This one jumped out at me as one that I had the perfect stamp for.

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I used a home-made stencil and texture past for the rain drops and when dry I inked the background with Forest Moss,Weathered Wood and Stormy Skies Distress Inks.  I downloaded some movie stills images and printed them as a contact sheet but at 40%.  I hit the nail on the head as they turned out to be the perfect size for the Tim Holtz Film Strip.  I attached the strip to the tag with two red brads.  I stamped the Umbrella Man on spare manila cardstock, cut him out, inked the edges and popped him up on foam.  I re-stamped the umbrella, popped that on foam too and added a layer of Dimensional Magic.

Here’s a closer look at the detail.

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Thanks again for popping in to take a look.  Why not join in with the challenge?

Cheers, Esther  xoxo

Friday, November 1, 2013

Creating for Christmas

When I went to Scrapfest By The Sea in August this year, I saw the most gorgeous altered book created by Trina Mclune.  You can see her beautiful book here.I knew immediately that I wanted to make something similar and while spending a day with Shell during the last school holiday’s, I found the perfect book to alter.

I had intended to take progress photos but once I got started, I just kept on going.

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The flower spray is a Prima vine and the Joy embellishment is one I cut from shrink plastic using the Cameo.  The Xmas tickets and Bingo cards are from a Kerri Bradford kit that I bought a couple of years ago.

I divided the pages evenly but then adjusted them a bit as some pages were ticker than others, tucked each section under and glued them in place.  Then I inked the edges with Vintage photo and added some vintage gold metallic rub as well.  When all the elements were safely glued in place, I sprayed the whole project with gold Glimmer Mist, not that you can see that in the photos.

So simple, so effective – I urge you to try this yourself.  You will love the result!

I am entering this project over at City Crafter Challenge Blog, a site new to me.  The theme for their challenge #183 is Game Night – to create a project that includes game pieces, playing cards etc.

Cheers, Esther  xoxo