Index Card a Day 2023 (ICAD) - weeks 5,6 and 7

Here's a round up of weeks five, six and seven of ICAD 23.  Above is: Evergreen; Playground; Charcoal (another of my somewhat grumpy charcoal faces); Cottage.

Perspective; Summer and Astronomy (an inked 'galaxy' background).

Week six was Imaginary; Metallic (using an embossing folder and silver card with black acrylic paint brushed on and them wiped off); Zodiac; Levels (another embossing folder)...

...Chandelier; Float or Buoy (using magazine collage); Trivia.

Week seven had Patina (using an embossing folder and acrylic paint dry brushing); Repeat (using one of my hand carved stamps, made from an eraser); Millefleurs; Wabi Sabi (which I chose to interpret using darning)...

...Vermilion; Raindrops and Focus.

Two more weeks to go and the challenge is over for another year.
 

Index card a Day (ICAD) 2023 - weeks 3 and 4

Here are the next two weeks' of ICAD.  Above, Seaglass; Alphabet; Sunflower and Xylophone. Inks, paint and magazine collage featured here.

Violet; Tranquility and Postage Stamp.

Unexpected and Enchanted Forest.

Inside Unexpected is a surprise...

...and a unicorn is hiding in the Enchanted Forest.  This one took a while as I kept changing the opening sections, cutting bits out, then putting them back.  I used a tree stencil with some inking as well as paper from a paper pad with the starry sky and the unicorn stamp which was embossed in silver. I finished it with lots of stickles (glitter glue).  It got there in the end!

Bubbles; Dictionary (using a piece of dictionary page with the word 'dictionary' circled; Indigo and Pinball.

Finally for now Asanoha, which is a traditional Japanese pattern based on a hemp leaf inside a hexagon. Thanks to the internet for this and for how to draw it too!

Some of these prompts are certainly giving me a challenge but it's an enjoyable one.
 

Artful August Challenge - in January! Week Two

The challenge continues with 'Round', so my brain went straight to the song 'Windmills of your Mind' and I incorporated some of the lyrics with just a few of my circle stamps.

'Box' had me thinking but I ended up trying out a new die set from Sizzix and creating boxes for the images to sit in.

'Stitch' was hand stitching over collage.

'Foliage' was made using my hand carved stamps which gave a good 'imperfect ' look to the page.

'Paint' sent me off to my acrylic paints for the background and the stencilling on top, finished off with  words from my favourite book for found words,  'The Trojan Horse' by Hammond Innes, which never fails to provide some suitable words and phrases. 

I used a vintage postcard from my Great Uncle's collection as the focus for 'Building' and some Italian stamps in the background.

I created a background for 'Ink' using walnut ink and then used distress inks for the pocket and little file folder inside...

...including some of my favourite stamped sentiments.

Two more weeks and a bit to come.

 

Latest cards and cakes

There were a few birthdays to make for during November. Above is the card for a colleague at work.  This stamp set (from Aall & Create) has a cat back and front with three different faces, so is really versatile.

Here's the inside...

...and the back.

Here is the 'Russian Roulette Revels Cake' with chocolate fudge icing, which we took round to her. She always looks forward to this cake.  

This is the card for my sister-in-law, using a distress ink technique I had seen demonstrated recently.

This is the cake for Chris, whose birthday was also in November. The cake is the same as above but with chocolate butter cream icing rather than the chocolate fudge. (It was delicious!)

Chris asked for a Snarky Cat card, so that's what he got!

Here's the other grumpy cat on the back.  

Finally, here is the birthday card for my Mum, whose favourite colours are turquoise and orange.  I really enjoy making these backgrounds with watercolour, stencilling and stamping.

#Printinktober 2022 - week four

The final week of #Printinktober and what an enjoyable challenge it was.  Chris gave me the purple and orange colour scheme for 'Big' above.  It is one of the biggest background stamps I have from Stamps By Me, so worked well for this. 

'Small' was lots of tiny images from Woodware, by Jane Gill, linked together, which reminds me of the TV game show 'Blockbusters'.  People in the UK of a certain age will remember this!

'Pretty' was all these pastels and a stamp set from Altenew called Nature Snippets.

Another Visible Image set for 'Orange' using Erica's Maple.

'Dots' was illustrated by this big stamp from Altenew.  

'Dark' was a bit tricky but as it means absence of light, I went for a clear embossed circle image which would show up when you tipped the page.  The stamp was one from Visible Image again.

'Botanical' was from a couple of sets from Creative Expressions by Sam Poole.  I have used these quite a bit and they have a lovely vintage feel.

'Wood' meant I could dig out my hand carved wooden stamps from Blockwallah.  This one is Birch Tree.  I have collected quite a few of these but they don't get used very often, which is a shame.

'On Black' gave me the chance to use a newish stamp from Indigoblu - William Morris Willow, which was heat embossed with white.

Finally, 'Favourite'. I couldn't really choose a favourite, as I like so many stamps!  However, Tim Holtz's Snarky Cats are one of my favourites.  They have been used quite a bit for my cat loving friends' cards.  I do have one more space to fill so am having a think about what to feature and then these will be bound into a book with a stamped cover, of course!

I will post an update once the book is finished and bound.

Wanderlust 2022 - weeks thirty-six to forty-two - Inks

I thoroughly enjoyed exploring Inks in Wanderlust.  We began with Distress inks, making a background and then using tea bags and photos to create linked images, showing elements of our personalities.  I chose to put a photo of my Granny and my Mum in the teabags and a stamped image of a woman to represent me - Granny gave me a love of nature and gardening and Mum gave me a love of music.  

We used acrylic inks for our next piece. We made lots of patterns using inks and blowing through straws. we then tried to bring out something we could see in the pattern.  I eventually decided I could see part of a face, so brought it out using watercolour pencils.  I think it is quite enigmatic!

Acrylic ink painted onto feathers was our next lesson.  I made envelopes and placed some family photos in them - my Mum and Dad on the left and my Granny and her family on the right with a small photo of Dad as a little boy in the middle. I have used these before, but they are great photos.

Another inky background.  This page took a totally different turn from how I thought it would be.  It ended up being a memory of Scruffy, our cat who we lost at the end of August.   I painted Scruffy in acrylic ink using a photo for reference.  The autumnal colours and leaves just seemed to work with the theme.  The two ghostly cats in the corner represent the other two who are buried in the garden, Gonga and Ginny.    

This was about using loose brush strokes, holding the brush right at the end and Acrylic ink. It is vaguely based on a self portrait but doesn't really look like me, although that wasn't the idea anyway.  Not one of my favourites, but an interesting process - letting go of perfectionism!

Much more to my liking was this layered page, using spray inks, stamps, stencils and a magazine focal image.  I like the feeling of movement with the leaves and the woman's hair. This also included a useful lesson on colour theory, so that we wouldn't make 'muddy' colours (unless we wanted to use neutrals, of course).

The last in the inks section was using alcohol inks and stencils.  I used Yupo paper (synthetic paper which doesn't absorb the ink) for the image on the left and glossy card for the one on the right.  I wasn't happy with the tissue paper image on the right as the tissue paper didn't fade into the image as it should have done. Possibly this was to do with the alcohol background.  So, I had another go... 

I kept the original which is now hidden under the flap on the right. This time I used alcohol inks and stencils on my gel plate.  I think this worked much better and the tissue paper faded as it should do.

The last theme for this year is Paper and Fabrics, which should be good.

#Printinktober 2022 - week three

Printinktober is continuing and I am enjoying looking through my stamp stash and choosing appropriate sets.  Above is 'oldest' which shows some of the first stamps from I bought quite a few years ago now, from the companies Dreamees and Craftwork cards. 

'Animal' just had to be this fabulous tiger stamp by Visible Image, with a leaf stamp in the background.

The prompt for this was 'unused' and most of these autumnal stamps hadn't been used very much, if at all.  The background shapes were painted using watercolour, using a Youtube video from creationsceecee here I had just seen as inspiration.

'Repeat' used a small square stamp from Hunkydory which could build up to cover the page.

'Human' used another Visible Image stamp and the flowers were from a Lisa Horton set.

'Blue' using more small square stamps from Hunkydory and building them into a pattern.

'Combo' had me scratching my head a bit, then inspiration struck after watching a video from Rachel Greig (part of the Wanderlust Live weekend) about creating stamped collage papers, which can be seen here.  I used a combination of stamps from seven different sets to create this page.

On to the next week...