Some tags and a bit of a ramble...

Hello friends, thanks for taking the time to drop in here! Today I am finally sharing the tags I made for my altered file folder that you can see in detail HERE

I actually made some more tags still, but I thought sharing just these 4 with a little detail was probably enough for one post......

As each of these tags has an image of a child on them, I want to dedicate them to the issue that has been on my mind almost constantly these last two weeks or so. The issue I am referring to is the one of what is happening in the United States around the separation of asylum seeking parents from their children. Of course I know that Trump reversed his policy and promised that the children would be returned to their parents. Well that was over a week ago and there are still more than 2000 children separated from their parents and no clear plans of how and when they will be returned. Thinking of these poor children and their parents makes me feel sick to the stomach, - I just feel so helpless in the face of this. If only I could give them all wings, like I did with some of the kids on these tags, so that they can fly back to their parents. Oh and by the way, all of these were created well before the horror of this tragedy broke in the news...

Anyway, sorry for the ramble and on to the tags....

This one is a size 8 tag that I ran through one of Tim Holtz's 3D folders. Next I coloured it with a mix of Distress Oxides and normal distress inks and to give it a bit more definition I then added just one spritz of Distress Spray in Ground Espresso.

I then took one of the paper dolls, paper pieced a hat and some wings on him and collaged him onto the tag in addition to some strips of washi tape. The final step was to add some shadow around him with a Stabilo All pencil.

The background to tag number two was created with the help of Distress paint, gesso, background stamping and stencilling with archival ink in Hickory Smoke.

The girl is a Paper Whimsy image that again I gave some wings and collaged onto the tag together with some fussy cut roses from one of the Prima collections plus some more washi tapes etc.

Tag number 3 again was run through a Tim 3D embossing folder, coloured with Antique  Linen and Vintage Photo Distress ink and some Distress Spray spritzt through a stencil. The little girl is of course another paper doll and the other collage elements were either stamped or cut from Tim Holtz paper collections.

The final tag is a size 10 tag. I started by stencilling with some Decoart Crackle paint. When it had crackled I added colour with Antique Linen Distress Paint, some Vintage Photo Distress Spray, some Decoart Antiquing Cream and some Ground Espresso Distress Crayon. I did some stamping around the edges and then finished it off with yet another paper doll and a couple of Tim die cuts plus some other bits and pieces from my collage box.

I love the effect of the crackle paste through the stencil. The darker shadows around the boy were created with the help of a brush dipped into the Ground Espresso spray bottle.

Well, that's it for today. I hope I have not upset anyone with my political ramble, I know I have quite a few American visitors and I firmly believe everyone should be allowed to their own opinion, so if some of you feel that what Trump did was right, I won't hold it against you.

Thank you for your visit and continued support

xxxxx

Artist Journey at AVJ

Hello lovely visitors, great to see you here! Today it is my turn to share a detailed step by step "Destination Inspiration" project over at A Vintage Journey. As you can find all of the details there, I'll just give you a little preview here.

Hope you'll take the time to hop over. I had great fun creating it and very much hope you'll like it....

Thanks for dropping in today like always and happy creating!!

A trio of Tinies

Hi everyone and lovely to see you here.
Another quick post from me today sharing 3 ATCs I made for a swap with the lovely Maria from Maria's Knutsel Plezier.

Maria showed some ATCs on her blog a while back and invited readers to do a swap with her. Now my whole crafty and blogging journey started really with swapping ATCs, but it has been years since I last did a swap, so this felt like fun.

I had quite forgotten how small ATCs really are, and yet it's amazing how much you can fit on.
Each one was done in a slightly different way, but mostly involved adding some texture with stencil, working with paints and inks and then adding ephemera and some embellishments.

Paints and inks are mostly Distress, but I also used some Decoart Media Line paints and on the one above some scraps of old book paper as you can see.

The one above was done using Distress Inks only. Most of the additions were little scraps from my scrapbox that lives permanently on my craft desk and alsys seems to get fuller rather than emptier....

Anywaym, that's it for now. Here's hoping Maria will like them.

Thank you for visiting and have a fantastic weekend!!

Tim's February Tag my version...

Hello lovely visitors, thanks for dropping in here.

Just a quick post from me sharing my version of Tim's February tag:

I won't go into detail as to how I made this, all the instructions can be found on Tim's blog HERE.

I pretty much followed what Tim did, just used different papers as I did not have many of the ephemera left. I also did not want a heart out of felt, so I made mine from chip board, (using his Movers and Shapers heart die) and added some crackle instead. I also added a little scribble instead of the stitching, just for a bit of fun...

I loved the way Tim had added his heart charm to a arrow, so I followed that idea pretty much exactly.

Because Tim's composition is slightly different from mine I found I had no space to add a word band, so I added some of the little letter stickers instead, shading around them like Tim showed on the paper elements. I love this technique and have used it often in the past, it adds so much depth.

Now this year I decided to keep my tags in a pocket book made for the purpose. You can find the instructions for that HERE if you have not seen it yet. This way I get to create a matching page for each tag. So here is my February page:

I used inks Distress Sprays, tissue tape, a stencil and some back ground stamping. The heart was made using the piece of chip board I had cut the heart out of, as a stencil.

Here you can see what the double page now looks like with both the January and February tags inside their respective pockets.

So that was my version of Tim's tag. I have seen so many wonderful interpretations around blog land already, Tim's inspiration is always amazing, and I can't wait for March....

I am adding this of course to Tim's February challenge

Thank you for visiting and I always love to read all your wonderful comments, thanks so much for those too!!!

My version of TT January

Hello lovely people and thank you so much for dropping by here...
Just a quick post from me today, sharing my version of Tim's January tag:

The original with all the techniques can be found HERE

Now last year I made all my tags as double ones, a size 8 on top of a size 10. This year I am just using size 8 tags. Instead I am in the process of designing a mini book with pockets for each of the tags and a page to decorate to reflect the season. A tutorial for that should be coming your way soon :)

I followed most of Tim's techniques, just changed the colours a bit, used slightly different elements and fewer words. Oh the one stands for January, just in case you are wondering.

Because my 15 is so big, I did not have the space for embellishments, - ah well....

I used Vintage Photo glitter and grunged it all up a bit.

I added shadows like Tim suggests (actually I usually do that anyway, it adds so much more depth).

A muse token at the top was the only embellishment I had space for as I did not want my tag to be too crowded.

Well, that's pretty much it. This tag was not one of my favourites, but hey, nothing like a challenge.

I'll be adding this in the usual place of course.

Thanks for visiting like always. I'll be back on Monday with another tag for A Vintage Journey.

Thank you for visiting like always and see you next time.

One for the Birds

Hello lovely visitors and welcome!
It's Friday and every second Friday we have a new challenge over at A Vintage Journey, as most of you will know. Can you believe we are onto challenge 20 already! Wow, how time flies! But this week it's not just time that's flying, because the lovely Chris who is hosting this challenge has chosen "Birds of a Feather" as her theme, and this is what she had to say about the challenge:
Get out your inks, paints, chalks, Gelatos etc and grab your bird dies, stencils, masks, stamps, whatever avian stash you have and conjure up something that sings of our feathered friends. Whatever you create, we want to see Tim's influence clearly identified. Let's see your magic!

So onto my project:

With it being the end of November and the dreaded C word (really I LOVE Christmas), coming ever closer, my project turned into a Christmas gift for one of my crafty friends. It's big enough to hold a size 8 tag inside and there is also a place for a special Christmas message.

Below is a quick step by step with a lot of photos.

1.You need to start with a piece of A3 card, I am lucky enough to have Kraft card in that size, so used that as my substrate as it is so strong. But any card would do. Cut it to 7" (18cm) by 16.5" (41.5 cm).

Fold it in half length wise and then fold each side to close to the middle, gatefold style.

2. Open it out again and then fold the corner of each side down, like you can see in the photo below.

This is the inside view and as you can see, you have created two pockets once you glue the sides, the bottom and corners down, but don't do this yet!

3. For the outside, glue on a ribbon, this will make it possible to close your booklet/folder later.

Time to cover your base card

I chose two different kinds of paper, cut to about a quarter inch smaller than your out and insides.

Here are my approx. sizes:

Outside: 2 times 4 by 6 7/8" (10.3 by 17.5 cm)

Inside: 2 times 4 by 6 7/8" (10.3 by 17.5 cm) in contrasting paper

Inside flaps: 2 x 4 by 3.25" (10 by 8.2 cm)

Corner flaps: 1 time 3.5 by 3.5" (9 by 9 cm) cut diagonally and then trimmed to fit properly.

4. Now the fun begins, altering the papers with inks, stencils, texture paste, sprays, whatever your heart desires:

Below are some photos of how I altered mine:

Wendy Vecchie Crackle Paste through Tim's Latticework stencil

Adding some watered down gesso

Two colours of Distress Sprays: Brushed Pewter and Walnut Stain.

Embossing around the edges of the paper for a special finish. I used Stampendous Aged Silver.

The back cover was done in a similar way, but instead of using a stencil, I just scraped on the crackle paste randomly with a palette knife.

To alter the insides I just used inks as most of them would be covered by the flaps anyway. The flaps themselves were done in the same way as the outsides. Now it is time to adhere your altered papers to your base card and to glue the flaps down to create the pockets.

I chose to embellish with different die cuts and of course a bird!! Below is a selection of what I used:

The 25 was given a metal look with the help of the same embossing powder. The bird is an Artistic Outpost stamp coloured with Distress Inks.

Finally some close ups of the finished project:

The inside, after I glued down the sides. The embellishment on the left, was bright silver to start with. A quick spray with Walnut Spray ink turned it all aged looking.

Another little bird, one of Tim's ideaology pieces.

Finally I chose one of the tags made for a previous project to fit inside as it fitted perfectly.

Well, that's pretty much it. Make sure to check out the challenge over on A Vintage Journey, where you can see all the amazing projects from my teamies and of course we hope you will play along, for your own creative enjoyment, but also to be in with a chance to win a fab voucher from our sponsor Country View Crafts

Thank you for visiting like always and have a great weekend!

The colours of Autumn challenge 15 at A Vintage Journey

Hello everyone and welcome on this lovely Friday. It is my turn to host a challenge at A Vintage Journey, the wonderful Tim Holtz inspired challenge blog sponsored by Country View Crafts.

Autumn is well and truly here in the northern hemisphere and as it is my favourite time of year I chose "The Colours of Autumn" as my theme.

I created a mini book using the wonderful Eileen Hull  mini book Cherished die, which makes making a mini so quick and easy.
As I am the challenge host, I decided to use all of my favourite Tim techniques, they are pretty basic, probably the simplest of all, but I just love them, - blending colours with Distress Inks, steciling, stamping and embossing, all Autumn themed of course.

For the cover I ran my diecut piece through the Sizzix/ Tim Holtz Alterations Thankful embossing folder.

I then coloured to my heart's content with various autumnal coloured Distress Inks :Dried Marigold, Ripe Permission, Aged Mahogany, Seedless Preserves and a bit of Dusty Concord and some  Walnut Stain around the edges.

I then layered it up with a piece of crumpled Kraftcard, coloured with the same colours, giving a kind of leather effect, and the Tim Holtz  Pumpkin from the Halloween Blueprint 2 set.

Some die cuts (the leaves were triple embossed to give them a glossy sheen) and an ornate plate, with a sentiment stamped on old book paper finished it all off.

The inside pages were all made with the die too. Here is a link to a video where Eileen shows how to do this: LINK, it was passed on to me by my lovely teamy Jenny from Pushing the Right Buttons.

I used pretty much the same technique for all of the inside pages, blending Distress Inks and stamping with Archival and stenciling in the background for more interest. This is the front page:

For this one I used the Spiderweb Layering stencil, some background stamps, some bleach stamping for the text and the Classics 1 set.

This scene was built up with a lot of Remnant Rubs and some background stamping with the Classics 19 set. I also added some splatters with the white Dylusions spray.

For the facing pages I used bits from the Walflower Paper stash, added some ink and stenciling and a sentiment only. This sentiment is from Indigo Blue.

More stenciling and stamping in the background. The vocal stamp is a Chapel Road Art stamp. I loved the fact that I could use both an apple and a pear stamp, such autumnal fruits....

The facing page, this sentiment is from The Artistic Stamper. I ran the bottom through a texture fade strip and coloured it  with H2Os.

The next double page, the sentiment is Indigo Blue, the wild flowers are Stampendous.

the last page:

The final page with a sentiment from the Classics 11 set. I covered in inside of the cover with more of the Wallflower papers and tied the pages with twine into the cover. (Eileen shows how to do this in the video, only she uses elastics, but I felt twine fitted the rustic autumnal theme better). This makes it quick and easy to add further pages as time allows.

Well, hope you like this mini. I've tried to keep the descriptions brief as we all have a lot of blogs to visit. And of course I hope you will check out the challenge, play along and see the really amazing projects my team mates have created.

Thank you so much for visiting and even if you are in the southern hemisphere, where it is now spring, you are of course very welcome to play along!!!