Steampunk Sea World and Steampunk Funky Fish Tags By Florence

Hi everyone

I hope you are all enjoying the weekend.

I can't tell you how excited I am about the new Steampunk Stamps!  They are amazing!

Like many of you, I am a huge fan of the Chocolate Baroque's Steampunk Stamp Range so when I saw the new stamps I couldn't wait to get my hands on them and have a play.  You are going to love the new stamp sets.

Apart from how great the images are, one of the things that struck me straight away when I looked at the stamp sets is that there are TEN stamps on each A5 sheets.  How wonderful is that!

These are some tags I made using the new Steampunk Funky Fish and Steampunk Sea World Stamp Sets.

I hope you like them.

Tag 1

Tag 2

Tag 3

Tag 4

I made all of the tags in the same way by stamping the images (using Black Archival Ink onto white card stock) and masking them to build up the scenes.

I left the masks on my stamped images and colored the background with Distress Inks and stencils.

I then removed the masks from my stamped images and colored them with water color crayons.
I then gave my tags two to three coats of Mod Podge.

 Tip: Stamping and Masking.  Start by stamping the image that you wish to appear at the forefront of your scene first and then mask it. Then stamp the next image that you wish to appear directly behind the first image and then mask that one and continue stamping and masking until you have built up your scene.

Thank you for looking.

Happy Stamping
Florence x

The call of the Sea (by Lesley)

Hi there, hope you have been inspired by all the fabulous creations that the Design Team girls have been posting here. For my post I thought I would be a small independent island amongst the sea of Christmas, so today's card uses the Seaside Dreams set.

1. Make the background using the acrylic block technique with Chipped Sapphire, Mustard Seed and Shabby Shutters Distress inks on a piece of thick white card from the Essential A6 card pack. When completely dry take a spare piece of fairly stiff A6 card and tap one of the long edges in white acrylic paint then create a random pattern over the background. Repeat until you are happy with the effect. Don't worry if the lines of paint aren't complete, it adds to the effect if some of these lines are broken.
    
2. Next stamp the shells onto a self adhesive label using Onyx Black Versafine. Allow to dry thoroughly and then 'paint' the shells using Sunshine Yellow and Butterscotch Adirondack dye ink. Tap each of the colours onto an acyrlic block and spritz lightly with water to create your paint palette. Build up the colour gradually with the Sunshine Yellow and add shading with the Butterscotch.
    
3. When dry cut out, peel off the backing and stick into place on the background. Add some shading under the shells with Butterscotch. Finally stamp the sentiment with Onyx Black.

You've probably guessed that I use self adhesive labels alot, but they are a quick way of adding an image to your background without having to do any masking. This way you can concentrate on the background and the image and then marry them together to get the finished picture.

Please keep tuning in to get your daily 'fix' of stunning artwork from our wonderful Design Team.

A Seaside Postcard (by Lesley)

I love beach huts, so I was truly excited with the new Seaside Dreams set.  Here is my interpretation of a seaside postcard, using a brayer and one of my favourite supplies, self adhesive labels.

The background was brayered onto a piece of A6 silk cardstock, using Adirondack Pool and Scattered Straw Distress inkpads and then shading was added to give the effect of clouds and sand dunes. The beach huts were stamped onto a self adhesive label and coloured with watercolour pencils then cut out, along with the flag pole and flag, Next the huts were stamped directly onto the background with Adirondack Jet Black ink and the cut out pieces stuck into place. The sentiment was added as shown..

I am a great advocate of using self adhesive labels, especially if you find masking difficult  It is what I call cheat's masking, why not give it a try. I hope this may have inspired you to create your own postcard and if you would like to read the full tutorial on how it was made you will find this on my blog.

Please keep coming back on a daily basis to see loads of other uber inspirational ideas from the fabulous design team girls.

An abundance of glorious stamps released today

Today we are launching the remainder of our range of 2014 Christmas stamps, and what a collection we have. There is everything from the traditional to cute and fun.

Our September Stamp of the Month is an A4 set, A Child is Born

Next are two A5 sets, Holly Bells and Santa Baby

Both of which are available as our usual money saving multi-buy

Finally, we have a really fun A5 clear set, Snowy Penguins

Here are a couple of cards from Glenda using the gorgeous penguins and snowman.

And if you are all Christmassed out, then we have something to remind you of summer. Seaside Dreams is another A5 set that it is going to be hard to resist. Glenda and I had a ball with these at the weekend (David and I were lucky enough to be up in bonny Scotland over the bank holiday), and here are just two of our creations. 

First Glenda has made her beach huts from Kraft card, don't they look cute

And from me, the seashells on a gelli plate background

I think we just about cover all bases here, and the Design Team have been working their little arty socks off to come up with some wonderful Christmas creations. So keep viewing and reading to see a new piece of artwork every day.