Dreamy notebook cover (posted by Claire)

Good morning, Claire here with a quick and easy notebook cover made using some of this months new stamps Briar Rose Butterfly (have a look at these and all the other new stamps here)

I began by masking a moon on a piece of kraft card and then used some cut and dry foam to apply White Brilliance Ink, smearing it here and there to create a misty effect. Next I stamped the foliage stamps with both White Brilliance Ink and Tea Dye distress ink I stamped the butterflies with versamark ink on to kraft card and embossed with WOW embossing powder  before cutting them out and adding them to the front of the cover. The sentiment is from Artistic Expressions, stamped with Vintage Photo distress ink. I've added some faux pearls in the corners to finish off.

Thanks for visiting today

Claire xx

Briar Rose Butterfly - by Florence

Hi everyone

I hope you all had a great weekend.

Today I would like to share with you a card I made using the new Briar Rose Butterfly stamps.  I know I keep saying this about all of the stamps but these are one of my favorites of this year.  They have a real country feel about them.  I just love everything about them.  I am ear marking this set and the Harebell Butterfly set to make some Christmas and Birthday presents with.  They stamp beautifully on to paper, card, wood and fabric.

For this card, I used the larger stamp on the sheet.  It is a lovely size about 12.5 cm x 7.5 cm.  This would be great decoupaged on a card.  Nice clean lines to cut.  I think you could get 4 layers with this.

please click on the image to enlarge

Just to share,  I recently went to the Butterfly Park on the coast here in Spain.  Oh, it is a wonderful place to go.  So serene and peaceful.   Anyway, in the park there were some giant blue butterflies that just gently floated around.  It was magical.  So, I have taken my inspiration from there for the color of my butterflies on this card. 

As for the roses,  I took inspiration from my garden.

please click on the image to enlarge


 When you look at a Briar Rose, the petals are never the same color.  Some are all white or pink, some have hints of yellow and orange on them.  This is my interpretation of the colors.  I hope you like it.

I stamped my image using black Staz-On ink (Archival ink can be used) onto one of the  Vintage Tag digital downloads, designed by Lesley Wharton, that I printed off.

I colored my image using water color crayons.  I colored the image with the crayons and then smoothed and blended them with a just damp paint brush.

I sewed my stamped image sheet to a piece of backing paper and then layered it.  Firstly, on to the country gingham card and then onto my base card.

I stamped my little "With Love" sentiment using Black Staz-On onto some coated card stock, trimmed it to size and then attached it using some foam pads.

That's all from me today.  

If, you have not seen them already, do check out the wonderful projects made by the other members of the DT.  As always you are in for a real treat.

Take Care

Florence x

Pretty Meadow Flowers (by Debbie)

It's hard to believe we are half way through June already and the gardens

are coming into full bloom with the flowers of summer.

I decided to dig out my Alcohol Inks and make a few backgrounds

for using with these beautiful flower stamps.

 

 

 

I used a coated card with the Alcohol Inks and blending solution which gives interesting patterns.

I kept the ink colours to earth tones so the colour of the flowers stood out.

 I stamped the Briar Rose with Archival Jet Black and coloured with Tim Holtz Distress Pens.

 

I added a few stencil shapes to this card before I stamped and coloured the flowers

 from Harebell Butterfly stamps.

For the matting I chose a colour of card that features in the coloured flowers.

 

Thank you for visiting

Debbie

A Magical Scene by Doreen

Hello to you all, I am sharing a card made with one of the beautiful Summer Fairies I have used the June Fairy which is a gorgeous silhouette. 

I have made the background by masking off the moon and mountains and sponging with distress inks Shaded Lilac and Spun Sugar.....I have then stamped my images with black Versafine  onto the background.The flowers have been coloured with Shaded Lilac,Dusty Concord and Mowed Lawn distress inks...I finished off with some glitter and the sentiment which is from the "Birthday Words" stamp sheet.xxx 

Enjoy you weekend whatever you are up to.

Summer Fairies in Greens & Blues (by Shirley)

Hello everyone, I hope you are doing well. 

I have a few designs to show today using the beautiful Summer Fairies Collection.     

The first design above features the beautiful fairy and butterfly from July Fairy and the Freesia from June Fairy.  The sentiment is from Fairyland Words.
 
I blended Peacock Feathers Distress Ink at the top and Mowed Lawn on the bottom of the background.  I used a ripped piece of cardstock to vary the shades.  I also used Mustard Seed Distress Ink with a piece of cardstock with a circle cut out as a mask for the sun,  which I also outlined with a white Gelly roll pen.    The Freesia was stamped with Mowed Lawn Distress Ink.

The rest of the stamping was done with Cobalt Archival Ink and the colouring with Intense pencils.   The butterfly is decoupaged and popped up.  I also used lots of stickles on the fairy wings and a little on the butterfly.  I added holograph glitter with a glue pen on her dress.

You can see the glitter in this close up below:

This next design above features one of the silhouette fairies, vine & miniature sunflower from June Fairy along with flowers from Sunny Sunflowers (which compliment the Summer Fairies very well). 

The large background above was created with Mowed Lawn Distress Ink using the Acrylic Block technique.   I also stamped the Vine and Freesia with Mowed Lawn DI.

The smaller background above was created with Mustard Seed DI using the Acrylic Block technique.  The flowers were stamped with Peacock Feathers, Mustard Seed and Mowed Lawn Distress Inks.  The Fairy was stamped with black Archival Ink.  I bleached her wings and added Diamond Stickles.

The little flowers and leaves were coloured with Distress Inks as well.  I highlighted with a white Gelly roll pen.    The flourish are die cut using Crealies CL CS 02.

The third and last design today features the beautiful August Fairy and the mushroom from November Fairy.    Joy is from Artistic Expressions.

The background was created using Lemon, Calypso Teal & Cut grass Dylusions Inks.   I spritzed with water and then sprinkled course sea salt.   After letting it dry & shaking off the salt,  I stamped the images with Cobalt Archival Ink.   I bleached out the colour from all the images and then painted with Dylusions Inks (on my craft mat, using water & brush).   When everything was dry I outlined with a white Gelly roll pen and added stickles to her wings.

Thanks for stopping in and have a great day,
Shirley

Briar Rose Butterfly (by Asha)

Hello friends! Hope you're having fun with the new June release stamps. Today I'm showcasing the Briar Rose Butterfly A5 stamp sheet. These new stamps make stunning summer projects, but I found out they are perfect for Christmas cards too!

For my first sample I stamped the largest briar rose image and coloured it with water colours. For the background, I did some inking with various shades of blue and stamped random snowflakes from Family Christmas. Next, I stamped the twig-like image from Briar Rose Butterfly all around the die-cut window and added some red liquid pearls - suggestion of a wreath of holly berries. To finish a greeting from Warm Christmas Greetings and some glitter on the butterflies.

My second project is also a Christmas card, this time in CAS style. I stamped the briar rose stalk and coloured it with alcohol markers. Next, I inked the background in shades of pale blue and stamped snowflakes and a greeting from Stained Glass Christmas. To finish, some pale blue bling and deep red ribbon.

The Briar Rose Butterfly A5 sheet is perfect for summer projects but they are so versatile that you'll be giving these stamps a good workout all year 'round. Come back soon for another visit because the rest of the team have more fabulous projects to show you... and you don't want to miss out, trust me!

Beijinhos,
Asha

Guest post - Art with everything by Bernie Simmons

This week our guest contributor is Bernie Simmons who has not only designed this colourful card, but has taken photos along the way to illustrate. Over to you Bernie.....

Taking the largest stamp from Butterfly Dreams I inked in Versamark Onyx Black and stamped onto a piece of  7" x 7" card.  

Once stamped I covered the edge of the image with low tack masking tape.  Then using Barn Door Distress inkpad I brushed the ink on the top corners of both sides of the card, gradually building up the colour. The next colour used under the red, was Spiced Marmalade, again working gently from the edges into the middle blending as you go. Squeezed Lemonade was the next colour, just to give a gentle hue of a sky at sunset, then Mowed Lawn. I wanted no harsh lines here, more a dreamy feeling so you can't tell where the land ends and the sky begins.

Now to colour with Pro-markers. I chose Tangerine, Apple Cider, Poppy and Sky Blue. Now to be honest when I had coloured the larger butterfly with the Sky Blue I was not happy with it, so I picked a more vibrant blue and went over it with Azure....I think it works better. 

I used a white pen to highlight plus Wink Of Stella which glistens and makes the whole card really stand out, but I can't seem to pick it up on the photo  I stamped Inspire, from Artistic Expressions, as the sentiment along the bottom of the card and Art is everything from Artistic Affirmations down the right hand edge. Then mounted it on black, added a little ribbon on the top and bottom corners and then onto an 8" x  8" card.

I hope you like what I have done here and the colours I have used ....Have a wonderful day.

We love the vibrancy of this card Bernie and a big thank you from us for being this week's guest blogger. Please add your thanks by leaving a comment and don't forget to pop over to Bernie's blog, Arty Crafty, to see more of her creations.

A touch of Orange (posted by Judith)

Hello everyone, I have a couple of samples for you today using the Briar Rose Butterfly/Harebell Butterfly stamp sets.

My first card was created by masking the top and bottom of the card, and then colouring the middle of the card with Distress Inks. I stamped the flower sprig across the bottom of the inked area before I removed the paper masks. I stamped two butterflies onto sparkly acetate, and added some coloured vellum behind them. Finally, I added a sentiment from the Amazing Birthday stamp set in the top corner of the card.

 

My second card was created by stamping the Big Bold Background Leafy Trails stamp onto a piece of kraft card with green ink. I cut a small rectangle of kraft card, and stamped the rosehip image using the same ink. I coloured the images with pencils, and edged the pieces of card with Distress Inks. I also decoupaged the butterfly. I matted the layers with dark green card, and added a piece of orange ribbon to finish. 

This little card would be useful for lots of different occasions.

Thanks for stopping by, Judith xx

Flowers and butterflies!! (by Maria)

Hi, everyone,

I love flowers and butterflies, so I was very glad with the choice of stamps we could use for our samples. The new sets of stamps "Briar Rose Butterfly" and "Harebell Butterfly" are really gorgeous! Fantastic!

I made two very different cards with these stamps, the first one I made again with my favorite technique, yes I love Dylusions ink for the salt technique. So I spread yellow (Lemon Zest), orange (Pure Sunshine), pink (Bubblegum Pink), green (Dirty Martini) and (Cut Grass) on one page. In the corners I've put some salt, then I spread Dylusions ink on a second paper, (all the bright colours but no greens). Then when all the papers were dry, I used the big flower stamp (Briar Rose Butterfly) and stamped ( I used some black archival ink) it on the first paper, again I stamped it on the second paper, and cut out the flowers. The above flower I stamped another 4 times on the orange-yellow paper, cut out of the paper and placed it on the flowers of the first card to create some depth, and so I did with the butterflies too. Then I've placed it on white, yellow, white again and finally black cardstock, I hope you like it and try it!

The second one,  I took two cards, a big one for the background and a smaller one for the front, I never measure my cards I just see how they fit together and that they fit in an envelope of course! I made this one with distress ink and the stamps from the Harebell Butterfly set.  I think the card shows how I have made it, please try it once too, it's such a fun and  the stamps are so beautiful to use for a lot of occasions, don't you think so?

Have fun and joy in stamping your ART!
Greetings
Maria

Simply Slim (by Lesley)

I'm getting a bit of a reputation for doing blue flowers - it's actually become quite a joke (and possibly one of my signature creations). So as you can imagine I couldn't resist using the Harebell Butterfly stamp set, at least the flowers are meant to be blue this time.

First fold a piece of A5 white card in half and mask off a strip 1.5" wide. TIP - use a wide masking tape as this allows you to colour without the fear of spreading the inks over the rest of your card.

Using Cut 'n Dry foam colour the whole of the strip with Adirondack Pool; then blend Adirondack Clover over the top for two thirds of the strip. Finally, blend Peacock Feathers Distress ink from the bottom to half way up the strip. Heat set to make sure the ink is dry.

Ink up the smaller of the script stamps from the Eccentric Edwardian set with Archival Aquamarine and stamp randomly all the way down the strip. Next ink up the harebell image with Memento Tuxedo Black and stamp at an angle as illustrated. Heat set again and then colour with pencils of your choice.

Using Tuxedo Black stamp the smallest butterfly from the Briar Rose Butterfly set onto a scrap of good quality white paper (I used 160gsm). Heat set, colour with pencils and cut out.

Finally, remove the msking tape and stamp the sentiment Just To Say from the Mackintosh Sentiments clear stamp set. Attach a tiny sliver of Ultra Bond 3mm Tape to the body of the butterfly and position on the card as shown.

As an alternative to creating this design as a card you could take a single piece of card measuring approximately 3" wide, make a bookmark and add a tassle or ribbon to finish.

There's a riot of colourful projects following behind me this month; to make sure you don't miss anything please call back each day.

Castles in the sky (posted by Claire)

Good morning, Claire here with a sample created using the beautiful fairy from the July Fairy set and one of the stamps from Fantasy Castles. I really enjoyed messing around with paint and ink to make this project

I began by stamping the fairy and castle with Black Archival ink on to watercolour card I masked them using masking tissue. Next I roughly 'splodged' on some white and some pearl acrylic paint to create the clouds. Once the acrylic paint was dry I started adding colour to the sky with lots of water and Twinkling H20 paints Once I removed the masks I had a bit of a panic as some of the blue had seeped under the mask but I found that using diluted bleach removed the colour but not the stamped image. The blue paint had also discoloured the clouds so I added some more paint and left it to dry. Next I painted the castle and then decoupaged the fairy (also painted with Twinkling H20s).

I added a little gem to the fairy's wand and stamped the sentiment (from Fairyland Words) and embossed with gold embossing powder. 

I added some chipped sapphire distress ink around the edges and matted the scene on white and then blue card to finish off

Thanks for visiting today

Claire xx

Summer Fairies - By Florence

Hi everyone

How is everyone this morning.  Has anyone got anything special planned for the weekend?

One of the stamp sets we are focusing on this month is the Summer Fairies.  Please check out the link to see the options.

What a magical set they are.

When I received the stamps the first thought I had was "wouldn't they be great to use whilst crafting with the children or grandchildren over the summer holidays".  They would keep the children happy for hours.  Saying that, fairies are always popular with crafters.

Not only would these make fab cards but what about invitations to parties.  Or, what about using them to make table decorations for a fairy themed party.  I would love one of those.  Any excuse to wear a pair of wings.

The possibilities are endless with these stamps.


Today I wanted to share with you an altered book project that I made.

please click on the image to see the detail


1. The Cover and Base.

Using a craft knife, I cut a rectangle out of the cover of an old book.
I
I measured and marked 1 cm around the inside of the book cover aperture, onto the first inside page of the book and started cutting away the inside of the pages, where I had marked, until I had reached about 1.5 - 2 cms depth, creating an internal box.

The book I used was a spy fiction book so I attached a page from Wind in the Willows to the page at the base of the internal box.  That is the page you can see as the background behind the embellishments.

I then roughly painted the whole of the book cover front and back with a lilac colored craft paint. 

I dry brushed some white paint over the painted cover, just a hint really, and then gave everything a really good rub with some sand paper.

The back of the book


When the paint on the cover was dry I used some stencil masks, a piece of bathroom sponge and some blue and pink paint to create some patterns all over it.

I stamped the butterflies, on the back cover, using Black Archival Ink.

I colored the butterflies with Distress Ink and a damp paint brush.


2. The Embellishments

 I stamped the 7 butterflies, 6 flowers and the fairy image on white coated card stock using Black Archival Ink.

When the ink was dry I *cut all of the images out and colored them using a damp paint brush colored ink from pens and Distress Ink pads.  I then gave them all a quick spray of artists water color fixative.  * When I cut the fairy out I left a 1.5 cm tab at the bottom of the image for fixing purposes.

I attached my flowers to cocktail sticks using silicon glue and added a sparkly gem to the centers.


3. The Assemblage.


With a craft knife, I cut away another small slot in the book page so I could slot the cocktail sticks in for fixing purposes

I placed the flowers and their wooden stems into the aperture, slotted the stems into the cutout slot and secured them with silicon glue.

I placed the fairy in the position I wanted and fixed her by glue the tab (as mentioned above) inside the pages at the base.

To add a little bit more of a support to the fairy, I placed and glued some trimmed bottle corks behind her.

To make the book solid, I glued the pages together.

 Firstly, I took a batch of pages say 1cm's worth and then glue two pages together, covering the whole of the page with glue and then repeated this for all of the book.

Holding the book closed I generously applied some PVA glue to the outside edges of the book pages. Firstly with a brush and then I pushed and smoothed the glue into the pages with my finger.

I then placed the book on the floor and laid 4 or 5 heavy books on top and left it to dry for a few hours.

Finally, I glued the butterflies onto the top left-hand corner of the front cover and added some ribbon to cover the title on the spine.  I had painted over this but the embossing still showed through a little.  I also trimmed off the ends of the cocktail sticks with a blade.

If you have any questions please drop me a line in the comments box.

I hope you enjoyed your visit. 

Kindest Regards
Florence x

A Kaleidoscope of Butterflies (by Debbie)

 

I admire Artists who can create beautiful pieces art that can be

that can be hung around the home.

When I saw the butterflies on the Harebell and Briar Rose Butterfly

 stamps sets to and gathered all my scraps of marbled card then stamped them with black ink.

 

  

 

 

I cut out the butterflies and arranged them around a canvas.

My first thought was to have them flying in one direction but was unhappy with the layout. 

I decided to have them sitting in a tree so I lightly sketch a tree design

 onto a canvas that had a coloured green and blue resembling a landscape.

When happy with the shape I painted with black and arranged the butterflies. 

 

 

 

 Here is the canvas hanging proudly in our living room.

 

Here is a small note card coloured with Coloursoft Pencils and a lightly inked edge.

These stamps are so detailed and beautiful to colour.

 

 

Thank you for visiting

Debbie

 

 



Guest Post - A Fishy Tale by Annie Watkinson

Today's guest post is from Annie Watkinson, who has created some very special projects. This is quite a long post,  so please sit back, relax and enjoy.

Products Used

Something Fishy UDLSP0330

Cosmic Shimmer - Aqua

Dylusions Spray Inks - Fresh Lime, Vibrant Turquoise, White Linen

Staz On - Teal Blue, Olive Green

Memento - Tuxedo Black

DistressInk - Walnut Stain

Promarkers - Orange, Bright Orange, Yellow

Faber-Castell PITT Artist Pen - White 101

My grandchildren have a fish tank, and love to sit and gaze as they swim round and round. Fish are very relaxing! Chocolate Baroque’s lovely stamps, ‘Something Fishy’ inspired me to try and recreate the gentle movement of fish and water. What I enjoy doing when I need inspiration is to create a ‘masterboard’. Put simply, this is a sheet of A4 paper on which I produce a background pattern, and then have fun cutting it up, and seeing how many projects I can make out of it! It is surprising just how many cards you can make with a sheet of A4.

So I started off picking lovely watery shades of spray inks, and randomly sprayed onto my sheet of paper. Before the ink had fully dried, I lightly oversprayed with Dylusions White Linen, then quickly sprinkled a coarse crystal rock salt on top and left it to dry. After scraping off the dry salt, I was left with a lovely watery fish tank, but it was empty!  The weeds were stamped around the edges, alternating with Staz On Teal Blue and Olive Green.

So along came the fish. I stamped and embossed the fish with clear embossing ink, and silver and gold powders. My background was now complete. I had an image in my mind of bright orange goldfish against the lovely blue background. So I stamped the fish onto white card, and then coloured and cut them out and spread them around the board. It is good to get fish swimming off the edge of the card, giving you the sense of continuation.

Now I had my background, I started to cut the masterboard up to see how I could use the various parts on the front of cards. I managed to get four cards and one bookmark out of it. Now I knew the positions of all the pieces, I went over the fish with Glossy accents, which really brought them to life. 

I also stamped and embossed the weeds onto plain vellum with clear embossing ink and silver powder, then placed them around the cards for the fish to have something to hide behind! The angel fish were stamped onto sticky backed vellum, giving them a translucent feel. The shell was stamped onto some patterned paper in Walnut Distress Ink to which I added a stick on pearl and some accents to the fish eyes, bubbles and angel fish with a white pen.

 

For the main card, I gave the bottom of my ‘tank’ a layer of micro beads to give the illusion of gravel. After matting all the cards on different coloured cards, I laminated the bookmark, and added a tassel.

I think you would agree that using different coloured matting really changed the mood of the cards!

We definitely would Annie. Thank you for your wonderful designs and for sharing your 'masterboard' technique; I'm sure this is something our crafty readers will want to try. If you would like to see more of Annie's work then please take a look at her blog, Serendipity Craft Room, and why not show your appreciation with a little comment or two.

 

Moonlight Butterflies by Doreen

Hello to you all, I am sharing a card today made using the beautiful stamps from the new June release

I have used stamps from the "Briar Rose Butterfly" stamp sheet.
There are so many stamps on these sheets .

I started by masking out the moon and sponging my background with Faded Jeans and Frayed Burlap distress inks. I then inked up my stamps first with Frayed Burlap made sure this was dry then stamped again just under the first stamps with Versamark and white embossed them. 

My butterflies were stamped, then coloured with Rusty Hinge and Faded Jeans distress inks, they were then cut out and decoupaged to add some dimension.

 I added the sentiment which is from the "Birthday words Unmounted set..xxx

Vibrant Flowers and Butterflies (by Shirley)

Hello everyone, I hope you are doing well.     

My designs today feature vibrant colours with the gorgeous and versatile Briar Rose Butterfly and Harebell Butterfly sets.     

The large background is Ripe Persimmon and Seedless Preserves Distress Inks that I stamped onto my craft mat and spritzed with water.   I dragged the cardstock through the ink and when dry I stamped the branch with both colours.

The smaller background is using the same technique but with Ripe Persimmon and Picked Raspberry Distress Ink.   I used the Harlequin stencil by TCW to add the diamond pattern.

I stamped the gorgeous image from Briar Rose Butterfly with Cobalt Archival Ink and coloured with Prisma Pencils.  I stamped the image a second time to decoupage the butterflies which are popped up over the background.   I added stickles to the butterfly wings.

And below is a CAS style card using the same colours:

The background was created by blending Ripe Persimmon and Picked Raspberry Distress Inks over a circle cut in cardstock.  I stamped a fragment from Textured Fragments with the Picked Rasberry ink.  The flowers from Harebell Butterfly were stamped with black archival ink.  The sentiment is from the fabulous Mackintosh Sentiments.

I hope you are able to visit often as we have lots to show this month, my teammates have created beautiful designs.

If you've missed the previous post today, it announces the May Comments winner. :)

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day,
Shirley