Now for something REALLY exciting……Bricks!!!!!

Hi again everyone! Hope your day( or night) is going well wherever you are.

Have you checked out the gorgeous new fairytale images available at MIC yet?    I saw the castles and the the dragon and thought it was time i had a play with colouring some brickwork, as so many of the background stamps have some brickwork in them. Sound boring? Well, it was quite a challenge for me as I like to finish things fast and this wasn’t ever going to be fast!

I concentrated on the bricks in this image for the purpose of practice.  Unfortunately the light in my room wasn’t brilliant so there is a yellowish tinge to parts of the image, please ignore this! I have used warm greys over the whole area though it doesn’t always look like it!

Starting with WO and W1, I laid down some colour , choosing to have my light source from the top left.

Next was some W2, and  W4, dotting the colour .

Here I came in with W6 and dotted the areas where I wanted most of my shading.

I then blended it back in a bit with W2

Some more W6 for shading

Now, laying down W2 and W4 in my shaded areas on the rest of the image.

Dotted in some W4 and W6

Now some heavier shading with W8 in the darker areas and blending in some more with W2.

The dragon I quickly coloured with greens, yellows and yellow greens (See image below) . The sky I dotted with B0000, B000, BV20 and B60.  There are some practice bricks to the right of the image that I played with before starting  the main image. By dotting the ink, it gives the effect of texture and this is also a useful technique for filling in large areas of background.

I hope you found something useful in this and hope to see you all racing off to colour some BRICKS now ! Yay! LOL!

MIC stamp used is Dragon Ruins Digi stamp

Pearls!

The new challenge over at Southern Girls is to use Pearls. How easy is that?   We have two fab sponsors this time around, Delicious Doodles and Fred She Said.   The image I've used is called Emma & Rosey from Fred She Said, and yes, there is a doggie in it! How unusual!

The papers are from my long stored stash.....MME I think.....!!! The pearl centre of my flower was given to me, thanks Trace!

I'm entering this in My Time To Craft- raining Cats & Dogs

Have you had a play with these gorgeous shadow box frames yet?  This is my very first go and it was so easy to put together, Zoe, you're brilliant!   I've never bothered making my own, seemed like too much trouble, and now I don't need to ....LOL!

I painted the pieces with gesso which dries quickly ( yes I'm impatient) , glued on the DP and edged with distress ink , before I put the bits together and glued and it went smoothly !!!!!!!!!!! Usually I lose a piece of something and find it later , glued to my jeans.....hehehehe!

The image is Lizzie with Gift and I printed her onto kraft then coloured with polychromo pencils. I did this months ago when my pencils first arrived and she's been sitting looking at me saying  "Do SOMETHING with me!!!!"  The frame around her is the Circle flourish frame which I coloured with Distress Stain then stickled.  The paper is Websters Pages that has been sitting in a pile for years.....yes, I've decided i need to USE some of my stash instead of hoarding it.  

MIC products used

Square Shadow Box

Lizzie With Gift

Circle Flourish Frame

Dragonflies Chipboard

My Dream.....

Oh to have got a puppy for a present!  Never happened to me but I wished all my life it did!  Had to go out and get my own in the end...hehehehe.   Well, Zoe gave us the CUTE image to play with, I had to play with it of course!  I also added in the background, the 3 seater couch and the magazine table from the Beauty Salon collection that was released with the recent Hollywood release.

Copic colours used:

Hair E13 E17 E19 E29

Skin E000 E00 E11 E21 R20

DressY000 Y21 Y23 Y26 Y28 R01 R02 R05 R08 R39

Dog E31 E33 E34 E37 E51 E53 E55 E57

Bow YG23 YG61 YG63 YG67

Box YR23 YR24 YR27 YR31

Table E31, E33 E34 E37

Bowl  YG03 G20 YG61 YG23

Couch G20, G21 G24 G82 G85

MIC digital stamp - Melissa's Surprise Puppy

Hollywood 3 seater

Hollywood magazine table

Mic Chipboard-Flower Leaf Frames

Things with Wings

Once again, we have three fabulous sponsors for our challenge over at Southern Girls.  Delicious Doodles, Marianne Design and Bugaboo.
 I've use a Marianne Design stamp -Snoes with Bird for my card, these images are so cute!

Paper is Websters Pages, and I cut a bird out of part of the sheet to pop onto the cage.  The ribbon is from the Funkie Junkie, leaf die is a Marianne Die and the birdcage is a TH die.


I'm entering this in Whimsy Inspiration- Things with Wings

Make it Crafty/Simply Betty release blog hop

Make it Crafty and  Simply Betty Stamps are really excited to be bringing you the combined  Hollywood Release!

Simply Betty Stamps has a range of characters  from Betty Monroe, through to Action Chris the movie director!!

Make it Crafty has a range of  background scenes perfect to switch and match with your famous characters!!

 

Now you should have arrived here from Cyndi, if not, check out the full list for todays blog hop at the bottom of this post. I have here my card using SBS Christian The Dark Hero  and MIC Hollywood sign which I've cropped to keep things in proportion...though I realise the Hollywood sign is actually MUCH bigger! LOL!

Of course we are  going to have heaps of fun with this theme and June 1st & June 2nd we will  be showcasing our stuff and then June 3rd we're bringing you a fun guessing  game... Will you be able to guess the movie??  We'll be giving you some  clues to help!!

Join us for the two  inspiration days and leave a comment along the way for your chance to win a  selection of new images.

  There will be FOUR  winners each day receiving a surprise character with matching background digi  stamps.

Then on June 3rd, guess  6 out of 12 movies correctly and you will have a chance to win:  

Grand Prize

  A DVD Movie of your  choice
  PLUS the whole collection of MiC & SBS digi stamp Hollywood release images.

Second Prize

The whole collection  of MiC & SBS digi stamp Hollywood release!

Can't wait?!!

  But we know some of  you just can't wait so both Betty and Zoe are offering you 25% off
  their Hollywood collections between June 1st and June 3rd!

Click Here for Simply Betty Stamps & Click Here for Make it Crafty!

We hope you have lots  of fun with us this weekend!!!

Barbara
Colleen
Betty
Cyndi
Viv         You are here!!!!
Alison
Jenn D
Suzi      
Beccy
Lelia     
Carole

Another House

Good morning, evening or whatever, wherever you are!  I want to share with you this card I made using  another favourite MIC image , an oldie but a goodie, the Fairy Tree House .  This  really caught my eye when someone used it on a card and I've loved it ever since!

I added a chipboard swirl, coloured with pencil then stickled , and some delicate corner chipboard in its natural state.

I used some MME paper distressed on the edges, flowers and mesh/ribbon from my stash. The  digital image is printed onto SU Kraft paper and coloured with Faber Castell polychromo pencils. I added and merged a piece of the Daffodil Dell background , just to add some more flowers to the scene.

The MIC products used are

MIC  Fairy Tree House digi

MIC Daffodil Dell

MIC Fine Swirls

MIC Delicate Corners

Boys in Training

We're all set for a long weekend of jumpers agility in Wanganui this weekend, just hope it doesn't rain. Riley doesn't like getting wet! LOL!  And he's my main man at agility now as Vinnie has got pretty slow in old age and Brodie....welll Brodie  has a style all of his own. He switches off his ears and run willy nilly around the course, jumping whatever he sees, and tunnels...well he can't resist tunnels, sometimes going through them multiple times ! LMAO! And what makes it worse, I can't yelll at him as I'm still on half voice mode , so he'll be running FREEEEEEEEEEEE! Yipeeeeeeeee!

Metallic Chippies

We all know and love the MIC chipboard bits and pieces and there are so many ways to use them. You can colour them with inks, paints, stickles etc but one of my favourite techniques is heat embossing them. They look so cool and are great for finishing off any project.  Embossing powders come in all sorts but my favourites are the metallic look ones, which turn your chippies into little metal embellies! Yay!

For this project  I've created a basic tutorial

Firstly, very carefully cut down through the tiny tabs on the chipboard with a craft knife, don't try to push them out

I'ved used a versamark stamp pad to ready the chipboard for the powder

As you can see, my versamark pad is marked and stained, but all I use it for is embossing, so its not a problem!  Make sure there is a good coating of versamark or embossing pen or whatever you use on the pieces.  Then either pour the powder over the surface or as I prefer to, put them face down into the powder, which I keep in small flat containers for this purpose and it makes clean up so much easier.

Then turn on the heat!   I use a heat gun, as do most people. Make sure to hold the pieces down with tweezers or something similar or you'll lose them.

Aren't they cool? !!!

Now I made a little box following a You tube  tutorial by Tracy  Loves to Scrap so I won't go into the details but I used black card stock and some Graphic 45 steampunk paper, some nestability dies for some shapes and this is what it looks like.

Added the chipboard corners

And I used a chipboard filigree centre that I don't think is available anymore but you could use one of the fancy ribbon sliders or a mix & match centre. This I also embossed, then stuck a dew drop on it.   To make it act as a closure, I glued on a magnetic clasp underneath

Then finally some coloured chippie leaves, flowers, some mesh ribbon, and some butterflies also heat embossed.

And there we have a gorgeous little gift box !

MIC chipboard used

Ornate Corners Two

Butterfly Leaves

Round Leaves

Mix N Match Centre 

All about the boys

Yep, this fortnight for Southern Girls, we have the dreaded boys cards/pages/whatever....always so hard to do, no flowers, frills , blah, blah. I find its best to go DIRTY cos boys are dirty right?!!!  LOL!

By that I mean distressing and inking, no matter what you were thinking.......hey that rhymes, aren't I clever!

So we have 4 sponsors this time around and I've used a cute stamp from Marianne Designs, called Soccer Don.   I'm loving these Marianne stamps !

I've used BG paper and embellies from my stash . Don is coloured with copics.

I'm entering this in Cards For Men- kicking back

Crafty Cardmakers- for the boys

Here come the boys- hobbies

MIC Giveaway!!!

Zoe is celebrating her new store with a fab giveaway!!!

6 MiC Rubber Stamps

Aleisha
Window Wall Elements
Tree of Love
Park Bench
Elven Hestia
Fairy Poinsettia

3 packets of paper flowers

4 chipboard sets

Butterfly Leaves
Butterfly Swirls
Ornate Corners
Delicate Corners

12 Ciao Copic markers

E21, E33, E57, Y06, Y17, YR23, YG03, YG06, G17, BG15, BG23, BG49


Head over here to find out how to enter.
http://www.makeitcrafty.com/store-blog/news/goodies-give-away

A Favoutite

I thought I’d share one of my absolute favourite Make it Crafty images. The very first time I came across MIC was when someone posted a card made with one of the gorgeous whimsical houses . I couldn’t resist hopping straight over to the store and buying a few and the Mushroom house has to be one of my favourites, especially for making ” Welcome to your new home” cards!

I thought a pencil coloured one, just for a change!!! so I coloured with prismas and polychromos onto kraft. The paper is Prima Fairy Flora, with some  mesh and a key charm from my stash. The sentiment I created in word, after finally figuring out how to get the spacing to suit! Took a while, but realised using individual text boxes and text wrapping, I could put what I wanted where I wanted. Yay!

To round out the scene I actually added Daffodil dell digi onto each side of the house digi, by merging them in Word.

To finish off this adorable setting what could be better than some MIC dragonflies and a butterfly coloured with copic R27 then stickled, and roundleaf chippies which I coloured with copics G99.

MIC products used:

Daffodil Dell 

Mushroom House

Dragonflies

Butterfly

Round leaves

A Cute doggie

I made this card a wee while ago , after my pencils arrived and I spent hours playing with them. This gorgeous little dog is a Chrissy Armstrong stamp from Whimsy , cute huh?

The copper foil I ran through my cuttlebug with an embossing folder, the gorgeous delicate chipboard corners are from Make it Crafty ( I'm trying to stop hoarding these, I love them!) The flowers are from my stash.

I've been unwell the last few weeks, started with a cold and a hoarse voice, which led over Easter weekend to a total loss of voice....and its still (2 weeks later) no more than a squawk and squeak with the occasional burst of sound. Everyone thinks its hilarious and the jokes are flying about how quiet it is, and everyone must be loving it....yeh, yeh, whatever! The doctor's instructions were to keep my mouth shut, no mouth breathing, no talking, no whispering......have you ever tried it? IMPOSSIBLE!  
 So if anyone finds my voice out there....please send it back, I'm REALLY over this!


I'm entering this card in Di's Digi designs- animal friends
                           and Paper Play - animal antics

Fairy Dahlia

This is  my first time colouring the gorgeous Fairy Dahlia and she is sitting on the fairy chair, both available from Make it Crafty.

I merged these two digis using word, Zoe has a great tutorial on doing this and its SOOOOO easy!   Anyway, I printed onto kraft cardstock  so that I could have another play with my new polychromos pencils, did I mention I have 120 of them? LOL!   I’m having so much fun with them my copics are being neglected.

Anyway, I’ve used some gorgeous prima paper and edged all the pieces with picket fence distress crackle paint, before layering the pieces, with some bits of muslin cloth. The flowers are all from my stash. The chipboard corners I left plain this time to try and balance out the kraft paper a bit. I adore these corners as they finish off a card so nicely.

 The Whimsy garden stamp I’ve  stamped onto white cardstock and sprayed with 2 colours of glimmermist to blend in with the backing papers.



And there we have it, a sweet girly card . Hope you find a little inspiration in this.

Make it Crafty products used:

Fairy Dahlia

 Fairy Chair

Delicate Corners  chipboard

Fancy folds

The challenge over at Southern Girls is to use fancy folds, ie not your normal plain card.   I decided to make a stair step card, because I've never done one before. 

The image is One of the pack ( Lycaonia)  from delicious Doodles, the paper I can't remember....its from my stash anyway!  As is the seam binding ehich I hand-dyed with distress inks.  The dark brown metal strip is from Ten Second studio, I love this stuff but hardly ever use it!

 I've been at home the last couple of days, with severe laryngitis.No real sore throat, just no voice.  Never had it like this before, I sound like a chipmunk who has been inhaling helium! Squeak, squeak!  The dogs love it, they can ignore me, and I'm sure DH is loving it too, soooo quiet! LOL!