Inspired by {Crafting my Home}

 Happy December :) We had our first measurable real snowfall here at my house this morning. The "crafting my home" collection of pinterest boards has a whole bunch of group contributors to the boards. On one of them ( which I forgot to write my self a note about which board this is on) I found these candy canes made from Pipe Cleaners. So I went to the craft store and bought pipe cleaners. And that is as far as I got with that. they need soaked in tea then dried and fluffed etc. ( Maybe after this years holidays ) I just liked the texture of them a lot. And I think they would be totally cool tied onto gift packages.

I have been die cutting Christmas shapes from sprayed mixed media paper for a few weeks now and I knew I had this Simon Says Stamp candy canes tag die. That I have not really played with much as of yet and I like how wide it is so, it is totally wide enough to write names on the back side ( see below)

So, I did cut some from Neenah Earthstone and SU riding hood red and sprayed sheets. but, I did not paper piece the entire candy canes just every other space. What is interesting about this shot is it was taken with a digital camera and the one below with my cell phone. It struck me funny how cold the cell phone shot is. 

The To From here is an older Impression Obsession stamp done in Versafine Tulip red and the HO Ho HO tag is from Lili of the Valley done in Crimson. On a side note the tags I just linked to are sold out again at the moment but, save it to your favorites. They do restock that stamp set frequently and 3 packs of stamps fit in one of their mailers they use from the UK. (so I tend to buy my stamps from them in trio's as I know they will all fit in the same package) The sparkly cord is May Arts and the jingle bells are from the stash. I have most of mine in old canning jars on the wall so, I could not tell you its size of mfg. info but, the bulk of mine were found at either Joann's or Micheal's. If you'd like to play along with us, you can find this challenge here at Splitcoaststampers. Thanks for stopping by.

Dirty Dozen Christmas Sample for December 2023

 I recently (Okay it was in October but, this is the first time they have been cut) picked up these stitched tag dies   CREAlies - Dies - Big Labelzz & Tagzz dies #20, with stitch lines at Frantic Stamper that layer and I loved that. also these tags are Huge. :) this one I did here uses the two smallest tags in the set. What the photo does not show you is it also comes with two hole dies so, when I did layer these two tags I did glue them together before I cut the hole at the top so that it would line up. 

The base tag is some Simon Says stamp school house red and the top is some Neenah cream that was stamped with the Unity Stamps A Little Christmas Carol background stamp with pinecone ink. the edges of that have some Distress Oxide vintage photo as does the edges of the Simon Says Stamp Holly & Berries tag die. now that one the top layer of the tag was cut from some handmade rice paper because, I liked the texture but, its kind of flimsy so, its backed with a second layer of just Neenah earthstone cardstock. The berries were cut from some Recollections glimmer paper and the holly berry printed paper is from the Simple stories vintage rustic Christmas pad. I did add some Nubo Crystal glaze to the berry dots on that print as the big diecut berries are so shimmery in real life.

The tiny made with love heart charm is a generic one I found here on Amazon. These are the copper colored ones as brown is a color I use all year long. I did think about cutting that tag hole off the holly tag but, left it as another opportunity to tie stuff on ha ha. The red fiber here is from "On The Fringe" it was called hot pepper and I really don't think any of those old fibers online places are open anymore I think what I see being sold mostly anymore is dyed seam binding type things. The letter B charm and the findings tag in the top of the red stripe ribbon is from Tim Holtz. ( I toss packaging so, I am not sure what their real names are anymore but, I don't use up whole packs of things right when I get them so, they are old and from the stash)

 

While I had that holly tag die out I decided to use it on the Work Christmas turkey gift card holders and so, I found these plaid bases in the closet. And the holly was cut from Scraps. The Merry Christmas is from Lili of the Valley Christmas sentiment tags set and a lot of the edges were inked with Vintage Photo DOX inks.

A closer look at that, the pack of plaid cards only had like 5 of each pattern so, I ended up mixing two of the mostly reds for these. I want to say they are hobby lobby but, they could also be Joann's or Micheal's. ( I have a drawer filled with little A2 cards and I am trying to use them up) There are red jingle bells on the cord with the sentiment tags also so they do jingle for a little bit of fun. :) That's about it from me, If you'd like to play along with us you can find this challenge here as Splitcoaststampers in the special forums set aside for Fan Club members. I hope you are doing well & Thanks for stopping by.

Watercoloring a Translucent Poinsettia

 Hi, It's my turn to host the watercoloring challenge at Splitcoaststampers this week and I chose this translucent looking petals one from Olga Koelsch seen here on YouTube called "How to paint outstanding watercolor Christmas flower - Poinsettia " I had picked up a pretty Poinsettia for my desk at work this last weekend at Albertson's and thought to use those colors. 

I liked the glow the yellow tones in the centers gave it such warmth. and then I started painting and ended up using colors actually pretty similar to Olga's video I think .

First layers of paint on a piece of Cold Press Arches 100% cotton watercolor. 

Second layer and my petals got a little wonky in the middle, and then I thought, oh no worries, just cover that up with the third round of paint.

So, I did and then I had that whole "well dang, there is no white space left for stamens thought" 

So I just painted over the mess. I knew in the back of my mind that there was not much glowing warmth on this that I had originally wanted so, I decided to add some gold Iridescent paint to this in a few spots.

Found some old Gold photo corners ( probably from Pioneer) and then found out my gold krylon pen is dead so, I used a gold wink of stella pen on the green printed paper mat and it does not really show but, it does hide that white edge on the printed paper from being cut. 

 The base here is some stardream in a shimmery gold that is A7 in real life. The sentiment is from the Greetery's four square holiday tags stamp set done in some Versafine clair Nocturn. If you'd like to play along with us, you can find this challenge here at Splitcoaststampers That's about it from me, I hope you all are doing well & thanks for stopping by.

Inspired by {PepperLu}

 This week Amy is sharing the PepperLu site for Inspiration and I chose this candy cane background that is linked up in the Inspiration challenge thread here. 

And I knew as soon as I seen it that I had this Jackie Freirich designs candy cane stamp ( seen on the left) but, I also knew I had the Honey Bee stamps Lovely Layers candy cane die ( its the one in the center with three layers) and I had picked up the Papertrey Ink classic candy canes set when they had that release as I new that it had both left and right facing candy canes in the sets. The one thing I found with the papertrey ink candy canes is you can pick two of the dies to layer but, if you use all three. you don't see what is on the bottom it just turns into a liner. So the two on the bottom here are those but, with only two layers glued together. 

So, all the red and green you see here was sprayed onto mixed media paper ( strathmore) and cut from the splatter sheets. the candy canes were all embossed with Tim Holtz frosted crystal and then had rock candy glitter on that while it was warm. the Pine branches here the one on the lower left has some WOW puff white powder on it for snow but, it doesn't really show up well on that text background so, the others I left as green splatter branches. That text Background stamp is from Unity Stamps called a little Chrismas carol. The candy canes heart tag stamp is from the Lili of the Valley Baked with love tags set. the tiny red ric rac is vintage and that iridescent cord is from May Arts. The card base this is on is some totally red glitter premade from Paper Accents.The edges of the stamped panels have some vintage photo DOX ink along them and this is A2 in real life. If you'd like to play along with us you can find this challenge here. thanks for stopping by.

Watercolored Diecut Candles

 While I was watching the video last weekend for the candle challenge that went live yesterday, I did think the back of my mind this could be a cool back drop for diecut candles. So, while everything was still out did give it a whirl with this Memory Box Glowing candles die.

So, the thought I had was to save some white space for the diecut colors. So I cut a couple candles and then used a pencil to do a shadow outline for the diecut on the background. ( this is a water soluble pencil) so, I knew it was just a general guide and not a hard and fast sketch.

So the sketched panel got a background coat of paint and then I started painting one of the candle die cuts with the same colors. 

So after that round of paints had dried I did glue the first diecut onto the background so that I could start adding some shadows to it. the Second diecut I switched the colors a little. I doubt I have ever done blue candles in the history of ever but, some of the people playing in the challenge did theirs as Blue and it made an impression on me.

A little more paint on. I did use the nib for some feathery foliage on the top piece also.

The did get even more paint since the previous photo. The base on the left is a shimmer from a bulk pack of cards from Micheal's a few years back. ( maybe Joann's) and the one on the right was some Bazzill I ran the cover through the big shot inside a Penny Black allover stitches folder to give it some subtle texture.  I also added some clear stickles glitter glue to the one on the right and when I thought it was dry enough to glue to the base, I found that it was not all the way dry so, there is stray glitter in the bokeh ha ha. Christmas cards are supposed to shine right? That's my story at the moment and I am sticking to it. On the one on the left I did pick it up in the air and add more paint to the very edges of the diecut so, there is not white edges as you tilt it. The sentiment on that one is from a Tim Holtz Sticker pad. the sentiment on the right is from a Crafters Companion Sam Poole set called Snowman kisses. If you'd like to play along with us the challenge with links to the tutorial can be found here at Splitcoaststampers. Happy Thanksgiving & thanks for stopping by.

Watercoloring a Christmas candle

 This week Linda is sharing this video from the watercolor classroom that uses a stencil for making Bokeh into the background and a nib for a fine line foliage. You can find this tutorial here on YouTube. Now, I don't know how you are when watching these video's but, for me its a little bit of a memory game. what do you remember about it most? I did watch the whole video all the way through and then did the painting 2 days later. So, what stuck with me was the bokeh and the foliage. And I really didn't have a plan for mine.

So, I started with a simple sketch of a candle ish shape with some leaves on the bottom. I had thought to use a stamp but, all my Christmas stamps of candles are taper type candles and I do have the Tim Holtz dies but, I decided to just see what happened.

So I started with the background and then I realized it was drying and I needed to go dig out the stencil so I stopped painting to do that, and I got some OK blobs and some you almost put a hole in the paper ones. 

The very first crafty brushes I ever bought were used to do tee shirt painting with acrylic paint like 30+ years ago, so this scrubber brush was one of those. It has pretty sturdy short bristles. The stencil here is from Donna Downey called bubbles. And I had seen someone do a bokeh background like this before and I had forgotten about it so, I was pretty stoked to try it. 

So, this is where it would have been good to have a plan for the bottom of the painting before I got to it, and I decided that if I remembered correctly there was a lot of fringy foliage on the top so, it didn't matter if it was soft and blurry under that. ha ha. I did use the end of the scrubber brush for the first round of berries here and then of course they were not all the way dry when I decided to do more bokeh parts to the top. 

Before I painted leaves on the painting I did do some trial ones on this piece here with this nib seen below.

I don't see well enough even with my glasses on now to tell you what that says on it. but, it seemed to work OK. I did refill it way more often I think than I seen her doing in the video with what ever it was she was using but, that's OK and I think I will leave this one out on the desk and play with it some more soon.

I did pull off the tape and walk away to let it dry thinking I would get the whole thing damp and add more to the background but, the foliage was bugging me so, I decided to just leave it alone. And then it became a simple card.

Up on some foam tape over textured Bazzill. This one finished out at 5 1/2" square in real life. If you'd like to play along with us, you can find this challenge here at Splitcoaststampers. Thanks for stopping by.