It's back to school time!

I've been back at work this morning so not been in my art room much.
I work part time at a nursery school and we had an inset morning setting everything up, sorting out plans etc. The children are coming in on Monday, some new ones and the rest coming through from the younger class. I have to say, some mornings you think you've never got out of the toilet, but it's always different, never boring! I love working with young children the best (I've worked with all ages) as they're always enthusiastic and we have a lot of fun!

I did manage to do a little more on my Christmas samples - just look at this wonderful tin I found in my stash.I'm definitely going to do something with this but you'll have to wait and see what!
Meanwhile I've got a couple more photos of ATCs that follow on from yesterday. This pink colour isn't one I'd usually associate with Christmas but sometimes I get desperate to get away from the traditional red/green or blues. Those little round gems are actually stickers from Paperchase that I just happened upon and I've used them alot.

These two use the same colours and I've added detail with a souffle pen. I realised the star one didn't really have a focal point so I put the text on a strip of paper across the middle.

What I love about making these ATCs is that I can do what I like on them! Most of my work I give away or send off, so I keep these even though you're supposed to trade them!!
All the stamps used here are Elusive Images and the background papers are from the Season's Greetings Artylicious CD Rom as before.
Talking about Elusive Images, Glenda's posted images of some new stamps on her blog - well worth a look! She's got news of lots of other new products as well - very exciting!

Need a cup of coffee now after all this typing!

Helen

P.S.
Even though I didn't have time to do much artwork, I did do a little stamp shopping - only a little I promise! Karen from Scrapz had got some stamps in that I wanted so I just had to order them! She's got a really good range of unmounted rubber - I frequently have to restrain myself!

It's never too early for Christmas!

Well. I'm back from Wales seeing my Mum - a very nice short break.
I've just added my Elusive Images Design Team logo to my blog which reminded me that just before I left I got a parcel in the post from Elusive Images with some new Christmas stamps which are going to be on a show sometime soon. Of course I can't show you the stamps (top secret!!!) but I'm sure you're going to love them.
It made me look through some of my Christmas art work and I found some ATCs I made after working on Christmas samples last year. These use stamps from both the Christmas Fusion and the Christmas Flourish plates and the curly edging on the corners comes from the greeting stamp on the De Morgan baubles plate.(It took me ages to find that stamp - I thought it came from a different plate altogether - I've obviously got far too many stamps!!! NOOOOOOOOO!! Not possible!!!) I wanted to add something to the corners and that just seemed to work. The background paper is from the
Artylicious Season's Greetings CD Rom. Quite by chance I printed it onto a piece of rainbow card and found it gave a great effect!

These two use the same sort of paper for the background and then I overstamped and added detail to the tree with a Sakura white Souffle pen. I also got a bit gem happy!

Well, I'm going to go and start work on some samples using the new stamps - I might give you some sneak peeks nearer the time, if Glenda lets me!
Happy stamping!
Helen

Lady in Red... well, pastel colours, maybe!

I've started colouring these BLine Design ladies and I've chosen fairly pastel colours - some of the new Memento inkpads.
I began by dabbing it on with a cotton bud, but then just rubbed the inkpad over it. I discovered the exact same designs but in a 1 inch size and used those to create a black and white frame. the corner designs are stamped on 1 inch Stampbord squares, but taken from the larger stamps. This next image is a close up of my favourite lady I made a background frame for her, this time roughly inking them with the same colours as the central square. I haven't actually done any work on the stampbord itself - I might, I might not, don't know yet!

For those of you who are a bit of an organizational geek like me, here's a photo of how I store pens, brushes etc. (Courtesy of Ikea!)

The idea was to clear my work surface a bit so that I had more than a 6 inch square to work in, but I didn't really succeed! I've discovered I just spread to fill the space!


I'm off Wales for a few days now, so no blogging for a few days!
Helen

Go with flow - it's Festival time!

Well I've just got back from taking my son and 3 of his friends to Reading for Reading Festival (the highlight of his year!). I dumped - sorry dropped! - them at the garage at the corner of the site along with loads of other parents doing the same thing - it's always a bit manic. We had to go back to 2 of their houses before even leaving Worthing as 2 of them had forgotten vital stuff (James was one of them!) Then I nearly reversed over their keg of beer as I left, as they'd left it just behind the car!
James enjoyed his birthday - he described it as a Festival sandwich - going to Reading today and then he and Vikki (our eldest), who's 21, took out youngest, Katie (12), to V at Chelmsford on Saturday! Her first festival and Muse were playing!They had a great time.

Haven't had much time to get in my art room, needless to say. Have got a couple more storage photos though. Lynn commented how well organized I was - not true - it's a case of necessity or else everything disappears into the black hole! This next idea I pinched from her - thanks Lynn! - storing the UM stamps in plastic document boxes. You can get 2 full sets in each and I've also added a sheet of card with the index sheet on the inside.

These are Elusive Images Snow is Falling...
I then moved all my inkpads into seed trays.


I couldn't resist stamping these BLine Designs (available in the UK from L. B. Crafts) onto Stampbord - they come as a set and just seemed to cry out for 2 inch Stampbord squares.

Usually I colour the Stampbord first, but this time I haven't so I'll be interested to see how these turn out. What colours shall I choose - that's the exciting bit isn't it? You'll have to wait and see!
However I can't leave you without a little colour! I made these ATCs a while back after a project I'd done with Impression Obsession stamps. The papers are from one of the Artylicious CDs. They say exactly what I feel!


Cheers!
Helen

Boys, boys, boys!

Well it's a very dull day here - so much for the sunny South! My son's invited some mates round for a bbq (he's 19 tomorrow) and I was hoping they'd be in the garden with psycho bunny (that's our rabbit), but no, I think it'll be guitar hero in the sitting room.
In some ways I find boys hard to make cards for, but in other ways it does lend itself to my love of bright colours. James and his cousin Tom have birthdays very close together, so I always end up making similar but not the same cards.

This card uses the Get Happy papers from Cosmo Cricket - these are some of my favourite papers! The man is from Paperbag Studios - Laugh,stamped on glossy cardstock, and the Be Happy text is from one of the Elusive Images new word plates. The hat is from Lost Coast Designs and the corner text is from PaperArtsy (Pierrot - plate 2).James has got lots of curly brown hair which is why I added the wire for a bit of fun.




The image sort of offset itself slightly differently in that you can only see two edges of the base card.
I thought I'd try that for the other card as well and this time I used the PaperArtsy Pierrot plate 1, stamps that I always like using. I even used the name of the paper in the card.

Talking of PaperArtsy, I've just reorganized all my PA stamps into a 4 ring binder. I just punched holes in the bag top and then filed them. I expect everyone did this years ago, but I'm a bit slow!

Also every summer holidays I seem to have a big clearout of my craft room aka the conservatory that I've taken over (I could probably set up shop!) which usually looks a real tip! Do you know, I even vacuum the floor (gasps of astonishment from my family).

Well, the bbq's heating up, so I'd better go!

Enjoy!
Helen

Put your sunglasses on!

I told you I liked colour! It'll certainly wake you up in the morning!

I was going to send you this Glenda but decided to put it on here as a thank you to you all for your help with the blog - note I've got my links going!

I've deliberately chosen hot, spicy (and clashing!) colours for this elephant tile to conjure up the flavours of the East.
The stamps are from the Paisley Elephant UM theme plate by Elusive Images. I've stamped straight onto a white bathroom tile with black Stazon. It's definitely worth having an extra tile to practise on as it can be a bit slippery and if you press too hard you can smudge it. However the good thing is if you make a mistake it's easy to clean up with a baby wipe! (I'm not telling you how many baby wipes I used!)
Once you've got in the swing of it, just keep going 'til you've got all the basic stamping done. Touch up any broken lines with a fine black permanent pen.
I then just painted it with Anita's glass paints and Porcelaine paints that I had.
I've sealed it with a spray varnish.

I'm feeling blue - and green!

This is a close up of a stampbord piece i made for a thankyou card. It uses Prima Build a Frame Clear stamps and the extra layer of the butterfly is stamped onto Artylicious paper. The background is a piece of Basic Grey paper stamped with Basic Grey Flourish Edge stamps coloured in with Prisma pencils. I've added wire and adhesive pearls to the butterfly.

If I can get the next photo to upload, you can see the rest of the card and envelope - I say 'if' as it's taken me about 2 hours to work out how to upload this one!!!

Wow! I'm amzed - that only took one minute! Anyway here you can see that I've layered the main bit onto some text paper (7 Gypsies Napoli Collection) and then some dotty paper (MME). I wasn't going to use text paper, it just sort of happened. the MME paper is double sided so I turned up the corner as I liked the green!
i'm going to go and practise uploading photos now before I forget how to!

I've made a blog!

I've made a blog! my first posting as a blogger! As an avid stamper, I've set up a blog to record some of the stuff I've been working on (wish I was such an avid typist -I'm extremely slow!).i'm lucky enough to be on the Design Team for
Elusive Images (that's Glenda Waterworth or Artylicious in blogspeak). I make up artwork to showcase her stamps and I have also designed some of them.In fact it's Glenda and Lynn aka Inkyartitude who ''ve encouraged me to set this up.I'm also lucky enough to be published in
Craft Stamper from time to time - I tend to do what I call "other stuff" ie. books, boxes, ornaments etc. If it doesn't move, it might get stamped on!I also make cards and bits and pieces for family and friends - that's how I started out. The first card I made was for my twin brother's 40th birthday. (I'm not telling you when!) Now, if they don't get a handmade card, they think I'm ill!I don't know what I'd call my style. I use mostly unmounted or clear stamps and love the grungey, arty, shabby look. i also love detail - in other words I don't know when to stop! I love the patterned papers you can get, but don't like cutting them up which rather defeats the object!I love working out how to make something - the design process i suppose.But above all, I love colour - clashing colours, toning colours, anything - and experimenting with different ways of getting that colour on the project., hence the name of my blog.