Calligraphy Christmas Card

This is another project we worked on during the week the Knuston. It actually looks a lot more difficult to produce than it was! You only have to make one wedge shaped section which is then photocopied six times, cut out and glued together to make the star shape. This can then be photocopied and reduced as many times as you like for your cards... all you have to do is add a little colour to each one as I have here.

Calligraphy

I'm just back from a wonderful week of calligraphy at Knuston Hall residential centre in Northamptonshire. We had a real international group this time with students from Belgium, Netherlands, USA and Japan... as well as one or two from England. I think I was the 'local' as I only live about 40 miles away! Here are a couple of pieces of work I did during the week:

The first one was written in gouache, the large letters in the background (As You Like It) were written using very watery black paint using a piece of wood, and then the quote written on top using a steel nib.

The second piece was written in watercolour, with colour painted inside some of the counters of the letters (I used Derwent Inktense Blocks for this). The fish was traced with pencil and I used a narrow nib and gold size to draw in the outline, then covered with transfer gold. I've added a few spots of gold to the text as well. The 'sea' at the bottom was made using tracing paper which I painted with acrylic paints, tore and then glued to the watercolour paper.

And another rosette...

... but this time on a Christmas card. I can't stop making these since I bought the die! I've used another stamp by Crafty Individuals here.

Birthday card for Mum

At a visit to one of my local craft shops last week I treated myself to some stick pins and the Tim Holtz rosette die. As usual, I couldn't wait to try out these new purchases so I decided to use them on a card for my Mum's birthday in November. I used a big 8ins x 8ins card blank (bought these ages ago and have only used a few!) and used a stamp by Crafty Individuals in the centre. The background papers are from DoCrafts V & A Hanovarian collection. Sorry the picture is a bit wonky - because of the 3-D elements it was difficult to scan.

SDC - Altered book page

Yes, we've got to alter a book page for the latest Stampotique Designers Challenge - so here is mine: Moon Girl sitting in a tree! I used a page from an old book which I first glued to some card. Then I embossed the tree using a Tim Holtz embossing folder in which I had dabbed inks - this colours the background but not the embossed part.

PaperBag Studios stamps

I've been busy over the weekend trying out a couple of stamps I've just bought, both by PaperBag Studios which is one of my favourite stamp companies. It's great now to be able to buy some of their stamps singly, cling mounted. My two latest acquisitions are 'Laugh' (I've wanted this stamp for ages!) & 'Lily and Zoe'.

On the 'Laugh' card I used three colours of Memento inks to stamp the image, and a background panel made using green and blue Chalk Mists and some sequin waste. The flower stamps are by Artemio and the leaf stamp is the latest freebie with Craft Stamper magazine.

The 'Lily and Zoe' card has a background using the 'wrinkle-free distress technique' in Weathered Wood, Mustard Seed and Pumice Stone Distress Inks, and I have used some stamps from PaperBag Studios 'Little Feet' plate.

I thought Lily and Zoe would be a good image to use on a Christmas card so went ahead and made one of those too!

SDC 35: Red, yellow and orange

Here is my entry for the latest Stampotique Designers Challenge on the theme of red, yellow and orange. We can only use Stampotique stamps for this one, so I have used two designed by Jo Capper-Sandon. Jasmin was stamped using Memento black ink and coloured with Copics. The background was made using torn paper masks and a variety of Distress Inks in the three colours.