Catch Up

I am playing catch-up with all the other bloggers making cards and posting about them.  I have been 'off air' for a while as my computer died but I now have a shiny new one.  But apart from that, I am a latecomer to blogging.  So I have decided to show some of the cards I have made over the past year.  Some have been for family and friends and others I have sold.  I hope that you will like them.


My card of the Month is one that I entered into the claritystamp challenge for the month of March.
I did not win but I did receive some very nice comments from some of the design team ladies. Well done to Dawn Lawson who did win with a lovely card. Details of the competition and rules can be found at claritystampchallenge.blogspot.co.uk

So for the first challenge 'anything goes' (as long as you used Clarity Stamp Stamps) I decided to enter a card I had made for my daughter Carrie who's birthday was in March.  I used the following Clarity Stamps:  Large Beech Leaf, Small Beech Leaf, Small Fern, Small grasses, May all Your Dreams Come true verse and of course the Large Easel.  I used the following inks: Memento - Summer Sky, Distress Ink - Faded Jeans, Archival - Jet Black, Memento - Olive Green and Archival Whispers - Whisper Sage

I started by stamping the image of the Easel onto my Theuva card using the Jet black Archival ink. then again on to printable acetate. I cut out the 'canvas' part of the easel using my craft knife, I then taped the acetate over the stamped image so only the 'canvas' was free.  Using a post-it, a small circle die and my bigshot, I cut out a circle (making sure I got as much of the sticky part as possible).  This I used for the moon which I placed onto the 'canvas'.  I then tore some A5 copy paper into two parts to form my hills and sky.  I covered the area where I chose my top hill was to be and started on the sky.  Using my Ink Dusters and Summer Sky ink I brushed lightly along the top of my hills.  I then used the Faded Jeans ink and starting from the top of the image I graduated the colour down towards the paler sky, blending with my brushes.  I then removed the circle (sticky note) from the image and very lightly coloured the moon using the summer sky ink and my ink duster (just to stop it looking so white).  Using the other half of the copy paper I covered up the sky and went to work on the foreground. Using a makeup sponge and whisper sage ink I started by pulling down from the copy paper covering the sky in small strokes (just as Barbara Gray has shown us).  I then moved my copy paper down and around a bit to form my 2nd and 3rd hill using the same ink and technique.  I used a bit of the olive grove ink on the 3rd hill to make it darker.  Using the small Beech Leaf Stamp and the Jet Black Archival ink (1st and 2nd generation ink) I stamped the top left corner of the 'canvas' to give the image of looking out through the trees.  My next step was to stamp out the image of the easel onto a large post-it and cut around the 'canvas' area and place this over the stamped image on my Theuva Card.

I then repeated all of the above steps to make the background to the card taking care to try and tear my A4 copy paper to the (near enough) same shape only on a larger scale.  I used the Small Grass and The Small Fern stamps with the Olive green ink in the bottom corners and I also used the Olive Green ink and torn copy paper with a makeup sponge to do the shadows at the easels feet. I then stamped up the verse with Jet Black Archival ink. 

I used my Jet Black Archival ink to go around the outside edge of the card then I used double sided tape to mount the image onto an A5 satin card.  I used pure white super smooth paper for the insert.

As you will note from the picture you will see that I should have stamped all my images first before doing the background especially with the leaves (that way you wont get a colour difference when using a masking technique).  I was taught to do the background first then build up your picture so I sometimes forget to do the opposite when stamping.