Your New Technique Projects

 

Good Sunday Morning Ladies, 

Well we were so blessed with the weather yesterday,  we managed to get out in the garden and get some jobs done, it was a lovely warm sunny day,  the car showed 19° when we popped out for compost and a Mcflurry!!! 

I have really enjoyed the New or Favourite Technique challenge, it has tested my brain some days but it has been fun trying new things. I think that rediscovering my love for Distress Inks has been a highlight, so was the credit card background technique.  I can myself using a few of them over and over. 

Let's have a look what you have been doing.....

Your New Technique projects 

Maria

Maria's Description:

I tried my hand on the floating frame technique that you 

made during the week. Hope they are okay.

Maria, are you kidding me?  These are absolutely stunning examples,  your first one is beautiful and has such a pretty, delicate pattern,  I really love the border down the side too, you could tie a pretty ribbon around that to make it extra special.                                               Your second card, that die you have used is perfect for this technique,  can I ask which die you used please?  That paper is so pretty too.                                                   I can't explain why but it really does warm my heart when I see that I have inspired you to do a technique, or taught you something you didn't know, I will be honest and say that I had tears in my eye's when I saw your cards,  seeing that You had felt confident in having a go because you had seen me use the technique.                   So thank you Maria for making me feel good it was a really uplifting.  To think you did it while feeling so unwell too. 😍🥰😘 Thank you my lovely and I hope you feel better soon XXX 

Karen

Karen's Description:

CARD 1: Here’s a card for tomorrow I used texture paste - indigo Blu Slap it on and Pixie Powders Simple Phill Martin sentiment stamped and heat embossed onto vellum I wanted to see the effect of the card through the vellum Hard to capture the iridescence 

CARD 2:  2nd piece to turn into another project was cleaning the stencil (this weeks card) 

Despite this weeks card being the second image of the first card it is equally as lovely,  those colours epitomise Sunshine!  The orange card that you have used compliments the colours perfectly.                                     Thank you so much for supporting the challenge despite having your legs worn out while on Grandparent duties XXX

 

Sonia

Sonia's Description:

Project 1:  

These are Backgrounds I created using my new sprays & Stencils

I used Lavinia Stencils, the smaller one with Pixie Powders, and the larger with Mystical Mica Sprays.

Project 2: card made using one of backgrounds..

Used Mystical Mica Sprays through a Lavinia stencil. The Tim Holtz butterflies are cut from water colour card sprayed with the mica sprays and backed with vellum. The sentiments are from The Stamp Market

Project 3:

Thrinchies,  The technique I used was scrunching up tissue paper, flattening it out and then inking over the top. I used for the backgrounds on my Thrinchies.

Wow Sonia those Mystical Sprays are amazing,  I love the colours, those backgrounds will be so versatile to have on standby for a quick card, I found looking up cards with spritzed or inky backgrounds on Pinterest gives some great inspiration.

The card you made using that background above is absolutely incredible,  it shows the background off really well,  like you have highlighted the best part, the colours are stunning,  the card is of course finished perfectly with 'Sonia's signature Butterflies'

Your Thrinchies are amazing and the backgrounds you have created for them have so much texture, working with tissue paper can be tricky.   A great idea though for any Tissue paper you have thats gotten a bit screwed up in your drawer,  you now have an idea for using it rather than binning it.  I love the idea of using up little bits of die cut background pieces on your Thinchies too, get your off cuts or bit boxes out and play.

You have given us lots of inspiration Sonia, thank you so much for supporting the blog challenge despite a busy week at work my lovely XXX 

********************************

My lovely Friends,   thank you so, so much for taking part and supporting the challenge each week.  

I have to say I have been thinking about whether to continue with Blog,  I absolutely love my blog, it has been a real lifeline for me as most of you my dear friends know, as I said in Maria's Description, seeing your creativity on a Sunday makes everything I do for the blog so worthwhile, knowing that you have inspired someone to create something they otherwise wouldn't have tried is just so rewarding.  

I hope that you all have a Super Sunday,  

Love & hugs to all of you,

Sandra

xxxxxxx

Mixed Up Saturday

 

Good Saturday Morning My lovely Friends, 

What do you all have planned for this weekend, garden jobs, family get together or maybe a bit of crafting?

We have a free weekend and as yet we have no particular plans, apart from potting on seedlings and maybe planting out a couple of perennials that we bought a couple weeks ago, they definitely need bigger pots, I also want to sow some mixed salad leaves as thats something we use a lot of.  Now talking of gardens I had a very close call yesterday!  I was mear minutes away from exposing myself to the blooming landlord, my wetroom is opposite our backdoor, the door was open as the cats were in the garden enjoying the sun.  I had just finished my shower and had a towel on my head and was holding the bath sheet that barely but not fully covers my "more than ample bosom ", Milo came dashing through the back door and made me jump and I lost grip of my towel, so I made my way to our bedroom a little flustered with my bum now on show!  When I walked past the kitchen window on route to bedroom I saw The Landlord poking about in the garden, Paul was at his desk, came dashing in when I let out a shocked squeal "oh bloody hell NO" !  I said why didn't you shout through and warn me or bring my bath robe, he replied that he had no idea as he hadn't knocked on the door to ask if it was Ok for him to go into the garden.  I mean our back garden is really private, not really overlooked so you dont have to worry about looking in your windows/doors etc.  He didn't hang around to explain what it was he had to visit unannounced to check on, OR did he run away, scarred for life at seeing my bare bum or worse ????

On a brighter note I wanted to share with you some of the beautiful tulips we planted last Autumn.

I have never seen Tulips as gorgeous as these, they have so many layers of petals they can't support the weight of the petals and tend to droop downwards, some of those gorgeous yellow ones are slightly tinged with red on the very edge of the petals, some have a green tinge.  The pale creamy ones were shaped more like daffodils but with more petals, the red ones are in the little bed that runs along the drive way.  The Forget-me-nots and that other Cretan or Star tulip  with the lilac outer petal and vibrant yellow centre and the primroses are all in the front woodland like border.   There is always something to look at in the garden, something to make you smile. 

We have a log by the garage door that had the most amazing fungus growing out of it, its changing and growing all the time and is fascinating but not pretty to look at....

Its beautiful in its own kind of way I guess  I love the almost lacy edges. 

Lilian's Spring Flowers

Lilian your borders are so beautiful full of Bluebells and bright red tulips, even after the wind and rain. Your Clematis has so many flowers it looks incredible, I don't think I've seen one with that many flowers!  Thank you so much for braving the weather to take a photo or two for us XXX.

Brenda's Garden 

Brenda's lovely garden, I love your beautiful Statue Brenda even more special that she was a gift from your girls x

Brenda's Description:

The statue was a gift from the girls, I really love it. 

She has a wire around her neck (no she isn’t committing Harry Carr) it’s to stop her falling and getting broken. She is tucked in close to the arch which is covered with a wisteria and looks beautiful when in full bloom. XXX

We have quite a few clumps of bluebells, they seem to thrive in our soil.

These are pots on the patio that. The mirror reflects the image, keeps it interesting. The metal poppies were a gift at Easter, I popped them into the soil, just another interesting thing to look at.

This was a plant given to me a few weeks ago, I have sat it in a large pot.

This tub was planted last weekend, I’m keeping the colour theme lilac/purple in that area.

Thank you so much for sharing your garden Brenda, the mirror is such a clever feature as it really does make the garden look bigger.  XXX

My Pinterest Boards

This one is Journal pages

This one is also journal pages

Cards made with different backgrounds,  including Alcohol inks.

Cards made with Dainty Flowers stamp and papers

More inky backgrounds and stamped cards

This board was cards featuring circles inspiration.

Card-io stamped cards inspiration board.

These two are Thrinchie inspiration!

Just a few of my boards, I have plenty to choose from, I have loads of food boards too, more than I thought.  My problem for the challenge will be which type of card or project to try !!  I am tempted to go for some Thrinchies. 

I hope that you all have a lovely weekend, 

Love and hugs as always,

Sandra                                                                    xxxxxx 

Our Next Challenge...

 

Good Friday Morning Ladies,

I want to say it's been a long week because it really seems like Monday was forever ago but in some ways it's flown, I think I am more shocked that we are at the end of April more than anything, the weather doesn't help, we had a little sunshine at 7am but it had turned to heavy rain by mid morning and stayed that way for the rest of the day, the forecast for the weekend isn't great, cloudy Saturday and Monday and raining most of Sunday, it's frustrating this time of year as you just want to be out in the garden, I keep seeing these stories of a 40 degree heatwave heading our way from Europe for May, I can see as far ahead as the coronation on our weather site and its not getting above 17 or 18 degrees, so not heatwave in the foreseeable weeks!  I hope that the weather is dry atleast for all of the thousands of people that are planning on lining the route for the Coronation parade.  I saw a video of a rehearsal and it gave me goosebumps seeing so many horses on parade, including huge Shire or 'Carriage' horses as they called them, with all of the Household Calvary dressed in their shiny body armour and their lovely plumed helmets, I was totally in awe and that was just a rehearsal in the middle of the night, I can only imagine how spectacular it will be on the day, so fingers crossed its a dry day!  Are you all planning to watch it?

Thank you for the lovely comments on yesterday's card, I got the idea from an article in my Creative Stamping magazine that arrived yesterday, I did some research for any of you wanting to have a go and found that Jennifer Maguire has a video on Negative Ink Layering, so that you can watch a professional demonstration rather than working it from my directions, although Paul does say every time I do a new technique ''You should do a video'' !  

Our Next Challenge

Now I am sure that I can't be the only one that has so many Cards or projects 'Pinned' on Pinterest from my endless hours of browsing.  

So I thought for this Challenge we could all have a look at our saved Boards and make some of the projects that we have saved, I have Boards for different card categories, Thrinchies, Journal pages, so I have lots to choose from, I am a bit naughtly though as I tend to screenshot things I like to my phone instead of Pinning as I think it's easier to just check my gallery on my phone. 

I have really loved the last couple of challenges, they have pushed me to try new techniques and Ideas, I hope that you have too.  I will say though that by the time I got to Thursdays card I was all 'New techniqued out''  I don't think I have ever tried so many different things in a two week period.  There are some that I will definitely be using again though.

I hope that you all enjoy this challenge, fingers crossed it will, I mean we will all be having a go at things we have loved enough to save so it should be enjoyable.

I hope that you have a Fantastic Friday and a lovely long weekend,

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra

xxxxxx