APRIL CHALLENGE RESULTS...

I didn't envy Lucy the task of picking five out of the April Challenge entries - so very, very difficult.  However she has come up with her five chosen ones, and here they are with personal comments on each from Lucy..

'Thank you so much for the glorious entries for the Nature's Beauty Challenge for April!  It has been a pleasure to visit you all, and I have gone back to visit once more to try to make the very difficult decision to choose five winners.  Every single entry was so beautiful and I do hope you will enter again in June.  Here are my choices in no particular order, and I do hope you will enjoy your prizes...

Entry 11.  Claire - I loved how Claire was inspired by the beauty around her in an unlikely place!  Great use of the CI stamps and beautiful colours and composition.  Loved the micro beads idea...

Entry 15.  Rachel - Rachel used CI lace, stencil and stamps to great effect in her vibrant and beautiful wall hanging...

Entry 17.  Myra -  Such a lot of work has gone into your stunning Printer’s Tray, Myra! I love the textured cover, and the great selection of CI stamps you have used inside...

Entry 24.  Elizabeth - I love the Spring background papers you have chosen for the background of your card, Elizabeth, the sweet Bird stamp, and those beautiful and unusual homemade scrunched flowers...

Entry 27.  Christa -  Such an unusual technique for the background of your card, Christa, and so effective! I love the tactile ‘baby wipe’ flower, and how you have created a perfect backdrop for the butterfly stamp...'

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Lovely work everyone!  Thank you for joining us in this Challenge and hope to link up with you again in June.

Jean x 

p.s. Totally forgot to say - could the 5 please email us at info@craftyindividuals.co.uk with your address and choice of stamp!  Many thanks x

BLUEBIRD..

We received a package of Craft Stampers - new June issue - today, and we designed the cover stamp for this issue - yay!  The June issue is now available to buy on our website at: http://www.craftyindividuals.co.uk/crafting-must-haves-c4/craft-stamper-magazine-c25
and this is another little item made with that same free cover stamp..

Also appearing here is a heart shape by Tando, papers from our 'Shades of Summer' background book, and also one of the new MDF birdcages!

Jean x

ONLY 6 DAYS TO GO....

....Until our current 'Nature's Beauty' Challenge ends and I have no idea how Lucy is going to pick 5 'winners' from the entries so far - the standard is so very good!!  Have a look at the 23 images as of now HERE - gorgeous!

Malcolm and I are having a couple of days away very soon - we are taking the overnight ferry from Newcastle to Amsterdam - and I'm getting very excited.  It will be so nice to have a change of scene if only for a short while, and hopefully we will get lots of photos - tulips perhaps?!

Meanwhile this is a little piccie of myself and Monty Moodle on a walk through the woods the other day - the bluebells are almost fully in bloom (I love bluebells!!)  It was very peaceful in there ....

Now back to the crafty handiwork..

I had better rattle through some more of the team's inspiration on the subject of Nature's Beauty before time runs out on me.  Here we have another little butterfly beauty by Joanna...

Features our butterfly die and floral branch die - it is adorable Joanna!

And I have a pop up card of delicious delights by Daniele next...

Quite a lot of Crafty Individuals products featuring in here.  The Winged Butterfly Lady, and the Dragonfly Drawing are amongst the stamped images.  If you check out Daniele's blog she has more information on making it HERE.  Its beautiful Daniele - thank you!

Coco and Sylvie have been playing very nicely with the bouncing bunnies from CI-372 next...

Then Helen has made a glorious hanging with our Tiptoe through the Tulip stamp...

And my final showing for this evening is a creative and colourful card by Brenda, who has also kindly given us the details in a step by step format as follows...

1. Place doily stencil on tag and apply distress paints (festive berries, spun sugar, picket fence) using blending foam and dry..

2. With tumbled glass, spun sugar and milled lavender distress inks blend colours over the whole piece and then mist with water and dry again.

3. Apply tumbled glass through a latticework stencil using an ink blending tool.

4. Lay an alphabet stencil on the card and spray with a glimmer mist or re-inker mist that you have made up yourself. (I used one I had already made up a while ago - sorry don’t know the colour).

5. I then cut the decorated piece to fit a C6 card and stamped the birdcage and roses image (CI-320) centrally using black archival ink.

6. Stamp it once more on plain white card and cut out the cage and bird, ink them both with distress inks and edge with walnut stain.

 

7. Find a scrap of patterned paper that fits the colouring of your design and die-cut ‘Victoria Corner’ twice.

8. I knew I wanted the little bird and flourishes but it didn’t fit my corners as I wanted it to so I cut both down to find the bits I could piece together to balance my design. Then inked the pieces with walnut stain distress ink.

9. Distress and ink the edges of your card and assemble the pieces together.

10. Embellish with whatever else you may have in your supplies that would fit the design and the theme. I used remnant rubs and chit-chat stickers.

After the riot of colour you have seen here tonight I hope you too feel inspired to join in our little Challenge.

Back soon,

Jean x

p.s. Be one of the first to check out the very cool new MDF goodies on our site HERE now (with more to come soon) - yum, totally yum!

DELICIOUS DELIGHTS....

More from the Team - delicious delights indeed! Nature is particularly delightful at the moment with some lovely Spring sunshine on those very pretty Spring flowers, and the Team have been ever so busy creating the following Nature's Beauty lovelies for you.

Lynne has been concentrating on using Linda's drawings of meadow grasses and flowers from CI-395 - a great stamp set that gives you the chance to build your own meadow, or indeed use them individually as Lynne has done here (loving the texture Lynne!)...

And finally here is a card from Lynne again which uses CI-385 - the complete set of the Summer Meadow images..

Joanna has chosen CI-191 to feature on her beautiful card below, with a little extra help from our butterfly die too...

And Helen has picked the right royal bird from CI-378 as her so very lovely focal point here....

Coco has made a delightful card with part of CI-407 and CI-364, plus our floral branch die      .....

And to finish I have a very cool step-by-step by creative Gio to inspire you.  Gio is a true master of altered art here - as who else but Gio would have decided to alter their Cuttlebug!!?!...

-cover the Cuttlebug with book pages using gel medium or a strong glue
-stamp the bottom using the CI-395 with different colours of Archival ink
-cover with a thin layer of gesso to soften the background
-spray lightly with a cosmic mister
-overstamp randomly using the same CI-395 plate
-create some texture with a stencil and a crackle' paste
-stamp the elephant and the giraffes on the white silk card with the CI-390 and Coffee Archival ink
-colour the stamped animals with Distress Inks
-adhere the stamped images to the Cuttlebug with tacky glue
-paint the upper side of the Cuttlebug with a metallic acrylic paint

Well done everyone - and please leave a comment if you have enjoyed the display tonight!  We have 12 fabulous entries so far in this month's Challenge, but we are still waiting for YOUR entry I think, to add to the window HERE!



Back with you again soon with more from Coco, Brenda, Helen and others!

Jean x