As I Say Goodbye To 2017.......

The time has almost come to say goodbye to 2017 and to welcome in the New Year.

I hope that you have all had a great Christmas.

For me, 2017 has gone in a flash.  It has had lots of ups and downs, but is definitely a year to remember.

It started off with both Dan and I being ill, me over my birthday!  Didn't even celebrate New Year 2017 with bubbly! But it got better.....  I was invited to join the Country View Crafts Design Team and have also become a regular PaperArtsy blog contributor.

I have spent alot of time travelling with work, and spend alot of time in London, which inspired the card above.  One of our London offices is in the court yard of St. Paul's Cathedral - it's always a wonderful sight - as many of my Facebook followers will know by the amount of photos I share of the cathedral.  The card I have shared was made for the Branch Manager of the London office, Het, who loves the Cathedral as much as I do!  

I have tried to be as kind as I can throughout the year and in 2018 I hope this will continue.

What does 2018 hold in store for me?  Well, I start the year with a 'big' birthday.  I am hoping that I can make more time to do the things that I love - spending time with family and friends and crafting.  My calendar is already filling up with lots of craft events, so I hope this continues throughout the year!

I really appreciate you visiting my blog and sharing my journey with me, thank you.  Your comments always mean so much to me.

Before I sign off for the year, I would like to wish you all a very Happy and Healthy 2018. I look forward to sharing the next year with you.

Warm Wishes

Miriam

.....These Are A few Of My Favourite Things.....Blue Christmas

Right from the start of this project I have not been able to stop singing the song in my head!!

Today I am sharing a post over at the PaperArtsy blog.  The theme for this fortnight is "My Favourite Things" - this got me thinking - I have so many favourite things it was hard to  limit them.

Here is the card that I have created using 5 'favourite things'

So, what are my favourite things in this card??

1.  PaperArtsy Fresco Finish Chalk paints

Regular followers will know that most of my projects contain Fresco Finish chalk paint!  I started by brayering London Night, Marlin, Blueberry and Glass Blue paints onto Tim Holtz tissue paper.  I really liked how these paints blended together  - I purposely wanted darker patches in some areas.

2. Texture

I love texture of any form.  For this project I brayered Fresco Finish Chalk paint onto the tissue paper using a textured roller.  I just loved the white specks!

3.  Hot Picks

I have always adored PaperArtsy Hot Picks stamps, which leads me on to my 4th favourite things...

4. Christmas

I used Hot Picks HPXM03.   I stamped the holly flourish in the background around the edges of the card.  The lamp post was then stamped and coloured using Fresco Finish chalk paints.  Here, I used Haystack, Autumn Fire, Berry Red and Hyde Park.  

For the highlight I used a white pencil.  I edged the card using a gold marker.

To finish I added a sentiment from the same Hot Picks set.

So, have you guessed what my 5th favourite thing was??  Well..... blue!!...which also features in a lot of my projects!

I really enjoyed creating this project for the PaperArtsy blog.

I hope that I have inspired you tonight. Make sure that you pop over to the blog to see the amazing inspiration!

Thanks for joining me......

Country View Crafts Challenges - Christmas

Hi again.  Today I am sharing my second project for Country View Crafts.

Here is my second Christmas project:

To start, I covered a card blank using Tim Holtz Christmas paper.

I then die cut a stitched circle and stamped the wonderful trees from a JOFY Christmas set that was released earlier this year.  I coloured the trees using alcohol markers and added some colour around the edges to blend out the white.  I mounted this onto the card.

To finish I added lots of Christmassy embellishments.

I love making Christmas cards, even if the thought of how many I have to make.

I hope that I have inspired you today.  There is still plenty of time to join in with the latest challenge.  Pop over to the challenge blog to see what the design team has been creating.

Thanks for joining me today.

Country View Crafts Challenge - Christmas

It's the last challenge of the year - and what better theme than Christmas.

Here is the card that I created for my first project of the month...

I can't tell you how much I enjoyed making this!!

I started by cutting matts from the Tim Holtz Christmas stack and Kraft stack.  I love the Kraft stack so much I had to buy a second pad because I used it so quickly!  Once cut, I distressed the edges f the mat and inked using Walnut Stain distress ink.

These were layered to a card blank and a stitched circle in Kraft card stock added.

Next, I die cut the largest reindeer from the newest Tim Holtz set and some ferns from Tim's Christmas Greens set.  The reindeer was offset to the right side of the card and the ferns to the top left of the circle.

I added pine cones and seam binding ribbon.

I added metallic distress crayon to a Tim Holtz words and numbers tag.  

This was tied to the seam binding, along with bells.

To finish the card I used a metallic rub-on.

Yes, this card was a Tim overload, but boy did I enjoy it!! 

Pop over to Country View Crafts Challenges to see what the other design team members have created.

Thanks for reading my post today.....

I'm Dreaming Of A White Christmas.......

Today I am showing a project over at the PaperArtsy blog.  The theme is 'True Colours -White' and I chose to use Kay Carley stamps and stencils for my project.

My natural instinct is not clean and simple and my art normally does not include much 'white', so this was a real challenge for me - and I enjoyed it so much I created a second project! I chose to create Christmas cards as I figured it would also help me get ahead with my card making.

Here is my first...

I started by stencilling Grunge Paste through a Kay Carley stencil in the top left corner and left of  the card blank.  Before the Grunge Paste dried I sprinkled clear glitter over the snowflakes.

I wasn't sure whether the glitter would stick to the Grunge Paste but it did and I thought it looked great.  This was then left to dry thoroughly.

Once dry, I sponged Zucchini Fresco Finish chalk paint through another Kay Carley stencil.  

Once dry, I stamped the co-ordinating stamp in Archival ink and blasted it with the heat gun to dry it thoroughly.  I then painted the leaves in Hyde Park and berries in Cherry Red Fresco Finish chalk paints.

I stamped the large flourish from an earlier stamp release.

Again, I painted the dots and snowflakes using Fresco Finish chalk paints.

To finish I stamped a few random snowflakes and added glitter to them, along with a sentiment.

I added a green border using green fine liner pen.

I enjoyed the project so much I decided to create a second while I was in the swing of it.

This project followed the same techniques as the previous.  This time I used two Kay Carey stencils - PS068 and PS069  .

Thank you for joining me today - make sure you pop over to the PaperArtsy blog to see the amazing inspiration from the team, and I hope you feel inspired to join in with the challenge.

Experimenting With Rust

Tonight I am sharing a project over at the PaperArtsy blog.  The theme for the fortnight is 'rust'.

I chose to use the gorgeous Everything Art stamps and to experiment with rusting powder.

Here is my project....

I wanted to create a rusted image with a stamp, stamping onto cotton - I had not tried stamping with rusting powder before so was quite nervous.  In fact, my first experiment didn't work - but I was delighted with my second attempt.

I used cotton as I thought it might create a soft effect.... and I was right.

I used the main image from Everything Art PaperArtsy stamp set 1.  I stamped using glue, making sure that I washed my stamp immediately after.  I then sprinkled rusting powder over the image.  In my first attempt, I sprinkled water and left the cotton - but it barely created and rust.  In my second attempt I squeezed a small amount of lemon juice over the image.  After a couple of hours (as can be seen in the pic below) I could see that this was more successful.

I then decided to leave the cotton panel overnight - the result was just what I was looking for.....

To finish the panel, I frayed the edges and added ink to 'age' them.

I then started to create a weathered rusty look panel.  For this, I layered lots of Seth Apter Fresco Finish paints until I was happy with the result.

This was then mounted onto a black card mat.

I stamped the word 'art' using Everything Art PaperArtsy stamp set 5 , then cut around them.  

I chose some rusty embellishments from my stash and then put everything together.

I had great fun creating this project, and I hope that you like what I created.

I hope that I have inspired you to join in with the fortnightly challenge and I look forward to seeing what you have created.

Happy Crafting!

Country View Challenges - Stencils

Today I am showing you my second project for the Country View Crafts Challenge this month.  You will remember that Gabrielle has chosen the theme of stencils for this month's challenge.

Here is my second project...

I tried to use different techniques in this project and chose to use the amazing new Seth Apter dies.  

I couldn't wait to get my hands on them when Seth announced them, so as soon as Country View Crafts had them in stock, I ordered them and die cut them all as soon as they dropped on my door step!

How awesome are those dies cuts??  Anyway - back to the project at hand!

I used the die-cut from the Strands die as a stencil and covered a card blank with Broken China Distress Oxide ink. I really liked this effect.

I then added drops of water to create splotches on the background.

My next step in this project was to randomly stamp Seth's French Text stamp in Archival Ink.

I also stamped other Seth Apter stamps randomly in Broken China Distress Oxide.  The edges were inked with Walnut Stain.

I re-purposed the die cuts that I used as a stencil and added these to the background.

I then covered the Periscope die cut in Deco Art gilding wax.  

I did the same around the edge of a card mat.

These were then all put together to form the card.

To finish, I used Tim Holtz Metallic Sticker Quotations.

So, there you go.  My second project for the Stencil theme.

There is plenty of time to join in with the Challenge this month - there is a £20 gift voucher up for grabs.  Pop over to the blog to see the amazing inspiration from the team.

Thanks for joining me again today.... Happy crafting!