Hello Autumn

 As Autumn breezes in, I've decided it's time to put my flip flops away for another year but I don't mind as although I'm not a fan of the colder days, Autumn is my favourite season.

Perfectly timed, I have just finished my Autumnal tag, which will become part of a monthly project that I am working on.

On the tag I have used a mix of wood grain paper and this great Autumnal leaf paper from one of the Dreamees CDs in my stash. This cute little owl is also a digi image, which is ideal as my colouring isn't very good.

There is something very satisfying about stripping the inside of a padded envelope and knowing how useful that will become one day......something only a crafter will understand ha ha !!    That envelope padding provided a vital piece of texture for my owl to nestle on.

I then added some pre-stamped and cut maple leaves along with a few die cut foliage and some digi foliage from one of Hayley Bignall's older CDs.

I've added a little Autumnal verse and a few more leaves to the 6 x6 inch wood grain page that has now also been finished to accompany my tag and some velco corners to attach it to the page.

I love the changing colour of the leaves on the trees..........and as I'm drinking my coffee and looking into my garden, that familiar tufty tail of the squirrel, digging up my garden and leaving by bulbs for me to pop back in the soil......

Have a fab day whatever you have planned for yourself.

Happy crafting

Challenges:  fabnfunky - Autumn 

August Memory Book Pages

I have August's memory book pages to share from last month and these have already been sent to my swap partner as part of our Dreamees group swap.  

I started with a bunch of lavender using the Dreamees lavender dies from the Nature's Garden Collection and their recipe of happiness sentiment. 

I thought this trellis die looked a little like one that you could get in a garden and with some green sisal behind, it gave a softer illusion to the background. 

On the adjacent side, I created a little folder using a piece of music paper that I found in my stash.  When I was cleaning my stencil after making a project, I  didn't want to waste the texture paste that was left over, so I made some prints on pieces of card which came in very handy as I used one of these brick stencils behind my hyacinth stamp. To add a little more dimension to it I added some tiny blue die cut flowers and some moss to the pot.

I also added a little tag using one of the Dreamees digi stamps from the CD Roms that they used to make and my usual ATC card that I normally include with my swaps.

On the flip side, I chose the peach kisses paper pad. A gatefold page with a pop-up behind the doors and on the adjacent page an open envelope of tags.

I stamped one of the little fairy mushroom houses and added it to the centre of my page.

I managed to get two larger tags (just) in the envelope. I sometimes get carried away decorating and forget about the space I have to fit things into. I used little stamps and dies on the coordinating papers from this pad.

On this tag, I used one of the very early Dreamees stamp sets,  the Elegant Dress, simply because when I was looking through my tray of stamps, it was right at the bottom looking all forgotten. The top layer of the mannequin dress has been stamped and heat embossed onto a small piece of vellum. These projects are ideal for using up all these small pieces in your craft box that you don't want to throw away.

Throughout my project, I've added Stickles glitter glue to highlight, and the addiction grows!! There always seems to be a cool colour that I think I might need and then I spot the new Distress Stickles!!

Have a fab day whatever you have planned for yourself.

Happy crafting

Lavender card

 Sharing a lavender card made for a friend, with a little bit of a difference today.

I recently purchased a lovely lavender stamp/die set from the Dreamees Natures Garden collection and decided to have a play with my air dry clay to see if I could get a decent cast from them as I already knew that they looked beautiful stamped and die cut.

It was a little fiddly and takes a little patience but I was happy with how they turned out.

The Das clay turned out pretty well but if you want something feather light for your cards I would recommend that you use something like Hearty.

To colour my flowers I used my Dreamees dinky inky reinkers . I mixed the Orchid and Eclipse chalk reinkers for the lavender blooms and for the stems I used the reinker sparkle in crocodile.  

As I like to get the most out of the inks that I use on my projects, I found that mixing a little clear acrylic bindex into my dinky inkies allows me to use them on a lot more projects. The one that I use is a Pebeo studio acrylics brilliance that I bought in Hobbycraft. It's great to use as a matt medium to seal your projects too and also to add to your mica powders to make your own metallic paints. 

Have a great evening

Happy crafting