Seasalt Inspiration

Seasalt has recently opened a new shop in Dorchester  and was giving away these postcards to advertise their sale:

Looking at it I thought what a nice card it would make so as I happened to have a similar boat stamp by Anna Griffin I came up with this:

Really pleased with the way this worked and it certainly looks summery!

Triangles

This is a piece of canvas work that I've finally finished after at least 2 years messing about with it.  I discarded it at least twice, took it off the frame I had it on and was about to unpick it at one point but eventually I rescued it and now am quite pleased with it.  I had been playing about with the idea of triangles so thought I would just stitch some triangle shapes onto canvas and see where it led.  I started with the purple threads and then I used the green and turquoise to make more elaborate patterns over the top and added some beads as well.  The dark purple border is a kumihimo braid that I made and couched down then I added beads and a triangular buttonhole stitch as the edging.  It's mounted on a piece of green/gold handmade paper (bought), then a canvas.  The green behind which doesn't match is the wall!
I suppose it just shows you should persevere with an idea.

Bird hanging

While I'm in the mood for blogging I'll post this little stitched piece I made recently. I'd been making paper beads and wanted to use them for something so die cut a little bird (an old Spellbinders die) from some fabric and stitched it all together using mainly hand stitching and a little wooden twig.  The finished size is about 10 by 8 inches.

Ombre effect inking

A project in Craft Stamper magazine prompted me to try getting this shaded effect using Distress Inks.  It's also similar to a cross stitch project I did years ago which had this light to dark squares as well.  I used 3 different sizes of Tonic nesting square dies and cut masks to ink through then 3 different colours of Distress inks in each colourway to build up the look.  The stamp is an old Elusive Images one which looks really good against the background.  I made a card in the blue colours first but then did this page in my sketchbook as a record of the inks that went well together.

I manage to do very little crafting these days aside from cards as needed hence the lack of blog posts but I'm hoping that one day I'll be more productive.

Apple Face

I've been making a little sketchbook featuring apples on and off for quite a while now.  I got it out again today and made this page at the top, die cutting an apple with a Spellbinders die and then stamping the face (Hampton Art) on it.  I built up a collage background and liked the result so much that I used left over pieces to make an ATC with another die cut apple.

Zentangling on stencils

I love the whole zentangle thing and though I can't aspire to the artistry of many of its practitioners I'm always amazed by how impressive even basic patterns can look.  In these two samples I used a stencil as my starting point, drew round the outlines and then filled in the shapes with patterns.  The top stencil was a basic grid, the bottom one is a stencil by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer and I did do it straight but couldn't manage to hold the sketchbook straight in the scanner!

Water droplets

A couple of week ago I was reading Shosiplatypus's blog and came across this card she had made. At first I thought she had dropped water on it but then I realised it was actually a stamp and she pointed me to Designs by Ryn, a Canadian website.  I ordered the water droplets stamp and the winter trees and they arrived in record quick time and are very good quality.  I suddenly realised yesterday that I had forgotten a friend's birthday on Monday so though crafting time is very limited these days I managed to make this card using the droplets to make a lovely background.  You can't tell from this photo unfortunately but I have also mixed a silver distress stain with broken china for the background and in real life it has a lovely gleam to it.
It's certainly worth looking at Ryn's website for something a bit different.