Free Love Machine digi stamp

I'm so chuffed to have reached 100 followers that I wanted to thank you by making a freebee digi stamp to give away. I asked Trace from InkyPinkyCraft what stamp she would like to see and she suggested a grungy heart, I figured Trace loves cogs then why not make cogs inside a heart and my Son said with his mega deep voice call it a Love Machine and the rest is as they say history.

I wanted to show you my take on the stamp, so I made this tag. As you can see I'm obviously using my time off work being very productive, imagine what I'd be doing if I won the lottery at home all day! I wish................

I used:-

A white tag

That Special Touch cog mask to emboss the tag

rub n buff silver, purple & green.

Black soot DI

TH cog & clock

Crown charm

spiral paper clips (my fav thing at the moment)

Stampendous Frantage embossing powder & mica flakes

I coloured the heart with Promarkers

Coated the red area with Rangers Rock Candy.

I'm entering this tag into Try it on a Tuesday - Anything goes challenge, I'm in early this time!

Now to give you my digi stamp & sentiment.....I have made it a PNG rather than a JPEG so you can have a transparent background. 

I would like to ask if you use this digi stamp please will you reference it to Michelle Webb and I'd really appreciate a link back to this blog, thanks a million xx. Right click the image and save to your computer.

I would really love to see what you make as well, so let me know and I will pop over and have a look.

Thank you for following me xx

Love Machine heart & sentiment - designed by Michelle Webb

Enjoy xxx

London 2012 Olympics canvas

I've taken two weeks off work for some time off and to take in all the Olympics while I get messy and inky. I was so proud of our gymnastic boys this afternoon. Well done, I was on the edge of my seat!

This little 7" x 5" canvas will be my memory of enjoying my time off and crafting away while the Olympics was on.

I'm entering this into the brilliant Try it on a Tuesday too, their two week challenge is 'So very British', and I only have a few hours left to enter into it. I better get cracking then.

I used Portobello Road Urban Stamps, Dylusions inks Postbox red, and London blue, red and blue acrylic paint and gesso.

I love being off work, see if I can post something everyday! Have I just set myself a challenge? Oh no.

Is it G&T O'clock now?

Cooked book challenge

The brilliant Hels Sheridan and Ellen Vargo have been challenging each other with a list of crafty ingredients and seeing what they can make out of them. The hugely talented Trace Metcalf  aka InkyPinkyCraft and myself thought this was a brilliant idea and asked Hels and Ellen if we could filch their idea and come up with some ingredients of our own and challenge each other too. Ellen said go for it! Hels and Ellen may have just started a revolution me thinks!

Hel's latest fab challenge is here and Ellen's marvellous make is here.

So last weekend Trace and I had a chin wag and came up with a list of things we didn't have! Not a great start, I did wonder if we were ever gonna find something we both had?  After reeling off my crafty stash we eventually hit on something we both had and we came up with the ingredients below:

Paper mache book
Tim Holtz Idea-ology
Gesso
Gilding flakes
Adorondack Dabbers
Ranger's Rock Candy
Stencils
Distress inks
Archival ink
Die

I added a couple of extra bits:
Chipboard
Mulberry paper
Spare bit of chain & a charm.

Hop along over to Trace's amazing grungy book here.

This is what I knocked up with my ingredients.

Method
I started off gesso-ing my book. Claudine Hellmuth's gesso is the best on the market, I love it's bright whitness.

 I used some baby blue mulberry paper on the front and back covers. I've got loads of mulberry paper just sitting in a box, I always think it's so nice, but never know what to do with it, it looks great on the covers.

I used the paint from Espresso & Butterscotch Adirondack dabbers to paint the spine of the book, which gave it an aged effect. I used the mini Time Travel Crafter's workshop stencil with Walnut Stain Distress Ink on the covers. I used the gilding flakes on the raised lines on the spine and on the sides of the book.

I cut 2 Tim Holtz 'On the Edge' dies and used the stencil with structure gel to make the clocks on the die cut edges. When it was dry I painted up the edges with the same Espresso and Butterscotch paint from the dabbers.

Love the aged look from the paint.

I used the Rock Candy on the Alphabet Soup Tim Holtz Grungeboard letters.

I used Eyelets to make holes in each side of the book and used a clasp and chain to be able to fasten the book shut when I want to. I adorned the front eyelet with a Tim Holtz Chain Tassel.

On the front inside is an ATC which fits perfectly on the inside cover. I used distress inks and cut out a butterfly from a TH paper stash sheet. I also used a little piece of TH measuring tape. The little B is from an old collection of embellishments.

On the back inside I used tissue tape to line the box, filled a bottle with Barn Door re-inker and water, and dropped a few pearly beads with eyeballs drawn on them! I cut the 50/ shield from a TH paper stash page and distressed the edges with Broken China. The film strip, coat hanger, bottle, bingo number, token and clock is all TH Idea-ology. The chain and charm is from my stash.

This was a really exciting project and I loved sharing the challenge with Trace.

Thank you Trace xxxxxxx

Again, again!!!

I've entered this into Simon Says Stamp Challenge - Anything goes 

Whoop Whoop I'm a DT member at Crafting Time

It's official, the announcement went up this afternoon, I'm delighted to be on the Crafting Time Design Team.

Crafting Time is a bricks and mortar (& online) shop in Shepreth, Cambridgeshire and their blog is called It's Crafting Time. They stock lots of yummy products from Dylusions, Melt Pots, Artistic Stamper, Tim Holtz, Indigo Blu and much more. Go check it out.

There are 6 newbies on the DT they are

me

Mel  The Yorkshire Fox

May May's Happy Daze

Maggie Just Scrapping

Jan Jan's Journal

Laura BubbaBooBits

I'm so pleased to be joining such a talented bunch of crafty peeps.

Michelle x

Wowee 100 followers, thank you so much, you wonderful people

x

Let sleeping kittens lie

This is a journal page of my cat Holly taken when she was only 12 weeks old. She's nearly 2 now, but still a very small cat, she's my perpetual kitten. She is often found in my craft room pulling out bits of ribbon and chewing on my paint brushes. She has a thing for sequin waste and when she gets a hold of it she has to tear it to shreds! It's under lock and key now.

I'm using my favourite product at the minute here, its the Stampendous aged silver embossing enamel with some mica flakes dropped into the melted powder. 

I used strips of ribbon, tissue tape, a cut up adage ticket and some fabric, stuck them down with matt medium and gesso'ed over the top. I also used my favourite Crafters Workshop stencil and pushed some gesso through this too. I stuck down my circular paper clips with some perfect pearls and sprinkled some mica flakes on this too.

She's still this cute, awee. 

xx

What is my art style?

A friend said to me that they didn't know what their artistic style was, and it made me think, you know, I don't think I know what mine is either! I see things in other people's great creations and something gets switched on, an idea pops into my head and I'm away. But I still don't seem to have a particular style yet, I suppose this will come in time I guess. 

The background is turquoise Dylusion's inks and gesso. The lovely extra bluey bits are where I have brushed over the page with interference blue Golden Paint. I love these paints, I gotta thank Kate Crane for introducing them to me,  or not  as I'll never have any money again at this rate. I have a very big Christmas list so far this year, and I'm trying to be good! 

I cut the words and parts of the lady out of the Sunday newspaper. The boots are Dylusions stamps. The hat and the hearts I cut out of a poetry book. Then I just started to write about what my style is, or if indeed I do have one yet.

Michelle xxxx

Calendar Journal - July

I've made a start on my calendar journal. If you haven't seen this before then please check Kate Crane's Art Calendar on her blog or the Art Calendar challege on Flikr  for more information and brilliant pictures.

I've been thinking that I wanted to give one of the months a science theme, with a periodic table for the squares. I couldn't wait to get started. The Dylusions inks give you the perfect colour for solutions in the lab bottles, bright and yummy. I looked around for some science stamps but couldn't find any so I thought, well I'll just draw something then, so I drew the lab bottles and the geeky lab tech girl.  I forgot to put the days of the week on before I took the picture,  but they're on there now. I know the Helium is in the wrong place, but it's ART! lol

I love the way the bubbles go across the page.

I used to look like this when I was a geochemist! lol

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

I also did a June page but I didn't take a picture of it before I wrote it out, so here it is below. It's a dragonfly insect life kind of theme. I remember in the summer holidays when I was a kid, disappearing off for the whole day with just some jam sandwiches in my pocket and a little net on a stick. I'd be facinated in lady birds on nettles and dragonflies. So I put little lady birds climbing up the jar shaped days. For the jars I made silver screw top lids from Ranger's silver Memory Foil. 

I really love the idea of the Art Calendar I've always wanted to keep a diary and I've never really kept up with them, but this is different, this is creative. That makes all the difference. 

Stampotique Designers Challenge Out of the box SDC57

For the Stampotique designer's challenge 'Outside of the box' I thought about using a product I had in my stash I hadn't used before, the Memory Glass came to mind, and I thought 'what could I make that was outside the box for me?'. Well making anything with the memory glass would be thinking outside the box for me. Then I thought 'what about inside the box', put Stampotique  stamps inside my 'outside the box' box! ... Are you still with me?.......Well here is a box I have never made before, using a product I've never used before and with new stamps too. I think that might constitute an outside the box project, well at least I hope so.

I started off with my Ranger Memory glass 2"x2".

Edged 6 little panes with Ranger copper memory foil.

Held the sides together with Blue tack while I taped over them with more Memory Foil.

I stamped on the outside of the box with a texture stamp.

I stuck a jump ring to the lid of the box and attached it to my two Stampotique stamped images, Devil-ish and Framed, which I had coloured with TH distress inks and Promarkers.

I fixed the lid onto the box with more Memory Foil and now I had my double sided Stampotique dangly hanging in my little glass box. I found an old purple perfume bottle lid, drilled a hole in it, put a head pin though to make a loop in the top and attached a long chain. I stuck the lid onto the top of the box and now I had my very own swinging Stampotique dangly in my gorgeous glass box. It looks awesome up at my craft room window. 

 Here it is hanging in my cherry tree. 

I love it!

I must not swear

Just a quickie Stampotique card which was started in the mini 1 hour class with Kate Crane at Art from the Heart yesterday. I finished it off this afternoon. It's a bit cheeky, but we gotta be a little bit cheeky sometimes.
I am going to add another post tonight for the Stampotique Challenge - 'Out of the box'. I better get a shifty on then.

Made with Dylusions Inks and hanging plant stamp.

I used the bleaching technique that Dyan showed us yesterday on the plant leaves. brush water on the leaves and blot out the blue ink, then use a paint brush and paint another colour of ink inside the leaves. Love this little tip, it looks fab too.

Stampotique Whisker Monster with sign

Some metallic blue acrylic paint, and some black gesso.

An old Dimention Fourth swirl stamp

Preview day at Art from the Heart

Art from the heart
An epic inky, painty shopping session and I loved every minute of it. Got there at 9am, and left at 3.30pm! Everyone was so nice, lots of people and there was no argy bargy-ness. Perfect. The table was set out in the shop with the journals open again...I love it when they do that....it just makes you want to whip your journal open and start inking up a new page straight away. Art journaling is going a bit mental at the minute, everyone's talking about it and wanting to have a go. I'm enjoying the ride, just like everyone else.

Once again I took my camera and took only 3 pictures...what a fool I am!...... I really wish I had taken more, one pic was of me and Dyan and the other 2 were of me and Kaz...the pics of me and Kaz we weren't happy with because we didn't have flattering angles!....how vain are we? But if we don't look fab, they're no good, simple as that.  Here is the pic of me and Dyan. I'm a short arse so Dyan came down to my level...however I look a lot shorter than 5'4" on here! Dyan looks like she's practically on her knees. Fab and groovy red hair too, looks brilliant.  I'm on a diet so when I'm thinner I won't look as short...well that's my theory anyway...I'm currently being beasted into shape by my Jillian Michaels dvd too....she kills me on a daily basis.

I was lucky that someone dropped out of Kate's class at 10am, and I stepped in to fill their place.

We made a Stampotique card, which when I finish it off I will put it on here, tomorrow maybe. You can see a little bit of it on the bottom of the haul pictures below.

We all made a concertina card in Sandra Hall's class. Which you can also see at the bottom of my haul picture too

In Dyan's class we did a bleaching and layering stamps technique, very..VERY...funny class.....mental note.. ...must take hard hat next time as Dyan likes to take the shortest route possible when passing you items. She couldn't very well get up and pass anything anyway today because she was sat with her foot up on two boxes, she had broken 2 toes ....ouch!... The funniest story was how she did it. Apparently Dyan thinks its quite natural to walk down the stairs in a ministry of silly walks stylee and manged to smack her toes off the bannister! 

I came home with dirty hands again.

Here is the haul, vetted by the cat of course first.  Every time I whip the camera out she's like 'get me, get me'. 

The little square boxes are pill boxes filled with Perfect Pearls, many different colours. The bag of swirly brass things are swirly brass things!...erm paper clip type things. 

I managed to pick up a Halloween in Wonderland 8x8 paper pad for Red Kitty B aka Sandra (or the other way round..who knows), I think maybe the last in the country. I was really lucky it was there. Apparently Ben found it in the studio. I got some great thick ATC's, really excited about those.

I spy an old Tim Holtz stamp in the middle there. 

This is a mucky mixture bag of stamps, I love every stamp in it! You can see my new 2 Stampotique stamps in the corner, I have a plan to hatch with those tomorrow. It will be on the blog very soon.

And finally 3 racks for my dabbers, distress stains, Golden paints and Adirondack alcohol inks, I have no excuses now for being untidy.

I think you could safely say that I broke the bank!

Until next time.

Bye xxxxx

Snap Happy Tag

I've been itching to buy some Golden paints since my class at Art from the Heart last month. So I thought I would treat myself and buy some payday paints. I got a delivery of 5 Golden paints yesterday and I wanted to play with them as soon as possible. The mop up tag I had from the 'What's your poison' canvas was just the ticket, for some painty experimentation.

I used the rest of my modelling paste from the last canvas with a flower stencil to give some texture to the tag.

I used some Pashmina Glimmer Mist, Interference blue and green & magenta Golden paints on the modelling paste to give the flowers some depth. I really love the effect of the interference paints.

I used Tim Holtz film stamp, film acetate strip, family photograph stamp, number plaque and tissue tape.

I used Stampendous Frantage aged aqua embossing powders too.

I drew my own little heads on the film. They look like they're having fun.

Oh and I used Adirondack alcohol inks on the number plaque & the acetate film strip.

Happy snapping x