MDF Guitar

I have had this MDF guitar kit sitting on my desk for at least a month, telling me it needs something done to it.  I bought it some time ago.  I think it was part of a kit for Powertex, but I forgot about it and then didn't have any inspiration to decorate it.

I put the main parts together with clear Powertex.  I then painted it with various acrylic paints to try and give the impression of a "curve" to the piece.

I originally wanted clear "strings" using beading thread, but I just couldn't get them to stick (even using red liner tape) so I ended up using twine, although it was thicker than I wanted - but hey ho go with the flow - as they say.

The kit came with two pink paper roses, but they were so squashed in the packaging they weren't really good enough to use, and anyway I needed 3 ( I always work in odd numbers). so I made some from air dry clay.

There was also am mdf "flower" type embellishment in the kit with hearts on, so I cut this up and used some of the heart for the keys at the top of the guitar, and then cut some more up and used them as a random embellishment.

I used a guitar stamp and a scribbled heart and a swirl on the guitar, and embossed it.   The Guitar stamp was painted with posca pens, as were the little heart decorations, and the three larger heart shapes that came with the kit.

Finally I added a little dried gypsophila in with the roses and and added some pebeo gold gilding creme and glitter to the twine.

another view

I wasn't to sure about this whilst I was working on it, or even when I finished it - but it is growing on me!

Butterfly Birthday Card

A fairly quick little card for a lovely little lady.   I stamped the Indigoblu butterfly with black ink and heat embossed it with clear detail powder, cut it out and painted it with distress oxides.  I masked off the card, stamped the butterfly in the middle, and then randomly brushed the background with distress oxides and did a light wash over the the butterfly with the same colours as the cut out butterfly.   I also gave it a little shadow.   The cutout butterfly was glued over the top of the stamped one on the card.

I edged the masked off distress oxide section with a black pen, added some peel offs (well it is no use them sitting in boxes being ignored) and then created the sentiment in Craft Artist and mounted it on card.

Die-cut Wedding Anniversary Card

Another family wedding anniversary card for this weekend - simple but effective.   Die cut into card stock with a Clarity die, and backed with Joanna Sheen Faux Pour paper in red.   Sentiment created in Craft Artist and backed with the same paper

Wedding Anniversary Card - Ginkgo

Another of my oops I nearly forgot cards for this weekend.    I have this stamp and die, which I bought by mistake - I thought I was ordered a poppy - duh - that's the problem when two things are the same item!   Anyway I thought I might as well use it, and it was the right size for this card blank.

Once again stamped with clear embossing ink and embossed with a red mix WOW embossing powder, and then water coloured with green.   The sentiment was created in Craft Artist and backed with some red Joanna Sheen faux pour card,which was the exact match for the stamped and painted image.

Nautical Birthday Card

It was a mad panic yesterday to discover that it was August and I needed to make a Birthday card and get it in the post for a family member.    He is quite into sailing, so I found this yacht stamp in my stash - I forget what make it is.  I do know it came free with a magazine, and I think it was actually a Sheena Douglass selection.

I stamped the image with my WOW! clear embossing pad, and used some WOW embossing powder in a blue.   I then lightly water coloured the image and also the surround of the card, and then edged the card with blue ink.   The sentiment was created in Craft Artist, and mounted on a piece of Joanna Sheen's faux pour paper.

Alcohol Inks

I watched show yesterday on the Kielty Inks, which are less "smelly" than normal alcohol inks.   As I had some, I thought I would try some of the techniques shown.   Erm .... yes ..... well a bit more practise is needed, but am happy to share my disasters!

I was trying to paint a flower - methinks it looks more like a distorted puffer fish!

I also did a random drop of all the colours of inks, which I have tried before, and it will make a good background behind one of the Clarity dies.   The demo showed adding bit of gold leaf to parts of the inks that were still tacky - I couldn't find my gold leaf - so dropped a few random bits of gilding flakes on.

This was my second attempt at a flower - a tad better (albeit I mucked up the leaves)   I found the ink was drying to quickly on my first attempt, so I added some extender, which helped a bit.    I think my main problem is that I need a bigger straw to blow the ink around, so the next aim is to find a suitable straw and try again.

A simple joint birthday cake for my son-in-law and myself, as we are having a family tea, and our birthdays are next door to each other on the calendar.  As my birthday is a bit of a milestone, we had to have cake and my son-in-law loves my rich fruit cakes (well so do I).  If nobody else wants any, we will be quite happy with that - it will be half each!  I must admit my fruit cakes have quite a reputation, and I have had many compliments in the past from chefs, but only the immediate family know the secret!

We both love royal-iced cakes too, but as I had hurt my back (see an earlier post) I couldn't stand to do the icing as it takes a few days, albeit only a few minutes each day, so for once I cheated and used sugarpaste.

We both love sweet peas, so I chose those for the spray on the top, colouring them the same as some I have growing in the garden.

Obviously I couldn't make the cake too feminine, so I discovered a train stencil in my cake stash, and my son-in-law collects model trains, so I stencilled it on to a strip of sugarpaste and attached it to the front of the cake, using the same range of purple colours that I used in the flowers.   To finish the sides of the cake I did scallops of little blossoms.

side front view

a glimpse of one of the scallops around the rest of the side of the cake

Quick gift card

To go with the huge card from yesterday - a little card to contain the gift of some money.  I can't remember who manufactured the set of stamps - apologies!

Just stamped in Nuvo black, and then watercoloured.  I can see that my eyes are getting worse, but fortunately with water colouring it doesn't matter too much.

I tweaked the painting on this image that I shared the other day.   I wanted to make a card from it, but the handmade rag paper was A5 size and I didn't want to trim the natural edge to it, so I had to create an A4 card.   Thank goodness for washi tape!.  It worked to join the two bits of cardstock and I used some more to create a frame around the front of the card.

(In hindsight, I think I have some A3 card somewhere, but I will blame it on the heat this week that I didn't even think of that!  Added to which I have been suffering from a very painful back following a collision with a wall in the house, where the wall won!)

I didn't add any sentiment to the card, so it could be mounted in a frame later.

Penguin Card

A card made for a family member who is mad about penguins.   Created in Craft Artist.   He was originally a Christmas penguin, but with a bit of tweaking and adding a hat and changing his bow, he is an anytime penguin!

The edges of the image were distressed with ink, and using the same ink and a stamp the edges of the card were also stamped