Faery Inks Mermaid Challenge

Helen here:
Just sharing my colouring of the Faery Inks Mermaid for their June Challenge over on Facebook.
Coloured with copic and used a undersea paper I had in my stash and added bubbles using a stencil, texture paste and glass beads. Die cuts are a tree make great seaweed though!!
Won Amanda's pick, very thrilled!!

The Otter.

Annabel here! This year an Otter and family have decided to inhabit the River Severn in Bridgnorth and everyone has seen it but me!

My friend's partner has seen it numerous times when crossing the bridge so she ordered an otter themed card for his 50th birthday!

Allegedly the otter seems to wave as he drifts passed you..(He is rather tame.)...so this Otter waves with his left paw when you move his tail.

I painted the otter pieces using acrylic paints as it seemed the fastest option to get what I wanted. The background is a scanned marbled background that Helen and I made on one of our "mess and make background" days. And I wish I could remember where I got the bubble embellishments from... they were the last ones I had and they are perfect for watery images!

One layer black silhouette cards!

Annabel again :) I've been really inspired by the "Keep-it-simple" and "One Layer Only" trends in card making at the moment. It's been very evident on Pinterest in the last few months. I wanted to have a go at a masked distress ink background directly onto the card and then black silhouette stamping on top of it. This is my first effort using distress inks blended in the background square (using a 12cm x 12cm mask) and then stamping on top with Versafine Onyx Black.

Stamps: Woodware JGS300 Going to Seed and Crafty Individuals Cl - 231 (Butterflies)

So as I was finishing off this set I remembered I had a rather nice unused set of Sheena Douglass " A Little Bit Scenic - Underwater Angels" I could use, and wouldn't this be ace with some water droplets or splashes on the distress ink background?? So... I carried on to this set.

I'm really happy with these, especially the two guppies on the left. ( The other fish on white are the envelopes for the cards.)

You might have spotted that the one fish card is not on one layer, but two. I found it super hard to keep the card clean! No blodges, marks, scuffs or... mess! To save a couple of the cards I remounted them onto a new card blank. And since they were no longer "One Layer" it meant I could justify adding some sequins -  I find it really hard to not use any embellishments. Although the seed head cards were more successful (at being one layer) I added some sequins to them too. I know... I think I have an addiction. lol!

Whoopsi Daisy Challenge

Helen Here:
Just love this little cutie from Whoopsi Daisy Stamps. http://cutedaisymay.blogspot.co.uk/
Coloured her with copics:
Hair E43, E53, E50  Dress E15, Y17, Y15, Y11 then cut her out using a Spellbinder die.
Created the summery feel using x Cut dies for the grass and flowers and a lovely little die from
Joy Crafts for the little bugs at the top.
Flowers from my crafty stash with a little leafy die again from Joy Crafts.
Papers from my stash.

Every stamp has a silver lining...

Annabel again! :) I came across the following image on the Paper Parrot Blog (Via Pinterest) and was really impressed with it! (Click the picture to view the relevant blog post.)

It seemed a really simple way of tackling flower stamps and making something with a completely different feel to it. I didn't have this set of stamps so I used a set of Joanna Sheen stamps from the Little Bit Sketchy collection called "Flower Power." As I  haven't got many pale inks, I stamped them using second generation stamping and Weathered Wood distress ink. It's not as beautifully coloured as my initial inspiration but I tried to do something similar using distress inks as watercolours - blobbing them onto an acrylic block, adding some water and then using them with a paintbrush onto the card. Once coloured I went over the stamped edges with a silver pen. A bit later it occurred to me that I could have just stamped them in silver to begin with??!??  But you live and learn! :)

Distress Inks - Weathered Wood, Peeled Paint, Fired Brick. Font - East Coast Stationery.