Colour Challenge with Penny Black

Trying to keep my craft room & the whole property tidy for potential buyers to view means that I'm scraping in at the last moment with my creation for one of the Penny Black colour challenges (Day 5).

front of card 

close-up showing fussy cutting detail  plus
 sparkle of glittered flower-centre

close-up showing Distress Inks
watercolouring 

 inside of card 

close-up showing tone-on-tone stamping &
inked edges of message panel

The poinsettia images were stamped twice in Distress Ink using the masking technique & watercoloured using a combination of Distress Stain & Marker. These were then cut out & mounted onto the background which had been stamped with the same image. Gold Ice Ice Stickles was mixed with Golden Rod Stickles to create the flower-centre as the Golden Rod by itself proved rather brassy.

Recipe

Stamps Penny Black 40-075 christmas pride (front of card) & 30-057 winter whites & green (message panel images).

Inks VersaFine Onyx Black (tone on tone background) & Vintage Sepia (message panel images); Barn Door Distress Ink & Stain (poinsettia image); Vintage Photo Distress Ink (edging message panel).

Pencils/Markers etc... Barn Door Distress Marker; Ice Stickles Glitter Glue (Gold Ice) & Stickles Glitter Glue (Golden Rod). 

Cardstock Winsor & Newton Cotman 190gsm Cold Pressed/NOT Grain Fin Watercolour Paper; white, kraft & brown cardstock from stash.

Unplanned Childhood Thoughts

Whilst watering the front garden a few nights ago (we need a lot of rain now after our very dry summer) I noticed the most astonishing sunset as I looked towards the sky over Brecon town. I took some photos & didn't really think more of it. A few days later my husband (observing my honey laden bread for lunch) read me an extract from a Rupert Brooke poem titled 'The Old Vicarage." It wasn't the bit about honey that caught my imagination but the hares at sunset. The image below is the result of my playing about with my photo & graphics editing programme about which I know very little. But there is more - hares led to rabbits & rabbits led to my childhood train journeys to & from school where I'd gleefully count the number of rabbits I could spot in the fields along the railway track. Isn't it strange what the imaginative mind will create if we allow it some freedom?

Midst all the uncertainty of trying to sell our house I'm exploring various aspects of artwork including lettering, journalling & Celtic art. It was on one of those little explorations in blogland that I stumbled upon the Take A Word Challenge where this week's word is Childhood.

Faber-Castell & Distress Stains

I continue to learn much from various art forms affiliated with stamping, & sometimes from quite unexpected avenues. I was introduced to Alexandra's work when she joined Penny Black as one of their Designers &, although I'm not a scrapbooker,  I always learn about some aspect of design, composition or a particular technique through her posts, as indeed I do from the other Penny Black Designers. Alexandra has also been a Guest Designer with Faber-Castell who have put together a prize for one of Alexandra's Followers (details are HERE).

A few months ago I mentioned the problem of mould on my Distress Stains. I was helpfully directed to THIS POST which mentions a similar problem right at the bottom of the post & that the manufacturers will readily replace any affected bottles of Stain. Apparently this was a problem that only affected the first batches of Distress Stains. After removing the mould I dabbed some test samples  onto scrap cardstock & now - ten weeks later - there is no sign whatsoever (see photo right) that there has been any contamination of my substrate. I decided not to contact the manufacturer as I understand that the initial manufacturing problems have been resolved & it's really no hardship for me to wipe off any subsequent mould from these particular bottles before I use them for anything.

Some bees & honey over on PEP tangles.