A tag and a card.

Hi you all! It's been another very windy day here, so I decided to stay home and watch the birds from my window, and of course, I spent a lot of time in my crafty kitchen. I made some lovely beef and vegetable soup, which gave me a delicious background aroma.

The tag I have made is for Simon Says Stamp and Show, who want to see something shabby chic. I have used cardboard - what else. I painted it first with gesso, then distressed and stamped the background with Victorian velvet and vintage photo DIs and my fave script stamp and flourish stamps. My Da Vinci lady has been stamped with Adirondack espresso, clear embossed,  fussy cut, and mounted onto a second tag. I added lace, ribbons, beads, a Prima flower and some leaves.

The second piece is a Steampunk note card, using  2 Moos as focal image. I am linking here to the Moo-Mania challenge Blog

I will be back tomorrow with a crazy hat that I decorated today. Take care, have a good day and thanks for visiting!

Bunnies and swirls

Hi you all! It's a cold and blustery day here, but no snow and no rain - yet! I braved the elements and went for a walk along the Rhine, but when gusts of wind came it was hard going! And as a reward, the rest of the day has been reserved for reading, crafting, coffee drinking and lazing about. Yesterday I really did a lot of H*******K - it was necessary! And now my apartment is sparkling clean - even my desk is cleared and polished, I had quite forgotten what it looked like!

Today I am sharing a card made for the challenge at Fashionable Stamping, which is about swirls this time. I need an Easter card for a friend, so have used my Alice Palace bunny stamps. I have layered the card up with brown cardstock, a stamped background with text etc, more brown as matting for card embossed with swirls, more brown and then the Bunnies. I embellished it with a scrap of ribbon, some prima flowers, a die-cut swirl , and a carrot for the bunnies.

Also linking to:

Aquariann Bunny Blog Hop

This was fun to make - as always! Wish I could say the same about the dreaded H*******K!

Have a good weekend, take care, and thanks for coming by!

Journal Pages

Hi you all! I just discovered to my horror that it's already Thursday evening, and somehow I was convinced it was Wednesday - where did the week go? I have been busy crafting this week - mostly crazy clocks! - and did not find much time for painting. But I did make these journal pages. I used a piece of crumpled tissue paper while spraying some paper flowers this week, and I found the tissue much nicer than the flowers! I gessoed my paper, tore the tissue in half , and smoothed it over the wet paint. I added a bit more paint and spray round about, did a bit of dripology, and added a photo also printed onto tissue. The flourish, lace and flowers were in the heap of stuff on my table. I used a Sizzix die-cut waste to add 'Live' with a white Edding paint marker. I like the uneven texture of the crumpled tissue. I wrote 'Life is measured in moments' on the left hand side, but it is hard to see here as the pages were still curling after being painted. I am linking to Paint Party Friday, hosted as always by Eva and Kristin, who are also organising an Auction in aid of Sandy Hook.

I am also linking to Art Journal Journey, where the theme this month is 'special moments'.

Have a good weekend, take care, and thanks a lot for coming by!

Steampunk, cuckoos and moos

Hi you all, hope you are managing to keep warm. We had another icy night, after a cold and sunny day. It was so good to see the sun, and although it was so cold, the sun melted a lot of the snow away. But don't worry, it snowed in the night, so everything is white again....I am very much hoping that the weathermen are right and that the temps will be rising from the weekend!
Today I want to share another 'clock' I made yesterday, mostly from junk recycled materials, to fit the challenges at Sandee and Amelie's Steampunk Blog and at Moo Mania, where the theme this time is also steampunk.
The owl branch and 'Roof' of my cuckoo clock have been made from cardboard. The moo cards have been made from scrap card with steampunk paper, glazed, and then I  added steampunk eyelets and embellies. It was fun to make, as always.

 And this is one of the crazy clocks I have in my kitchen. It's a cowkoo clock, and the little cow comes out every hour and moos. There is a little sensor over the 'cowshed', so if there is no light the cow stays home and keeps quiet, I don't think I would want to be woken every hour during the night!

Have a good day you all, take care, have fun and thanks for visiting!

A Blast from the past and more....

Hi you all from the German Deep Freeze - brrrrrrrrrrrrrr! I think we might have to make brightly coloured Easter eggs this year so that we can spot them hiding in the snow....

While I was clearing out I discovered this 'art-work' from my early days. I think it must have been made in the early 1950s. Cutting things out and sticking them into a scrap book was evidently a hobby then, too, although I think my fussy-cutting is better now!

But the back of the page is the real hammer! No comment....

And now to my day's crafting. I made a giant tag from cardboard, which has been partly peeled and then gessoed. I had some paper printed with eggs which I applied to the wet gesso to make the background. When it was dry, I rubbed the backing paper off the transfer to show the eggs. I painted over the background using some diluted metallic paints, and  then built up layers using rub ons and cut outs, then fussy cut eggs, glazed and rolled over a needle to make them look round, and fixed with foam squares. I added two stamped and fussy cut birds (TH), and some flowers, a wooden bird from crafty embellies and a butterfly from my stash, fixed down with foam squares of various thicknesses to give depth. I added the adage ticket and some beads to finish it off. I am linking to Inspiration journal, where we have to add some pop to our work, for example with foam squares.

Take care you all, thanks for visiting, and have a good day!

Steampunk Cuck-owl clock

Hi you all. It's a very cold, windy and frosty evening, not how I would like it to be! Roll on spring!

Today I made a steampunk cuckooowl clock for the challenge at SanDee and Amelie's Steampunk blog.

I managed to resist the temptation to put a real clock-work into it, as I think if any more clocks start ticking in my kitchen I will really go round the twist! I used a cardboard box, covered with some coordinating DCWV papers, and trimmed with washi measuring tape, to measure the hours. I added lots of clockwork and other parts from an old clock, some flowers inside, a rusty owl'face, and a clock with a top hat throning on top. There is another owl holding an hour-glass, can you see it? 

I had fun making it, got very sticky, and never burnt any fingers with the hot glue gun, so that's something!

Have a good day you all, take care,  and keep warm - or cool, as the case may be! And thanks a lot for coming by!

A card and a satchel

Hi you all, hope you have had a restful weekend. The spring has disappeared for the time being, and we are once again in the grip of winter - not what I need! But when the weather's bad outside, there's always plenty to do inside, like clearing out drawers and tidying up! I am so happy that I have got this done at last, and tomorrow I will be carrying a big sack of shredded paper, garbage etc to the container. I found lots of old friends that had gone missing in action  - glue runners, sellotape, scissors, brads, pens & pencils, rulers, pencil sharpeners, photos and much, much more! And now I can open my drawers easily and see what is in them!

This card has been made for the 'Time flies' challenge at Try it on Tuesdays. I worked on a piece of card from some packaging, and mounted it onto dark brown and bronze matting. The photos in the film strip are from My great Auntie Fanny, My Mum as a kid, and My Mum with me. The stamps used are from LaBlanche, all other embellies were from my stash.

The second piece has been on the go for about three years. I made one of these little satchels for  a friend's baby, and as I still had plenty of the paper, I started a second one. I found it a couple of weeks back in one of my many boxes, and decided to finish it, which I did. In the meantime I have filled it with a pretty album and sent it to a friend in England, and it has already arrived. It has been made from cardboard, covered with paper from the 'Sascha' collection, and clear varnished.

I am glad that I got it finished, I don't like having half finished projects hanging around for too long!

Have a great day you all, take care, and thanks a lot for coming by!