A gorjuss girl

Morning all!  Wow not often I say that here is it lol!  Got a few mins before I go and pick the Moo up so thought I'd share one I just just finished.

This is the sitting pretty gorjuss girl coloured with promarkers and I also dragged my coloursoft pencils out and added a bit more to it.  I used papers by Crafts & Me and the spotty one from Bearly Mine separated by a border of black magic coredinations card which is turquoise inside, also used that as the card matting.  I added one of the de la rue swirly die cuts glittered with letratac and glamour dust and a turquoise punched butterfly with added bling on the body, a magnolia birthday sentiment and various flubbers and leaves :)

Thanks for stopping by!

I'd like to enter into...

Flutterby Wednesday

Crafty Catz - Beginning wth B (blue, butterfly, black, border, bling)

Allsorts - Anything goes

Creative Insprations - Anything goes

Simon says stamp - anything goes

2012 Promarker Tutorials - Monotone

Good Evening all!  I'm back again with another promarker tutorial for you and this time we're looking at colouring in monotone.  It might seem a bit daunting as of course your colours are somewhat restricted but in case you haven't noticed my banner up there you'll see I kinda quite like colouring in monotone and hope to teach you how to do this and *think* in monotone :O)


Firstly I would HIGHLY recommend using an image you're familiar with.  Doesn't necessarily have to be the easiest one just one you personally enjoy and are familiar with.  If you've previously coloured one in photograph it then use your photo editting software and turn it into GREYSCALE.  A lot of the free programs also do this.

This will be your guide whilst you train your brain to think in monotone.  So firstly grab your coloured image, I've used Miss Mirabelle by Hannah Lynn (Crafts & Me)

 Next use a photo edting program and turn your image greyscale (I think photobucket does it).  Print it out or save it on screen.  This will give you a great guide how dark or light colours are in greys and help with shadows and highlights

OK feeling confident?  Grab a full set of greys - I use COOL GREY 1-5 plus the BLENDER.  If you think in terms of skin tones then the blender will be equivalent of ivory, cool grey 1 will be your blush and cool grey 2 your vanilla or colour you use for shadow. 

For the skin tone I started with the darkest colour first in the shadow areas on the skin so use COOL GREY 2 and add some shading.

Next use your COOL GREY 1 which will be the equivalent of your blush and working from the dark into the light blend the colours in

Then to finish the skin off use your blender which is the same as ivory and it should be looking nice and luminous like below :)

Next look at your greyscale image and you'll see the bra bit is darker than the top so I used the darkest greys here COOL GREY 4 & 5 and a lighter mix for the top COOL GREY 3 & 4.  If anything appears to dark just run your blender over it lightly and let it dry.

Then onto the hair, I used COOL GREY 5 for the darkest parts at the roots etc then blend that in with a mid tone COOL GREY 3 then the lightest bits are COOL GREY 1.  You can also leave a bit of white showing or again use the blender to lighten the highlight points.

And here she is completed!  I only did one layer on this one but you can add a bit more depth to it doing a 2nd layer or using coloursoft/prisma pencil too 

Here's the 2 completed side by side.  Hope you enjoyed the tutorial and do have a go at this lovely technique, you'll be hooked!

What's in a name?

Evening all!  I'm poorly ick ick tonight, got some kind of tummy bug and cant eat owt and I'm sooooo hungry!  I'm dreaming of that whole pizza I'm going to have tomorrow mmmmmm 
Should be alright tomorrow, better had be I had loads to do today which now has to be done tomorrow accch pffft! 

Anyway I have one to share with you tonight and the topic is "Whats in a name?"

Have you ever been influenced for or against buying a stamp simply by what its called?  I say this as I'm a sucker for a well named stamp, star usually does it for me lol!  I've always liked things called Star from when I was little, its just something I warm to immediately :)

Teresa from Crafts & Me sent me my DT digis yesterday and I couldnt contain my excitement on 2 of them.  One because its called JANESSA.  I have a cousin called Janessa which is an unusual name especially round these parts and I was aware Hannah Lynn had one of her drawings called this so imagine my excitement that its now a digi!!  Tell ya if I wasn't on the DT I would have knocked you flying in the rush haha!

Then I downloaded the other images I'd been sent as I'd already run off to print Janessa out and coloured her skin in :)  The next one to catch my eye was LADY OF THE STARS and I just KNEW I'd like it and I opened it and wasn't disappointed!  This one is by Sara Burrier and she's just a beaut!  I quite often trim the digis down if they're long ones but this I wanted to keep at her full length so I made a 7x5 card which I don't do to often nowadays.

I coloured with flexmarkers on the dress with a bit of azure promarker and have added loads of glamour dust to the star string and wings and finally added some itty bitty stars which are nail art ones and glued them on individually - its the aspergers in me I love finicky detail :)

Anyway I made this for a certain lady who hugely inspires me and has been a massive influence on me over the years so I'll pop that in post tommoz - watch all the stars fall off lol! 


Carrying on with the names thing, theres a lovely digi stamp by saturated canary which I do like the look of and love seeing everyones coloured versions *but* she has same name as ex husbands previous wife urrrrgh!  Funny how things like that can put you off!  Hey you cant please everyone and I've bought plenty more there lol!

So here's my Lady of the Stars which I thoroughly enjoyed colouring in :)

I'd like to enter into...

Papercrafting Journey - Fairies/Angels
Flutterby Wednesday - Open
Creative Card Crew - Fantasy
Fab n Funky - Use a digi
Rubys Rainbow - Sparkle
Divas by design - Anything goes

Midway reminder Crafts & Me anything goes

Evening all! Bet you thought I'd forgot my resolution hehe!  Fear not I'm here lol!  Not here for much longer mind as I've had some Ovaltine so I'll be hitting the sack soon enough.

Kids went back to school today, they were NOT impressed being woken up at 7.30 am after all the long lie ins we've had over christmas break.  Ethan was particularly miffed saying But its still dark!!
After school I took them to the local dog shelter as we're considering getting a puppy but I wanted to see how they reacted around dogs first.  Ethan took it in his stride, Mols was a tad scared particularly of a huge rottie, so was I lol!  It just didnt seem to like people in general :/
No rush yet and we're still considering breeds, having some good suggestions on facebook, border terrier is my fav but I think Mols would love a spaniel with floppy ears.

Right-O onto my creation today and its a mid-way reminder for Crafts & Me Challenge which is running for 4 weeks and is an ANYTHING GOES.  For this I wanted to make a "Sound & Light Thingy" :D

Its a windchime but also has hanging stars with AB coating that really sparkle in the light.  I used the Crafts & Me digi MAY and coloured with promarkers and added versacolor ink in pale purple and a darker purple around the edge.  I did play around with some flowers and whatnot but decided to leave it as is.  The wires are secured on a strip of mounting board in the middle so its very secure although they do get tangled up and took me about 15 minutes to untangle them and hang it up lol!  The hanger is made of AB coated crystals too.

I'd like to enter this into...

Anything goes challenge - blue+1 other
Partytime Tuesday - Anything goes
Top Tip Tuesday - Anything goes
Magical Mondays - Anything goes
Ooh la la - Anything but a card
Truly Madly Crafty - Anything goes
Flutterby Wednesday - Open

Let the music move you

Rose has set a challenge this fortnight at Crafts & Me and she has chosen "Let the music move you" and would like to see song words, musical instruments, notes or simply be inspred by music.  For this one I used one of the brand new digis by Hannah Lynn called Moonglow, now you KNOW I just had to have that one given my addiction to moonglow products!

This was inspired by a track you might remember called Blue Monday but not the Depeche Mode version, the version I like is a by a band with a rude name and is a synth rock version - Link to video here if you're interested lol!

I've coloured with promarkers and used distress ink and stains around the edge in stormy skies and dusty concord.  The flourish is by sizzix

Would like to enter into....

Papercraft Star - Flourish
Papertake Weekly - Anything goes
Pretty little ribbon shop - anything goes

There's a STORM coming!

Oh yes there is most definately a Storm coming!  That is a Mr Storm Lee!  Now some of you won't have a clue who I'm talking about, others may vaguely remember him but a band of us known affectionately as The Stormtroopers are big fans of a certain Storm Lee who appeared on this years X Factor.  He got stick off Simon for his name, the other judges stuck up for him, his first auditon is here.  He sailled through Boot Camp (and what a performance he gave there, you can see that one here!)  If you look closely you can see Simon nodding along although he doesn't want to admit it hehe!  He then went through the judges houses phase and gets better and better!  Great version of I cant live here. 

Unfortunately Storm got Louis Walsh as his mentor who saw fit to dye his hair bright red and cover him in make up :/  He left on week 2 - completely robbed!  He has such a lovely voice!

Anyway who needs the X Factor, churn them up and spit them out!  All the other contestants who left X Factor did a mad dash of christmas light switch ons and shopping centre and tacky nightclub performances, Storm on the other hand could be found doing benefit gigs for The Trevor Project  He is staunchly anti-bullying, cares about his friends and fans, he has a good heart and thats the reason I like him and that sets him apart from the others.  He's taken the time to chat with me so I know he's a good man and isn't false like many other celebs.  Having been someone who was bullied simply because of my name I really paid attention to Storm on X Factor.  I've actually changed my name ((counting...) twice by deed poll and once by marriage such was the effect it had.  Now you know me I don't talk personal stuff much but I will stand by Storm particularly given his anti-bullying stance so thought I'd tell you all about him!

Storm had an album out but it had to be pulled for the X Factor but now he's going to re-release it on itunes!  Soulfillapopkilla is a collection of 11 awesome tunes including covers of Heart of Glass and Never can say goodbye (Storm style of course!)  But the one to watch (or listen to on repeat like I do lol!) is the amazing BEAUTIFUL BLUE.  Go listen, you'll love it! 

So as an Ode to Storm I've made a little Art Deco, in Beautiful Blue of course! 

I started with the background, the lightning bolts (which are actually a piss take of Simon Cowell) were masked then I've airbrushed with a promarker letrajet in shades of blue and black leaving a central shine point.  The image started life as a photo below then I used some filters in paintshop pro to alter it so I could colour it and its also done in promarkers with some black pencil to add a deeper shade.  I've overstamped with brilliance ink and voila my Ode to Storm :)

And I got a signed copy of Storms album too!  I've actually listened to it waaaaaay more times than my Take That one, you can hear it here, go on, I promise its *really* good!  This is mine all mine whoop whoop!

So thanks for reading, took me ages to write! Hope you check out a fellow artist! Soulfillapopkilla re-release date 1st March 2011

I'd like to enter my art deco into....

I Love Promarkers - Anything Goes

Sew Many Challenges - Anything goes

Charisma - No embellishments

Stamp Something - Digi Day

Stamptacular Sunday - Whateva (Text is hand stamped)

Moody Blues at Crafts & Me

Its time for another challenge at Crafts & Me and my turn to host so I have chosen one of my favourites - MOODY BLUES as in case you haven't noticed I'm rather fond of my blue promarkers!

We're also sponsored by Kraftin' Kimmie Stamps who are offering a choice of stamp from their shop HERE.

For this challenge I used the Cinderella stamp from Kraftin Kimmie which Crafts & Me stock here  I just love the dress on this one, she's a joy to colour.  I used the sky blue, azure and french navy for the dress to make a really rich satin blue, I've tinkered wth the photo to try and get it as true colour as I can as the dress is actually a couple of shades darker than that.

I've added some lilac versamagic around the edges and stamped using the hero arts fabulous flourish stamp.  The little text is one of my favs from Stamping all Day.  DP's are from Bearly Mine designs from the plaids collection and the darker blue is a freebie here.  Flowers are Wild Orchid, the rosebuds I've coloured 2 tone with promarkers.

Would like to enter into...
Cute Card Thursday - The Blues
Creative Card Crew - Anything Goes

Birthday sale & New release at Bearly Mine Designs



Its Donna's Birthday today over at Bearly Mine Designs and she is having a sale on all of her amazing digi sets and CD's from today until 19th Nov.  She is also celebrating her new release digi set Christmas Dreams, these are stunning!
I've used Donna's digi papers for over a year now and the advantage I get from them is they are unlimited.  I tend to make my inserts when the card is ready to be dispatched somewhere which may be quite soon or a while after I've made it and I never have any trouble looking for a piece of matching paper to go on the inside and finding I've run out, I just print another one off - simples! 

The card I've made today I used one of the papers from the new Christmas Dreams set which has the most beautiful hanging heart but it seemed such a shame to cover it so I've used a sheet as the backing then cut 2 squares out of another sheet and layered these over the top so the heart shows again :D
I've coloured Tilda with promarkers using cool aqua around the edges of the clothes and the blender pen to get the really pale shade with added sparkle on the lace on the clothes, stars and around the edges of the backing and squares and the heart.  She's sat on a shaker I made with a Nellie Snellen die, I've no idea why I made a shaker as I'm usually rubbish at them but the mood struck!

Anyhow I'm entering this into the following challenges:

Totally Tilda - Icy Christmas Tilda
I Love Promarkers - Icy Colours (Entry #2)
Creative Belli - Old, New, Borrowed, Blue (Old - the glitter snow in the shaker which is about 6 years old!  New - The new release DP's, Borrowed - Tilda stamp borrowed from Ms Dolphin, Blue - yep!)
ABC Christmas - Winter Wonderland
A Spoonful of Sugar - Snowflakes
Paper Sundaes - Let it Snow
Crafty Calendar - Winter Snowflakes

Thanks for looking!

Crafts & Me #17 Glitter

Its a sparkly one this next fortnight over at Crafts & Me and we are challenging you to use GLITTER!  Not hard given the time of year - mind you its not hard ANY time of year!

For this challenge I was colouring in The Gift by Molly Harrison but checked the DT blog and my teamie Tracy who's hosting had also chosen to do The Gift and also in the blue colours I'd picked out lol!   I hastily cobbled together another one haha!

Sooo this one is KRISTA by one of my favourite artists Hannah Lynn. 

She's coloured with promarkers in my favourite blues (Cool Aqua, Sky Blue and Azure) and I've used a sakura stardust clear pen to accent the hair.  I've used glitter card punched with a martha stewart doily lace punch and the blue card I sprayed with crafters companion iridescent spray & sparkle (Which says is non toxic but smells like nail varnish so spray outside unless you want to choke lol!)  I've embossed with the divine swirls embossing folder.  I also sprayed the flowers with the the crafters companion spray (by which time I really was choking!)
Starry background paper is a freebie from Bearly Mine Designs HERE.  I've drawn round the edges of the larger stars with the sakura pen and used stickles glue around the edge of the card.  The harlequin paper is a daisy and dandilion one which I've distressed with scissors and some broken china distress ink.
Sentiment is another by Stamping All Day (I do love their little text stamps!) which I've embossed with Moonglow Morning Glory Azure Teal. 

Hope you can come and join us for our sparkly challenge!

Would also like to enter...

Anything goes - Emboss it
Flourishes - Glitter
I love Promarkers - Icy Colours (My fav, I'll be back!)
Crazy Challenge - Things with Wings