ArtStacks New Release!

 Hello! I'm sure by now you've seen the gorgeous new release from ArtStacks! It's a new 'Artist Series' featuring the fabulous Tamara Laporte, aka Willowing. There is two packs...'Fabulous Faces' and 'Artsy Animals'...

I was absolutely delighted to receive these two packs, the colours and designs are just gorgeous and so much fun to create with. Here is the 1st that I can share...

Here I've used the elephant and the tissue paper 'strength butterfly circle' from the 'Artsy Animals' pack and the cute tissue paper crown from the 'Fabulous Faces' pack.

I also had a personal play, I mean how inspiring are these packs! I simply adored the tissue paper girl here, that I had to have a 2nd play (secret squirrel with the 1st). I overlapped her with another piece, I loved how the hair framed the face. Of course the background came through the face a little darker than expected, so I ended up painting it with a soft pink, Dina Wakley's carnation I believe. I also added a flower to her hair, again from the 'Fabulous Faces' pack.

Make sure you pop over to the ArtStacks blog, as they are having an introcudory '12 days of Willowing' to feast your eyes on...you can find it HERE.

Thank you for stopping by, it's always much appreciated.

Happy crafting!

March Kraft+ Challenge!

Hello! I know, I know, I'm super slow at posting this one (insert embarrassed face) 1. I was actually late in completing my page & 2. I've been so busy! LOL I'm not 100% what with, as I don't have a lot to show for it??? I'm looking forward to the school break, where I can indulge in a bit of nothing & some creative time.

Anyway, you're not here to listen to me ramble...this months Kraft+ Challenge is a sketch challenge. Everyone loves a sketch challenge don't they? It's a great starting point to get the ideas flowing.

Now, you can use the sketch to kick-start your project, you don't have to stick with it perfectly, though I have pretty much stuck with this one. I just swapped out the photos for the transparency frames by Dina Wakley, which I also journaled on with paint pen. I've also added the butterflies from a sticker page from ArtStacks, as well as some background stenciling. Oh & a figure using Dina Wakley's Collage Collective.

I do hope you'll join in with this months Kraft+ Challenge, head over to the blog to see more inspiration...you'll find it HERE.

Thanks for stopping by, it's always much appreciated.

ArtStacks fun...

Hello, I'm here today to share my recent play with the gorgeous products from ArtStacks Designs. I'm so lucky to be on this team, the products are gorgeous and lovely to create with.

Once again, this page started as a 'mop up' page, in my Dina Wakley 6x6 Kraft journal. In other words, any excess paint from another projects was added here. Some using a stencil, like the pink and red and the yellow was scrapped on with a spatula (mainly as my yellow is so old, it was drying out). I had then randomly stamped around the page. I then added some ArtStacks tissue paper, flowers from the Anemones and Friends pack and the face from the Faces and Figures pack. I love these faces and I love adding them to painted backgrounds, as long as they aren't too busy. Here I've placed her over a 'quieter' spot towards the middle of my double page. I wish I was, but I'm not great at shading faces, so don't even try. I embrace whatever comes up from underneath. The only thing I have done is colour the whites of the eyes and colour-in the lips. I coloured in the flowers, just to highlight them a little. 

I've cut a figure out of cardstock from the Deb Weiers Wonky Critters pack, edging with Distress oxide. My title "Be true to yourself' is from the 'All Dressed Up' pack. I've also added some black circles as contrast, which I then added to with the Tim Holtz stain stencil.

Pop over to the ArtStacks Blog to see the amazing creations from the rest of the team, HERE...you won't be disappointed.

February Kraft+ Challenge

 Hello & welcome to a new month of challenges. This month over at Kraft+ Challenges we have a colour challenge for you.

This month we want you to use with your KRAFT...yellow & red/orange. Minimal additions of black & white are allowed

When creating this mood board, I couldn't find an inspiration photo so used my own sunrise photo. I initially was going to scrap this actual photo for the challenge. Haha I certainly couldn't go wrong there with the colours, but after doing a tidy up of my ArtStacks products, found the perfect piece to use in my art journal. The inspiration for my art journal background came from this Deb Weiers piece. I just love her work! I scraped on the yellow and orange paint with a credit card and as some of it was Distress Paint, sprayed it with water to allow it to merge together. Because it got quite messy, I ended up mopping up some of the excess with the music paper I had sitting around. I had used it to cut out circles previously. At that point I figured it was the perfect addition to the background. I added lines of black paint and circles with the lids of the Distress Paint. I then added cup rings using Tim Holtz stencil and more black paint. I added a Tim Holtz Stencil Card under the Deb Weiers art piece and a Dina Wakley chipboard piece painted with more Distress Paint.

 

As I had previously said, I've gone a bit made with the cut pages and I thought this one worked perfectly with the wonky figure, especially with one eye peaking through. Haha this looks like a spine to me (LOL that may be more my daughters influence with her recent job ;)) but considering Deb's artwork says "our ancestors live in our bones"...it all made sense to me!!!

Pop over HERE to check out the amazing creations from the rest of the Creative Team. I do hope you'll join us this month. Thanks for stopping by, your support means a lot to me.

Happy crafting!

ArtStacks creating.

Hello, today I'm sharing my recent play with ArtStacks products. It was the opposite  page of January's K+ 'cut out' art journal page, so I started with similar colours. Partly because I was already using them and I like both sides to blend well together ;) even if they are single art journal pages. In the yellow paint, I've journalled with a wooden skewer. it's hard to see the texture in the photo, but it's more visable in real life.

This is with the 'cut page'...

This is my page using ArtStacks using the gorgeous canvas paper from Lisa Oxley's Floral Fetish, which I can out using a figure stencil or chipboard. I had also cut a stencil flower from the same range. As well as a torn strip of paint sample paper from Lisa's Bright & Bold range. The title "Be Brave" is again from ArtStacks, it's from the fabulous 'All Dressed Up' pack.

Thank you for stopping by, it's much appreciated.

Happy crafting.

Creating with ArtStacks.

Hello, today I'm sharing some creative work using ArtStacks products. I'm using my small Dylusions art journal, which started as a 'mop up' page...essentially using up the ends of paint, no point wasting it ;) The leftover paint was scraped on the page using a palette knife and sponged through a stencil.

 I've then added a handcut circle from a piece of sheet music, adding more yellow paint over the top to embed the circle in the page, which was scraped on with a palette knife. I then randomly stamped around the page and journalled with white paint pen on the darkest part.  I added some ArtStacks tissue paper flowers (from Anemones & Friends pack) and then coloured them in with white water-coloured paint. Finally adding the 3 ladies (from The Dressmaker CardStack) and a title (from All Dressed Up).

Here is a close-up of the tissue paper flowers, which I roughly painted with water-colour.

Thanks for stopping by, it's always appreciated. Pop over to the ArtStacks blog to check out the amazing creations from the rest of the team, they are truly fabulous! 

Happy crafting!

January 2023 Kraft+ Challenge

Hello and Happy New Year! 

Hopefully we, at Kraft+ Challenges, can inspire you to create with us during 2023. As this month marks our 8th birthday, we thought it would be fun to revisit old K+ challenges. So for this month, chose an old challenge, any challenge from all the years of K+ and let it inspire you. It's that easy! It may be a challenge before your time with K+, or one that you really liked, or one that you simply didn't get to participate in previously...whatever the reason, let us know which challenge you chose.

 

I went back to December 2020, as I love a colour challenge and was also drawn to the leaf image in the top corner.

This was clearly one challenge that I truly did enjoy as I ended up completing 2 art journal pages for this original challenge. LOL so now I've done 3! You can find the original posts HERE and HERE.

Again I did an art journal page in my Dina Wakley Kraft journal. I've been hugely inspired by Niamh Baly and her amazing cut pages. I had started a number of the late last year, but hadn't had a change to get back to them. One of them ended up being perfect for this challenge with the green leaves in mind.

I had used the fern stencil by Dina Wakley to cut out my page. This was my 2nd attempt, so I now knew to connect the leaves to add strength across the page. I painted it a couple of different greens, including some gloss spray. I roughly added lines around the leaves and veins with various green paint pens. Finally adding thin strips of the woven paper to match the bottom inspiration image.

 

On the main page, I've used one of the tissue paper girls from ArtStacks Designs after layering down some paint (Dina Wakley) and painted stencils (Crafters Workshop and Kaszazz). I've used more of my homemade transparencies.

You can find the full inspiration blog post from Kraft Plus Challenges HERE, it's worth a look, the DT as usual, outdid themselves #bestteam

I do hope you'll give this months challenge a go.

Thank you for stopping by, it's always appreciated.