Soul of The Rose Cushion for That's Crafty

Feeling in a romantic mood after the dark depths of Halloween projects. I decided to create something a little more feminine. If you'd like to know a little more please pop over to That's Crafty for more details.

I have been fiddling with my blog and so wished I hadn't, it's taking me ages just to centre my post title. It will teach me to leave well alone in future and concentrate on crafting instead LOL!  

Its been so dreary and dark the last few days I've really struggled taking the photos, so you'll have to excuse them as they are rather grainy. 

Have a great day and Happy Crafting XX

Cities of The World ~ Fashionable Stamping Challenges

I would like to welcome my new followers, and a big thank you for everyone who regularly takes the time and trouble to visit my blog and leaves comments. I've had a great crafting week, firstly my win at the Stampsmith (still haven't managed to choose which set I want though, I am such a ditherer LOL.) Then I came top three in Simon Says stamp and show and finally Jean  asked me if I'd like to join the fabulously talented Crafty Individuals design team and of course I said YES! Thank you Jean it will be a real pleasure.

I hope you are all enjoying the bank holiday weekend. It is so cold here at the moment, I'm longing for some warmer weather. I'm imagining it is a tad warmer in Florence, the city I chose for my Fashionable Stamping Challenge project. I went to Florence in my early twenties, whilst inter railing and stayed in the most amazing youth hostel there, we only managed a short visit so I would love to return again, as it is the most gorgeous city. The new challenge at FSC is Cities of The World. The other Stampetes have created the most fabulous projects so please do head over to FSC for some beautiful and inspiring art work. As we are a stamping challenge we do need to see some form of stamping in your project and no digi stamping please. Our generous sponsor is the lovely Marina from Cottage Crafts.

You can probably tell I have re-discovered my sewing machine recently. There are some gorgeous fabrics around and I picked up some lovely linen fat quarters from ebay, which I have used in this hanging. I don't like tacking and couldn't find any pins so I held the fabric together with a tape pen before sewing, ooops, probably why it's turned out a bit wonky, plus I didn't measure anything! 

The stamps set is Bella Vita and is from Oxford Impressions. The words are stamped with sepia archival ink and stamped onto linen. Venus is stamped onto cotton which I painted with gesso first then coloured with Inktense pencils and a gold krylon pen. Then sealed with matte medium. I added a lace butterfly and some loops for hanging. 

I'm entering this for 

Pan Pastels UK ~ Anything goes

Enjoy the bank holiday weekend, whatever your doing and I hope you manage to squeeze in some crafting. xxx

Soul of the Rose

I don't own many Oxford Impressions stamp but I did buy The Soul of the Rose set from my first visit to LB Crafts early last year, unfortunately LB Crafts has now closed its doors, which is a shame as I'd only just discovered it and used to enjoy visiting Olney. But I can console myself by using this set of stamps which has lots of gorgeous Pre Raphaelite images. I used my favourite stamp which is of a painting by J. W. Waterhouse and I gave her the full shabby treatment.

I stamped onto glossy paper with archival ink and used my zig photo markers to tint the image. The background paper is from Kaisercraft sweet nothings range. The rose is stamped onto an old book page and I distressed a mica tile.

I am entering this in the following challenges

Craft room Challenge ~ Vintage
Simon Says Stamp & show ~ Anything goes
The Stampman ~ Vintage
Pan pastel challenge ~ Girly/Mother's Day

The sun has finally made an appearance so I'm off out now, we have had fog all this week.

Have a great day & happy crafting xx