Backgrounds with Neocolor crayons

 Yesterday I tried to catch up on all the videos I haven't watched yet from the Creative Jumpstart series and there was a fantastic video by Ronda Palazzari about using Neocolor II watercolour crayons. I've had my set for a while and used them quite a bit but they have been left untouched for a few months so it was great to get some ideas to play with. I decided to make some backgrounds as the starting point for some scrapbook pages. Some of these have been made with specific photos in mind and some are just random creations.

The first page (above) has a layer of gesso with another layer of gesso painted over a stencil before being left to dry. Then the Neocolors were scribbled over the top before being sprayed with water. I then rubbed it with by fingers.

The next page (below) has the same technique. This looks a little more random but I have a photo in mind for this and I'm hoping it will make sense in the end!

This one used a Crafter's Workshop stencil and I coloured in some of the sections with the Neocolors before doing a light mist over the top with a Glimmer Mist.

Same technique again here using a Studio Calico hexagon template, but I sprayed the hexagons after I had coloured them in to make the drips.

Neocolors on a rubber stamp. The stamp was re-wetted (is that a real word?) between stampings rather than reapplying the colour. This technique came from another video by Dina Wakely, but seeing as I had my Neocolors out, I thought I'd try this one too.

Neocolors on a foam stamp. These foam stamps are part of the Claudine Hellmuth Layers range and so I may well go back over the top of the coloured circles using the coordinating line stamp.

And just in case you are wondering if all this water, gesso, misting etc makes the pages curl... yes it does. But I don't worry about it as they soon flatten out once they have been inside a scrapbook squashed between other pages for a while.

Hopefully I'll be able to turn these into some finished pages soon, so come back and see how they turned out .

Splash! - a summer layout

With the wind, rain, hail and thunder outside the window and the snow only just melted, it feels a bit funny scrapping photos of running around on a beach on a hot summer's day. This is my page based on this month's sketch over on the Sketchbook 365 challenge blog. It's based on a layout by Yvonne Yam.

I started out with a piece of paper from Echo Park's Note To Self collection which looks like corkboard so I went with that and made it look a little like a notice board, using brads for my drawing pins. I love these Studio Calico polaroid style frames...

I cut out some flags from a sheet by Elle's Studio and made the bunting. I like curling the edges of the flags to add a bit of texture to the page.

The challenge finishes on 15th February and there's a lovely prize from Echo Park up for grabs. Check out the other ideas from this sketch from the rest of the design team too - so creative!

Scrapbooking with Mists

Happy Snow Day! We've had lots of fun in the snow this morning with lots of photos taken and I was inspired to try different settings on my camera by the lovely photo on this gorgeous layout by the talented Katherine Sutton. Love it!

I have been continuing to watch the videos in the Creative Jumpstart series and I have been playing with my mists combining them with the techniques I have been inspired to try out. This is my first one, inspired by a video by Heidi Swapp, where I cut out my own stencil from scrap card in a starburst shape. It wasn't totally clean as I had some escaped mist in places around the edge but I think it worked well, particularly on Heidi's own Color Magic paper (which has a resist pattern printed on it).

The next technique I tried involved stamping into moulding paste, inspired by a video by Louise Nelson, which I then coloured with mists after the paste was dry. Louise's technique used a crackle effect stamp but I didn't have one so I went for circles instead using my circle stamps by Basic Grey. I used the lovely chevron tape again too (it makes me happy!). I also used lots of small silver brads - I still have a lot of brads from years ago!

Love the texture xxx

The third technique was inspired by a video from Nathalie Kalbach, who runs Creative Jumpstart. She used Gloss multi-medium and a stencil to create a resist pattern which was then coloured with mists.

This worked out to have a much subtler effect than the two other pages, although that may just have been my colour choice. There is a nice bit of thrifty scrapbooking on this layout too. There are two doily transparency pieces which are actually packaging from some Prima flowers.

If you are looking for a creative jumpstart for the beginning of the year, check out the Scrap365 blog party. It's starting today and runs for a week with lots of inspiration and prizes. There's a Facebook page to join too.

A creative Jumpstart for 2013

Happy New Year! I'm back! So November went pear-shaped with family illnesses and then we went through a second lot of illnesses in December too so things went a bit quiet on here. I was actually crafting a lot, but none of it could go on here. I was catching up with magazine projects and I also completed an entire scrapbook for my sister's Christmas present with photos of her lovely kids - speed scrapping!

I have taken a decision to cut down on a few of my commitments and so I'm hoping to keep Wednesday mornings for a bit of creative play. But where to start? A friend sent me a link on Facebook to join Creative Jumpstart 2013 and it's been fantastic. It's run by Nathalie Kalbach and it's FREE! (You can send a donation to help with the running costs which I think is more than fair as Nathalie has been putting in a lot of work to keep it all running smoothly). All you have to do is sign up for the newsletter and you get e-mailed daily links to videos and giveaways from some very well-known names in the crafting world.

So here's where I started...

There was a video by Julie Fei-fan Balzer about layering stencils and so I went crazy with my stencils, distress inks and mists. I love this photo of my little boy, even though he looks so sad. I know this face he pulls is a baby face and he is growing up so fast.

The stencils I used included Crafter's Workshop 6x6 patterns Strips and  12 x 12 Dot Burst along with an airbrush acetate stencil I found on eBay of the hexagons. I also included some of that gorgeous black and white chevron washi tape (love it!) by Queen & Co and some star stamps.

You can still join the fun on the Creative Jumpstart until the end of January.

Canvas commissions

I go to a Toddler group every week with my little boy and for the past year we have been meeting in a different place while our church underwent major renovation work. The Clevedon Family Church welcomed our group in and let us share their lovely space. This week was our last week there before moving back to the newly refurbished church and I was asked to make two canvases as thank you presents. One for the church and one for the lovely lady who has been helping us every week.

This first canvas was the one I made for the church. It's a little bigger than A4 size. My stamping is a bit wobbly but I'm happy with how it turned out.

I started by sticking down pieces of patterned paper onto the canvas. You can see some of the paper showing through the paint here...

I dug out some old alphabet stickers and wrote out the words "love" and "thanks" repeating across the canvas, which I gessoed so they would disappear into the paint.

I then painted and stamped to finish the design, using a variety of stamps so that the Bible verse would fit in. I also discovered when I came to stamping out the numbers - I hardly have any number stamps!

This next canvas was for the lady who helped us every week. My friend tipped me off that this was a verse she liked.

I used moulding paste mixed in my acrylic paint to give it some lovely texture. The sunburst was done with the Crafters Workshop template "Burst". The flowers are from the Insightful Meadow set by Unity Stamps and I stamped them onto an old sewing pattern before using white embossing powder and then tearing them out.

I knew that would come in handy one day

Recently I have been thinking I have too much craft stash. Is that possible? I think maybe I should have a declutter and get rid of some old bits and bobs that I haven't used in years? Well, this page proved I do need to keep it!

This is a page about when I took the ginger one crabbing last summer and I knew I had the perfect thing hiding away in one of boxes of embellishments. Can you see it here?...

Yes, it's a crab eyelet! I knew that would come in handy one day. Now I can't possibly get rid of things can I!

We're off to see the wizard

Before everything went pear shaped last month I managed to make it to my local crop and get some pages finished including these two.

In our town we have the longest running cinema in the UK and it has been celebrating it's centenary this year. In the summer there was a fancy dress parade through the town finishing at the cinema and if you came in fancy dress the  you got a free ticket to see "The Wizard of Oz". It was brilliant and the girls loved it. There was a fabulous sense of community and there were cheers and boos and singing along to the songs!

I was doubly excited to find die cuts from the Wizard of Oz at Scrapping the Magic - perfect for my scrapbook page. I took my latest Quirky Kit with me to the crop and combined all the sparkly elements from the kit with the die cuts.

I also completed the quickest page I have ever done. It took me all of 5 minutes but I think it works perfectly. I used 12 x 12 black cardstock, a packet of Batman stickers, some comic book style die-cuts from SEI and a photo. I think that's all it needed...