Nature is Unique..

Hello Friends

For those of you who visited my desk this week you will know that I had a layout on there that I was working on so without further ado here it is.....

The photo is of one of Hubby's Bees who was out for a beautiful early February day two years ago enjoying the sweet nectar of Snowdrops.

I started this layout with a sheet of plain creamy yellow cardstock which I sprayed with Ranger Colourwash in Lettuce, Terracotta and Pesto whilst using Heidi Swap, Tim Holtz and Crafters Workshop masks.  I sprayed the colourwash in sections and then unscrewed the spray part, removed the tube and then flicked the ink to get some small splodges.  Well, gotta get inkey haven't we?  The flourish stamp here is from Crafty Individuals and most papers used are 6x6" My Mind's Eye - Tangerine. 

I stamped up a new stamp which I bought from Ebay and unfortunately there is no makers name on it.  I inked it with Archival, embossed with embossing powder and coloured it in with Copics.  The bakers twine is Stampin Up and finished with a little button from my jar. 

I cut the "Nature" letters using my Cricut and Quickutz self adhesive paper (cuts like a dream, glad I rediscovered it).  I went around the edge of the letters with Forest Moss Distress Marker to make them pop as well as stamping them with Stayzon Forest using a Hero Arts flourish stamp.  The word "Is" was made using Grungeboard letters adhered onto a grungeboard block which I adhered then painted with Paperartsy Fresco in Snowdrop,  with colourwash and flicked again then a little Adirondak Lettuce.

The Unique was stamped with A Lettuce again and embossed with embossing powder and trimmed then flicked with Colourwash and edged with A L.    The Stampotique Bees were stamped with Archival ink and embossed with embossing powder.  They were coloured with Wild Honey Distress Marker and an embossing pen was applied to the wings along with some Pearl Perfect Pearls.

I used the lace mask from TH which has given the effect of a crown at the bottom of the page. I will have to remember that for future projects!  I added some lace and Stamping Up bunting below the photo too. On the pink strip of paper you can see a little of a Pink Paislee stamp and the shimmer of the bee's wings.

The layout came a sketch from Liz Chidester of thescrappiest blogspot - so thanks Liz.  I really liked this one and hope you do too. I am linking this up with Simon Says Stamp - Lace, Facebook CC101 - spray ink, as well as the Snippets Playground.  Here is the Sketch....

Thanks for reading all the way to the end and hope you like.  I look forward to receiving your comments.

Have a great snowy weekend and please be careful.  Do heed the advice of the Police and other bodies of only going out if necessary.  

Hugs

Hettie

CC2c- Bees in My Garden!!

Good Evening Peeps

For anyone who has popped over here to see what I am showing you in my Scrappy Tuesday session, well I am afraid that for this week it will be a Scrappy Tuesday on Thursday!  The reason being is I have been working (albeit slowly) on my latest lickle project for my CC2C with the Lovely Linda.  Also, I wanted to try and tie in this week's piece with Sarah over at Mojo Monthly, as well as  Simon Says Stamp's Anything Goes as it has Snippets in there I can join in on  Di's Snippets Challenge.  So for once you have a four for one on this piece.   

I cannot tell you exactly what the challenge is with the CC2C Challenge, week 5, other than it involves Shattered Stains and can be found on page 48 in the new Compendium of Curiosities.  You may remember I had a go at this technique when I undertook the Creative Chemistry Course recently and absolutely LOVED this technique.  So when Linda announced on Friday that this was this week's challenge I put my thinking cap on and decided to try out a little theory which popped into my mind a few weeks after the Creative Chemistry course.  This was that I if I stamped an image using Archival ink I could maybe use a wash made with Perfect Pearls and water to colour an image in, to make a flimsy wing type colour for Bee wings.  Well, I have tried it and I like the effect.  Let me know what you think please. I should also mention that this week's Challenge for CC2C is sponsored by Simon Says Stamp!

The background to this piece is a canvas base which I have coloured using Mustard Seed DSs, and Rusty Hinge and Wild Honey DIs.  Edged with black and then the edges covered with papers stamped with my small Bee stamp and grunged using a piece of metal mesh which I "acquired" when I was in the shed some time ago.  Not sure if Hubby notices it has gone yet!  Shhh!  

I cut a piece of cardstock to size and used the Wrinkle Free Distress technique with the spritz and flick (love doing this too!) to obtain colour and depth to the piece.  Using Black Soot DI to stamp various flowers and flourishes and Archival to stamp the Dragonflies (first outing for them!).  I then adhered the background piece to the canvas.  

Using various different pieces of patterned paper (mainly snippets left over from the layout I showed you last Tuesday), cardstock and book pages, I used punches and dies to create (loads and loads of) flowers and leaves in order to make flowers with layers.  I inked most of them (when don't I ink ey?) and I scrunched, frilled and generally manipulated them until I got them in the shapes I wanted.  I then adhered them together using glossy accents and finished them off by adding a bottle cap with a punched middle, adding glossy accents before adding micro beads to the centres.  

To make the bees look like they are hovering I cut up small pieces of wood (you know those little pieces of wood you get with the canvas to wedge it?  well I sawed those up into little pieces), adhered them together with glossy accents and attached them to the canvas and adhered the bee to the wood using foam dots.  

To make the quotation, I inked up a piece of A4 cardstock about 3" and typed up the verse on my computer and printed on top of the coloured paper.  The reason I did it this way is I have learnt (the hard way) that if you print a sentiment and then ink it with DIs it smudges, even when I have tried heat setting it first.  Therefore, I colour first and print second.  It might not be the case for everyone but it is for my printer (HP)!

Well, I can honestly say I have had a few fun filled hours of learning and playing with this piece and have had a lovely piece to give to my Bee Keeping Husband to go in the porch.  

Please leave me a comment so I know you have Bee-n!  Why don't you join in the Challenges too!  

Hugs

Hettie

Ingredients:- Papers - Authentique, MME, Bazzill, Old books; Ranger/Tim Holtz - black Archival ink, pearl Perfect Pearls, Rock Candy Distress Crackle, Stamps, Glossy Accents, Distress Stains; Mustard Seed, Peeled paint, Distress Inks; Black soot, Wild honey, Rusty hinge, Vintage photo, Spiced marmalade, Mustard seed, Crushed olive (my latest favourite!), Antique Linen; Stamps - Paperartsy, Jo Capper-Sandon Stampotique, Autumn Leaves; Micro beads - Art van Go; Beer bottle caps; Recycled chipboard; Punches - Stampin Up, Martha Stewart; Dies - Tim Holtz, Paperartsy, Sizzix.