Bah Humbug!!

Hello and welcome to Magpieheaven! Over at Country View Crafts they have a great challenge by the name of 'Bah Humbug' - click Here for details, while at The Artistic Stamper the challenge is 'Anything Goes'. Both challenges have some fabulous vintage inspiration for December makes! Well, wasn't 'Bah - humbug!' Scrooge's favourite phrase? When I was twelve I had the part of 'Little Fan', Scrooge's younger sister in a school production of Charles Dickens' 'Christmas Carol'. I grew to love the book, even though my character dies early - typical Dickens to have ailing female characters who die young!!! It has continued to mean Christmas to me. I decided to go with a vintage look for this card and to use an image that suggested to me the wonderful, jovial Ghost of Christmas Present who takes Scrooge on a magical tour to show him how those around him are rejoicing in the spirit of Christmas.

I began by sponging and spritzing a card blank with some Vintage Photo, Evergreen Bough and Broken China. I then stencilled over with some Snowflake Fresco paint through a Crafters' Workshop honeycomb stencil, dabbing some thin wisps of the Snowflake in places.

I then added this image from Bo Bunny's Silver and Gold paper collection. The snowflakes are punched from some Crackle Glazed card - Fresco Antarctic over Baltic Blue. I distressed the edge of the paper with Vintage Photo and Evergreen Bough and turned down the corners to reveal the lovely holly design, as it's double-sided paper. I just had to add a little Treasure Gold, Green Amber too.

Then to add my 'Ghost of Christmas Present'. He was stamped onto a die-cut oval, painted with Fresco Nougat edged with Frayed Burlap distress ink. I used Wendy Vecchi Potting Soil Archival ink for the image and just stamped on the edges with the fir bough from Artistic Outpost, Snowy Woods. The Saint Nicholas or Spirit of Christmas Present is from the same plate. I used Wendy Vecchi, Fern Green Archival to stamp my fir boughs in the corners.

I had lots of fun creating the background for my tag, swiping and spritzing and flicking with Vintage Photo, Frayed Burlap and Evergreen Bough and sprinkling with gold Perfect Pearls powder. I stamped the script from Paper Artsy mini 26 in Versamark and embossed with Stampendous fine, copper embossing powder.
 The tiny leaves are punched out of card painted with Fresco Hey Pesto and  frosted with dry distress glitter.

A pine cone brad and some Festive Berries dyed seam-binding providing finishing touches. As always just click on the images if you would like to see how the background textures look in more detail.

The stencilled snowflakes are sponged with Evergreen Bough through the card left when I punched out the Crackle Glaze snowflakes..

 The text on the paper originally said 'Winter Wonderland', but I liked what was left behind when I guillotined it without thinking - Winter Wonder!

Here is my finished card, which I would like to enter for the 'Bah Humbug' Challenge at Country View Crafts  and also The Artistic Stamper Anything Goes Challenge. Thank you so much for stopping by to take a peek at my Ghost of Christmas Present at this very busy time of year!

Tag #1 of the Funkie Junkie 12 Tags of Christmas - Midnight Mass

Welcome to Magpieheaven where I'm slowly making my way through Linda Couglin's wonderfully inspiring '12 Tags of Christmas'. This is an amazing challenge offered by the Funkie Junkie boutique, which also supplies all kinds of great craft materials. There's still time to enter: you have until December 22 and the opportunity to win a great prize, so click HERE for all the information you need. For this tag, I was inspired by Linda's Tag 1, which you can see if you click HERE. This is my third tag, as I'm not working to any particular order. When I first saw Linda's I thought I would never be able to create a tag like that! I loved the effect she created with her stunning contrasts of black and white and the chalkboard technique, but I'm not a black and white person at all. I then turned to my Fresco paints and sought out the darkest blue I have: Baltic Blue. I've not used it very much, as I realized I tend to shy away from very dark colours. However, once I'd covered my tag with a nice smooth coating of this deep, midnight blue I was happy!

I wish I could have photographed the plain, dark blue tag, but the camera was in use by daughter again, so little peeks of the finished tag will have to do. Anyway, what I thought immediately was - Midnight Mass! I remember when I moved to a country town from London as a young girl, I started to attend a Church School and it was there I first heard about this special service held the night before Christmas. I still recall the magical feeling of coming home from the service after midnight with my new school friends, our footsteps ringing in the quiet streets; a scattering of stars and the moon glittering on the frost. Linda's amazing tag was entirely white and black except for a little 'pop' of red, which looked great. I decided, though to stick with my blue and white combo, as this best tied in with my Midnight Mass theme. I am always tempted to play with blending and adding colours, but this time I kept my Baltic Blue as a straightforward, solid background. I did add a scattering of white embossing powder to suggest snow or maybe a myriad stars in the wintry night sky.

I added the book-plate from the tag die, Crackle glazed, Snowflake over Baltic Blue and added two little diamond studs. The Christmas message is from Artistic Outpost's Snowy Woods plate. I embossed the snowflakes from Snowy Woods, using Versamark and Wow, white embossing powder. I also dug out my Tim Holtz die of little houses. I love this die and I have used it in lots of different ways since I bought it. I painted my card die-cut with Fresco Snowflake and added Shabby Blue Frantage. The snowflakes standing out in this image are punched from card or die-cut from a Movers and Shapers die and covered with melted white embossing powder.

I am working with Tim Holtz die-cut tags, which are not 'jumbo' sized so I have to think carefully about not crowding too much onto them. For this reason I have been playing with the idea of adding borders to the tags. On this one I added the swirly 'On the Edge' TH die, which I painted with Snowflake and edged with Shabby Blue Frantage. The paper lace is punched from a Christmas Book, explaining the origins of the Midnight Mass and I gave it a thin coat of Snowflake.

A piece of seam-binding dyed with Broken China distress ink and my third tag, Tag #1 - if that's not too confusing - was finished! I am entering it for the Funkie Junkie 12 Tags of Christmas Challenge. Thank you so much for stopping by today, as I know how the Christmas frenzy is taking hold at this point! Good luck with all you are creating and planning!

Funkie Junkie 12 Tags Number 2 - Brother and Sister

Hello there! Well Christmas is drawing ever nearer and I'm doing my best to complete the twelve tags of Christmas inspired by the very talented Linda Coughlin  at The Funkie Junkie Boutique! Please Click Here for details of the shop and Here for the Challenge and rules! It's a great way to gain inspiration for Christmas makes from Linda's lovely designs and there's still a chance to win a prize: you have until December 22nd, midnight, eastern time so do pop over and give it a look.
The tag I'd like to enter today is Number 2. Here is Linda's original. I'm so behind I'm not doing the tags in any order. I'm going with the ones that give me immediate inspiration. They're all so lovely I'm sure they all will in time! What I loved about Linda's tag was the beautiful golden deer. I loved it so much I bought the Tim Holtz die. Now I can't give you step by steps this time, I'm afraid, as my daughter had the camera all day to do a photo-shoot for college, but here is my deer and I will take the tag detail by detail and explore how I did it and what it means to me.

As soon as I saw Linda's tag, I was reminded of a fairy story I read to my children called 'Brother and Sister'. In it a pair of children of royal birth are abandoned in the woods by their wicked step-mother. They stop to drink by a brook, which sings to them, warning them that if they drink of it they will be turned into wild beasts. They resist for a while, but eventually the boy drinks and is turned into a deer. His sister protects him until he is wounded  by a prince hunting in the forest. Well, I expect you can guess how it all ends! Once again it is about the loyalty of a young girl just like Gerda in 'The Snow Queen' so females don't get an entirely bad press in fairy tales! I covered my die-cut deer in Versamark and then applied several coats of gold embossing powder. When they were melted I stamped with Music Stamp from the Paper Artsy Sarah Nauman, 007 Eclectica plate, making sure I covered it in Versamark first. Because the deer in the story is a prince in disguise I gave him a crown from some Dresden gold foil cut to size and a little gauze scarf with a green gem at the throat.

 I used a colour combo a bit out of my comfort zone in this one! I broke open the Frayed Burlap, which I don't often use! I swiped my tag, made from card and a Tim Holtz tag die, through Frayed Burlap Distress ink sprinkled with gold Perfect Pearls powder and spritzed with water, repeating the process until I had a look I liked. I don't have the AO Midwinter stamps that Linda used, which were perfect for her composition, so after drying with my heat gun, I stencilled the trees from my favourite Clear Snaps stencil in Paper Artsy Fresco, Nougat. I was pleased with the snowy, misty effect and the way the trees glimmered through in gold and frayed burlap.

I added a pediment die to the top and bottom of the tag and edged with Wendy Vecchi Potting Soil Archival ink. I added to the snowy effect with lots of dobs of Gesso, including on the gauze. In this photo you can see the Champagne Crushed Glass Glitter in the left corner. I didn't have any of the beautiful cheesecloth or Tim Holtz linen ribbon that Linda used so I substituted some gauze, which I dyed with Festive Berries Distress Ink and some copper Perfect Pearls. I painted the hemp thread with some Gesso too. It is difficult to see in the photos how the trees shimmer with gold and how the Shabby Rose Frantage glitters on the musical snowflakes!

I used the sentiment from the Artistic Outpost, Snowy Woods plate stamped with Potting Soil and clear embossed. The little snowflakes were stamped from an X-cut snowflake stamp and painted with Nougat before being stamped with the music from Eclectica.

Here is the finished tag. I attached my deer with little foam pads. They were slightly visible so I melted some Frantage around them and - hey presto - vanished! Thank you, Linda for your inspiration and thanks to my visitors and followers so much for stopping by and looking at another of my twelve tags with a Christmas story behind it! I have another one ready for tomorrow, so I would really appreciate it if you could drop by - I understand how pushed for time everyone must be, though, as the Festive Season gathers momentum.

A Winter's Tale - Inspired by Alison

Well, Magpieheaven visitors, I really hope you are not feeling overwhelmed by Christmas preparations. I am determined not to be anxious about a season that is supposed to promote peace and good will! Today I had to visit the Dentist, but I tried not to think about it too much and to spend some time playing before my visit: I should probably have been Christmas shopping, but craft won, I'm afraid. Over at Paper Artsy Alison Bomber has been at her most inspirational! She is a phenomenal artist. Not only does she create amazing work, she is also so generous and honest about sharing the process with her readers. We are included one hundred percent as Alison confides in us about not only her triumphs, but also those bold enterprises that threaten not to go quite to plan, but turn out all the better for that! If Alison's baubles were bothersome, she lets you know that they were and we all gasp in awe at the wonderful outcome!

I so wanted to play along with Alison this time, not just because I admire her work, which I do, but also because her projects look such fun! Alas I don't possess very many  of the wonderful products Alison used this semester! I have no liquid leaf; no triptych to decorate and no baubles or Rock Candy Crackle! I wasn't giving up that easily! I may not have baubles to decorate, but I am trying to create a tag tree in my favourite vase. My plan is to photograph my Winter Wonderland mantel-piece when it is all complete. Each of my tags is going to be about an aspect of what Christmas means to me. Trying to keep in the spirit of Alison's intrepid experimentation I attacked a tag and some card first with Fresco paints and then with Distress Stains: Antarctic and Inky Pool and Faded Jeans, Peeled Paint, Evergreen Bough and Picket Fence. I wanted to create patterns with drips, not in the more impasto style of Alison's gilded icon, but in a water-colour way. I was beginning to think baroque skies on ceilings stretching way above our heads, although I feared ending up with a grey and slushy day in Bromley Town Centre. Would those drips look better with some stamping?

I was thinking that I might enter my tags for the Funkie Junkie 12 Tags Challenge so this will also be my first one! I am actually starting with Week 8 and Linda's lovely blue, snowflake background is what inspired me. I do hope I have time to complete all 12 before the 22nd - eek! Here is a link to the Funkie Junkie Boutique where some of the beautiful supplies to make tags and so on can be found. I played with clear embossing some snowflakes from the Artistic Outpost plate and also using WOW white embossing powder on some others. I don't have the extra thick clear embossing powder that Alison used on her baubles, but I should so like to play with some of that! I swiped my tag through some Perfect Pearls powder to create a shimmer and - in the absence of the fine crackles of Rock Candy - I substituted a silver skeleton leaf, which looks like fine broken lines in the ice or frost fronds.

I liked the marbled look of my backgrounds and the way they shimmered, but I wasn't sure where I was headed exactly and the clock was ticking on towards the horrors of the Dentist! I wanted to use a Lynne Perrella Paper Artsy Christmas image rather than a traditional Santa and that's when the idea of  'A Winter's Tale' started to occur to me.

 I think it was the texture of that leaf that did it! I started to think of a wonderful production of 'A Winter's Tale' - almost the first Shakespeare I ever saw - that my friend Nina's mum took us both to see when we were sixteen. It starred Judi Dench as Hermione and the directer was Peter Brook. At the poignant moment when Hermione's statue comes to life the audience all just gasped as Judi Dench stepped out from a giant pillar of ice, a warm, living woman and not a statue at all. Those memories of the magic of theatre and transformation kept informing what I was doing as I played around with my tag, hoping that a puddly mess would turn into something glittering and festive courtesy of Perfect Pearls and Tim Holtz Dry distress glitter!

I used my marbly card to stamp an image on from LPC0017. I used this image the other day and I am growing to love its versatility. On this project it reminded me of a ceiling painting that a fairy-tale couple such as Hermione and Leontes might have in their palace. I used Wendy Vecchi Cornflower Blue, inspired by Alison and Linda's blue palettes. Like Alison, I tried France Papillon's technique of creating Grunge Paste embellies. These I frosted with Dry Distress glitter and stuck on very carefully! I made about six, but they were probably too thin. These two were the only ones that slipped off my craft paper satisfyingly all in one piece: they reminded me of icing sugar! The snowflakes I had punched out of card I coloured with Frescos in Antarctic and Inky Pool, Nougat and Cinnamon and Shabby Blue Frantage. I wound stained seam binding, lace and singed grey gauze around my tag fastening and added some cream hemp thread. I bordered with Crackle Glazed icicles and a Crackle Glaze frame in French Roast with a coat of Antarctic over the Glaze. I also used brown paper lace with text an musical notes on it.

I wanted my tag to evoke the wintry mood in the first section of Shakespeare's play, where Hermione's little boy settles down to tell a story with the words, 'A sad tale's best for winter.' 

Here is my seam binding, lace and gauze and a Prima brad, which I coloured with Treasure Gold White Fire to co-ordinate more with the winter colours of the tag.

Thank you for looking at my tag today: I do hope I shall be able to complete 12. Thank you Alison too for inspiring me to create something blue, shimmery, dangling and frosty with the supplies that I have, even if it wasn't baubles. I should like to enter this tag for The Funkie Junkie 12 Tags of Christmas and I'm starting by linking to Tag#8 and

The Paper Artsy Alison Bomber Challenge.

WOYWW - Hurray! One card made!

Hello, dear visitors, it's time for the best blog hop around: WOYWW! It's hosted by the amazing Julia Dunnit! If you want to find out the meaning of WOYWW'; the joys of being a 'desker' and why we snoop around the desks of the world every Wednesday then click HERE and all will be revealed!
This week has involved us zooming my mum here, there and everywhere for this and that! There has been such a lot to arrange so that she can settle down and feel at home in her new flat. Her bath needed attention and her kitchen tap was leaking so Kevin helped out! He is great in an emergency, but I've decided, and sorry that this is a never-ending story, that he is such a perfectionist that our kitchen crawls along for a bit and then comes to a standstill. We are in 'standstill' mode at present. I think the lulls are due to him creating the cupboards very, very lovingly. We have handles now on four cupboard doors, but that's about all! Ah well, after Christmas there will eventually be worktops, a sink and tiles and you will all be able to hear my 'happy dance' half way across the globe: everyone's invited to the virtual party too, of course, as I've said so many times before. On Thursday Matilda is doing a photo shoot for her next college project on the Punk era - the University's choice, not hers (!): they like to take you right out of your comfort zone - in our unfinished kitchen with her model dressed as Siouxsie, the '70s punkette! Her lecturer suggested broken crockery all around would look cool and add to the Punk vibe! We-ell, it's one thing having an unfinished kitchen, I'd rather not fill it with broken crockery! Anyway, I must reveal what's on top of my washing machine today before I get totally distracted!

As you can see, I've got one card made and tags cut to have a go at The Funkie Junkie 12 Tags of Christmas and today I'm going to play with distress stains before I nip out to the Dentist and take my mum for a blood test - and - fear not, gentle visitors - there's not a broken plate in sight...yet! Do you suppose I'll get those tags done before December 22nd? Thank you so much for dropping by today. It's always so lovely to see you. I'll try to return as many visits as I can. I don't think I managed everyone last week, so please forgive me if the week ran away before I had time for a peek. I'll do my very best this week, even if it means crunching over broken tea mugs! Happy WOYWW!

A Card for Rosemary

Hello and welcome to Magpieheaven! Today I managed to create a card for one of my oldest friends, Rosemary, which I should like to enter for the Arty Inklings Christmas Challenge. Rosemary is a  very creative person: weaving using her own vegetable dyes and rag-rug making to name just two of her interests, so I wanted her to be one of the people I send a hand-made card to this year. This is quite a simple card, but I used some of my favourite elements on it and I tried to choose what I thought might appeal to my old friend.

I used one of the Card Blanks I bought from The Range recently. I then cut a piece of Bo Bunny paper from the Silver and Gold collection and stuck it down, folding back each of the four corners a little. I then distressed them with some Vintage Photo and stamped in Wendy Vecchi Potting Soil Archival with the Paper Artsy Mini 26 script stamp. Rosemary is a real country girl, so I was sure she would love the beautiful swirling holly leaves. I first met Rosemary when I was fourteen and I had moved from London to the countryside. I recall coming upon some skeleton leaves on a walk with Rosemary when we were at school! I was such a 'townie' I had never noticed the amazing beauty under my feet before. Again, while at The Range, I bought some silver and gold skeleton leaves so I added them to this card.

I placed one in the corner of an image (Paper Artsy Ink School Days Plate 1) I had stamped onto a piece of Bo Bunny paper using Wendy Vecchi Potting Soil again - no - I don't have shares in Wendy's range, I just love this colour! I wanted to convey the impression of frost fronds on the window. The other one I placed in a little spray with the fir bough from Artistic Outpost's Snowy Woods plate stamped onto card painted with Nougat and Cinnamon and tied a piece of seam-binding dyed with Evergreen Bough and Festive Berries around them. I tore around the fir bough and edged with Stampendous Frantage in Shabby Blue. The window is a Tim Holtz die. I painted first with Old Gold Fresco, Crackle Glazed and then painted with Nougat Fresco, which I edged with Cinnamon. Before the paint was dry, I sprinkled with a little dry Distress Glitter by Tim Holtz to give a frosty look. I also stamped snowflakes randomly with Versamark and then embossed them with a mix of Mica flakes and Wow white embossing powder. The finishing touch is some narrow ribbon, almost the same shade as the Nougat window frame.

While at The Range I also spied some little holly leaf buttons, which went well with the paper design. This one is just threaded through with a little cream hemp. For the Sentiment I used the Lynne Perrella Collection stamp 0017 sponged with Nougat and Cinnamon and edged with Shabby Rose Frantage. The little boy on this image seems to me to have a look of wonder. I used him to represent the young C. S. Lewis on my Narnia panels, which reminds me of Rosemary's other passion! She collects children's illustrated books from long ago. I do hope this card will help her to know that I always remember her with affection, even though we don't see each other that much these days. Thank you for stopping by today and looking at another one of my Christmas makes. I should like to enter this for the Arty Inklings Christmas Challenge. Do check out some of the lovely entries that have linked to this challenge, if you can - you still have some time to join in!

A Very Vintage Gift!

Hello and welcome to Magpieheaven where time seems to be moving as swiftly as Santa's reindeer! I really must get a move on now December is upon us! Thanks to my daughter we have one present to put under the tree! Our dear friend Patsy who helped so much when my mum moved, happened to mention that the one thing she would love for Christmas would be some luxurious perfume, chosen just for her. Well, since Matilda started work at the Perfume Shop three Christmases ago, she has become quite the expert on choosing the perfume to fit the person. She decided that Patsy would like something spicy and exotic, but not too heavy and she chose her a lovely gift-set for my Mum to give her - here it is all ready for wrapping!

The gift box looks wonderfully festive, but not conventionally so with its rich browns and gold sequins - very sophisticated. I decided to complement this in my wrapping. As I love all things vintage, including unusual vintage tones I am really excited about the Our Creative Corner Challenge to create something that says 'Christmas' but with an unusual colour palette, drawing on creams, chocolates, wines and coppers. I should like to enter my wrapped gift for the Our Creative Corner, Very Vintage Christmas Challenge. I began with the tags for my gift. It was fun playing with Distress inks like Vintage Photo, tiny smidges of Evergreen Bough and Soot. On one side of my tags I simply swiped through the Distress Inks, heated, misted and swiped again. I love using my Frescos like Nougat and Cinnamon too - they sound so deliciously Christmassy! They came into play on the other side of the tags.

I sponged a ready-made tag after removing the string ( I put aside to paint with Old Gold Fresco) with Nougat and a blend of Cinnamon around the edges. I then stamped the image of the two cupids from LP017 in Wendy Vecchi Potting Soil Archival and some script from Paper Artsy Mini 26. I also stamped some of the brown paper I was planning to wrap the gift in with Mini 26 too. This I later die-cut with some Paper Artsy Waxy brown paper to turn into a tattered florals die-cut flower. As you can see from the little screw top jars of fairy dust, I added some Frantage in Shabby Rose to the edges of my larger tag. I only used a very little, as I wanted everything about this wrapping to be subtle.

I also stamped with script on the reverse of the tags, as although the back is not visible at the moment it will be when the gift is unwrapped:. below you can see the tiny splodges of Frantage at the corner of the larger tag.

The pack of tags also contained smaller sized tags and I painted one of these with Old Gold, a thin layer of Paper Artsy Crackle Glaze and then nice, thick strokes of Nougat.

I edged my Crackle Glaze tag with some Rose Quartz Treasure Gold and stamped it with the fir bough from Artistic Outpost's Snowy Woods plate. The addition of a gold skeleton leaf and a tattered pine cone rose in Nougat and Cinnamon with a little golden-brown narrow ribbon finished it off.

Here is the package all wrapped up! Please just click on the images if you would like to see in a little more detail. I stamped my brown paper with Versamark and then embossed with whiteWOW embossing powder, as I wanted the Snowy Woods snowflakes to really 'pop' against the neutral tones. I also stamped some script from a 'Crafty Individuals' stamp, sometimes allowing it to run over the snowflakes. I wanted a worn, uneven look so I used this without the block. There are some lovely Christmas ribbons on sale, but I wanted mine to co-ordinate with my vintage look. I recently bought a jacket. I liked the shape, but not the strange ribbons that were attached to the sleeves so I unpicked them! Luckily I kept these, thinking they were bound to come in useful. I stamped some of this very silky, luxurious ribbon with Snowy Woods snowflakes, this time with Wendy Vecchi Potting Soil Archival.

I placed a pearl at the centre of the script flower and edged the waxy paper petals with Rose Quartz.

Here is some tea-dyed lace I added and the Old Gold painted strings. I liked the way the lace retained a little of its former colour, but toned down by being steeped in tea.

Some ribbon and punched paper lace completed the larger tag.

Ultimately I was delighted with how glowing and warm the package looked, even though there was not a red tartan or an emerald green Christmas tree in sight!

 Thank you so much for stopping by to take a peek at my vintage wrapping! I do hope your Christmas preparations are going well and that your days will continue to be relatively stress-free and peaceful as the 25th draws closer.