Cullercoats Charms and Curios

 August 2024 ATC Challenge: Prompt HEAT As the prompt was HEAT I decided to do a hot African night sky.  I made the background sky for all three ATCs as one piece. I cut a 2" circle to use as a mask then used yellow, orange, red and purple distress inks to make a sunset. I started using dried marigold for the range but it was too pale so used a prism orange ink pad which was much brighter. Adding the red Adding the purple - went over all the colours to blend and intensify them several times. I used a stencil to try and make some rays for the sun.  I smooched water through the stencil then dabbed it off to remove some colour. I then dabbed some yellow distress oxide through the stencil.   I tore some paper to make a stencil for the ground which I coloured using dark green distress oxide. I then removed the sun  mask and coloured the sun with yellow distress ink. I then stamped on African animals and a tree using versafine black ink.  The stamp set is by...

Stamperia Seaworld Mixed Media Canvas PIER 9 I used a canvas from an acrylic painting I did at an evening wine and paint group. Great fun to do with friends but not much learnt about actual painting!!.   I used acrylic paint to create a rust effect around the sides of the canvas.  I then covered the front of the canvas with scrapbook paper that had a rust effect. I distressed the edges and coloured with rusty hinge distress ink.  I then used stamperia  scrapbook paper. I punched out one of the portholes and layered it onto card to create a raised frame. I die cut cogs and painted them with rust paint.   I cut out three images of the diver from stamperia paper and decoupaged him to create depth.   I stencilled some rust paint through an industrial looking design onto the paper.  I then layered up the cogs, die cut plants and the diver. I used elements from the stamperia papers to create a frame around the picture.  These were layered...

 July 2024 ATC Challenge Theme: Marine    I had already made this mermaid card for another group challenge and there is a tutorial for it in an older blog.  I had stamped out extra mermaid images in momento ink but had not coloured them so thought I could use them for the marine theme for July's ATC Challenge as each mermaid fits nicely onto an ATC sized card. Coloured the mermaids using alcohol pens.  Then fussy cut them out. I used some sea patterned paper I had left over from another project to create the background. I had some die cut sea plants and some stamped shells.  These were arranged to create the seascape to place the mermaids on   I added some wording and a pearl to the shell one of the mermaids is holding. I also used some cheese cloth coloured with green distress ink in the background.  Unfortunately due to poor lighting the individual photos are a bit washed out.

SEAHORSE PICTURE AND TAG CARD                  I am trying to incorporate recycling into my craft so used card from a packaging box.  I cut the cardboard to size and peeled of some of the top layer to expose the corrugated section in the middle. I then painted the front with white gesso.   Once the gesso had dried I stencilled over the front using sizzix structure paste and an imagination crafts stencil.  I also used another stencil to create some bubbles.   Once the paste had fully dried I painted over it using distress inks and highlighted the edges with a brown distress ink. I stamped some texture using forext moss distress oxide ink and some texture stamps. I stamped some seahorses in a brown waterproof ink onto some background paper I made a while ago using brushios. I then fussy cut these out. I also die cut lots of foliage which looks like seaweed and also an anchor and ships wheel. I arranged the sea horses and die...