Dragon's Dream TIO - DT piece B and a flower

For this theme it's Gabrielle's turn to pick and she has chosen B and a flower, so I have gone with Bee and a flower, mainly because I really like my Thistle Stencil from Imagination Crafts, and not for the thistle, but for the bees as the corner flourish on the same stencil.  But more of that later.

I started with a wooden tag I got from my first visit to the MDF man - I will say on record now it will not be my last!  I based it with Rose Fresco Finish from Papertartsy, then with Blood Orange and London Bus swept over the whole thing to deepen the colour to more red than pink.  I did the same with the wooden rose which came from the sale bin at B&Q and was a twin pack for less than a pound.  I added pewter Treasured Gold to hit the highpoints and give a worn look.

I coloured some Grunge Paste with Chutney Fresco finish and used this through the Bees on the stencil.  I used Zesty Zing through a crafters workshop stencil to get the honeycomb effect and to make the stripes on the bees. I again used the pewter TG on the wings to make them shimmer like bumble bee wings.

I then decided that one tag wasn't enough so I decided to double it with one I cut using Quick Cutz nesting die set and some cream card, I continued the honeycomb onto the card and using ELB05 from PaperArtsy, stamped the phrase in Fuschia pink Stazon.  I used a combination of worn lipstick and Forest Moss on the edges of the wooden tag to highlight them, then rubbed in some pewter TG.  On the card tag I went over it with spun sugar distress ink.  finished off with a rose brad, picked out in TG and a bright co-ordinating ribbon.

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New Challenge on Dragon's Dream TIO - S and blue

I started this with no idea where it was going, I had based my tag with Guacamole Fresco Finish acrylic paint, and was also halfway through altering another piece at the same time and had some Antartic Fresco Finish left over from the top coat of crackling it so I splodged it on top of the green and that is where my sea started.

It's May's turn for the theme this time on Dragon's Dream and she has chosen S and blue, and that's where the inspiration hit with the sea, one of my favourite (but lesser known or played) Beatles songs is "An Octopus's Garden".

I continued the sea theme by creating seaweed courtesy of the Ltd Edition Fresco Finish paints from Lin Brown and by using a semi opaque colour (Seaweed oddly enough) through a splodge away stencil followed by a translucent colour (chartreuse) through an Imagination Crafts Stencil over and then washed with another translucent shade (Beach Hut) I got the layered  underwater look I was after.

I then used my Viva Las Vegas Stamp of Otto and bathing beauty (minus the bathing beauty) and coloured him in with Distress Markers and cam up with this.

Fished it off with a rose brad to look a little more garden like

I am entering this into the following challenges:
Scrap it Girl - Tags and Bags
Stampotique - Paint or Pen
Our daily Bread Designs - Rain or Water
Sunday Stampers - Nature
Squirrel and the Fox - All Creatures Great and Small

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Emergency Crafters DT Piece - Polkadot

For this month's challenge I have used a Polkadot C5 card blank from Kan Ban.  I used a strip of matching ribbon from Dovecraft and a Topper and Sentiment from Hunky Dory.

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Altered Ecelectics DT Piece - Altered Letter Rack

This particular beauty has caused me lots of problems, when I bought it, it was a hideous orange colour which refused to be covered, so eventually I got there and this is the result.

I acheived this (finally) by gessoing the whole thing three times before using my PaperArtsy Fresco Finish paints on, I started with Little Black Dress, followed by crackle glaze, then this was topped with Antarctic and left to work.  Once dry I washed Bora Bora over the top and finally coloured  Maimeri artist medium with Dusty Teal and used this through the Imagination Crafts Stencil Tropical Leaf.

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Me, myself and a random nomination

I was nominated forThe Liebster Award by my best mate Cazz who blogs at http://thecazzbar.blogspot.co.uk/  I have known her for some 5 years and met her on twitter.  The nomination works on various sets of rules but these are the ones we seem to be following:

1. Post the award on your blog.

2. Thank the blogger who presented this award and link back to their blog.

3. Write 11 random facts about yourself.

4. Nominate 11 bloggers who you feel deserve this award and who have less than 200 followers.

5. Answer 11 questions posted by the presenter and ask your nominees 11 questions.

So here we go.  Thanks to Cazz for the nomination and here are the 11 random facts:

• I won Battle of the Sexes quiz many years ago on Gary Davies Radio show (Radio 1 circa 1988)
• I used to be the membership secretary for "The Guild of Fan and Disciples" the Terry Pratchett fan club
• I also occasionally build model kits
• I passed my driving test on the first attempt.
• I have a tattoo on my right shoulder
• The first time I flew I was 32
• I wanted to be a fighter pilot, but in my day women weren't allowed to
• I have Elvira - Mistress of the Dark autograph and on the reverse is a photo of her signing the photo I have the autograph on
• it's 10 months since I last had a haircut (it'll probably be another 10 before I get round it)
• I'm the techy person in our house
• I can't abide hard boiled eggs

WOW!!! that is hard to do.

Now for the questions

Question 1   what's the weather like where you are RIGHT now? Come on, up off your chair and go look...   At the moment dry and dark, but by goodness the rain has been torrential today

Question 2   where is your favourite place to go on holiday? - Greece, mainland Greece an area called the Pelopenese and a town called Tolon

Question 3  How many rooms in your home? 5 plus landing and stairs

Question 4  what's your favourite colour? - PURPLE - but you all knew that

Question 5  what was your last blog post about and why did you write it? - last blogpost was about a Design Team Tag, I wrote it so there was something to show those wanting to play along and so they knew what I'd done.

Question 6  You can have 4 guests for dinner (alive or dead) - who would you choose and why? - Peter Ustinov for his anecdotes and witty reparte, Audrey Hepburn for the glamour and because she's my Shero! I love her films and the work she did for Unicef, Stephen Fry, again for the tales and to raise the tone of the evening and finally Kylie Minogue, she just seems to be so genuine and after the battle with Breast Cancer and overcoming it to come back better than ever, that and she's an inch shorter than me so I won't be the shortest person in the room

Question 7  what was the last song you listened to? - Radio GaGa by Queen, I have the radio on in the car all the time, but couldn't tell you what was on as I pulled up at the house, the Queen track was on at lunch time and being my favourite band, the rasio went right up and I sang along like a loon

Question 8  favourite film of all time - Breakfast at Tiffany's

Question 9  red? white? rose? Always Red

Question 10  name of your first school and your favourite teacher, Bamber Bridge Methodist School, Mr Rainton

Question 11  (and the last one, you'll be happy to know)  what is YOUR best feature / attribute? - I have no idea, before I put the weight on I would have said my size it hadn't changed since I was a teen, now I wouldn't know.  I'm guessing those of you that know me will have your own thoughts on that.

I won't be nominating onwards, but I look forward to reading your comments/responses to what I have written.

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Dragon's Dream TIO DT Piece - Z and a face

This time Silvia was at the helm for choosing the theme and I'll be honest, I struggled with the Z part, so I spent an hour rummaging through about 4 million sheets of paper (I kid you not) to find one with a Zig Zag pattern on which I backed my tag with, but it was a tad on the bright side, so I used a combination of Distress Inks to tone it down quite a bit, and a combination of stencils to add more layers to the background.  I stamped the face Using Indigo Blu stamps and Versafine Onyx Black and used Distress Inks again to fade into the face leaving that part white.

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Dragon's Dream TIO DT Piece - C and Metal

Well this time it was my long term twitter buddy's turn to choose the theme and she went with C and metal.  I started by making a tag blank from white smooth card and covering it in a random blend of Butterscotch, Terracotta and Pebble alcohol Inks, I then cut Spellbinders Sprightly Sprockets in Tim Holtz self adhesive foil and cut the Corner Flourishes, and Cogs Edger from Tim's Sizzix Range in his self adhesive metal card and used the same alcohol inks to rust these up.  I stamped the clock face from and word the Timeless set which combines G45 with Sizzix dies I aged these down with a touch of Vintage Photo Distress ink and added in the clockhands from Papermania Chronology range with a brad.

I would like to enter this fir the following challenges:

Crafting form the heart #9

Through the craft room door - anything goes

paperminutes - glittery brown

Inky Chicks - Monochromatic

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