Lava Lamp

This is the Lava Lamp with the Diamond Glaze and ink on tin foil.

I stamped the Lava Lamp in Silver Encore and then when dry used a knife and steel edge ruler to cut away the inside.

Onto a piece of Window Plastic I tapped bright inkpads and then drizzled with Diamond Glaze. Flipped it over and straight down onto the tin foil. I gently pressed down the edges to seal. After about half an hour drying time I then attached the lava lamp over the top, leaving a tin foil edge.

As you can see there is an air bubble in the lava lamp and when pressed will move around, but the more you press it the more the colours will mix together. After several days you will find that the colours will mix together on their own so this card does have a fairly short shelf life - but is great fun.

To maintain the colours of the lava lamp you can use tissue paper instead of tin foil, all the Diamond Glaze will dry so there will be no movement but it will retain all its colours.

Bad Blogger

I'm sorry, I know I have hardly posted up anything this week. I did manage to photograph a Lava Lamp and Diamond Glaze card which I will try and post tomorrow.

We have just been so manic getting ready for the Demo Day this Saturday and the Retreat which is only a couple of weeks away that my blog has been neglected.

I will try and take lots of photos of Demo Day and all the artwork that is created throughout the day so that I can post up pictures for those of you that can't make it along to the shop.

Wisteria

I have always loved Wisteria so when we moved into our current house back in 2000, one of the few things that I planted in the garden was a Wisteria to grow over the garage. Now, we are not big gardeners in our house, both Martin and I suffer with hayfever so having flowers is something we avoid but I really wanted a Wisteria. I do try and prune it in the autumn and water it during the dry months but it was very slow to grow for the first 5-6 years. As you can see now it grows quite a lot in the spring and for the very first time it currently has flowers. This picture I took with my standard SLR lens, but then I decided to get out my macro lens, which I hardly ever use. . . .

. . . and this is the result.

Because the macro lens is quite a bit bigger than my normal lens it is heavier to carry around and doesn't fit very well in the bag, but I really must make more effort to use it as I get fantastic results. As we don't have any other flowers I started taking photos of the Daisies in the lawn

Waffle Book

This book was designed by Rosie at JudiKins and made by Julie @ Stamp Addicts. All the score lines are created using the Scor-It on a sheets of silver metal. Lesley is going to colour it with Mica Gloss inks and it will be on display during Demo Day next Saturday.

Create & Craft Club

Yesterday I was at Create & Craft filming a how-to video for the Club, it probably comes out in the August edition but I'm not sure.
They wanted 'Young and Funky' and I had an idea in my head of what I wanted to create and Tuesday afternoon I started playing with the Lava Lamp stamp and some solid flowers and some bright Printworks inkpads.
For the inside of the Lava Lamp I was creating a Diamond Glaze mixed with ink on acetate background. Whilst I was doing this Vicky had just finished eating her lunch and was about to throw out her tin foil wrapping when she had an idea.

She cleaned the tin foil and then suggested we use this instead of the cardstock to create the Diamond Glaze background. So she proceeded to ink and Diamond Glaze the acetate and then placed it, wet side down, onto the tin foil.

It looked good, so I decided to cut more tin foil big enough that the same piece would also create the layer around the Lava Lamp, on top of my bright funky flower background.

We then got distracted by work stuff so didn't get back to it until Wednesday afternoon. At which point we discovered that the edges of the acetate had sealed to the tin foil but the centre remained liquid and you could still push around the DG and colours. We are thinking that the air can get to the edges so DG dries but if the air can not get to the centre it may never dry - How cool would that be?

Unfortunately I don't have a sample to show you at the moment as the one I created at Create & Craft I had to leave with them but we will try and create some more samples before Demo Day next Saturday.

Klimt

JudiKins make a great selection of Klimt stamps. If you have seen any of the work by the artist you'll know that you need to include a touch of gold. I don't know if you can see it on this card but she does have some gold on her head. You can use a gold pen to create this but I always find I get a much better and brighter result using gold leaf.

This is the Klimt Ladies Cube inside the Postage Frame.

We'll always have Paris . . .

It has been many years since we visited Paris but we do have the Paris cube here, which serves as a reminder. It has been stamped inside the Postage Frame. To layer the Postage Frames as shown you have 2 options - you could stamp them all separately and cut them out or, as in this card, you can stamp your prominent image (in this case the frame with Eiffel Tower) and then mask and stamp either side, repeat if necessary to create a longer image.

Leda

This is Leda from JudiKins. I believe she is from the Da Vinci range of stamps and can be found here. (The image on the website is much darker than the original and doesn't show all the detail).

On the top card she is simply stamped in Stone Grey Stazon on Kraft card and then coloured with Lyra Aquacolor crayons.

For the second card she has been stamped onto a Laminating Sheet (sticky backed acetate) which is layered over the top of Poly Paper. The Poly Paper is a textured paper that has been coloured with Lumiere paints.

Michiko

Unfortunately this photo came out a little blurry (I hadn't been drinking, honestly!). This is Michiko, she has been stamped onto Window Plastic (heat embossable acetate) and then coloured from behind with glue and glitter.

Last of my Ballerinas

On the top card the middle Ballerina is stamped first and then masked and then the other two are stamped either side.

The bottom card she has been cut out and mounted onto a Bead Curtain background.

Niji Paint Ballerinas

On all three of these cards the background has been coloured with Niji watercolour paints first and then when dried stamp on the Ballerina with Stazon. Mask the Ballerina and then you can stamp the background.

To highlight the Ballerina use your waterbrush to lift paint off and then dab with a tissue, when dry you can then add other colours of paint and a bit of sparkle.

Ballerina

At the moment everything we are working on is Top Secret for the retreat or TV so I can't share any of that with you, so I have gone through the archives to bring you some of my favourites over the next couple of weeks. This is the JudiKins Ballerina and she is one of my all time favourites. In this card she is dancing in a field of Poppies. The Poppy stamps is the Large Poppies by A Stamp In The Hand, unfortunately A Stamp In The Hand no longer produce stamps so stock of these is limited.

Peacock Feather

I apologise if I have already put this card on my blog, I just can't remember. This is the JudiKins Peacock Feather and it has been embossed with 4 different Twinkle embossing powders. The background has been created by stamping the same stamp using 2 different Brilliance inkpads. This stamp is one of our old favourites

Workshops

We had a great time at Hatfield House.  Introducing so many people to stamping is very rewarding and the show itself was really nice.  Annabel came with me on Sunday and she had a go at pyrography and flute playing, she watched the different bands playing and the Morris Men dancing, the Punch & Judy show, pots being made, glass being blown and many other things.  It was very hard not to spend all my money on the fabulous hand made clothes, jewellery, pottery, etc.

This afternoon I managed to put some of the workshops on our website, I will put the rest up on the website later this week so you can book them online.

Hatfield House

We are currently running Make & Takes at the Living Crafts show at Hatfield House but we will be back in the shop Monday to start preparing for the South Stamp Show in Worthing next weekend.

If you are visiting the South Stamp Show you can phone us up until Friday to place orders for collection at the show.

Looks like it is going to be a lovely day so I hope you get to enjoy it.

Cards for MS Charity

Our design team member Brenda is collecting hand made cards to sell at a charity fund raising event.  To read more details please follow this link here.

If you want to send any of your cards to us at Stamp Addicts we will be happy to pass them on to Brenda for you.

As Brenda is hoping to raise lots of money for this MS charity she needs your help.

Papercraft Essentials

Have you seen Vicky's article in Papercraft Essentials issue 41? She has used the JudiKins Atomic Retro Bollio . . .
This one is stamped onto air dry clay and coloured with Mica Gloss inks.

The background on this card is Mica Gloss inks spritzed on.

Stamp 3 sides of the bollio and then cut into squares or weave together.

This card incorporates the Judikins bicycle.

The photographs in the magazine look much better than mine.

Dreaming Fairy

This card was created by Kay Carley with the JudiKins Dreaming Fairy available here. As you can see Kay has created the background using layers of torn and stamped vellum.

Shoelicious

Vicky made this card from a Printworks previous stamp of the month. The wood mounted version is available here and the unmounted here.

One of those days . . .

Do you ever have one of those days where you know you've worked hard all day but when you look back on the day you're not entirely sure what you have actually achieved?

I seem to be having more and more of these days over the last few weeks.  But then I guess I only have myself to blame for taking on so many different challenges (and not the online creative type).

I achieve more when working under pressure so I'm sure I will manage to meet all my deadlines, although I might have to stretch them just a little bit.

I'll try and come back with some more artwork soon.

Containers of flowers

We have lots of different sizes, shapes and styles of containers ideal for flowers.

Work in progress . . .

As you can see these are still a work in progress, they've yet to be mounted up onto creased cards. But we came back from the shows and hit the ground running . . . .

Next weekend we will be running make & takes at the Living Crafts show at Hatfield House, followed by The South Stamp Show in Worthing the following weekend.

We also had a meeting with Ideal World this week and it looks like we could be appearing on live TV more frequently from June onwards - watch this space.

I forgot to mention - all stamps used are from Stamps by Judith. Don't you just love the Rock Wall, perfect for so many things.

Griz Bear

Medium Griz Bear from Stamps by Judith.

Remember most of the Stamps by Judith stamps are not available online but can be purchased by telephone.

Tulip

This is the Printworks Tulip coloured and then coated with Diamond Glaze.
The background was created by tapping Blending Blox onto a Heat Sheet, spritz with a little water and then smoosh (technical term) the card into the ink. Allow to dry before stamping.

Recent Shows

Here are a couple of samples that Vicky made at some of the shows recently, more to follow.

The backgrounds are window plastic coloured with inkpads and Diamond Glaze with tissue paper . All stamps from Stamps by Judith.