Tim’s tag for October – a Halloween journal pouch

OMG here I am just coming in under the wire with my October ‘tag’ and it’s the last Halloween make for this year. I decided to make a tag pouch using the giant size 12 tag from Ranger. I had a brand new set of Retro Halloween framelits sitting on my shelf  just waiting to be used and as they come with both stamps and dies I thought they would be perfect for Tim’s technique using a mask to cover the image.

I have followed Tim’s instructions for the outside but used a mixed-media layered technique for the inside.

I began with blending victorian velvet distress paint through the gothic stencil and went on to add some aged mahogany through halloween words.

I dipped the tag in distress stains and dried it, then used more stencils to blend distress inks over the top.

I love the colours and how they mixed together creating some fabulous blends.

I used the reverse side to create the outside of the pouch following Tim’s techniques – go take a look at his process steps, they are so easy to follow and he produces amazing results.

You can see I used texture paste in both white and black.

When all the layers had dried I stamped, painted and die-cut all the images from the framelits set and found some mini movers and shapers dies which I cut from black card.

I added phrases and quotes to both side to create more of a journalling effect. The lettering was made up of chit-chat stickers, label letters, the stenciled lettering and some were computer generated.

I got right to the end and suddenly realised that the front cover didn’t look quite right.

Can you see what I changed?

Distress inks – seedless preserves

Distress stains – victorian velvet ,dusty concord, stormy sky

Distress sprays – iced spruce, dusty concord, tattered rose, brushed pewter

Phew, so pleased I had time to play today and do this piece, I was feeling so disappointed that I hadn’t found time to take part and now I feel re-inspired and ready to move on and make some more DT and workshop samples.

I am linking to Tim's blog and wish to say thanks Tim for your continuing inspiration and ideas.

Just before I go it’s officially the hottest Halloween ever in the UK, today we have had highs of 23 degrees Celsius which is 73 degrees Fahrenheit. At home we have had all the windows and doors open as it’s just like a really warm summer day. The only difference is that the shadows are long and the cherry trees have completely lost their leaves. what is happening to our weather?

I have flowers still budding.

Summer bedding still full of colour.

Spring flowers blooming again.

Pots still a riot of colour.

And the cats enjoying the sunshine.

This is my bee box, I’ve seen bees going in, but need to do some research about how they use it.

And lastly I just love this photo of a single red rose peeking through the bare branches of the Cherry tree.
Update - it seemed silly having a bee box and not knowing how it was used so googled it and found out -
Red mason bees need a box filled with hollow pipes, such as cut lengths of bamboo. They lay their eggs one at a time with a supply of pollen or nectar and a plug of mud between them.
So now I know what will happen next year when the eggs hatch, we will have lots of Red Mason bees in the garden yay.

Have a great Halloween evening with plenty of treats and no tricks.

See you again in the morning.

hugs Brenda xx

Bountiful Harvest at A Vintage Journey

Welcome everyone. Today sees a new challenge at AVJ and the theme was chosen by our fabulous Sandy. Having made a harvest canvas earlier in the autumn I had to have a deep think about the theme for this one but decided I would definitely get the melt pot out and use bees wax

You can see a narrow hessian frame which was the left over piece from die-cutting the large ticket a few days before. I had glued hessian to card before hand and was left with the edges that just needed a trim to create the frame. I cut the background paper from Tim’s seasonal stash, it is the piece with all the autumnal recipes on it. Then I die-cut the gate and fence from core’dinations paper using the ironwork gate strip die. I gave it a sanding all over then inked the edges and added some treasure gold to random areas.

To create the leaves I adhered a strip of foil tape to card and gave it a colouring of alcohol inks …..

… and die-cut using autumn gatherings strip die.

I put the melt pot on to heat with bees wax in the pan and covered the background with it.

Keeping the wax hot I added the gate and fence……

…. and then when cool I inked the edges of the hessian frame and adhered it to the background piece. I love the rustic look it adds to the collaged view.

The mini movers and shapers cog was die cut using card, inked over with walnut stain DI and then smeared randomly with embossing ink; using vintage photo distress embossing powder has given it a more aged look, I also added a little treasure copper to it. This provided me with a base to add the wheat sheaves and leaves.

I couldn’t resist adding a little butterfly - it's just a sneak peek as it will be coming up on my blog tomorrow (with a tutorial for the new CVC challenge).

The butterfly was dipped in the wax which gave it a fabulous oily look and it fitted on the background perfectly.

The sentiment is one of my own computer generated and printed out.

So here’s my celebration to a bountiful harvest for 2014 and thanks Sandy for the theme.

Have a great end to the week and come take a look at all the amazing inspiration from the Creative Guides at AVJ.

hugs Brenda xxx

A Christmas Delivery – Crafty Individuals

Jean and Malcolm at Crafty Individuals have brought out some new stamps for Christmas and I love this retro Vintage image, CI – 421, which can be found on their shop site HERE.

Originally I wanted this to be a Christmas card with a vintage feel to it and had the idea of making a vintage Christmas cabinet card, but it didn't suit the kraft background I was going to use, so I found this lovely blue paper in my stack of paper pads and this design evolved. The cabinet card did get used and you will see it coming up soon on another CI sample.

I began by stamping the image onto sticky back canvas which has given it that old and faded look. I coloured with distress markers and a water brush and added some sparkle in the snowy places. The edges were blended with distress inks and I mounted it onto card and inked and distressed the edges again. Because the glitter was also rubbing off I gave it a very light spay of varnish.

The flower was cut using the tattered poinsettia dis in white crinoline. I added the brad, stiffened it with spray starch, scrunched it and dried and then very, very lightly inked some of the petal points with walnut stain distress ink.

the ‘joy’ is a wooden sentiment given the picket fence distress paint and glamour dust treatment – that is adding the glitter while the paint is still wet and left to dry.

I used some of the bits from the courtyard framework die, stamping over with a text stamp, some pretty borders and a simple sentiment.


Have you managed to join in the Crafty Individuals October challenge yet – it is called Halloween madness or Christmas Frenzy. There are still a few days left to join in.

To enter put together your chosen project, which must include at least one Crafty Individuals product please, then post your Challenge project on your Blog, before the end of the month, and include a link back to the CI Blog.  Leave a link in the URL box displayed in the post. At the end of the month Gio will set about choosing five lucky participants, each of whom will win a CI rubber stamp of their choice, and don't forget that as per usual, once you have linked in your creation, you can also claim a lovely 25% discount code to use on anything you purchase from the CI Website, which will be valid until the 10th of November. Have fun.

hugs Brenda xxx

Tattered Layered Snowflake

I have a card over on the Country View Crafts Project Blog today and have used the gorgeous new Layered Snowflake by Tim Holtz. It has been embossed, dipped in picket fence distress paint with glitter added to alter it and I love the kraft, red and white colour combination.

It would be lovely if you could pop over to take a look and see the details of how I made it.

Thanks for stopping by here. Have a very happy Sunday.

hugs Brenda xxx


Update - copied over from CVC

HI everyone I hope you are having a happy Sunday. I am joining you today with a Christmas card that you could put together very easily but has a great deal of vintage charm.

I began by die-cutting Tim’s new layered snowflake die with embossing folder. It is fabulous for creating that wonderful texture on it.

I splodged it randomly with some picket fence distress paint.

When it was dry I smeared some glue with my finger over the painted area and covered it with platinum glitter.

The new Holiday Words thinlits give you fabulous greetings to add to your cards quite quickly and teamed with the ‘Stick It’ sheets work beautifully without any fuss in trying to adhere them to your design.

The instructions on the packet are very clear. I cut a piece to the size I needed for my dies, removed one side of the protective paper and rubbed it onto the reverse side of the card I wanted to use.

With my very thin dies I always use the sizzix magnetic platform as this keeps the dies in the place you want them to be and they don’t slide around. At this stage you die-cut in the normal way and have the Stick It paper underneath and not showing.

It looked like this when I took the dies off the card.

I gathered all the pieces I wanted to use in my design including papers from the Merriment set and making a shabby rose Jennie Atkinson style

I painted an edge around my card ….

… and assembled the card.

Thanks for stopping by today and taking a peek at my shabby Christmas card and if you want to try making shabby shabby flowers take a look at Jennie’s blog HERE

One layer thank you card no:1

My lovely ladies at the Art of Craft loved the workshop I did making one layer cards. This design used a focal B Line stamp, a text stamp, a border stamp and a sentiment stamp.

We stamped the main image on the card and on rough paper to make a mask and that was all it needed to put this one together.

We tried a wide border using a Tim Holtz stamp and used two colours of distress ink….

… and distressed the edges to give it a more vintage look.

The second card was made in exactly the same way ……

… using a different border stamp.

So where has this week gone? There's just not enough time to get everything done at the moment. I seem to be teaching 2 - 3 workshops and am so sorry I am still not getting round your blogs.

I hope you have had a good week and wish you a lovely weekend whatever you have planned.

hugs Brenda xxx