Hello there and happy Wednesday or happy hump day as it's fondly known!

Today I've created a card with a quick and easy background, using one of my favourite collage techniques.  Last time I showed you how to cover eggs with tissue paper, this time again I've used tissue paper, but to create a pastel coloured background.


I keep lots of tissue paper for collage as I love the translucency of it as well as being able to use it as a stamping medium on uneven surfaces.

I took a couple of pieces of pink and mint green and cut them into small pieces, gluing them to a piece of white card with some gel medium. The great thing about tissue is when it's overlapping like this it creates a beautiful effect.


I made sure this layer was totally dry before moving on to stamping and embossing a random pattern of flowers and leaf shapes using this stamp set from Pretty Pink Posh called Autumn Blooms. I used Opaque Pastel Pink and Mint Macaroon powders.


I cut my card to size and mounted…

It's that time of year again when most of the population becomes a little mushy and soft, our crafting goes pink, fluffy and maybe a little kitch.

I don't do fluffy or kitch terribly well but I like to make a dramatic statement nevertheless and I think I may have done that with these hearts.

When I received some of the new WOW! products unvailed at Creativation this January, I was very eager to try the new Trios. This particular set is called Confetti and containes a set of three fabulous colours, each one mixed with chunky silver flecks. The result is an amazing burst of silver here and there which is quite magical.


I used the powders on some twice die cut hearts.


I began by die cutting a lacey flower pattern and embossing it with one of the powders from the Trio pack.

This is what the powder looks like directly from the jar. The silver particles are bigger than the finer coloured powder.



Originally the idea was only to use the black as a background to show off the embossin…

I love to create wreaths at Christmas time and including them on a card is so classic. If you don't have winter foliage stamps why not look at some of your other stamps for images to adapt. Using the right colours and a bit of sparkle almost any image could be adapted into a wreath for Christmas.

I started simply by lightly drawing my circle on a piece of card. I had a roll of tape at hand so used that.


For the first layer I stamped and embossed directly onto the card with Glamour Green Embossing Glitter, the small leaf from a set by Pretty Pink Posh called Autumn Blooms.



For my next layer I stamped, embossed and die cut (the set also has matching dies which makes this part so much easier) some of the other foliage shapes. I chose Metallic Gold Sparkle Embossing Glitter and as I didn't have a red embossing glitter I created my own by mixing some Coral Beach Sparkles with a little Bonding Powder.



I arranged the pieces on my wreath and glued them down.



The biggest revelation to me wh…

It's October already and Autumn has well and truly kicked in. Here we still have sunshine but with the chilly nights and shorter days, the trees are showing their Autumn colours. I love this season for crafting as the colours are so rich and inspiration is everywhere.


For this project I cut some leaves on what I had to hand which just happened to be this Kraft cardstock. I wanted to work with Embossing Glitter but was unsure how well the glitter would hold up againsed the dark Kraft background but I was very pleasantly surprised.


I did find that some of the more translucent colours such as Sand Dunes, seen below, came out totally different on the Kraft than on plain white. You can see the contrast between the two is quite stark.


However, some of them came out better than I imagined. Hot Gossip on the right became a gorgeous, rich dark copper colour and Mermaid Tails on the left lost alot of the blue colour to leave only the gold flecks showing. 


 The results were so pretty, now …

I recently rediscovered my packets of oven bake clay (following a clear out, as one does) and thought about creating some one-off pieces of jewellery with it. The theme this month is 'Metallic' which made me wonder how it would look if I used embossing powder to metalize some clay embellishments?

The first experiment went horribly wrong which I'm showing you here just so you know what not to do! This is embossing powder on raw clay then baked in the oven. The temperature was way too high causing bubbling and separating of the powder, and before you ask no I didn't get rid of it. I may do something with it in the end.


Experiment two went much more smoothly. I made a couple of organically shaped circles and pinched up the edges. I used the heart mould to press some clay into one of the smaller hearts.



I baked the clay as it said on the packet and when it was cool enough to handle I used a sponge to apply some embossing ink over the top. The sponge allowed me to get into…

Two things I'm starting to embrace as I get older are sparkles and the colour pink. My style was definitely not at all sparkly and shiny and pink was not usually in my repertoire but as I get older I find my style changing and softening somewhat.

I was asked to make a new baby card recently for a girl so my pink sparkly side well and truly came out to play. I have the cutest stamp set by Pink and Main too called Hedgehugs and the little hearts on it are the cutest.

Initially I watercoloured my background by smooshing it around in some dye ink which I'd smeared on my craft mat and sprayed with water to thin it down. Once dry I could stamp the hearts and emboss with Pink Sherbert Embossing glitter.


I cut some butterflies and dabbed the bottoms with ink and dipped them in the same Pink Sherbert.


I also covered a die cut heart with Oyster Glintz powder to give it a real shine 

and gave some letters the same treatment. Here you can see a closeup of the gorgeous embossing detail.


…

I love a bit of collage and for a while now I've been meaning to try out one of the black pages in my Prima Mixed Media journal. I gathered together a few neutral papers like coffee dyed paper, a dried out tea bag, some calico and a few smaller bits and pieces with the same colour theme. 
I thought the new Glintz colours would look amazing on some of these different backgrounds especially as they have a pearly finish on some gorgeous subtle colours. 


I wasn't disappointed with the results. Below you can see the Oyster on black which is hardly there at all in certain light.

 The Rose Glintz too blends in to this piece of coffee dyed paper and harmonizes with the postage stamp in the centre of the page.


I was most curious to see how the Aztec would look on the coffee paper and I deliberately chose a piece with a huge coffee stain on the side.


It came out beautifully with a subtle shine of coppery pink.

I thoroughly enjoyed putting this page together with some stitching, washi …