Beau and more later....(Part 1)

Sharing a pair of cards today featuring two of the newly released stamp sets from Barbara Sproatmeyer! She is one of the artists/illustrators at Whimsy Stamps and Beau (and later Colton) are two new Polka Dot Pals released today! Both with an artsy vibe!

Here is Beau, she has spent all day decorating her brother's (Colton!) art studio. I like to invent a little narrative as I colour. I know, it's bonkers. There is a clue to the geographical location of this studio within the picture!

Apart from the sentiment, masking tape and room background all of these stamps are part of the set! Just tonnes of options for creating a decorating or painting scene with them. I was spoilt for choice.

Here is the full stamp set:

And here is my creation close up:

She is on kraft card and I coloured her with polychromo pencils. I added a few touches of white posca paint and white gel pen. Sentiment made on the computer and is Mister Sirloin font.

I didn't have a background paper that I liked so I made one! I used distress oxides also on kraft paper and then cut down to size. This is one of my most used Hero Arts Sets, Brush Strokes AC026.

Bling was from the stash, and I am really happy with how she came out - adding a smear of paint on her face really made me happy with her!

Thanks for joining me for this post, in a couple of hours I will post part 2, Beau's brother Colton! Why not check out Barbara's blog to see her makes with the new releases next?

Something different, but still with cats :D

Just wanted to share a little set of drawers I painted for my friend's special birthday! They are all famous cats from the internet, instagram, books etc. I just used normal acrylic paint and I think this box came from a Paperartsy stand at a craft fair, but I'm not definite! (It was quite some time ago!)

So top row is Maru (in a box), Bob the Street Cat, and Lil' Bub.

The bottom row is Dewey (the library cat), Grumpy Cat and Venus (the two face cat).

I filled each draw with tiny cat themed items, including grumpy cat characters, a mirror, Simon's Cat pin, badge, good luck chime and squishee cat.

I think I would like to do one with cartoon cats on next time, Pusheen, Simon's Cat etc, that would probably be a bit easier too :) 

Guitar paint job :)

My friend Mike asked me to paint some images onto his old electric guitar to give it a bit of revamp! He chose lots of images that were meaningful to him (at least 100 in the end!) and I then collaged them together. These were the initial mockup pics.

After a few adjustments I began to sketch them onto the guitar body. (Mike had already sanded and primed the body, as well as removing all the neck and hardware.)

Adding the background colour. (We've decided it might be better to spray paint the background colour if we do it again!)

The first go at the details in white and dark blue.

 Finished front and sides!

And I did exactly the same process with the back. Here is the finished back and sides!

I then passed it back to Mike to laquer/wax. He kindly sent me this pic for that part of the process!

And finally here is all put back together, except for the strings! (hopefully have a picture to add soon with them on too!)

Really fun project and glad it looks so awesome now it's done! Hope to have some more photos to add of the finished result! Bit of a learning curve with this project, but I would love to have another go soon :)

Marvel Age of Ultron Nail Card

Hi, back again! :) (Cross posted to Crafty Magic)

When my friends bf asked for a "nails themed" card I was somewhat challenged! But never say I won't tackle anything, because I will. :) (Please see earlier card involving Helicopter and Orang-u-tan lol.)

This is an Age of Ultron themed set of finger nails card. The nails were painted onto card "nails" and then shaped to try and recreate a fingernail effect. The are supposed to be ( I tried my best!) Hawkeye, Thor, Iron Man, Captain America and The Hulk - green version.


I hope she enjoyed it as much as I did making it. :)

I suppose you could use this as template to do any kind of nails, but I suspect it might be a bit of a niche market? What do you think?

The Otter

Annabel here! (Cross posted to Crafty Magic)

This year an Otter and family have decided to inhabit the River Severn in Bridgnorth and everyone has seen it but me!

My friend's partner has seen it numerous times when crossing the bridge so she ordered an otter themed card for his 50th birthday!

Allegedly the otter seems to wave as he drifts passed you..(He is rather tame.)...so this Otter waves with his left paw when you move his tail.

I painted the otter pieces using acrylic paints as it seemed the fastest option to get what I wanted. The background is a scanned marbled background that Helen and I made on one of our "mess and make background" days. And I wish I could remember where I got the bubble embellishments from... they were the last ones I had and they are perfect for watery images!

Painting Cards

Had in an order for two "Arty" themed birthday cards for the same person. Tried two new designs with this in mind.

The first, on Kraft Card, was created by masking off an area of the card using post-it notes and then applying media directly to the card. I had a go at heat embossing a cowslip stamp and then layering on gelatos and pastels after. My edges weren't super tidy so I added strips of ribbon either side. 
Greeting stamped directly onto card, whilst " Grandad was printed and matt&layer'd on.

Had a go at this design using some Hero Arts stamps from there Stamp Your Story Brush Strokes set. The colours are all distress inks. I paper-pieced the brushes and added them after.


Made a really cheerful card, which is great for a man's card, they can tend to feel a bit solemn.

p.s. Cowslip Stamp was also a Hero Arts Cling Stamp called Elegant Weeds.