Sitting Pretty

Sitting Pretty

Today I would like to share this make with you, it uses a stamp set called

 Mermaid Queen Rubber stamp sheet - A5

I also used a Grey Inkpad, Watercolour Brush Pens, a Clear Glitter Gel Brush Pen and one of my Make Art inkpads Garden Patina which I used to colour the background and the mermaids spotlight bubble.

Another card made using the Mermaid Queen set and the very versatile and much loved

 Make your Mark Rubber Stamp sheet - DL

I used the worker stamps in the Mermaid Queen stamp set, a mop up background on glossy card, the stamped images were embossed using a clear embossing powder.

The bubbles from the Make Your Mark set I feel set the scene on the backing card for the finished topper.

Thank you for looking in today

Love Doreen 

Punky Posy

 Punky Posy

Hello all Chocolate Baroquers, I'm back for my second visit this month. I would like to share this Steampunk floral tag with you today.

Using a sparkle paint to cover the MDF Tag used in one coat, leave to dry and stamp the Roses onto Drawing Cartridge, I coloured the roses using Inktense Pencils and after shaping slightly I used a crackle glaze to add a sheen to the roses.

Returning to the tag I stamped and heat embossed the cogs randomly directly onto the tag using a black inkpad and clear embossing powder.

Apply the roses to the tag using a gel of to aid the depth required, I also added a metal cog from my embellishment stash. To finish I used a little glitter and some variegated coloured organza ribbon for a bow and to hang the tag from.

A4 Drawing Cartridge 220gsm - pk 10

Steampunk Butterfly Rubber stamp sheet - A5

I also used the Steampunk Butterfly stamps to create this card, which actually contains the beautiful Steampunk Butterfly.

Thank you so much for looking in today 

Love Doreen

 

Memories Of The Beach

 Memories Of The Beach

Hello everyone, I hope you are all well and looking forward to the weekend, here are two of my projects from last months shows.

The tag in the first photo and the canvas both use the Seashell Collage

 Seashell Collage Rubber stamp sheet - A5 

The tag is a bit of a long make but only because I used 3 different colour Crackle Enamels, which I spread in a random way mixing them without worrying about the mix. Set aside to dry. Then stamp the images in a permanent ink and fussy cut the images. Once the crackle has dried using a 3d gel to mount the images and then using a sealant of choice to seal the crackle and images.

The Canvas Board is very straight forward to make but do keep a spare piece of smooth paper to hand. I stamped using the Archival Colbalt Blue inkpad, the images need to be stamped with a firm pressure then using the paper you have to hand stamp the image this will leave a textured print for you to use either to decoupage or to use on another project.

Thank you for looking in today 

Love Doreen 

Time to Re - Visit

 Time to Re - Visit

Today we re - visit these lovely houses.

Dutch House

Italian House

Bridge House

Turret House

It was more than a pleasure to re-visit these lovely stamps, they really are very versatile.

I have used different mediums to colour but in the main they have been stamped with Versafine inkpads in either grey or black. 

Backgrounds have been coloured using Distress Inkpads smooshed onto a glass mat and applied with a paintbrush.

To extend the Bridge House I used a mask using the Masking Tissue.

This was also used in the making of the Turret House which also used a sentiment from Life Is So Much Better.

Thank you for looking in today

Love Doreen 

  Orchard  Designs

Using a blank wood plaque and Versafine Clair Acorn and the taller of the trees from the Orchard Design a Tree set, which I slightly extended. A dye inkpad was used to colour the sky applied with a stencil brush. The heads of the flowers were also coloured from a dye inkpad and paintbrush. The foliage on the tree was stamped with a Plum Archival Inkpad. Both the stems of the flowers and grassy area used a green inkpad and paintbrush. The white gel pen daisies were left to dry before applying 2 coats of Deco Art  Decoupage medium to seal.

This card needs a little pre preparation I have used something called

 ' Goosebumps' Which is basically a clear medium that remains raised when dry this was flicked onto the card not sprayed. Anything you have in your stash that does the same will do equally as well.

 Once dry you can carry on as normal.

Using a mix of Distress Inkpads, for the sky I have used ; 

Wild Honey, Rusty Hinge and Crackling Campfire, which have been applied to the card using a soft brush randomly building up the colour to give the illusion of a sunset.

The trees and hills have been stamped and using a torn piece of paper and soft brush to build the colour for the hills from the really dark working the colour from the brush without adding more colour to build the distant hills , if more colour is required on brush use the brush very lightly or using a scrap of card apply the dark ink to be used at a later date. The trees and hills used a Versafine Clair Inkpad 'Pinecone', stamping the foliage until no ink remains on the stamp which will add depth. Buff the colour from your raised dots and although some will stay most will come off and mount onto  Craft Card for contrast. 

 

This card is so very simple, again using a remnant of the above card with the raised medium. I used a circle of  Masking Tissue. Then using Distress Inkpads in colours Shaded Lilac, Faded Jeans and Hickory Smoke using circular motions fading the colour out to the lovely soft grey. The Hills were coloured using Black Soot with a make up sponge and a torn piece of copy paper. Then the tree was stamped with Versafine Clair Nocturne.

So there concludes three relatively quick and simple cards from the  Orchard Dress a Tree set.

Thank you for looking in today

Love Doreen

 

Blossom Lane

This canvas was quite a labour of love as firstly I stamped, coloured and fussy cut each of Kim Moody's latest release of stamps which include ;

Kim Moody - Bottle and Jug A6 rubber stamp 

Kim Moody - Cotswold Stone A6 rubber stamp

Kim Moody - Luv Shack A6 rubber stamp

Kim Moody - Urban Chic A6 rubber stamp

Plus I have also used the Chocolate Baroque stamps

Orchard Design a Tree Rubber stamp sheet - A6

Although not a necessity and very time consuming I stamped and coloured some blossoms to add depth to the canvas fussy cutting the individual blossoms and shaping and applying each of them to the trees.

Next the canvas itself was coloured using a wash of distress inks, which I also used to colour the cottages. The path was just randomly sized paving slabs yet again coloured using a paintbrush and distress inkpads allowing the colour to fade before replenishing the brush which gives a natural look to the shading.

The sentiment is from the Life Is So Much better set which was simply stamped and cut up before being applied to the canvas.

Life is so much Better Rubber Stamp sheet - A5

To finish I simply set everything in place before adding some birds using a fine liner pen.

Here are also one each of the cards from Kim's new range;

Thank you for looking in today 

Love Doreen

                            

Marked Retro

                                                                 Marked Retro

Hello Everyone, welcome to my third post for May, Marked Retro uses 3 stamp sets

 

 Make Your Mark

 https://www.chocolatebaroque.com/make-your-mark-rubber-stamp-sheet-dl.html

Life Is So Much Better 

https://www.chocolatebaroque.com/life-is-so-much-better-rubber-stamp-sheet-a5.html

Retro Florals   These are available by phoning Chocolate Baroque Direct and speaking to David or Lesley, they are not on the website.

 

Take an A5 piece of glossy card and randomly splash with Distress Inks ( I unscrewed the tops from sprays and flicked the ink in the tube onto the card, please make sure to cover surfaces as this is quite a messy process) Leave to dry. Once dry randomly use the stamps from the Retro Florals set using  Distress Inkpads squished onto a glass surface or messy mat as this will stop you contaminating your inkpads. Then you may wish to use a stamp press to use the Make Your Mark  stamps as you an achieve a really black mark by inking and stamping until you have the black you require.

Leave to one side to dry thoroughly (this will take a while) 

Take a couple of small scraps of card 1 piece of black and I used a rusty coloured piece of scrap but if you don't have a piece to match ink a piece of white card leave it to dry properly before using it to stamp your sentiment. 

Buff the dry topper using a soft tissue until you achieve a beautiful shine. 

 Mat and layer onto a black card blank. Add mat and layered sentiment.

 

 

Thank you for looking today

Love Doreen 

 

Moonlight Shroom

                                                          

                                                                       Moonlight Shroom

Hello Everyone,

 today I am using the Mother Earth stamp set it contains 2 large image stamps and 3 complimentary words which can be used in many other ways than just with this set.

https://www.chocolatebaroque.com/mother-earth-rubber-stamp-sheet-a5.html

Using 5 PanPastels I have used Green, Blue, White, Silver and Black.

Versafine Onyx Black to stamp sentiment and image. 

https://www.chocolatebaroque.com/versafine-inkpad-onyx-black.html 

Watercolour Card is used for base and the PanPastels work well add your colour in a gentle sweeping action to achieve a smooth effect, use the light colours first adding silver to the moon to give it a sheen, Any stray strokes can be taken away using an eraser and this is how I also achieved the effect of stars. Build the colour by adding more in stages and then the shadows, shape and depth are using the black in the same way , where you want darker shades add the black a little at a time. Finally add Sentiment.

Mat and Layer onto a white card blank. Spray with Pastel Fixative to seal.

Thank you for looking in today,

Love Doreen 

 

 

 

 

Retro Meadow

Hello Everyone, well here we are already into May ... Can you believe it ? 

Today I am sharing this simple but effective technique which is very achievable to the beginner and going forward. It also makes for a rushed card needed quickly and without a fuss.

 

To make the Landscape style card you will need :

One A4 piece of card folded in half.

Half of an A4 piece of stamping card plus the same in a contrast colour of your choice to mat and layer.

The stamps used are a selection from the Retro Flowers A4 set of stamps, which although are not available on the website can be ordered via a quick call or email if you prefer to Chocolate Baroque where Lesley or David will provide you with any information you require. I have also used a sentiment from Life Is So Much Better

https://www.chocolatebaroque.com/life-is-so-much-better-rubber-stamp-sheet-a5

 I have used a selection VersaFine Clair Inkpads to stamp my images randomly across the width of the card starting with the 1st generation and stamping without re-inking until there is no ink on the stamp,

Then using the stem stamps in the set I have chosen 3 different shades of green to give the long grassy effect starting with the lightest colour and working my way through until happy with the result.

Trim your contrast card to your desired size and then trim the stamped piece accordingly. I am always inclined to glue the contrast card in place and raise the stamped image with foam pads. 

Thanks for Looking in today,

Love Doreen

 

 

 

Pretty Steampunk Christmas

 Pretty Steampunk Christmas

Oh no, I hear you cry .... lol  but Christmas really isn't far away now. With all the hot weather we have been experiencing this year I have really found it quite hard to start  making mine and a break in the weather and looking through stamps for this blog this set caught my eye out of the Steampunk  Christmas as it had this beautiful tree, different from the norm but so very pretty.

Products used in the making of this card :

Chocolate Baroque Steampunk Christmas A4 set of stamps

Chalk inkpads in pastel shades of Pink and Lilac

Wink of Stella clear brush pen or any other sparkle pen you have will be fine.

Micro beads in Lilac and clear drying pva

Darker shade of lilac card for mounting.

 

For the background randomly stamp 2nd and 3rd generation images in both the pink and lilac.

Ink and stamp the main image and sentiment.

Take the ink pad and on a mat lay down some ink, picking the ink up with your clear sparkle brush pen extend the flow of the base of the tree to ground it. Then add sparkle wherever you choose.

Dot pva on the fronds of the snowflakes that make up the tree and add a bead to each.

Matt and layer onto your card.

Thank you for looking

Love Doreen

The Lovely Lily

The Lovely Lily

This different but very beautiful lily is not the type that many of us are used to seeing but I think it is exquisite. It comes from the DL Lily set of stamps although it does actually have a four leaf clover,ladybird and several other worker stamps in the set.

The sentiment comes from the Bold Blooms set.

Products used in the making of this card are :

Chocolate Baroque Lily DL stamp set

Sentiment from the Chocolate Baroque Bold Blooms set

Versafine Clair Nocturne

Clear Embossing Powder

A torn out page from a discarded or old book that has an aged look but has probably seen better days.

Koh I Noor watercolour pencils

Satin finish mirri card for mounting on.

1. Trim page from book but keep excess for stamping and mounting sentiment.

2. Stamp and emboss image.

3. Roughly colour the image in your favoured shades and blend using a little water on your brush.

4.To enhance the image go round using either a grey or light blue pencil and drag out the colour with a little water.

5. Stamp the sentiment using the Versafine Clair onto a piece of the scrap from the printed page and trim quite close to the stamped image edge the sides using your inkpad, then mount on another piece of the scrap from the page and edge again using the inkpad.

6. This is a flatish card no foam tape was used in the mounting of this onto the satin card or for mounting the sentiment so perfect for the post.

As an afterthought if you like a card to have some sparkle then instead of using water just use a clear sparkle brush pen to blend the colours. This will leave a subtle sparkle not as noticeable as glitter,

Thank you for Looking

Love Doreen

Lacework

Lacework

A simple but classic style of card and very effective no matter which colour background or embossing powder you use although I would definitely recommend a very fine powder if you have no detail embossing powders.

Very short product list for this one :

Chocolate Baroque Lacy Fragments stamp set.

Versamark inkpad.

Detail embossing powder

Black Card for stamping and a piece each of black and white card for matt and layering of card.

Heat Gun

In this beautiful set of lacy stamps there are several their are several borders to choose from as well as corners and hero images, all are very fine and very detailed.

I feel there is not a lot to tell you in the making of this card as it really is self explanatory for us who have crafted for some time but for those who are just starting out on their wonderful crafting adventure this is a technique that never gets boring.

1. Stamp using Versamark then pour over your embossing powder, tap off the excess powder and decant back into pot.

2. Tun on your heat gun and allow to get hot then direct at the embossing powder, when it starts to melt chase it round the image as it will burn and dull the powder if left too long on one area. 

3. Matt and layer onto a card and apply topper using foam tape for extra dimension.

Although I have not added a sentiment this time of course one can be added later to suit the occasion or recipient of your artwork.

Thank you for looking

Love Doreen