Spring has sprung

Spring has sprung and with it I have reverted to bright colours and contrasts.

More ATCs to swap this time and the theme was to use stencils or die cuts. Needless to say I had to go the whole hog and squeeze both in.

My background is a gelli plate print made using Crafters workshop stencils to create the harlequin and circle patterns. I have die cut fronds from Crafty Individuals background paper (book 3 Spring of course) and used chip board die cuts coloured with acrylic paints too - mainly because the paints were still out from the previous swap.

Way out of my comfort zone

One of the swaps I joined in March was to make a postcard using a technique specified by the swap organiser. On this occasion the technique involved painting over a background of cardboard shapes and crinkled tissue paper.

Check out Therese Urbanska's blog - she has some pretty Christmas decorations made using this technique.

Needless to say I launched in with no proper forethought - and glued a bird shape to my postcard and covered it with crumpled tissue no problem. Then I got to thinking about the painting but I really should have done that first.

Me and my rules - I decided I'd have to use brown (because my bird is a sparrow) so what with my lack of painting skills the end result is not exactly eye catching. Oh well, live and learn.

Home alone

 

A very rare occasion today - I find myself home alone with time to "play". Funny how with some free time and an empty kitchen to spread out in inspiration disappears. I suspect it is the result of having too much stuff - makes it too difficult to decide where to start.

 

So first I played silly games on the computer until I ran out of lives... and then I went blog hopping and on-line window shopping. Whilst doing so I came across some really useful inspiration on the Sprinkle of Imagination blog where they have a colour challenge.

 

The background started life as a cake board recycled from Christmas with a layer of book pages and a coat of gesso. I stencilled on some green paint and then over-stamped with Crafty Individuals Crackle background to start with.

 

I had a root about in my stash and dug out some gelli print backgrounds in mauve and got started. I've also used various other backgrounds and printed papers including Crafty Individuals book 3 Springtime to die cut lots of flowers and foliage. I seem to have a lot of purply shades but had to paint some paper flowers plum coloured.

 

So here is my May Queen - looking I fear a little bit like an alternative Christmas wreath. Whatever, I had a nice time making it as evidenced by the amount of mess I made. I really will have to get on with some housework now!