Muse best wishes

This week's Muse is Michele Ferguson who makes the most beautiful CAS cards.  I was inspired by the layout of the Muse card and the placement of the embellishment.  I die cut the alium twice to give it a little bit more dimension.

Materials used:-
Clarity stamps - Aliums
Sentiment - Chocolate Baroque Mackintosh sentiments
American Crafts coloured card
Dies - Lifestyle crafts flowers and Dienamics pierced rectangles
Ink - colorbox Cats Eyes celandon

I am also entering this card into CAS on Sunday where challenge #80 is flowers.

Thanks for visiting!   Margaret

Mackintosh flower

I was delighted that my card was selected as one of the top three in last week's Muse challenge - thanks to everyone who voted for it.

Now on to this week's Muse challenge - I loved the beautiful CAS card created by this week's Muse, Anita Bowden.  I was inspired by the colours,  the stylised flowers and the white space on Anita's card and tried to recreate these.  I love the work of the Scottish designer and architect, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, and felt this flower stamp was very similar to his designs. I embossed the flower design and then watercoloured it with distress inks.

I am also going to enter this card into Addicted to Stamps and More CAS challenge #154

Materials used:-
Stamps - Chocolate Baroque SKL Rose Stem and Mackintosh sentiments; Uniko Studio Lattice Background builders
Distress inks - evergreen bough, seedless preserves and shaded lilac
Black onyx versafine ink and archival ink (watering can)

Thanks for visiting - I really appreciate your comments. Margaret

Colour challenge

It's a colour challenge over at Less is More this week so Chrissie and her team want us to use opposite colours of the wheel. I decided to use turquoise and orange pencils to colour the butterflies - the stamp is from Chocolate Baroque.  Everything went well until I smudged the sentiment!

Materials used:-
Chocolate Baroque Year of Stamping - April stamp
Sentiment - Uniko Studio Fontiments Birthday set
Archival ink - coffee
Spectrum Noir pencils
We Are Memory Keepers corner chomper

Thanks for visiting - now pop over to LIM to see what the other participants created.

Even more black!

I have been inspired by a design Chrissie had on her blog to make another "predominately black" card for this week's Less is More challenge.  Chrissie had embossed black card for the background which I had never tried before.  I thought the black needed something to lighten it so I added a panel continuing with the music theme.

I think there is something very classy about black and white and this challenge has certainly inspired lots of great cards on Less is More.

Materials used:-
Embossing folder - Darice music
Chocolate Baroque stamps - Mackintosh sentiments and Music Fanfare set
Ink - distress ink pumice stone and versafine onyx black
Memory box die - treble clef

Thanks for popping by - I really appreciate your comments.  Margaret

Watercolour tulips

It's a colour challenge at Less is More this week and the colours are

 YELLOW and GREEN

This tulip stamp is ideal for the challenge - I watercoloured the tulips with Pebeo paints. The tulip stamp is from Chocolate Baroque who are releasing a new stamp every month in their Year of Stamping - in addition to the stamp you also get lots of ideas for using the stamp.

Materials:-
Tulip stamp - Chocolate Baroque
Sentiment - Chocolate Baroque Mackintosh Sentiments
Pebeo watercolour paints
Black onyx versa fine ink
Sheena Douglass card

Thanks for visiting my blog - I really appreciate your comments.  Margaret

Oriental thanks

The inspiration for this card came from the beautiful photo on the Inkspirational blog.  I decided to use the tree stamp from the Chocolate Baroque Serenity set as I felt it had an oriental feel.  I added the twine as the card seemed too clean and simple!

I am going to enter this card into the following challenges:-
Inkspirational #76 - photo inspiration
CASology week 134 - Monochrome
Just Add Ink #251 - thanks

Materials used:-
Tree stamp - Chocolate Baroque Serenity Stamp Set
Sentiment - Chocolate Baroque Mackintosh sentiments
Versa fine onyx black ink
Baker's twine from stash

Thanks for visiting my blog - I really appreciate your comments. Margaret

Special friend

This week's theme on Less is More is Friends so I used one of my favourite stamp sets, Mackintosh Windows, to make this birthday card. I love Charles Rennie Mackintosh designs! I stamped the image in black and then embossed this to make the watercolouring easier.

I am also going to enter this card into the following challenges:-

• Uniko Studio #17 challenge which is Love and Friendship
• CASology week 130 where the cue card is Friend

Materials:-
Stamps - Chocolate Baroque Mackintosh windows and sentiments
Inks - archival black and various distress markers
Card - Sheena Douglass white stamping card (great for watercolouring!)

Thanks very much for visiting my blog - I really appreciate your comments. Margaret

Hello

This card was inspired by the photo at the Time Out challenge 22 - I tried to recreate the wood effect and the pattern on the cushions in my card.

I am also going to enter this card into the following challenges:-

• Darnell's NBUS challenge #3 as I hadn't used the Chocolate Baroque stamps before
• CASology week 129 where the cue card is NBUS

If you haven't heard of the term NBUS you will need to look on Darnell's blog which is very entertaining!



Materials used:-
Stamps - Chocolate Baroque "Waterlily Mandala" and Hero Arts "Artistic Windows"
Card - Stampin Up crumb cake and vanilla
Inks - Versa craft poppy red, Versa color paprika and white
Memento ink - desert island and bamboo leaves
Die - Lawn Fawn "Scripty hello"

Thanks for visiting my blog - Margaret

Oriental card

I am entering this card for Challenge #47 at Addicted to CAS where the code word is ORIENTAL. I inked a Hero Arts stamp and clear embossed it before watercolouring it with distress ink. I then used a white gel pen to go over the leaves. I felt the sentiment matched the oriental style.

Materials used:-
Stamp - Hero Arts Asian Frames
Sentiment - Chocolate Baroque Mackintosh Sentiments
Distress ink - festive berries
Background screen - EK punch

Thank you very much for visiting my blog - now pop over to Addicted to CAS to see what the design team and the other participants have created.

Chocolate and mint!

Week 188 on Less is More is a colour challenge using chocolate and mint. The hardest part of the challenge was finding a mint coloured ink. I finally settled on a metallic watercolour marker. I clear embossed the image before colouring it. Then I mounted the image on some dimensional foam and added some tiny brown pearls to the centre of the flowers to finish it off.

Materials used:-
Stamp -  Hero Arts Asian Frames
Sentiment - Chocolate Baroque Mackintosh Sentiments
Archival ink - Potting Soil
Letraset Metallic Marker - green
Die - Lawn Fawn Stitched Party Banners


Thank you for visiting my blog - now pop over to LIM to see what the other participants created.

Inspired by words!

Challenge #13 on Time Out is to use words for your inspiration. So here is my card inspired by the quotation from Twelfth Night, "If music be the food of love, play on". My emphasis was on love and music.

I stamped the music through a mask I made from copy paper as I didn't want harsh lines. The heart was embossed with white embossing powder and inked with distress ink. I put it on foam pads for extra dimension. I felt I managed to achieve the CAS look I was aiming for.

Materials used:-
Heart stamp - Chocolate Baroque "Music Fanfare" set
Sentiment - Chocolate Baroque "Mackintosh Sentiments"
Music stamp - Crafty Individuals
Distress ink - picked raspberry; Archival ink - watering can

Thanks for visiting my blog - I hope you pop over to Time Out and see how the words have inspired the other participants.

Willow Tea Rooms

This is a scrapbook page I made recently following a visit to the Willow Tea Rooms in Glasgow. Everything in this tearoom, from the furniture to the cutlery, was originally designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh. The tearoom has recently been refurbished and is now open again as a tearoom.

I love the Charles Rennie Mackintosh style and I wanted to capture this in my scrapbook page.  I stamped the image with archival ink and then watercoloured it with distress markers, finishing off the flower with some perfect pearls. I made 2 tags for some hidden journalling. The title was printed using a Mackintosh font.

Materials used:-
Stampin Up - background paper, vanilla card and tag punch
Border punch - EK Success
Stamps - Chocolate Baroque Mackintosh Windows set
Font - downloaded from charles-rennie-mackintosh-font.co.uk
Distress markers - various

Thank you for visiting my blog - I really appreciate your comments. Margaret