Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - T

This fortnight's letter on the Craft Barn Challenge is T. I decided on tree because I have a favourite quote I had made up into a stamp that is relevant  - like the branches of a tree, a family may grow in different directions but its roots remain as one.  I painted the pages with white acrylic and then stamped the tree by Sunday International, the quote and the branch by Crafty Individuals onto tissue paper with Adirondack espresso. The background is Impress chartreuse, spring green and emerald ink splodged on with cut n' dry foam.

UK Stampers ATC Swap - July

Childhood is the theme on this month's ATC swap on UK Stampers. After this we're having a break for the summer so I thought I ought to make an effort to take part.
I've used a lot of scrap bits of card that I seem to collect but never get rid of. I used 2 such pieces as the bases for my ATCs. I used a dragonfly mask and sprayed some inks over, then the sequin waste and flower stamps from the Christine Adolph cube in butterscotch and watermelon Adirondack inks and a couple of other small stamps. I added an Elusive Images open weave fabric stamp with Versamark and added silver Perfect Pearls but it barely shows.  Stampsmith's butterfly kisses was stamped with Versafine spanish moss on some scraps of photographic paper. I stamped the text with watermelon ink and added some pieces of the TH vintage lace die with a few gems to finish.

Tim Holtz Tag - July & May

This month's Tim Holtz tag features a homage to the 4th July Independence Day celebrations. I did not have suitable stamps but here in the UK this past week we have had our own national celebration when Andy Murray won the Wimbledon Tennis Championship.
I used Tim's brayer technique for the BG with barn door and faded jeans DIs spritzed with water. I love the effect and mopped up the extra ink with some scrap card. The Union Flag is stamped with an Artemio 2 -step stamp in Adirondack denim and red pepper. The BG text is by PA (it's actually French) and I used a Kaisercraft washi stamp for the stripes. The image and text are computer generated and the number 1 is chipboard covered with some of the extra scrap card. I did try to recreate the crackle effect but my Viva Croco crackle has dried up  ): !
So next step is to try and catch up with my May tag.
Edited to add: I have caught up with the May tag so I thought it would be best to include it here.

I had attempted this tag in May but had ended up with a muddy mess. This time I decided to do each colour separately and let it dry thoroughly in between. I used wild honey, barn door, spiced marmalade and broken china DIs spritzed with gold shimmer spray on a craft sheet. The green and bluish flourishes are rub-ons and the Mona Lisa stamp is from a grab bag. I randomly stamped parts of Stamper's Anon diamond mosaic with Brilliance lightning black. The sentiments are TH stamps and a small piece of sari ribbon finishes off the tag.

A Quick Card

I needed a quick card for a male friend and decided to use a piece of card that I had sprayed with Sticky Fingers inks some time ago. The scalloped oval and oval are nesties. The flourishes are from a Studio G set and the sentiment is a wood mounted stamp by Stamp-it.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - Y

A CAS entry from me for this fortnight's Craft Barn Alpha Challenge. There were very few Y words in my dictionary and I had already done several potential words like yashmak, yule and youth in other forms. I narrowed it down to Yin and Yang or Year. The position of the Yin & Yang definitions on the page was very awkward so by a process of elimination Year it was.
I covered both pages with white acrylic (masking the definition) and then stuck some peel-offs all over. Yes I know horror of horrors PEEL-OFFS!!!!! I have a ring binder full of peel-offs that I used to use a lot when I first started cardmaking. Most of you probably have the same. But then we all became too sophisticated to use peel-offs and abandoned them. This idea of using them as masks was one I saw on the Katzelkraft forum some time ago. Anyway back to the project - I applied Impress lemon yellow with a foam pad and then removed the peel-offs. Then Hampton Arts crackle stamp was used all over with Stazon mustard. The months around both pages are by Studio G (it's getting harder and harder to stamp directly onto the pages because they are so lumpy now) and the months and dates stamp is by Hero Arts.
PS - All Katzelkraft fans please check out my post here.

Katzelkraft Competition

Regular readers of this blog will know what a big fan I am of Katzelkraft stamps. These lovely red rubber stamps are made in the Alsace region of France and stamp beautifully. Béatrice the owner of the company is currently holding a treasure hunt competition the prize of which is a box containing 135 stamps.
The details of the competition (in English) are here
Find the 10 frogs and don't forget to mention you heard about the competition on my blog. If you're quick you will be able to take advantage of a 30% discount on some stamps that is running for the next few days (as the stamps are not wood mounted postage rates are very reasonable). So an ideal excuse to look through the stamps!
Good Luck!