Craft Barn Dictionary Challenge - Cover

I finally managed to cover my dictionary. I decided to keep it simple using some textured handmade paper that I have had for a while. I didn't want too many 'bits' on the covers as I want to keep this on my book shelf and have a flick through from time to time.
I randomly stamped the Tim Holtz carte postale stamp and parts of his diamond mosaic stamp in Archival grape. I added some red pepper postmarks from a B-Line Design cube and brushed all the edges with Versafine imperial purple. The alphas are some that I bought from Poundland a while back.
I made an index for the inside front and added a title on the facing page which I diecut with a Sizzix die.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - the Final Two

 

The remaining 2 letters for the Craft Barn Alpha Challenge are X and I. I am just scraping in before the deadline as we have had quite a hectic holiday season. The first letter is X and I only had half a page of definitions. I looked at the usual X options such as x-ray and xylophone and x-ray would have been appropriate at the moment as my dog has been unwell and has spent a couple of days at the vets. We have seen a few of her x-rays but TBH her intestines are not something I want to inflict on all of you. I did toy with xenophobia but it's not a word I could depict very well through the medium of rubber. Finally I opted for xerophyte - a plant that is adapted for growth under extremely dry conditions. Amongst the cacti and yuccas I spotted a Californian Poppy also known as eschscholzia californica,  the seeds of which can lie dormant for a long time but with a little rain they will spring to life, germinate, flower and set seed in a matter of weeks (who knew?). With the help of my Memory Box poppy die I cut several poppies and coloured them with my coloursoft pencils. I did debate going over 2 pages onto the Y's but I thought I'd leave this as the only single page entry as that's all there was.

Next comes I with many more options. I have had this Artemio London stamp set for a while and have used it quite a lot. I wanted to use it somewhere in my dictionary but thought about it after doing C for Christmas early on in the year. I had no L for London definition so couldn't use it. However it occurred to me that all these images of London (my home town) are iconic - you don't have to be a Londoner or even British to recognise them. The text is cut with Sizzix petite petals strip die which I just bought in the Craft Barn sale (I brayered red & blue inks over some card and outlined the letters for more definition). BTW this stamp set is also in the sale (in store) and I like the fact that the union flag is in 2 parts so you can do the red and blue bits separately.
So that's it... I've really enjoyed this challenge I only have to decorate the outside now and I will post that later. Thanks to Isabelle and everyone at the Craft Barn for coming up with this. I'm looking forward to a new challenge next year. Thank you also to everyone who has followed and commented on all the dictionary posts - we have become quite a community.
Have a Happy New Year!

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - Q

I've taken time out from the Katzelkraft Challenge to complete this fortnight's entry for the Craft Barn Dictionary Challenge. We're down to the last few letters now and Q is the letter that has been chosen. I went with question - a BG of tumbled glass and broken china DIs and some question marks stamped randomly in Versafine majestic blue (some questions come out of the blue). I diecut most of the question words from various alphas I have and stamped 1 of them. Finally I asked a question myself 'why is it that so many question words begin with a W?'.
I am sorry that I'm going to be very busy with work over the next few weeks and I may not be able to visit all your blogs. I will try and catch up towards the end of next month.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - N

This fortnight's letter for the Craft Barn Challenge is N. This was a surprisingly thin section of my dictionary but there were a few words that caught my eye - Nymph, Nature, Nuture, Newspaper and Night. However with time constraints Number seemed the easiest to do. I covered the pages with navy ink (well Adirondack denim) but left the words showing through (newsprint?), added a number embossing folder and a bingo card. The numbers were cut with the curls and swirls Cuttlebug dies and an old Xcut alpha set. The text was made up from random letters I keep in a box when I diecut a whole alpha strip. That's it really quick and simple.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - L

This fortnight's letter for the Craft Barn Alpha Challenge is L with the extra requirement of a window on the page. I've chosen lazy as my word this time as I had this lazy lady stamp by Tatty Button. I wanted her to lie (languish) on a brick wall so I sponged through the stencil with barn door and fired brick DI. The houses are a TH diecut with lit windows. The Lavinia Lane text is by Crafty Individuals and the other text is by Paper Artsy (stamped in Brilliance pearlescent lavender). I used a lattice stencil with Brilliance pearlescent orange and added a Hero Arts lantern. Some punched leaves finished the pages. Sorry the pic makes everything look a bit wonky but it is all straight IRL.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - J

Sometimes it takes ages to decide what to do for the chosen letter of the week on the Craft Barn Challenge and sometimes, like today, inspiration strikes immediately. My chosen word is jigsaw as in puzzle but my jigsaw is of a jam jar with jellybeans (can you tell I had fun with this one?). The jigsaw is a Sizzix die I picked up a couple of years ago in The States. The jam jar stamp is a charity shop find by Rubber Stampede stamped with  Memento London fog. I cut some spare rubber into a bean shape and used Stazon blazing red for the jellybeans. The different shades are 2nd & 3rd generation stamping (I saw a Hero Arts video a while ago that did something similar). I brushed the page edges with picked raspberry DI and used some computer generated text.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - G

This fortnight's letter on the Craft Barn Alpha Challenge is G. I did contemplate doing Geisha but as I'd already done 2 oriental themed letters (H for Haiku and K for Kimono) I decided against it. I got this giraffe stamp in a grab bag a while back and it seemed like a good opportunity to use it. Unfortunately due to the size of the stamp and the position of the definition I had to photocopy the definition and add it later - up till now I've always managed to work around the definition. I covered the pages with white acrylic and brushed on ripe persimmon, spiced marmalade, worn lipstick, frayed burlap and pumice stone DIs. The giraffe was stamped and coloured with coloursoft pencils and Sansodor. I cut one of the larger trees away from the stamp and used it along the bottom edge along with a Darkroom Door flower stamp which looks like a tall tree (sort of). I cut a letter from my Hippie Chick alpha and added the definition. Not many letters to go now and I'm very pleased to have managed to keep up - I won't know what to do with myself next year!

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - Z and Catch-up - D

 

Catching up with the letter D which I missed a few weeks ago. DH & I have been going to dance classes for a few years now and we both enjoy it tremendously. It's a great way to keep fit and it's fun to do. The dancers are a Papermania stamp coloured with coloursoft pencils and Sansodor. The quote is from Non Sequitur's Paris in the Spring set. No dance floor is complete without a glitter ball which I cut from holographic paper. I used Archival cobalt and Impress lemon yellow for the BG.

This fortnight's letter for the Craft Barn Alpha Challenge is Z. I have a zebra stamp and I'm not afraid to use it!!!! So we have zillions of zebras (well a few) on a zingy/zesty background (orange, lime & lemon). I stamped and masked the zebra on Paper Artsy Crackly paper, roughly cut them out and coloured the backs with a white oil pastel crayon (I didn't want the BG colours to show through). The definition is highlighted with zeros and the quote is from a Dr Seuss book called ' On Beyond Zebra'. Now that I've caught up I'm hoping to visit you all and see what you've been doing.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - O

I'm uploading my entry to sneak in before the deadline. I'll add details tomorrow. Craft Barn Alpha Challenge O.
Edited to add: I'm back from my travels and brushing away the tumbleweed that has been floating around this blog for the past month. We started in Luxembourg with a birthday party in a vineyard on a hill overlooking the Moselle and ended in Nice in a friend's apartment overlooking the sea. In between we visited Frankfurt, Prague, Vienna, Budapest and Maribor & Lake Bled in Slovenia. It has been so hot that we perhaps didn't manage to see all that we could have but we saw A LOT of wonderful things.
When I saw the Craft Barn letter was O I immediately wanted to do O for Ossuary which is a place they keep bones. About 60km outside Prague is a town called Kutna Hora which has many different things to see - a silver mine, churches etc but it also has an ossuary. Nothing can prepare you for the sight of the remains of about 30,000 people used to 'decorate' this church - there are bone chandeliers, a bone coat of arms and pyramids of skulls. It is really gruesome and not my cup of tea at all but worth visiting.

A sample of the delights at the Ossuary
 at Kutna Hora, Czech Republic

Anyway ossuary was not in my dictionary so I went with plan B. I figured owl would be a common entry but I have a fab little owl die and stamp set I wanted to use so we have officious owls - here I'm referring to those people who put on a uniform and suddenly become Hitler. I kept the pages monochrome because for them everything is black and white and kept the BG text to signify the blah, blah, blah of bureaucracy. I thought the googly eyes gave them an extra hint of megalomania and I drew the all important hat.
Now I have to catch up with D which I have an idea for...

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.

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.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - B

If ever a week in my life matched the letter chosen for the Craft Barn Challenge it would be this week. The letter is B and I have selected baby but I could equally have chosen boy. One of my baby boys had a birthday this week (he turned 19!) and the other graduated from University and is now a BA.
I have used a Katzelkraft stamp (I believe it's an image of the owner Béatrice) and an image and quote from Paper Artsy. The BG is Impress cerulean blue with Stazon azure blobs or blotches made with a Katzelkraft stamp. The quote on the left hand page is by Hampton Art Stamps.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - U

Washing line sketch by Jo Spaul

This fortnight's letter for the Craft Barn Challenge is U. Of course umbrella was my first thought but I thought a lot of people would choose that so I decided on underwear (I have no idea why). I found this sketch of undies on a line and decided to go from there. After covering the pages with white acrylic paint I decided to leave the BG quite plain and stark (clean, white underwear was the way to go when I was little). I coloured the sketch with coloursoft pencils and then made up this quote using another 2 words beginning with U. I had planned to stamp a corset on the opposite side but (Goldilocks moment) 1 stamp was too big and the other too small. I remembered I had a Non-Sequitur plate (Springtime in Paris, I think) with a lady's torso and 2 different skirts and legs to use with it. I embossed the feathered skirt with red glitter embossing powder and coloured in the other parts with watercolour pencils. I decided she ought to be a high-kicking showgirl (she's forgotten to dress herself as my mother would say) and if you look closely you can see her flashing either a garter or the top of her stocking (I leave it to your imagination). As the BG was very plain I edged both pages with some ink.
Phew I'm quite worn out after that!
Edited to add: A Wall of Fame winner.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - F

The twist in the 11th Alpha Challenge on the Craft Barn blog is the letter F but only words between Fe and Fr. That ruled out several good words such as family and face. I've been away for a few days and have been trying to catch up with various things so I've only just managed to complete this.
I decided to go with Free/Freedom. Apparently in the language of colours, blue is the colour of freedom (who knew?) so there is quite a bit of blue.  I drew hand sketched frames (you could call them freeform?) and used tumbled glass, salty ocean and stormy sky DIs on the BG over some cloud-shaped masks. The flying birds (they have feathers, right?) are Tim Holtz and Crafty Individuals stamps and the bird die is by Sizzix (I could say it was a finch but I think it's a swallow). The foliage and flowers are by Paula Pascual from the punchable tags set. The text is cut from an Xcut set and Tim Holtz's alphabetical die.
I'm sorry I have not been able to visit anyone this week - I have an awful lot on at the moment but I will try and have a look at your no doubt wonderful entries.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - K

This fortnight's letter on the Craft Barn Alpha Challenge is K. I had a look through the K section for suitable words and came up with king, kiss, knowledge but kimono jumped out at me. I covered both pages with white acrylic paint. I used a trellis screen mask and perfect peach Glimmer Mist as a background on the right hand page and flipped it over to use up the excess mist on the left hand page. The kimono is by Non Sequitur stamped on blue card. I coloured the detail in with coloursoft pencils and Sansodor. The Japanese girl and the BG text are by Simple Expressions stamped in Archival plum. I used a scrap of washi paper to cover a chipboard K and made an obi (belt) for the kimono. I punched a couple of floral motifs from the same washi paper. The DPS was edged with Archival plum and I stamped a Non Sequitur motif in each corner with Impress chartreuse.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - A

I've just returned from a few days away and on my return I found a beautiful birthday card from a friend in New Zealand with an Autumn theme and a line from a song I like  'the falling leaves of red and gold' . When I found out that this fortnight's letter for the Craft Barn Alpha Challenge was A my mind was made up as to what to do. Autumn is one of my favourite seasons and I love Autumn colours - there is something so beautiful about the way Nature shuts down for the winter and while it is sad to see winter approaching, the dying leaves put on a truly magical display. I wanted the writing to show through this time so I just stamped straight over it but used some picket fence Distress Stain over the area I wanted to put the quote. I know I've used these stamps and this ink pad before in a similar way on other projects but I just love the effect. The ink pad is Kaleidacolor autumn leaves and the stamps are by Simple Expressions. The Shelley quote was in a grab bag. I used a CB die set called fall leaves with some crumpled brown paper that an order came wrapped in and coloured them with spiced marigold, tea dye, peeled paint and aged mahogany DIs. Some parts of the leaves are raised up on foam pads to give a more natural shape and both pages have been spritzed with gold shimmer. Sorry if I haven't visited your W entry yet but I will try and catch up. Have a great fortnight!

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - W

If ever I needed something to be on time it was this fortnight's letter for the Craft Barn Alpha Challenge. I knew I would only have a small chance to get it done in time for the deadline and had planned that if I knew what the letter was on Sunday morning I could have a think about it while I was away all day Sunday. Of course things never go according to plan and the letter didn't appear until Monday so I have not been able to think about this DPS as much as I would have liked. The challenge entry also had to have circles on it so here is my Wonderful Wrinkles page. Wrinkles get a very bad press from companies eager to sell their expensive wonder potions so I wanted to portray them in a more positive light. The BG was made using the wrinkle distress technique which is the first technique I learnt using DIs. This is much easier on a loose sheet of paper than on a bound page but I  managed to carefully crumple the pages and then rub the tea dye ink pad over. It hits the raised creases and gives a crackle effect. I spritzed some water over to make the ink run a little and when dry added scattered straw DI all over (guess who forgot to mask off the definition!) . I wanted to give the effect of wrinkled skin. The circles are from Inkadinkadoo's circle and dots set stamped in Adirondack red pepper, Impress chartreuse, lemon yellow and peony purple and peacock feathers DI. The quote is from a stamp I had made a few years ago. It was too small for the page so I stamped it out and enlarged it. The image is from a card I found at the charity shop. So nothing too exciting I'm afraid but needs must. Have a good fortnight!

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - R

R is the letter chosen for the Craft Barn Alpha Challenge this fortnight. I was thinking of Romance but then I saw this quote in a magazine (it's an ad for Audemars Piguet watches) and decided to go for Rules. It reminded me of Picasso who was a classically trained artist before he developed his own amazing style. I covered the pages with white acrylic - I prefer it to my slightly yellow gesso. I roughly doodled around the word and decided to use rusty hinge DI and red pepper Adirondack as my ink colours. The ruled lines stamp is by Katzelkraft and the embossed ruler/tape is a CB folder. The cracked BG is a stencil which I brushed ink through and then outlined. I decided to add some rosettes from my bit bag. Finally I wrote a few rules that we come across in daily life.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - P

P for plant is my chosen word this week, the verb and the noun. I decided to use gesso to cover the pages rather than white acrylic paint as I have previously done. I wanted to cover the unwanted words but only lightly so I used a thin layer of gesso. I doodled around the words I wanted to keep (I can't believe that was the first thing I did  - in the past it would have stressed me out to draw on the pages). I had a picture in my mind of stylized flowers predominantly in pink and purple. I stamped some background flowers with Brilliance starlite black and then added some flourishes for stems with Stazon olive green. The border is a Paper Artsy stamp with Stazon cactus green. I stamped and die cut various flowers and even found 2 dried flowers that I've had for years. I edged the pages with worn lipstick DI.
You can see the other entries here.

Craft Barn Alpha Challenge - M

Some days you just know immediately what you want to do and this was one of them. This time the Craft Barn Alpha Challenge was for the letter M but with the added proviso that the chosen word had to be between Ma and Me of the dictionary. So music, mystery and monster were out. I covered both pages with white acrylic paint making sure I masked the definition.
My M for Man started with a stamp depicting Michaelangelo's Creation of Adam (the first man). I stamped it on some PA Crackly paper that I bought from the Craft Barn yesterday. Leandra has done a very informative (if a little long) video on how to use this and I picked up several tips from that. I wanted this week's DPS to be monochromatic but I wanted a hint of flesh colour so I used watercolour pencils to colour the back of the stamped image by picking up a bit of colour onto a wet brush (thank you Lina for your excellent demo at the shop yesterday). The image was stuck down with Mod Podge. The BG of the image is made up of speckles so I decided to carry this over onto the whole DPS with a Hobby Art speckles stamp. The right hand page was stamped directly with an old Rubbadubadoo vitruvian man stamp, watercoloured and masked before adding the speckle stamp. I doodled some X's and Y's around the definition (a man's chromosomes). I added the computer-generated quote from Hamlet and some arrows.
Thank you once again for all your kind comments and the wonderful inspiration that your entries provide.
Edited to add: A Wall of Fame winner.