Crafty Mrs P: February 2017

Hi everyone, thanks for coming to visit my blog.
For this month's Challenge, we have Flower Power and there are countless floral Clarity stamps & stencils, so there's plenty of choice for creating a piece of artwork and entering the competition!
I thought I would go with the January 2017 New Design Club stamp - this is a great club to belong to and for just £5 per month, per club - either stamp, stencil and/or Groovi, any combination of whatever you fancy. For each membership, you receive a monthly brand new design with a great inspirational pamphlet from Barbara with a couple of ideas to start you off. Well worth considering joining up if you're not already a member - visit https://claritystamp.com/pages/newdesignclubs for details. This also entitles you to 10% off your Clarity purchases!
So on with my piece of artwork.....
Ingredients
7x7 piece of watercolour paper & an 8x8 base card
Jan 2017 New Design Club stamp No. 123 Rose Vase
Word Chains - No.'s 2, 3, 6 & 8
Bursts Powders by Ken Oliver
Embossing powder - Clear & White
Corner stamp from Sketchy Paris Fashion set
Black Archival, Versamagic Watermark & Ocean Reef Artistry Inks
Perfect Pearls Mists
Black Promarker, a Stabilo point .88 pen & Watercolour pencils

Firstly, dust the watercolour card with talc and stamp the Rose Vase inked up with the Versamagic. Sprinkle with White Embossing Powder and heat set. (I cut masks for the Rose Vase at the beginning, but decided it was better to use the masking fluid as the masks didn't stick down all the way round in order to protect the whole image whilst using the Bursts).

Paint on the masking fluid and allow to dry before continuing. Choose the colour Bursts that you want to use - I chose Pthalo Green & Ultramarine mix for the top and Alizarin Crimson & Sepia for the base of my piece.

Cover each section with post it notes where you want the divide where the vase is and VERY LIGHTLY sprinkle the Bursts onto the artwork - a little goes a long way with these powders as they are so vibrant. (Brilliant value and last ages). Spritz with water and watch the magic happen. Do each of the colour combinations separately and wait for them to dry (As you can see I got a cool second background piece by placing another piece of watercolour paper onto the bursts whilst wet). You could always speed up the drying process with a heat gun - using this method, if there's enough water on your paper you can direct the heat to get some cool patterns too if you wanted to by blowing the water with the heat.

Wait for the whole thing to dry completely before continuing. Mask off with post its as before and spray with the contrasting Perfect Pearl Mists. For mine, I used Blue Raspberry at the top and Interference Red & Perfect Copper at the bottom. Leave to dry.

Next, crop the artwork equally on each side and rotate the pieces. Choose the words to stamp onto the pieces and use Black Archival to stamp them, then clear emboss.

Colour in the Rose Vase - I used watercolour pencils here. Use the Stabilo pen to define the line between the colours and scribble under the vase for shadow (I used a wet brush to blend the pen lines - it reacts well with water).

Edge the main piece and the outside edges of the other pieces with the Black Promarker and stick the pieces to the base card. With second generation ink, i.e. ink, blot, plot, stamp the Sketchy Corner into the top corners of the centre piece and the bottom corners of the outer pieces.

That's it - All done! (Mmmmm, it's slightly crooked so I may have to remount on another card - lol)

Have fun creating a piece of artwork to enter the Challenge. The winner will be chosen by Barbara after 28th February, so you have plenty of time to put your thinking caps on to come up with something. Simple to enter now too, just load your artwork on the pinned post trail on the Clarity Worldwide Facebook page.

Good luck xxx

https://claritystamp.com/products/word-chain-2-stamp-set

Crafty Mrs P

Wednesday, 1 February 2017

Clarity Challenge February 2017 - "Flower Power"