Monthly Challenge- Animals ends tomorrow

Just a quick reminder if you want to enter the June Challenge it is supposed to end tonight, but before I post the July challenge, I thoughtI might give everyone another few hours to enter!

So you have until 6pm tomorrow 1st July to enter. Just post your entry and place where it is under June Challenge- Animals.

The prize is a FULL set of Linda Luckin animal stamps- a great prize for any stamper!
Here is a taster

Good Luck!

Sisterhood of the Blogging Stampers -19

Not completely official yet, although we seem to have made it official, I am proud to be a member of the Sisterhood of the Blogging Stampers 19 . I have to say a little bit about myself here to introduce myself to my other sisters. I am a rubberstamp manufacturer here in the UK, and am married for the second time to Mal, have two grown up children, Joe and Aimee, and love to create when the urge takes me! Welcome to my blog!

P.S. don't forget to add a comment to win
Red Roses giveaway

Red Roses giveaway!

Yesterday was one of those days where the blood pressure rose higher than normal ( I don't suffer high blood pressure mind :)), and it started when DD called to ask if you need a passport to go to Southern Ireland. She then told me she couldn't find hers, and was leaving in 20 minutes!!! Being a student and like me her room was a mess! So while she frantically looked for it, I called the airline to check the flying requirements, and was put on hold!!!while calling her on her mobile, as she searched her room. Literally 2 minutes before the cab arrived she found it!!! Now if she had told me the night before she had lost it, then I could have raced up to her house ( an hour away) and helped her look for it, but 20 mins before she leaves- not a hope!
My blood pressure finally went down, and I spent the evening creating a gift for a lucky reader of my blog! I used a 4 x 4 box canvas and sprayed with gold webbing spray, and then stamped our Clarice Cliff Style rose images around the edges. Then using white utee I stamped the roses into stampbord and layered onto the canvas, and edged the stampbord with gold Krylon pen. Finally I printed the words onto sticky backed vellum, and put on the canvas. I think it is rather pretty. The brooch is a domino piece of stampbord uteed with white and the Clarice Cliff style roses stamped into it with coloured stazon, then edged with gold krylon pen.

To win this canvas and this too- to make it

all you have to do is post a comment . I shall draw the winner by "the random integrator" on Saturday July 12th.
There is also a runner up prize of this brooch I made too!

Anyone can enter from anywhere in the world , just leave a comment for me. Good Luck!

Found!

Whilst doing my post and window shopping in our small Town, I came across a book with a label" FREE BOOK!". Never one to pass up an opportunity, I looked inside and found it to be a bookcrossing book, left for someone to pick up and read. I had been on this website before,and always wondered if I might come across any! So I am the proud owner or holder , if you like of a big fat green book called Supernature by Lyall Watson. It looks a bit too much for an easy read, but you never know. I mean I could always alter it, but then that wouldn't be in the nature of the idea of book crossing! So it may well find its way back onto a park bench similar to where I found it.....

All Boxed out!

I am a sucker for boxes, and a confessed collector of them! This weekend was no exception, as I spotted a gorgeous box at a show that I worked. What will I do with it- absolutely not got a clue, but I just had to have it! So I am now the proud owner of a "sewing box" by Mic which will no doubt go with my other boxes to be looked at and stroked and occasionally opened to look inside! (BTW I did ask DH permission before I bought ANOTHER box!!!!)

All suggestions for what I put in it are welcome!

Saturday quickie!

Just a little taster for you today. This was created by Hels for the blog only ( such a sweetie), but I love the use of the lady picking flowers from the Garden Plate.
I am working a show at the Hilton Hotel in Maidstone today so have blogged early , as I will be dog tired when I get back and will probably just sleep in the front of the telly! I love demonstrating, and we are doing make and takes so will be fun to see people working with my stamps and paints.
I will blog some of my demostrating artwork later.....

New Member of The Creative Team

Yesterday I invited a Nicky to become a member of the Stamp Connection Design Team. I love her altered artwork, and when I saw her latest piece I just knew I had to have her on the team. I think it was the legs that did it!


Welcome Nicky! Check out her blog aptly named The Altered Inker

A Birthday Card

Hi, I thought I would show you a Birthday Card I made last week( it has arrived so can show you now!) I used chipboard flowers and a large Tag too from The Artistic Stamper.
I used Crafty Individuals papers to cover the Tag. They are the smoothest papers I have used in years, and work perfectly with the chipboard.
I painted pearlescent powder paints on the flowers, and then stamped over them with one of The Artistic Stamper Calligraphy Mats. These are unmounted dies of various scripts that have been in the catalogue for many years and are some of the most versatile stamps I know.
I was quite pleased with the effect and I know the recipient liked it (I think :))

Sunday Stampers Blog Challenge

Hels asked me a few weeks ago if I would like to guest on Sunday Stampers Challenge, and of course I said yes! I had to make something that would go with a song title. What I had in mind was to use just black and white. She chose the song title -Ebony and Ivory- and I did the artwork!

I used offcuts of the black and white chipboard we sell, and used the four sisters stamp from

The Artistic Stamper's Garden Plate. This is a stamp I absolutely adore but haven't used much.
I used it three times in different ways, plain white ink on black card with our glossy accents, white ultra thick stamped with black stazon, and finally black ultra thick with a white memories inkpad. I then cut the finished stamps out, and layered them on card and them onto a long canvas, which was sprayed with black webbing spray. ( thank you DH for doing that part, as I am not very good with a spray can!). It was a bit of a mission photographing it as the Glossy Accents "bounced" off the camera, but hopefully you can see the end result.

My favourite bit is the white ultra thick as the faces came out 3D, giving it the most wonderful effect.

To enter the Sunday Stampers challenge go to Hels' blog, and get the chance to win the stamps too!

Coming soon...

Just a teaser here.. created by Hels, a new series of stamps which will be available from July. Hels has designed them , and I think they are gorgeous.



If you like them please bookmark us, and we will let you know when they are available
Happy Stamping!

Book Workshop

On Saturday I did 2 workshops at Sharon's Card Crafts using a plethora of products from

The Stamp Connection,primarily making a small A7 book bound with a BIA.

We used chipboard A7 book Blanks,

ultra thick embossing powders, pearlescent paints,

and a multitude of stamps from The Artistic Stamper!

It was great fun, but hard work, as like always I had made the project too long, and instead of 2 hours we worked hard for almost 3!! Many thanks to the ladies who were there. I went home absolutely exhausted!! Looking forward to the next one in August.

Alison